meet the clarks

My cousin-in-law, Nicki, tagged me to do this on Facebook, but we all know I refuse to answer these things on there. Ha. Enjoy getting to know us a little better.

♥ How long have you been together?
We officially "got together" on February 21st of 2002.
♥ How did you meet?
We were in the band together and had a lot of the same friends.
♥ Who asked whom out?
It was a mutual decision... (me)
♥ Whose family do you see the most?
Well, we do LIVE with the Clarks, but we see both sides an awful lot. It's a blessing to be moving close to family.
♥ Do you have any children together?
Sweet angel baby Liam!
♥ What about pets?
We have: Jethro the Bloodhound (my love!), Shiner the hound, Lily the cat, The Rock the Scorpion, Snowflake the Snake and The Cuteness the Tarantula (my other love). He's a vet, what do you expect?
♥ Did you go to the same school?
We were at the same middle school for a year and a half, the same high school and college together. :)
♥ Where do you eat out most as a couple?
Lopez. Mexican food, really- but doesn't that make us the standard Texas couple?
♥ What do you do the most as a couple?
Geez, right now it's been working on getting our house- but we always sit and watch True Blood together on Sundays, and we have lunch together almost every day.
♥ Where is the furthest you two have traveled together as a couple?
The BAHAMAS on our honeymoon
♥ Who has the craziest exes?
Zach.
♥ Who does the cooking?
When we have our own kitchen again, I will.
♥ Who is more social?
Zach. I have a tendency to be shy if I'm in a new situation, but I've gotten better.
♥ Who is the neat freak?
Me. I love to clean house and I'll randomly get a wild hair and feel the need to power clean, even if it keeps me up until 4 am.
♥ Who is the most stubborn?
It's pretty even- we're both extremely stubborn.
♥ Who hogs the bed?
Zach. He's a mover at night- but he says I do- and right now, Liam is the one hogging bed space.
♥ Who wakes up earlier?
Zach. He has to be at work!
♥ Where was your first date?
We went to Chilis and then to see that movie Dragonfly.
♥ Who has the bigger family?
Zach- he knows his Grandmother's cousin's grandchildren well. They're just more "cousins"
♥ Do you get flowers often?
No, but I don't expect them and that's something I knew going in. Ha.
♥ How long did it take to get serious?
Well, as long as is prudent when you're together in high school. But he was stellar while he was away his freshman year of college and I was a senior in high school.
♥ Who eats more?
Zach goes through phases where he'll eat a lot and then he'll eat next to nothing- right now he's not eating a lot and I'm inhaling food to compensate for breast feeding.
♥ Who sings better?
Uh, we're both pretty tone deaf. It's not pretty.
♥ Who does the laundry?
I do the laundry for the most part because I love to do laundry. He'll do it when I've got my hands full and he needs something pretty badly.
♥ Who drives when you are together?
Zach. The truck has the smoothest ride and I refuse to drive it unless I'm forced.
♥ Who picks where you go to dinner?
We decide together but it takes forever. It's a running joke.
♥ Who is the first one to admit when they’re wrong?
We're both very adult about it.
♥ Who eats more sweets?
I eat more sweets, but Zach has a salty tooth, so he gets his fair share of junk food.
♥ Who cries more?
Liam. Me, but I don't cry much.

liam's playroom

I could not be more excited about decorating my new space if I tried. Yes, I realize they haven't even put up walls. Yes, I realize they haven't even poured the slab... and yes, I realize they haven't cleared the lot yet.

I am still excited.

I have two rooms planned out, but my most "complete" is Liam's playroom. Our floor plan has one bedroom adjacent to the master which will be Liam's room (he's little, I don't wanna have to walk that far) and another at the end of the hall, next to the garage and laundry room... this will be Liam's playroom/guest room.

We opted to let Liam have the space for himself because we realized that any potential guests that are going to balk at staying in the playroom (translation: not Cory and Lindsay) will probably be in town visiting either set of our respective parents, in which case they can stay with them, because both sets of our parents have some seriously rockin' guest spaces. So. Liam's playroom...

WALL COLOR.

My inspiration is from Uppercase Living. I love their Caribbean Blue color they've introduced and have chosen it for my wall color. This image is just one way of showing the color in a fun way. Thank you, Uppercase Living!

SOFA/GUEST BED.

Ikea. Why Ikea? Because there will be a toddler in the room playing. A BOY. I don't want to put in anything too nice, so if it gets kind of torn up, I won't be too upset.

MAIN FABRIC.

I ordered 4 yards. I plan on putting at least 2 large floor pillows in the space, and who knows what I'll do with the left overs... there's a potential for curtains, or I thought about covering either a large peg board or magnetic board with the fabric and hanging it on the wall for Liam to display his future art works... we shall see.

