Now I remember what we did a few weeks ago!  I knew there was a group of photos that I wanted to upload but couldn't remember what or where I put them!

So.  Every spring (usually the first weekend of March), Yuma hosts The Midnight at the Oasis Classic Car Show. We missed it last year but planned for it this time. It was a little chilly out and like good parents we bundled V up, but we both forgot sweatshirts for ourselves. J.E.B. of course is a walking heater so I held his hand close to me to get as much warmth as possible, but even that did little to help my frigidness. (Man, how crazy am I? It was prolly about 60 degrees out. I have been living in the tropical or desert climates for far too long if I think that 60 is frigid!)

The whole area was quite large. They were all parked in a few baseball fields and we walked around for about an hour and a half or so. We went the first night and there were still a number of empty spots I assume since the people would be showing up for the weekend.  It was fun to look at the old cars. I think the oldest we saw was a '35 something, but we didn't get a picture of it. I think it was a truck. Yeah, I know, great story Wendy! But I was focused on getting pictures of old Corvettes for my dad. He loves the old corvettes but I couldn't remember exactly what year(s) he liked. So all of my pictures are of the 'vettes!

Well, some Ford Cobras too. My parents' neighbor has a cobra and its gorgeous. I have no idea what year it is....as I told one of the guys at the show, all I know about it is that its red! Such a typical girl response when talking cars!



A '62 Corvette



A '64

A happily snugged Peanut!

This one didn't have anything on its info sheet, but I liked the paint job

A '65 Ford Cobra

Again, no info on the sheet, but still beautiful!

Some randoms of the past week or so. Not much has been going on other than work and our projects!

She loves to check out the fans

She was so tired here. I glanced over at her and she was resting her head on the blue globe thingy with her eyes almost shut. She roused for the camera, of course, but fell asleep before I even got her into the crib for her nap!

This is a common occurrence at any point in the day when she is close enough to reach me. It is especially common to see this in the evening as I'm getting her supper and our supper ready. Cute? Definitely. Cumbersome? Very!

And this is the kitchen after I disentangle the Peanut from my legs. Sometimes the quilt is replaced by a cute little bear mat that our friend gave us, but the Tupperware cabinet is always open and toys are always scattered around. The pack n' play is a barrier for the dog food (which she loves to play in). Sure it takes some concentration to navigate the toys and Peanut, but at least it minimizes her screeching!

I've added a Page to the blog called Our Projects. It's to the right, above the Team's Videos link. Its a place that I'll update as we each complete new projects here at home. We have started some new hobbies and this page is about them!

So last night I cut my thumb. Dad, you may want to stop reading here! I was prepping vegetables for a stew recipe I got from a Rachel Ray magazine...French Spring Chicken Pot. Basically chicken stew. It sounded great. It looked great in the picture in the magazine. No big deal.

So I was prepping veggies while the chicken was poaching in onions and water on the stove. J.E.B. was working out in the living room and V was crawling around the kitchen playing in the Tupperware cabinet. A pretty typical evening in the Bolen house actually. Well that is until I brought the chopping knife down on my thumb knuckle.

I said some choice phrases as I grabbed my thumb and went to the sink to run cold water on it. On a side note, at least I cut my thumb in the winter here. In the summer we don't have cold water. No, I'm serious. We have hot and luke warm. I'm not kidding. Ask my mom; she visited me this past summer when V was a tiny thing and remarked on how she'd never washed potatoes in warm water before! So thankfully when I needed cold water to run over the gash in my thumb, this time of year allowed me to do so.

I was doing fine with everything as J.E.B. came over to look at it and then he went into our room to find peroxide (which he couldn't because I had tossed the rest of it just that morning as it had expired over a year ago). Then things changed. I started to get really, really warm. The room started to close in on me. I could barely hear V's upset crying/whimpering right at my feet. My legs started to get a little jellyish. I knew I was about to pass out. I called to J.E.B that I was going to pass out and then did the only thing I thought I could do and not pass out/fall on top of V who was hovering close to me: I sank to the floor with my hands still above me in the sink.

That was the sight that J.E.B. came back to--me kneeling on the floor, leaning against the cabinet with my hands in the sink. I barely remember him helping me to sit against the dishwasher. I only wanted to close my eyes and pass out. I do recall him yelling my name and forcing me to keep looking and talking to him as he picked up V and cleaned/wrapped my thumb.

The timer for the chicken went off as I was trying to stay away from the darkness which was desperately trying to overcome me. In the end, it was all ok. It wasn't deep enough for stitches so some neosporin and two bandaids later I was sitting on the floor leaning against the dishwasher comforting a distraught V while J.E.B. put the prepped veggies into the fridge for dinner another night. We ended up having noodles and pasta sauce instead since he was hungry and when I thought of food I felt sick.

