End of January Snapshot.

Little son likes to grab onto my arm or try to put his feet in his mouth while I am trying to change his diaper. He is just starting to stay sitting up when I set him in a sitting position on the floor. He just started cereal and first foods a couple of weeks ago and is now consistently sleeping for longer stretches at night, hooray! He doesn't have any teeth but he does chew like mad on his hands. He will babble sometimes, just "Ababbabbabba" in varying pitches and sometimes almost a scream, without being upset. He is really a happy baby and rarely complains about anything.

Bigger son is getting funnier and cuter every day. His latest thing is to say "Mommy, give me a hug," and put his arms out to get the hug. He will put items on his head and say things like "I'm an astronaut," or "I'm Santa Claus," or occasionally, "I'm a baseball." It's pretty fun when he will ask me to do something and if I can't help him right away he will ask again but say please. He tries to sing songs he's heard more than twice, with varying levels of success. Too funny.

Progress Report.

So. I am doing well with the running portion of my resolutions. If not for a plugged milk duct I would have run 4 days last week, but as it was I ran 3, not too bad. At least I managed to avoid developing an infection which would have laid me up considerably more than one day.

As for reading, I need to get on that. I am planning to finally get to a real book after I post this. The reader will also get some use this week.

Writing: check. I need to see if I can wrangle my husband to read my really bad first draft of my novel and tell me what to do to help it out. Or maybe I should just trust I can fix some of it myself and start doing that till he's ready to read it. Hmm.

The kids are progressing rather faster than I want them to. The big boy is taller, I'm sure of it. He is finally starting to understand the process of going to the potty; now if only he would tell us when he needs to go instead of just going when we put him there ourselves. The little boy is smiley as ever, and really starting to work on teeth (chewing his tongue, fingers, toys, etc. and drooling). We'll see when one finally breaks through. He also babbles like crazy, so cute.

Resolutions, 2011 Edition.

Happy New Year!

I have been away for far too long again. I spent some of my fleeting me-time in the last few weeks thinking about reprioritizing, and that has led me to form the following resolutions.

1. Run the 2011 Chicago Marathon. This was always going to be one of my goals this year. It will kick my butt into gear on getting back in shape after having my second son, and I have always wanted to run a marathon. My brother, a marathon veteran, has committed to running it with me, so I will have a friendly face and running partner as well. Hurrah!

2. Read and write more. This is one of those things I've been "meaning to do" but not really trying very hard to do it for the most part. I was given a book reader by my wonderful husband last Christmas (2009!) but it has mostly collected dust over the past year, to my shame. It even has over 30 books just waiting to be read, but I need to stake out the time to use it. I plan to get this time by not sitting around playing silly games on Facebook when I could be soaking up great literature. The writing portion will include updating this blog more often as well!

3. Finish editing my manuscript to prepare to submit to editors and agents by the end of 2011. I have already made the fundamental change I decided on once I was finished with 2009's NaNoWriMo (changing my main character from the male character to a female), but I still have a lot of work to do to make it presentable. I think that if I chip away at it consistently, I should have something to be fairly proud of by the end of the year. I believe I have the kernel of a good idea here, hopefully I can turn it into something people will want to read!!