I want to give a shout out to Amanda @ RunningwithSpoons for the link up.

Its #thinkingoutloud Thursday!

Tomorrow, will be 2016... say whaaa?  The way time is flying, the next time I blink, I will be 80 years old, with a walker, stocking falling, and in a nursing home because Ryan is tired of changing my Depends.

Wrapping up 2015 has got me thinking about my New Year resolutions. Of course, I am like 80% of the population that only lasts about four weeks with my resolutions, but hey, at least I last four weeks.

The last few years I have mostly made resolutions to lose a few lbs or to make sure I exercise 4-5 times a week.  Then, life gets involved, laughs at my resolutions shoves it right back in my face.  This year, I am going to change up my resolutions, make them obtainable, and see how far it gets me.  I am not saying I am throwing in the towel on exercise...not at all.  But, life can get hectic.  There are weeks that I can knock out five workouts with no issues, then, the next week things are crazy and I am lucky to get two workouts in.  At that point, I have failed my resolution...instead, I am going to workout as much as I can, eat as healthy as I can, and not beat myself up about it.  No resolution...just accountability,

So, what are my resolutions? 

Jingle all the way

Santa and the grandparents came to our house over Christmas, and when your child is the only one and is the only grandchild, they get spoiled.  And when I say spoiled, I mean there is no way I am going to find room in my house for everything he got.

However, I will take the clutter any day of the week because it was so much fun watching Ryan's pure joy and excitement opening up his gifts.  And let us not forget, he just had a birthday two days before Christmas...  Just add those gifts to your mental picture.

To top it off, Ryan was just as excited about collecting all of the bows from the presents and attaching them to my head.  (Isn't he so thoughtful!)

When Ryan woke up Christmas morning, he let us know he was ready to do business when he came downstairs looking like this:

Hat backwards and all, he was ready to tear the house up.  (He insisted he wear his hat and insisted he wear it backwards.)

And, as you can tell from the above picture, Santa left him his very own Dyson vacuum that is battery operated and actually sucks up dirt a little bit!  Ryan was absolutely ecstatic since he squeals with joy when it is time for mama to vacuum.  This time, he gets to help.  (I might have been as equally excited as he was.  He has literally vacuumed my house every single day since he got this.  (And he even insists he store his vacuum right beside mama's.)

His GiGi (my mom) even got him his very own art table and chair with some "special markers" that only work on certain coloring paper!  Thank you GiGi for ensuring Ryan does not mark up our walls.  I will forever be indebted to you.

 Ryan also got his very own Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Mickey figurines and a Wilson carrying case for all of his Chuggington trains for his train table.

I also need to warn you that Ryan has gotten his license and you must steer clear of the road.

That's right!  He is full-on driving in his new truck.  Ryan shouted, "Big truck" when he saw this beauty outside waiting for him.  He drove for hours, but when I tried to hitch a ride, he was not amused and quickly let me know he was not driving his mama around the block.

Christmas at the Schwartz house could not have gone any better.  With Russell's parents there, my mom, and my sister, it was so full of laughter.

What was my favorite part of the day?  #Twinning with my son that night :)

XOXO,
Sherri

Weekend Recap | I have a 2-year-old!

Happy Monday!  I am linking up with Katie for my weekend recap!

I hope you had a great Christmas, I know we sure did.  On top of Christmas, our little boy turned TWO And, because we took a bazillion pictures of both events, I am going to separate my weekend recap post into two posts.  Today's will be on Ryan's birthday, and tomorrow's will be on Christmas.

We started his birthday with his huge birthday surprise.  He got a train table! He shouted "OOOOh!" when he saw it and played all day with it.

We had family arriving that day to spend Christmas with us, so once they arrived we headed out to our party for Ryan.

We had an "Oh-Two-dools"event for Ryan's birthday, and if you follow Mickey Mouse Clubhouse like we do, then you know exactly what I mean.  Ryan is absolutely fascinated by Mickey.  If he is watching he will not hear a word you are saying even if you are squatting down at his level, right in front of him.


So, it was only fitting to have a Mickey themed event.  Because we just moved to Wilmington, NC, we haven't made any friends yet and Ryan hasn't made too many either.  For that reason, we kept his birthday very small and it only included our immediate family and friends who were staying with us for Christmas.  Ryan didn't mind, he had loads of fun.  (And momma didn't mind because it was cheaper!)

We took Ryan to Chuck E. Cheese's, not knowing if he was quite big enough but it did not disappoint.  Ryan had an absolute blast.  Heck, and even the adults did.  My husband was challenging everyone in the building to a basketball shoot-off in one of the basketball games they had.

We all got pizza, drinks, cake, and plenty of tokens.  It ended up being a competition on who could win the most token tickets.  

When it was time to open presents, Ryan loved his potty!  While he isn't fully ready to dive in hard on the potty training, he is telling us when he goes and what he does, so we are easing in to it.

It was such an awesome day.  Spending it with my two-year-old laughing and playing was awesome.  Nothing beats watching your child experience pure joy.  

Catch ya tomorrow for my Christmas recap post!

XOXO,

Sherri

Merry Christmas from our family to yours!

