zzzzzz....

apparently i didn't get the memo. maybe my inbox is full. maybe they had the wrong address. hell, maybe they meant to leave me out. whatever. the joke's on them...i'd much rather be awake with the peace and quiet than asleep and missing it.

this is what is happening inside 126 park avenue today, thursday, may 15, 9:25 a.m.

wil napping in his bed (woo hoo!)

murphy shields his face from the paparazzi

stone was asleep - the camera woke her up

lucy has two beds of her own...but prefers ours

i am about to clean the bathroom...impossible to do while sleeping

summer salad

i love to cook. i love denise. i love denise more than i love to cook and i love to cook a lot.

denise is doing an interactive post on her blog about summer salads. because i love denise and because i love to cook it's only natural that i would participate.

it's not yet summer here (ugh) but i am already thinking of all the great salads i like to make during the hot weather. if we aren't grilling we jump from one pasta salad to another all summer. now that i am growing a garden i will be able to supply some of my own ingredients. that'll cut down on the grocery bill that (i agree denise!) seems to steadily climb as the country faces what may or may not be a recession.

anyway, below is the recipe for one of my favorite summer salads...enjoy!

basil tortellini salad

1 package cheese tortellini (i use butoni & have substituted chicken tortellini for the cheese)
1 small red sweet pepper, cut into bite-size strips
1 cup broccoli flowerets
3/4 cup thinly sliced carrot
1/2 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons parmesan cheese
1 tablespoon snipped fresh basil or 1 teaspoon dried basil, crushed
1 tablespoon milk
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 cup pine nuts or chopped walnuts, toasted

- cook pasta according to package directions, drain. rinse with cold water, drain again. in large mixing bowl combine pasta, sweet pepper, broccoli & carrot.
- mix mayonnaise, parmesan cheese, basil, milk, pepper & garlic in a small bowl. pour dressing over pasta mixture. toss lightly to coat. cover and chill for 4 to 24 hours.
- before serving, stir in nuts and, if necessary, more milk to moisten.

11.*

lions, tigers and bears...oh my! in celebration of my first mother's day ryan and wil took me to the bronx zoo for the day. we had an absolutely wonderful time and i couldn't have asked for a better way to spend the day. the zoo is a beautiful oasis in the middle of the city and once inside it's hard to believe that you're in a city at all! ryan loved the gorillas and i, of course, loved the giraffes. both were magnificent!

we finished the day at our favorite mexican food spot, carlos o'connor, before coming home to mow the yard and relax in front of a thrilling (but not victorious) red sox game.

thanks to ryan for making the day perfect and all about me. apparently, he either read my list or read my mind because going to the zoo was just what i wanted to do. i love my guys...thank you for loving me too!

for more highlights of our day, click here.

*11 is a 2 part item. visiting the bronx zoo completes part 1...up next...the central park zoo!

moms

i love my mom. and now that i have wil, i know how she feels about me. what a beautiful thing it is to be someone's mom. only 5.5 months into this gig and my heart soars each time i look at wil and remember that he's mine. it's an awesome thing and an extraordinary responsibility. yes, it's also the hardest job in the world...but today, mother's day, let's just love our mothers and, if you are a mother, love being one.

The art of mothering is to teach the art of living to children. ~Elain Heffner

for a photo gallery of great moms, click here*.

*regrettably, i do not have pictures of all the great moms i know...i also do not always have moms with their kids (or all of their kids). this is an album of moms that, well, i have pictures of. enjoy!

can you EAR me now?

okay, so this blog isn't supposed to be all about wil but, hey, i spend 90% of my day with the kid so my experiences with him are going to be blogged about.

the poor kid has an ear infection. it only took me 3 days to figure it out and get him to the doctor. actually, let me give credit where credit is due...ryan was the one to point out the white goo in his ears. oy vey. ay dios mio. SIGH.

there has been a lot of crying, snot and we have begun calling him wil vader but there is also medicine which denise promises me will produce "a new kid in 24 hours." i'll hold her to it.

with any tragedy comes comedy and we always seem to get our fair share of both. after the doctor's visit we went straight to CVS to fill the prescription. problem: i left the prescription at the doctor's office. SIGH.

while we were at CVS the second time, waiting for the prescription to be filled, wil got tired of being in his carseat. uh, really tired. to avoid a scene i took him out of the carseat and held him, swaying to the muzak CVS is kind enough to provide its waiting customers. we swayed around the magazine rack to lucky star and he smiled at the women on the covers. (apparently he has a sweet spot for gweneth and is thrilled with the news that john & jen are a couple).

then, in a twist even law & order (shout out to my mom - law & order's biggest fan) couldn't manufacture, a familiar tune began to play. i knew within a few bars but i couldn't help but second guess myself. then i knew...then they started....boyz II men....i'll make love to you.

the lights went down and we swayed to the muzak. one man's comedy is another man's tragedy...in this case, one man's comedy was that man's comedy again. good times.

wil, get well soon!

the grass is always greener...

our yard is three weeks young today. if this beginning is any indication of what's to come we might get the yard we dream of afterall! grow grass grow!




and my first tomato has popped up...it's a new variety called "lucille"...tasty!