ACCENT FABRIC.

I intend on recovering the throw pillows that come with the couch in this fun fabric... since I ordered 2 yards of this, I'm sure I'll have left overs of this as well. 

In addition to what you see there, my hubby has an old armoire from his bedroom suite that we're going to put in the room to store all the board games and the TV and VCR Liam will have. Yes, VCR. Large tapes are easier for little hands and that way he can watch all the classic Disney films that they've decided not to release in the past 10 years. My child cannot grow up without Beauty and the Beast! We'll also accumulate, I'm sure- I'll have to find some sort of storage device for toys, but for now, he's got a pair of closets and as far as I'm concerned, out of sight, out of mind for now.

busy bitty

{Mommy, Bitty and Great Grandma-- excuse the Texas Monthly with that *#@% of a coach on the cover!}

My bitty baby boy has had the busiest week a 6-week old baby has ever had! (I exaggerate, I know, but it's close!)

Since last I actually posted anything to read...

Wednesday last, I can't remember what we did. Pathetic, I know. 

Thursday was a big day! Mommy had to go to her OB (picture below) to have her 6-week check up and get a sibling-preventative, so Liam and my mom went as well, so we could get a picture of us with my doctor. I love her so much, and I wanted to have a photo to put in his baby book I need to get. After the doctor, we headed all the way up to IAH to pick up Grandpa Ed who had just flown in from Doha, Qatar! It took forever for him to get through customs, as the Emirates flight he was on got stuck behind a BA flight from London and a flight from Guatemala. Ouch. We finally headed back to Sugar Land, Grandpa in tow, after 6:30 in the evening. We had a late dinner with Grandparents Small and headed home.

Friday my parents brought my current mode of transport back to me and then we waited for Liam's Godfather to get into town. He arrived shortly before Zach got home from work and we spent the evening enjoying each other's company and watching Forgetting Sarah Marshall- so funny! 

Saturday Zach had to work, and after he got home, we headed out to W.L. to sign some more papers with Dana, and we brought along Liam, Cory and Grandparents Clark because Dana agreed to open up an inventory home that is our floor plan so that everyone could see the space. Then we headed home and the boys played on the video games upstairs until it was time to go to Lopez with both sets of grandparents and Cory. Wow. 

Sunday we got up and hung out until lunch time- we went out again to the Another Time soda fountain in old Richmond, which takes a long time. We sat in the car while Zach and Cory ran into Best Buy afterwards. Cory left around 4:45 pm. Boo! Great-Grandma Darlene from KS/AZ flew in and that evening we headed over to have dinner with Grandma and Grandpa Small and GG (what she's decided she wants to be called). We headed home and stayed up watching Eric, Sookie, Jason and Lafayette on True Blood- because that cannot wait.

Monday Liam and I took GG and Grandparents Small out to W.L. to show them the inventory home. They all loved our house- or the floor plan we have chosen. We drove them all back to casa de Small and headed back to our abode to rest up and have some lunch. That evening we went out to dinner with family Small. Liam had his first melt-down in a restaurant. It would have been okay if not for the large, loud party behind us and the gentleman who bumped into my sleeping baby while moving chairs around at their table. 

Tuesday was daddy's day off and the Small family came over to see Liam's nursery. We hung around in the afternoon- Liam was wiped out and that evening he and I headed over to the Small house to say goodbye to Grandma. We were way too late and Liam went to bed too freakin' late that night. 

Wednesday/Today we sat around all day- all day. Liam has been so exhausted from all our running and going, it was really nice to give him a day where he didn't have to get in his car seat and run all over Sugar Land. It was also nice for him to just get a chance to sack out on my belly and stretch out and take a nap. Napping in your carrier is not very comfy. Ask the baby. 

That's been our week and what a long, tiring week it has been. Today was such a welcomed change! I have had time to get a lot of my own stuff in order for our house. I have Liam's playroom all designed and ready to go- I ordered fabric today from the site that Meredith found, and I have furniture and wall color all planned out. It's going to be cute, and something that doesn't seem overly childish. I also am in the process of getting his new nursery all designed. We opted not to ask Grandpa Roger to paint now, so that we don't feel bad in a few years when Liam is old enough to want to pick out his own bedroom decor- we think it'd be nicer for him to get to pick what he wants his Grandpa to paint. 