Many of you will laugh at this post since you know that I used to be a veterinary technician and my favorite place to be was in the surgery, scrubbed in and participating. What I say to that is that was always an animal. I've never once claimed to be brave when it comes to blood and people, especially my own. Heck, I still need to sit on the table to get a vaccine and I can't watch the technician poke the needle into my arm, but I CAN watch the blood fill up the tube. Strange, I know!

Apparently J.E.B. feels that I overreacted as it was just a cut. But what he doesn't realize is that I come by it all honestly. As far as I can tell, the Angelovich clan (or at least the branch of the Angelovich clan that includes my parents, my brother and sister and I) is not great with blood or crises involving blood. I can think of a situation of each member in my family regarding blood in which we did not "shine" except for my brother and that is prolly because he has been living outside of the US for years and hasn't told me about his less than macho moments!

But on a plus note, I was quick when I first got cut and there was no blood on the knife nor the cutting board and veggies! That's right, cat-like reflexes over here! Thank you very much!

So we have a walker! Yup, Victoria is now walking! She took her first steps a few weeks ago by complete accident and then didn't really show any interest in it. She would cruise around the coffee table but that was about it. Then the beginning of this week she decided that it was time and has been taking more steps and more steps as the days pass. You can see her determination to come to you and its adorable to see her get herself stable and decide to take that initial step. Mom, I guess she is taking after you, walking at 8 months old!

I got a great video of her walking to me two nights ago. She's so happy and proud of herself. We're happy and proud of her too ... but now that means even more vigilance on our part! I have a feeling that it is only going to get worse from now on! She is a determined, head-strong little thing and already has been getting into things that are not for babies. Namely Atlas's food and toys. The little imp will continually crawl over to his bowls squealing and giggling and stop near it, waiting for me to tell her no. Then she'll lean a hand closer to the bowl of food and leave it in the air, again waiting for acknowledgement from me. Then she'll s-l-o-w-l-y put her hand in his food and grab a piece and then wait again to see if I say anything. All the while smiling. What a pip, as my dad would say!


Below are just a few miscellaneous pictures of us.

She was sitting next to him and petting him gently on her own for a change but when I got the camera out, she moved. Then he moved. This was as close as I could get them again.

So many of you know that I make my own baby food. We do use the Gerber jarred stuff, but only for traveling or for the fruits that I can't get at the store. For the most part though, all her food is prepped by me while she's napping or sleeping at night!

I find it interesting that our views on life and just about everything are pretty conservative in this house and J.E.B. regularly scoffs at "tree-hugging hippies" yet once V was born you'd think we became environment-conscious, Earth-friendly, Green followers. Why you ask? Because I started making my own baby food, baby wipes, laundry detergent and have been using cloth diapers since V was a month or so old. Sure we have all of the store-bought types of those items for traveling or convenience, but that is all they are used for. I tease J.E.B. that he has become a hippie himself, but he firmly holds to the fact that all this saves us money and that is the main reason we do it. OK, yes it does save us cash, but still, I can't help but giggle to myself as I make laundry detergent that we're a little weird! (but since I'm home all day with V, I have plenty of time to experiment with all this and I enjoy it, so why stop!?)

The idea to make our own baby food was first put into our brains by our baby class instructor at the hospital. She was a self-proclaimed hippie who I swear looks just like the actress Karen Allen, who played Marion in Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark. Anyway, she gave the class tons of handouts and information which included making your own baby wipes (which we LOVE much more than the store-bought kind I keep in the diaper bag for convenience) and making your own baby food. After listening to her, I didn't think it sound all that difficult: steam it, puree it, put into ice cube tray, freeze. One ice cube = one serving size. Ok, I can do that!

So one drawer in our freezer is now dedicated to V's food and is full of quart bags of ice cubed vegetables. While we were in Flagstaff with our friends in January, Molly introduced me to a book all about making your own baby food. While the author is a freakshow and waaaaay too crazy for me to take seriously (I'm paraphrasing here, but she thinks eating meat is one of the most dangerous things you can do. Seriously?! Come on!), she does have some great recipes in there and a lot of info on when to feed what and how to prepare it, etc. Because of that book, I'm also now making my own rice cereal for V from brown rice. Really quick and really easy but I still keep the Gerber rice cereal on hand as a backup.

Well,  the other day I made V some chicken. Up until now, I've only made veggies or fruit and the little bit of meat she's had has been the jarred kind. In case you were wondering, the food processor made short work of a cooked chicken boob.

Below are pictures of her introduction to chicken. It was a little dry so I added some water to it then found that mixing it with the prunes/apples mixture was better. I made the mistake of giving her a cube of broccoli last week or so without adding water to it. Well, the pureed broccoli was (is) very dry and crumbly, and instead of quick wipe of her hands and face with a towel when she was finished, I had to dunk her hands under the facet! She had fun, but man, she was a mess! So I learned with the chicken, but it didn't grab the water as well as the broccoli did.

She was very generous with offerings to Atlas, who very quickly learned to hang close by when its V's time to eat



For someone who likes neat, clean things, this whole teaching-your-baby-to-eat-by-herself-thing is torture!



