Shopping Spree!

No, I didn't run out and buy myself a sexy guy! I went shopping with Fontessa at Target to fill Tyoma's closet with size 2T clothes (for 2 year olds!). Her help with baby clothes was much appreciated. Especailly since our financial situation is so dire. We picked out some light colored tops and shorts to scare away the mosquitoes, plus family goodies.

Later, I took photos in the back yard:

It was weird, this is the most fun that I've had with Tanya since she's come. Also this is the first time I took any pictures with her. A day doing something together helped break the tension between us. This is good. I wish our visit could have been more like it was today.

Before I was born, mom was riding motorcycles in the mountains on the weekends. After I was born, she traded up to trailbreakers and still rode her butt off. Then for a while she rebuilt auto and boat engines in our living room. Since then she's traveled all over America, the Caribbean and parts of Australia. Check out some of her awesome photographs at Ramblin Cameras (over 800 images!). Happy Mother's Day, Mom. You're the greatest! I am blown away and humbled by all the incredible things you have done over the years. Thank you for all of your love, support and help while I've been coping with so many new and difficult changes in my life. I couldn't have done it without you! Hugs, Lori

...to mess with a poll. Anyway, I present three baby pictures. Tennisfiend is on the left, Tyoma (our son) is in the middle and I'm on the right (or next line depending on your window size). Who does Tyoma resemble
 the most?

E.T.A. Official offline poll results: 3 Tennisfiend, 2 Bestfiend, 5 "both of you"

I think that if it came down to seriousness, Tyoma definitely looks like papa!

Tanya arrived with a batch of Russian photographs to add to out family album. How cool!

Happy Mother's Day!

Before I was born, mom was riding motorcycles in the mountains on the weekends.
  After I was born, she traded up to trailbreakers and still rode her butt off.
Then for a while she rebuilt auto and boat engines in our living room.
 Since then she's traveled all over America, the Caribbean and parts of Australia. Check out some of her awesome photographs at Ramblin Cameras (over 800 images!). Happy Mother's Day, Mom. You're the greatest! I am blown away and humbled by all the incredible things you have done over the years. Thank you for all of your love, support and help while I've been coping with so many new and difficult changes in my life. I couldn't have done it without you! Hugs, Lori

Dad's Photoshop

 Dad added a banner to the latest Tyoma pic. How cute!

Cactus Garden

Yep, it's that time of year again! My favorite cacti are blooming!



These blossoms are the size of tea cups!





A slightly wider shot.




It's difficult to see, but a total of five cacti are blooming.




Photo by Fontessa. Scan by Wonderwarthog.

Despite a difficult winter, I still babied my favorite specimens, covering them up like children on cold nights and giving them plenty of food, sunshine and water during the day. Unfortunately, I was less attentive to my cactus family portraits, but you get the idea.

Some Garden Pictures

Fontessa took some phots of our garden to show off to the folks in Moscow:


I think these are "Love" roses or perhaps the hardy "Lincoln." My favorite!



Yep. The nearly indestructable "Peace" rose stuggles to survive. I am not much of a Rosefiend.



A variety of blue sage that Fontessa was much enamoured with.

Tyomasaurus Rex

Grandpa calls Tyoma "Tyomasaurus Rex" since he's sucha big guy! 98th percentile, dudes!

Family Outing

 Here we all are at Veteran's Park. Picture courtesy of Papa Yuri and son A.K.

From the center, left: Tyoma, Tennisfiend, Bestfiend, Papa Yuri, Mama Irina, Dadfiend, Momfiend and A.K.

Anyway, here's our little story. Since A.K's folks were in from Moscow at the same time as TF's mom, we were planning on having a giant multi-national jamboree at our house. Unfortunately, poor A.K. came down with his first flu in six years and was totally wiped out.

At the last minute, he suggested that we all meet at the park to protect baby from the flu and still say howdy. The party was set for 12:30, but I planned to meet my folks thirty minutes earlier to ease Tyoma into a new situation with minimal fussiness. New stuff=insane crying jag.

As fate would have it, A.K. and his folks were traveling near the park at about the same time I was. They saw my unmistakably familiar truck (it once belonged to A.K!) and pulled into the park. A.K. and I dashed out to meet each other, both wondering if we had mistaken the proper meeting time. Then my folks showed up! Despite the confusion, we sorted things out and the K family made a quick trip home to pic up camara gear and goodies.

Papa and Mama K gave Tyoma a traditional silver spoon for teething along with a teething toy. Papa Yuri explained how the spoon should be left in baby's water to "purify" it. This quaint custom actually has some medicinal basis since silver solutions are effective and gentle anti-microbials. Anyway, no one brought any vodka or caviar, but we all enjoyed bottled water, including Tyoma who sipped it from the plastic cap. Yay!

Move to the Sunroom

Heh. My all-consuming passion, the project of pimping out the bedroom is complete. Then what happens? I move back in with my dear husband for three nights only to have three major problems arise:

1. Sleeping with the baby monitor disrupts our sleep. Tennisfiend doesn't like to be woken up by random squalls from the baby and I can't sleep soundly while I subconsciously waiting for baby to wake to prevent TF from being disturbed. 
2. We are both so accustomed to having more sleeping space that we crowd each other. My sweet husband is an angel in his waking hours, but at night, he is the bed hog from hell. 
3. Before my pregnancy, hip problems were never recurrent. Now, my pelvis is more particular. The cramped and worn bed causes lingering aches and pains.

How do I solve this problem? I inflate our camping air mattress and place it in our sun room. With my superfluous supply of pillows, plus the lovely ones that Fontessa made me, it looks like this:




Very pretty and surprisingly comfy! I love sleeping between a big bookshelf and sunny windows. :D

Another angle since I am so proud of my camera.

Lil' Creeper

Tyoma is beginning to crawl! Actually, it's more of a "Night of the Living Dead" drag, but he's moving! It seems to take most of his effort, but he inches across the floor, straight to the nearest bookshelf! He's definitely our son! Yay!

Odd to note: his crawl isn't very coordinated. It seems that one leg doesn't quite get it. I'll be watching this, but since he is so normal otherwise, not too worried.