That's all for now, it's bed time and I have to get my son to sleep so that he's ready and on a decent schedule for tomorrow- we're heading shopping with Grandpa and Grandma Small and I would like a happy infant!

muggin' monday

{He can't be bothered with the pacifier any more.}

{Trying really hard to learn how to suck his thumb.}

{With Mommy and Mommy's fantastic OB.}

{"I don't wanna hold this thing anymore."}

{Snugglin' with Daddy.}

{Swingin'.}

{Hamming it up for the camera.}

{Yes, he is licking the water off his hands.}

{Liam took over my side of the bed.}

{Good Morning, Bitty!}

{Sitting with my GG (Great Grandma Darlene)!!}

{Waiting in Daddy's truck to be fed- looking cute!}

comfy cozy

{Liam and Mommy, late night feeding!}

*sigh* My bitty boy doesn't look like a newborn anymore. He's a fully fledged baby now. Not that it's a bad thing, I just didn't expect it to happen over night. It was like I put a newborn to bed one night and the next morning he was a baby- he's just started cooing in the last few days- only a couple times a day, but he's discovering noises other than crying and it's going to be blissful. He's staying awake a lot longer... my favorite time of day very rarely happens now- I never get my afternoon naps with my baby on my chest. He's too interested in checking out the house. Funny child. He spent the day today with my momma at her house- he loves going over to her house. My in-laws and my mom bought the EXACT SAME pack & play for our use at their houses. Liam WILL NOT sleep in the pack & play here at my in-laws. He screams bloody murder if you put him down in it, even if you put him in it when he was asleep, within a matter of minutes he's awake and upset. However, he'll sleep for hours in my mom's pack & play. Go figure. 

Moving on, like I said, my mom had him all day today (as in, we got up at 9, we were at her house by 10:15, and didn't pick him up until a little after 5) because we had meetings with our lender and our interior designer at our builder's design center. Since our mortgage meeting was at 11 in the morning up on the Sam Houston Tollway around Westheimer, and our Interior meeting was at 1:30 on the Sam Houston Tollway past 290, we decided that was a little too much to ask of our baby and we left him with mom. Of course, the first meeting was nothing to write home about, but I did enjoy myself at the design meeting. 

We added a massive interior package to our house with our home-buying consultant, Dana, but we knew there were more upgrades we wanted to do to the home and we got to settle on those today, and we picked out our carpet, tile, granite, cabinets... it was so fun! Zach and I are very much in tune with each other, in so much that a meeting that was intended to last for 3 hours took us half the time. We went in knowing the cabinets we wanted, and then quickly picked the granite and kitchen tile. We opted not to put the kitchen/foyer/laundry tile in the bathrooms (the difference between ebony cabinets and white cabinets) so we picked out another for that right away and were left with the most timely decision being carpet- because let's face it, standard builder grade carpet sucks and needs to be upgraded. 

We signed off on all our upgrades, we toured the facility and saw all the appliances we'll get first hand, as well as all the lighting and the bathroom finishes, fixtures and the kitchen hardware. We signed the papers at the lenders... now all we have to do is wait for them to build! We drove past our lot on our way to pick Liam up and there wasn't any progress, but it's only been a week since we signed the papers with Dana, so we weren't surprised (honestly, I didn't expect any progress until after the lender meeting anyway). I'll post pictures as things happen... I can't wait to post pictures of SplashPad Texas, which is a block from our lot! 

That's about it for now, unless you're Meredith or Ivy-- I'll answer you ladies' questions separately because I just don't want to get too specific on a public blog because our neighborhood is built out pretty well and if you know our neighborhood + our builder + a small detail about our lot you can pretty much figure out right where we are. That's a bit much, hm? Happy week, everyone- My daddy comes home from Qatar on Thursday! He's bringing Liam clothes from Abu Dhabi- I'm sure we'll have post-worthy pictures to share from that! :)

{Liam clutches his pacifier while my mom and I shop}

200 = 1 + 11410

Look who's a month old today! I can't believe he's been here this long... and by the same token, I can't believe he's only been in my life for a month, he IS so much my life now.

He was lounging, looking cute today and I couldn't resist snapping a picture- he's really becoming Mr. Personality!

Liam got great news today! He's so excited (you can tell from the pic, huh?) that his Grandpa Ed is coming home on the 20th and his Great-Grandma Darlene is coming on the 23rd! What a lucky baby!!

We went over to Grandma Nancy's house for dinner on Tuesday, and she snapped this classic picture. Liam has really become much more alert in the past week and he loves looking at his Daddy- he just watches him and studies his face. It's precious to watch.

He's such a joy- such a snuggler! He upset himself early this morning by spitting up his last meal (an odd occurrence: he's only really spit up a handful of times since he was born) and wouldn't be comforted in his basket, so I pulled him up in bed with me and nursed him back to sleep- and when I woke up a while later, he was snuggled up against me, with his fingers curled around my pajama top. Melts a momma's heart!