The next few posts will be just some random things that have been going on with Team Bolen, mainly Victoria! :)



Two weekends ago Team Bolen joined up with Team Thompson in San Diego to take advantage of Sea World's free admission for military. The park has a military appreciation deal where active duty members and their dependants can get free admission once a year. I don't know if its just on holidays or any time, but either way, we took advantage of it and enjoyed the marine animals.

We drove up Saturday afternoon and stayed in a hotel for the night with plans to head to the park on Sunday then head home. The guys had a "96" for Presidents' Day (96-hour leave, or 4 days) so it worked out well since they still had Monday off. The Thompsons also got a great deal on the hotel through Priceline, so we all stayed in a 5-star for cheap! Although, we weren't terribly impressed with the hotel.

It was V's first trip to a theme park and she did really, really well. Aside from waking up at 0445 and not wanting to go back to sleep, she did great. She normally takes a nap from 0900 - 1030/1100 but with her early wake up, she ended up getting a nap in at 0730ish for about an hour...in my arms. Apparently she isn't as comfortable with the pack 'n play for a crib as I'd like her to be. So I broke all my rules and snuggled her in close and we both napped under a blanket for about an hour. Man, I missed snuggling her while she slept!

We got to the park when it opened at 1000 and did the whole theme park thing -- saw shows, walked through exhibits, ate food. It was great. I LOVE theme parks and amusement parks! If we lived in downtown SD, I swear I'd have season passes to the zoo and sea world. J.E.B. on the other hand, would be perfectly happy visiting a theme/amusement park once every 10 years.

I never paid much attention before I had V, so I don't know if all parks do this, but Sea World had a stroller honor system. Meaning, you parked your stroller outside of the exhibit or show and then retrieved it once it was over. There were zillions of strollers parked all along the paths at the shows and I was surprised (pleasantly, mind you) that there really seemed to be trust between the parents who were in the park. As far as I could tell, no one bothered another stroller. That being said, J.E.B. and I both agreed not to leave anything valuable in the BOB (I LOVE this stroller by the way. Totally, so totally worth the expense!).

As I said earlier, V was a champ. She did great eating with us (I stashed some baby food jars in the diaper bag) in a covered area and wasn't fussy or cranky at all. That is extremely impressive considering her first nap was at 8am and she didn't sleep again until 3pm! I could tell that she was starting to fade a bit during the sea lion show, so I put her in the stroller afterwards and reclined it a bit. I swear, we were barely out of the stroller-parking area and she was already asleep. So while Team Thompson and J.E.B. saw the sharks, I wandered around with a sleeping V. We headed home after that and she woke up only for a few minutes during the stroller-car seat transfer and then not again until about 5pm or so while we were finishing up our drive. She was great!

Unfortunately Team Bolen was not so great when it came to the camera. We both forgot to bring the battery charger and the thing died in the hotel room the night before! So here is the only picture of our Sea World trip!

When we were in Oki I bought a tarp to cover some cut wood we were going to use for a bonfire. Simple enough. Well, I guess I bought one that was tooo big since it covered the whole jeep. No, seriously! J.E.B. still teases me about it. But I say, it did get all the wood covered right?! For those of you who have seen our backyard, the tarp was almost as long as the grassy area. Seriously!

Since we were only going to San Diego for one night, we moved Atlas's kennel into the backyard in a protected corner of the porch and left some food and water out there for him. It was a nice weekend so we weren't too worried about him. Even though his kennel was in the corner, we still wrapped the tarp around it just to ensure that in case it did rain or get too windy, our furry guy would be comfortable.

J.E.B. and I had been meaning to put everything back together (fold the tarp and put Atlas's kennel back in the office) but we just didn't get around to it until I decided enough of the blue thing in my view and took care of it yesterday. Well, remember this is a HUGE tarp and easily a 2-person job. But I decided I didn't care.

I took The Bean outside with me and of course Atlas pranced out the door once it was opened and together we folded the tarp. Well together we tried to fold the tarp. The moment V heard the tarp crinkle she charged right over to it and for a few minutes had a blast crawling around and playing with it. Check out the video I took. Too cute. After I moved her to the opposite end, I had Atlas sit on one corner. Did I mention that it was also a little windy out? Have you ever heard the phrase "its like herding cats?" Well that is exactly what it was like. Victoria was crawling up and down and across and back while Atlas would sit for a bit then get bored with me and walk away only to have me call him back. Finally I gave up on V and Atlas and used two charcoal bags we keep near the grill to hold down the ends.

It took me a few minutes, but I got that tarp folded and put back into the garage closet and moved Atlas's kennel to its original spot in the office. But it was a beautiful day out and we all had a great time.

Like herding cats! Atlas just decided he'd had enough and got up from his sitting position on a corner and V is in the middle of charging up and down the tarp

She didn't stop going back and forth and up and down it until I had folded it so much that she had no more room to move!