Wordless{ish} Wednesday: To the Zooo!

Two days before Christmas the fam and I wandered over to our local zoo. R got a zoo pass for her birthday last year… and, we really wanted to take advantage of it before it expires! AND, it wasn’t raining (yay) and, we sorta knew it would be empty. We have the Zoo Lights each winter at our zoo and it gets PACKED at night…. so, we went just before the zoo lights started… enjoyed the freedom of letting R walk without getting trampled! So nice. It was freeeeeezing…. but, still very fun. 
All of the animals were out! All of them! All the bears…. cats, wolves…. everyone was up and out to say hi to Ruari! ๐Ÿ˜‰
Highlights:
– Ruari asking over and over where the Puma is. You see… R is obsessed with Diego and there’s always a Puma chasing Diego. So, she wanted to see one. Side note: every time we get in our car R starts saying, “There’s a Puma chasing us!” Every time.
– The cougars were out playing! One of them was playing with a ball and looked like a sweet little kitty… with fangs and claws. Ruari was asking, “Mama, play kitty?” “Mama! I play kitty?” That was making everyone at the cougar spot giggle. She really wanted to play with the kitties… and, they were so close to us. She didn’t quite understand why she couldn’t play too. ๐Ÿ˜‰
– Mike taught R how to put her hands in her pockets while she’s walking to keep them warm and toasty. It’s adorable. 
Can you tell which one of us was super happy to stop walking and checking out all the animals to take a photo?
{Headwrap from lovely Susannah Bean}

Pretty much: an awesome family day.


{If you have a Wordless{ish} Wednesday, please feel free to link it up below. And, feel free to link up to these blogs too… 5 Minutes For Mom, Parenting by Dummies, Project Alicia,And Then She Snapped, Jenni from the Blog, and Live and Love Outloud.}

signature

Categories: family, portland


Twitter talk.

A while back I read a post from Beth Anne on Heir to Blair about how Twitter broke blogging. AND, I’m sorta new to Twitter… I had an account back in 2008 and never did anything with it… it’s gone. Now I have my @thepapermama account  (started one year ago) and love it.. I luuuuve it. ANYway… back to what I was saying…
Twitter has sort of ruined blogging. All of those silly random things I would have normally just blogged about… I tweet about. All the funny things my silly SILLY kid says to me… tend to mostly end up on twitter… lost… possibly to never be found again. I don’t want to lose them. I want to remember what Ruari’s been up to…. and, what I had for dinner 5 months ago (ok, maybe I don’t care about that…. unless it was fried chicken or Oreos… or fried oreos? Mmmm…).
Here are a few tweets from mahself that I would like to remember…. from the past 3 months. ๐Ÿ™‚
10/1/11: R has jut started trying to count… “3, 4, 7, 9, 7, 3, 5, 6, 9, 10.” #mychild
10/6/11: AND…. I’ve lost my mind. I just told someone my daughters name is Chelsey. #soclose #maybenexttime
10/7/11: I just put a diaper in the fridge. #mamabrain #imawesome
10/7/11: Ha ha! I almost wrote, “I love you.” in reply to a comment because someone said it on tv in the background. Ha ha ha! #imcrazay
10/11/11: I am totally crying right now. Ruari keeps saying, “I yuv yoouuuu!!!” Translation: I love you. First time she’s said it to meeeeeeee.
10/13/11: Ummm… My daughter just did a pretend scream and ran away saying, “bug!”. #wheredidshelearnthat
10/26/11: I gave R a diaper and told her to change her diaper. She’s actually trying…. Ha! How convenient that would be…. ;D #mychild #gobabygo
10/27/11:
Normally I will kiss ouchies when R falls… But, she fell on her bum and is saying, “Kiss butt? Kissss butt?” #hahaha
10/29/11: The best thing ever: Ruari saying, “Bye bye mama! I yuv youuu!” as I’m leaving. <3 #love
11/1/11: My kid is cracking me up. Whenever I ask her if she wants something… she says, “A ‘course!”…. aka: Of Course! #hahaha #cute
11/3/11: I am dying from the cuteness! My child refuses to take these off! <3 #hahaha
11/4/11: Look what my daughter is making me wear! I think I will wear it out for girls night tonight! #stylish
11/11/11: I’m guessing every parent has to go through the toddler painting with poo thing. #myturntoday #hahaha #gross
11/12/11: Husband: “Oh, holy crap! Oh, whoops crap! Bah!” Daughter: “Holwy crap?” Sometimes it’s hard to never cuss…. #copycatkid
11/23/11: My hubs thinks I’m crazy because I asked him if he took the garbage cans out yesterday… Cause we do that on Fridays. #yesterdaywastuesday
11/25/11: I just asked naughty R if she needed a timeout… She said, “no. no need the timeout mama.” when did she turn human? #mychild
11/26/11: I don’t even want to tell you guys what I’m eating…. ok, I will. It’s delicious! I put gravy on mac and cheese. Yup. #heartattackinabowl
11/26/11: I asked winey girl what’s wrong today? She said, “ima grumpy.” #mychild #bwahaha
11/30/11: Do you ever talk to your animals like they’re your toddler and can understand you? Yeah, me too. #crazytalk
12/5/11: I don’t think I will ever stop doing the newborn baby sway while standing… #standinginline #swaying #nobabyhere #momhabit
12/7/11: Ruari keeps wiping me with a towel and saying, “Ewww, mama clean the poopy.” over and over. #ishouldbeoffended #hahaha #toddlers
12/8/11: Me: “Watch where you’re going, there’s a wall there.” Ruari: “Good idea mama. Good idea.” what? She is so cute. #hahaha #23months
12/9/11: Ha ha ha! My child asked me to take a photo of her. This is how she smiled with the addition of 2 paci’s.
12/9/11: R’s reaction to a lipstick commercial: “Oh no! Oh no! I’m scared of the purple!” what? Not her shade I guess. ๐Ÿ˜‰
12/10/11: She keeps asking me to take a photo of her elbow. #hahaha #weirdo 