(note: lucy isn't crushing my veggies. nothing has been planted yet. garden coming soon.)

rockabye baby

lately i've been having trouble remembering the words to lullabies. and by lately i mean since wil was born. in the beginning i would just forgo the singing and hum or make the shhhhhh sound but that's not working so well anymore. singing works and as we all know, when something works, go with it. i remember certain songs (twinkle, twinkle & rockabye baby) but i only get so far before the words escape me. when this happens, as it often does, i launch into my old standbys: jesus loves me and take me out to the ballgame. i know all the words to both of those. usually a few choruses of jesus loves me followed by one or two slow, singer-songerwriter versions of take me out to the ballgame and we have a sleeping wil. but not always.

driving home from north carolina a few weeks ago was the pits. we drove 55 mph in a torential downpour almost the entire way which added hours to our trip. we also took a wrong exit in washington d.c. taking us through the city and not around it. fun to see the pentagon but not at the expense of another half hour added to the drive. needless to say...the trip was long and we starting to feel it.

as we approached the new jersey border the rain broke, sun came out and we picked up the pace. we were feeling good and beginning to see home on the horizon. then we hit a wall of traffic. s-l-o-w again. slow. really slow. stopped. slow. stopped. slow. sigh. we fumbled our way along the turnpike. we got 45 miles from home. we were overjoyed. ryan turned the sirius to BACKSPIN and we rapped along with the notorious B.I.G. and puffy. good times.

just as big poppa was wrapping up wil decided he was done with the ride. done being in the car. done being nice about it. done being patient. done, done, done. DONE. to drive the point home wil began to wail. he was distraught. he was beside himself. it was apparent that he wasn't going to stop. we tried everything. loud SHHHHHHHHHHH. whistling. windows down. windows up. i crawled in the back seat and tried to help. nothing was going to work. nothing. ryan suggested soft singing. we'd already tried loud singing. so i started a very soft version of take me out to the ball game. VIOLA! it worked. he began to calm down and soon he was quite and still, watching me sing. 30 minutes of take me out to the ball game and jesus loves me will take a toll on anyone. desperate for another song i couldn't think of one. well, not really. i couldn't think of an appropriate one. in fact, the only song i could think of wasn't just inappropriate, it was weird. but i was blank. ryan was blank. and so, having no choice, i began the slow, soft version of the boyz II men hit, i'll make love to you. i sang (not to him, but at him...very important to note that difference), wil smiled and ryan couldn't stop saying, "this is just wrong." we thought of ross & rachel singing baby got back to emma and persevered.

we laughed. we wanted to cry but we laughed harder. we were exhausted. we were punch drunk. we were completely out of ideas but we took a chance on the one we had. and, guess what, it worked. please don't call CPS. i promise to google lullabies...see if i can't learn the lyrics to a few age appropriate songs, er, uh, relationship appropriate songs.

until then...good night. sleep tight.

banana fana fo fana

wil is an eater. at the ripe old age of 5 months he's already showing skills that could rival any major league eater. he loves sweet potatoes, has a real soft spot for kiwi and goes bananas for, well, bananas. however, his desire for the banana has gotten a bit out of control as of late.

exhibit A:

it's not a spill...it's BA-NAN-A

on thursday wil enjoyed a banana as an afternoon snack. for all the fun he had i didn't enjoy myself quite as much. no...from the beginning he was fighting me for control of the spoon and launched into a huge gutsy cry when i didn't refill said spoon quickly enough.

exhibit B:
i have asked nicely for the last time...i want that spoon lady

because wil is only 5 months old and cannot yet feed himself i insisted on holding the spoon. what insued was a fight not only for control of the spoon but the bowl as well. he not only cried for the spoon he resorted to SCRATCHING me and grabbing my shirt. alas, when i got all the banana down him i was going to get down him with any respectibility left, i gave in...i gave up. i gave him the spoon. unsatisfied, having only scored half of the bounty, he began attempting to launch himself out of the bumbo to get to the bowl. again, i gave in and handed him the bowl. he immediately shoved his face his face down in it and, quickly realizing it was empty, threw it on the floor.

exhibit C:
now didn't i see a bowl around here somewhere...

exhibit D:

this just in: lucy does not eat sloppy seconds

my go-to gal, lucy, was called in to destroy the evidence. in an unlikely twist of fate she decided that food cast aside without any care was definitely not for her. this resulted in my sprinkling cheese ON THE FLOOR over the banana. (please do not ask me why i did this. i am a new mother. i am tired. i do strange things from time to time. if this is as odd as it gets, let's consider ourselves lucky.) lucy happily lapped up the cheese...and left the banana behind. (snob) ironically, later, when i removed wil's clothes and put them on the floor to take the hamper, lucy happily lapped up all the banana off his shirt while i washed wil. REALLY?

the rest of the evidence is below. wil fought me for control of the banana and he won. of course i think the joke is on him because he ended up wearing more of the banana than he got in his mouth. oh, and where is the bib you might ask? ripped off by our dear wil in the melee and cast to the four winds. no picture of that. you'll just have to take my word for it.

here are some shots of the victor savoring his win. there are no shots of the loser. when you are a loser no one wants to take your picture.

round 1 (and only): wil

vic-tor-i-ous!

aaahhhhhhhhhhhhh...banana

i think i'm gonna need a short shower

when do we eat next?