And for our big news...

We bought a house!!! 

Uh... we bought a lot and they're going to put our house on it :)

The above is Liam, Daddy and Dana our homebuying counselor walking the lot...

We're so excited. We signed the papers on Tuesday- we were already preapproved with their lender- and we picked out our brick and our hardy plank color. That was exciting. If you know us, you'll laugh: when we brought the slab of brick to Dana as our choice his first response was "I like that, it's different." Haha, the story of our life!! It's exciting to have an address- to have a place that's ours. It's very surreal to stand in the street in front of a plot of land and realize that it's yours. Very surreal. 

Well, that's it for post #200! What a wonderful week we've had... and what a year 2009 has been and is going to be for us!

thank you niki

First and foremost, I need to thank my photographer, Niki Gregg, for the fantastic photos she took of Liam- these two she posted on my Facebook and I'm so in love with the first one (and the second) that I'm seriously considering it for announcements and to order to hang in our bedroom in our house.

Updates on Liam:
Liam is a monster eater... but he's not into a routine. He just likes to eat whenever and he doesn't like to go to sleep at night without eating himself to sleep... I'm pretty sure this is a habit we need to break and soon, but it's mighty convenient at night when he wakes up for his 3 a.m. feedings.
He's been such a trooper lately, tagging along with Zach and I while we go to various meetings (more to come) and he's even been to Lopez TWICE!! The first excursion went very well, we slept the whole time. The second time was this past Friday and wouldn't you believe our luck, the fire alarm started going off while we were finishing up our meal... overprotective as we already are, we jumped up and rushed Liam right out to save his ear drums... only to get him to the truck and discover he'd slept through he whole experience. Yes, he did pass his hearing test in the hospital, the boy can sleep through anything once he's good and sleeping.
The boy loves to sleep- but only in certain places. He likes to be wrapped up and placed in his basket next to our bed, but he fusses if you don't lay him down on his side, facing me. He loves to sleep in our bed. After Zach goes to work, at his next feeding, I bring him up in bed with me, put down a waterproof pad and let him sleep in bed with me, but again, he fusses if he's not facing me. He won't sleep in his crib, he hates it. He won't sleep on his belly, unless he's laying on my chest and right now that seems to be his favorite place to be.
Liam has experienced all modes of transportation: he's ridden in the car (loves it!), in our stroller, in my mom's stroller and in his BabyBjorn carrier. He's toured many a home in the carrier and he's such a champ... unless he's hungry. Since I'm carrying him, it's almost like a tease when he's decided it's time to eat because he's in the right position but isn't getting what he wants. Poor boy.


That should be all for now... hopefully I'll have an exciting reason to post in a couple of days!! Here's to hoping...

liam's portraits

Liam's newborn portraits are done! 

Head over to Niki's website and follow these steps:

1. Click on the "weddings" option

2. From the options along the top, click on "clients"

3. Input the password "liamclark"

4. Enjoy 

... and feel free to tell me how adorable you think my son is :)

tusen takk

I wanted to take a minute and say thank you to all the wonderful friends and family who have sent messages our way since Liam was born. Your support and love have meant the world to us, it's so nice to know that people out there are thinking about us and had my son's well being in mind. For that, a thousand thanks!

Many thanks also to my MOMMA who bought Liam his stroller all on her own. It's such a wonderful gift, we love, love, love our stroller!! It's not quite a "bells and whistles" kind of device, but I know it's going to be one that lasts us forever and it's just too darn cute to boot. Liam enjoyed his first outing in it... with many, many, many more to come!!

This picture is for Miss Emily S. who bought Liam his bathtub. I told you he likes his baths! He's a happy camper when he's in the tub, he likes it especially when you take the warm water and let it run down his back. Also, a thanks to Miss Rhonda for Liam's froggy warmer- one of the dang smartest little things I've ever seen- my baby doesn't get cold in the tub thanks to that wonderful little item, and it also makes it easy to censor his tub photos!!

Finally, Liam enjoyed his first experiences with "tummy time" recently, and while it didn't go over quite as well as bath time in the tub did, he still was a pretty good boy about it. He likes his Baby Einstein mat especially because there's a mirror attached to one of the arms and he was able to watch himself in the mirror while he kicked about and that made him a happy boy. 

That's all for now, I have got to get some sleep (while I can) because Liam has been ultra demanding with his feedings lately- he's not even giving me 3 hours between anymore... and it's wearing me out. Or maybe I'm tired because he decided he didn't want to go to sleep until 5:30 this morning? However, I wouldn't have it any other way.