12/14/11: So exhausted. I was running from a murderer all night. I never have those dreams. #nightmare #timeforcaffeine
12/15/11: Dang. Zombies were out to get me in my dreams last night. So tired again. #nightmare
12/22/11: I don’t know where Ruari learned “COWABUNGA!” from… BUT, I love it. It’s totally tubular, dude! #teenagemutantninjaturtles
12/23/11: R is asleep on top of 5 books. I want to move her… But, will she fall back asleep? That’s the big question.
12/24/11: AND, then I died. I buckle R in the car… She asks, “What up, Mama?” ha!
12/26/11: Ruari came running in the room and yelled, “I’m a doctor!” then left.
I’d encourage you to wander back through your old tweets! It’s so fun looking back.

signature

Categories: about me


{CLOSED} GIVEAWAY: $100 to spend at ModCloth! Happy New Year!

To celebrate the new year I wanted to share a sweet giveaway with all of you…. something I would prefer to keep…. but, I can’t. Darn. ๐Ÿ˜‰ How would you like $100 to spend at one of my favorite online shops? ModCloth!

Yup! Awesome. It’s VERY simple to win.

What you can win:
$100 gift card to ModCloth!

How do you win? Please follow these steps… AND make sure I have a way to contact you through e-mail. If I don’t… I’ll have to delete the entry… ๐Ÿ™

First, the mandatory entry {1 entry}:
a) you must be a follower of my blog somehow… Do at least one of these: Subscribe to my RSS feed, BlogLovin’, Subscribe through Email, or Google Friend Connect (see sidebar).
b) Then, head over to ModCloth and tell me WHAT you would spend your moolah on.
You must do both “a” and “b” to win. Plus, include your email address. ๐Ÿ™‚

For extra entries (Please use a separate comment for each entry):
1) “Like” me on FB: The Paper Mama{1 entry}
2) Follow me on twitter: @thepapermama {1 entry}

3) Tweet, Blog, or Facebook about this giveaway. You are welcome to copy and paste this tweet {1 entry}:

” Giveaway! Win a $100 gift card to #ModCloth! http://bit.ly/uYKp2s From: @thepapermama ”ย 

