Moran Family Adventures: musings of a boy mom

Virginia Is For……Polar Bears!  As a weather forecaster, I'm supposed to be *thrilled* when weather is exciting and challenging. It seems like since I've come back from Alabama, that's all that the weather's been. With wind chill in the negatives and snow piling up, this Pacific Northwest girl is not in a happy place. And with the late hours, constant phone calls, and pressure to get the forecast just right, this weather girl is not in a happy place. BUT the snow makes for a fun background for pictures and a new adventure for Jellybean so in another sense, this mama is a very happy girl!  A while back I bought a baby sled for Jellybean from Target and I've been itching to use it! He loves being pulled in the snow and with it knee deep, mom gets a pretty good workout too. Abby- well she has ALWAYS loved the snow and it's a good way to exhaust her- so again, this mama is happy. My mom sent Jellybean a snowsuit for Christmas so I plopped him in his sled and...

My Diaper Bag My good friend since college, Amanda, bought me the most amazing diaper bag when she found out Jellybean would be gracing our lives. She knows I probably place too much influence on *nice* things and by nice I mean brand names. So when we got the e-mail for a Kate Spade flash sale (which my friends and I eagerly await for every few months) she jumped on the opportunity to get me a spruced up diaper bag at 75% off. Those Kate Spade flash sales make our day- no- our week! I love that she supports my desire to be a fun fashionable mama. And I love that the bag is a simple black and white pattern vs. something that screams look at me I'm a diaper bag! My favorite part? The inside and the portable changing pad are PURPLE. Since we both went to the University of Washington, purple automatically became one of our favorite colors.  Other things I love about this diaper bag:  1. It's lined in purple! Oh wait, I think I already mentioned that.  2...

Latches, Knobs, Buttons….. Jellybean loves knobs, buttons, pulling drawers, opening cabinets.... basically anything you can find at a hardware store, this kid wants to play with it. So, during one of my MANY Pinterest surfing afternoons, I came across the idea for an activity latch board. I first started looking for something like it online but the hefty price tag was a big deterrent. Then I saw this mom made one for a quarter of the price! I'm not too handy with a drill, but this looked easy enough.  I scooped up my Jellybean and off to Lowe's we went to find knobs, and latches, and all those fun things he seems to be obsessed with. I bought the wood board from Michaels along with some "construction" themed paint and back home we went to get our Bob Villa on. The best part? I spent MAYBE $25 on everything I needed for this project.  I also grabbed some random knick knacks from the junk drawer, like a lock and some carabineers.  First I painted everything and of ...

Another Pinterest Inspired Activity  I got home from my 5 week trip to Alabama at 2300 on 13 February. Needless to say, I didn't have much time to plan some big fancy Valentine's Day activity/photo shoot with Jellybean. Luckily, Pinterest always has great quick ideas and when I spotted this fun kiss covered baby picture, I was immediately sold on re-creating it with my little man. I used Mac lipstick in Brave Red. My absolute FAVORITE bright red lipstick. Why would I use crazy expensive lipstick to cover my little man in kisses only to wipe it off minutes later? Because he's worth it that's why! And it didn't wipe off minutes later…..no amount of baby wipes, breast milk (yes I tried breast milk) and even a warm soapy bath took that stuff off my little one. I scrubbed his face pretty good but I'll admit, 4 days later…there are still hints of lipstick on those rolly polly legs of his. It'll come off eventually…. and he's not developing any kind of negat...

Working Mom problems…Air Force Style  When I got the news that I'd have to go to Alabama for 5 weeks, I was completely devastated. Ok, I knew it was coming, I knew I had to go to this training at some point, and I knew what I had signed up for when I chose the military life style and when I didn't chose to opt out of that lifestyle even though I could have because I was pregnant, I knew the road ahead of me and its potential challenges. With all that said, I was still not looking forward to leaving my little one for 5 weeks! I immediately went to work scheduling trips home on the weekends. Fortunately, flights from Atlanta to Norfolk were really cheap and I was able to fly home every other weekend.  Now that I'm home and sort of settling back into a routine (this Snowmageddon turned my 3 day weekend into 5 day one), I'm looking back on my 5 weeks apart from my family and it wasn't terrible. I think it helped that my class during this training got along real...