ย 

Note: Giveaway ends on Monday, January 31st, 2011 11:59 PM Pacific Time. Winner will be chosen at random from Random.org.
P.S. If you entered this giveaway and don’t see your comment: no worries! My move from Blogger to WordPress is confusing and I can’t get my old comments to show now. But, I do have them all saved. ๐Ÿ˜€

signature

Categories: Uncategorized


The Newborn Sway

I don’t think I will ever stop doing the newborn sway…. For those of you that don’t know what that is: when you first have your baby… And you’re holding it 24/7… You learn to just sway. You sway to keep them happy, asleep, for everything.
So, what happens when your baby grows and turns into a toddler? Well, you cannot stop! Anytime I’m standing still… In a line… Or, if a little baby cries: I do the newborn sway. Not even holding my kid… and, I’m swaying. If you do this in public…. 60% of the people around you won’t even notice you’re doing anything. 10% will be moms that TOTALLY get it and are already swaying themselves. The remaining 30% will just think you’re insane. ๐Ÿ˜‰ (scientific facts people… Kidding).
My favorite sway and baby-free moment: I was at a grocery store buying a bottle of wine and I was cradling it like a baby…. And swaying. Ha! Took me a couple minutes to notice. I bet the percentage of people thinking I’m insane went up to 50%. ;D
Are you a newborn baby swayer?
FYI: Yes… I DID make this .gif!!! Thanks to this post.

signature

Categories: about me, gif


New Years Style

my style: //earrings:f21//blouse:thrift//dress turned skirt:thrift//tights:f21//shoes:thrift//
Total cost of outfit: around $18! Yeah!

Happy New Year!!! I hope you all had the best new years eve. I was lucky enough to celebrate it with a few of my closest friends, while my mom watched Miss R for the evening. First we did dinner at a local yummy Cajun restaurant, Tapalaya. Very yummy and very inexpensive (can you say, fried chicken? Yeah!). Then we headed back to our house where we played games and had a couple (or more) drinks and celebrated the new year!!! AND, we listened to the Dr. Dre Pandora channel… I can’t even begin to tell you how much this flashes me back to junior high/ high school… Whoa…. “with my mind on my money, and my money on my mind.” in high school I really listened to quite the variety of music… From Snoop Dogg to Sublime to TLC to N’Sync to Dave Mathews. Quite the range. So, I just stayed up VERY late and listened to this Dr. Dre channel. Even after my friends left and the hubs went to bed. It’s like I couldn’t stop. Every hip hop/rap song that came on reminded me of high school/fun memories with my closest girls. Sometime I will have to make a list of my fave hip hop/rap songs from the 90’s. I don’t want to forget!!! ๐Ÿ˜‰ Am I alone, or are you reminiscing with me right now? ๐Ÿ˜‰ I mean really… Big Pimpin (jay z) played! Total flashback. I really hope you all had the loveliest of holidays and every one was safe! Happy New Year!

FYI: I love this:

Linking up with Mandy from Harper’s Happenings.

signature

Categories: Uncategorized


The Paper Mama "Sparkle" Photo Challenge


This weeks challenge: Sparkle!
The challenge: All my photo challenges should be based around your children (p
ets are always welcome). Bokeh? Sparkle? Yes please!


My example of “Sparkle”:
I’m just realized I didn’t really take any photos this week! SO, here’s a photo from a couple weeks ago with the sunlight sparkling behind R’s head. ๐Ÿ™‚
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
  • First time joining the Paper Mama photo challenge? Start here for rules and upcoming challenges. ๐Ÿ™‚
  • My photo challenges do require you to have either your children or one of your furry children (pets) in the photo (unless it’s a self portrait week). It could be just one finger… or a toe… but, they must be there.
Favorite Photo from 2011
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The Paper Mama


signature

Categories: Uncategorized


The Paper Mama "Sparkle" Photo Challenge


This weeks challenge: Sparkle!
The challenge: All my photo challenges should be based around your children (p
ets are always welcome). Bokeh? Sparkle? Yes please!


My example of “Sparkle”:
I’m just realized I didn’t really take any photos this week! SO, here’s a photo from a couple weeks ago with the sunlight sparkling behind R’s head. ๐Ÿ™‚
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………
  • First time joining the Paper Mama photo challenge? Start here for rules and upcoming challenges. ๐Ÿ™‚
  • My photo challenges do require you to have either your children or one of your furry children (pets) in the photo (unless it’s a self portrait week). It could be just one finger… or a toe… but, they must be there.
Winter
…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

The Paper Mama


signature

Categories: Uncategorized