Since I will be sending the next two days surrounded by family (I hope you are too), I wanted wish everyone a wonderful holiday!  I hope you get to spend it surrounded by the ones you love watching National Lampoon's Christmas Vacation :) (because that's what I'll be doing!).

MERRY CHRISTMAS FROM OUR FAMILY TO YOURS

xoxo,

Sherri

Happy Birthday Ryan!

Happy 2nd Birthday to my beautiful baby boy!

Learning to live with my husband...again

One of the hardest parts of getting married, for people who have never lived together, is learning to live with each other.  Learning their behaviors, tendencies, cleaning habits, or lack of cleaning habits is frustrating.  You look at your husband, who has left his dirty socks on the floor next to the dirty clothes hamper, like a little kid, and wonder if they will ever grow up.

Weekend Recap | The Fart Machine

Happy Monday!  I am linking up with Katie for my weekend recap!

It was hands-down, one of the most fun weekends I have had since we moved.  Wilmington, NC, finally had it's first real winter temperatures here but it wasn't too cold to still have fun.

My dad and his wife came in town for an early Christmas celebration and Ryan was in heaven with his Pop Pop.

Recap in pictures:

Friday Favorites | 12.18.15

Thanks to Katie and Heather for the link-up!

I can't believe we are just 1 week away from Christmas Day!  What I am even more blown away by.... I will have a two year old on Wednesday.

I am not prepared.  I find myself staring at Ryan more and more while we are getting closer to his birthday, just trying to hold on to as much of his "little-ness" and "baby-ness" as I can.  I am so amazed by him every single day and I love the fact that he is at the age where we can have conversations but it has just all flown by way too quick.

I think I am in partial denial.

In other news, sorry I have been a bit MIA lately.  This week has been extra busy with work and meetings that by the time I get home, I crash.  I am starting to think my New Years Resolution is going to be for me to hold myself more accountable to my blog.

Just a thought...

But, I am giving you a heads up, I will be blogging some next week but I will be with my family Christmas Eve and Christmas Day.

Now, on to my Friday Favorites of the week:

Weekend Recap | Let it Go

Happy Monday!  I am linking up with Katie for my weekend recap!

This weekend went by exactly as I expected it would.  It involved running store to store getting all of my Christmas shopping done, chasing a crazy toddler around stores while people looked at me like I was a bad parent, and then wrapping all of the presents (and thinking about wrapping my son and giving him away as a "present" too).

Just kidding about the very last part of that... maybe...

I would have taken a TON of pictures capturing our weekend experiences but every single time I pulled my phone out, Ryan wanted me to play the song "Let it Go" on my phone.  So obviously there are very little pictures to show you from the weekend.  Except this one:

And, this is the only one that made the cut because he was just so darn proud to find a horsey he could ride.

After that, no pictures were allowed because my phone was too busy playing "Let it Go."  I guess Ryan finally jumped on the Frozen bandwagon.  Confusing thing is, he has never seen the movie but he knows the song.  Daycare must be playing it during music time because all I know is, he came home one day and started belting out "Leee itttt goooooo."

It's a catchy tune too, because I found myself singing "Let it Go" in my head the whole time I was in the stores chasing down a toddler that refused to get in the shopping cart and thought he could run sprints down aisles.

I had to bribe him with some random snack treats I found down an aisle in order for him to semi behave.  I say semi very loosely here.

So, how was your weekend?!

XOXO,
Sherri

Friday Favorites | 12.11.15

Thanks to Katie and Heather for the link-up!

We have just two weeks left until Christmas and I am way behind.  I normally have everyone's Christmas presents knocked out in November, and right now, only Ryan's is taken care of.  So, I am now heading into this weekend starting mission Operation Christmas Present.

The mission, which I have chosen to accept, is to start AND finish finding gifts for everyone else in our families.

We have family visiting us for the holidays starting next weekend, so I am down to the wire.

Here's what I would really like to do...

But, I guess I am going to try a little harder...

In other news, I have stumbled upon some humorous images to share for my Friday Favorites:

30-minutes or less | Quick but tough - Treadmill workouts

Now that I am working and fighting some really bad traffic in my commute, my time is even more precious to me in the evenings.  30-minute workouts are a must, nothing more.  And if I can find some workouts that are less than 30-minutes long, then I am one happy camper.  Several months past, I wrote a post on some of my favorite workouts (here), but it was time to update it.  I get way too bored and change my workouts up all the time.

Weekend Recap | Starting a new routine

Happy Monday!  I am linking up with Katie for my weekend recap!

This weekend was just what the doctor ordered.  A lot of R&R.  I started my new job last week, which is going well, but it definitely has me re-thinking my schedule a little bit.

I have to fight a lot of traffic in my morning and evening commutes, I am barely making it to daycare in time to pick Ryan up before I get fined, and then have to come home and cook a meal.  It's getting harder and harder to get Ryan to bed on schedule and has me considering some changes.

What changes you might ask?  Well, right now I am starting to cook (or freeze) all of my meals for the week on Sundays so that I don't have to do anything but warm it up when I get home or open the crock pot lid.

We shall see how that goes...

If that doesn't help, which I know it should, then I am back to the drawing board...

Now, to reflect on my weekend in pictures:

Tis the season

The Christmas season is my favorite time of year.  I love the meaning of Christmas and the way my house looks all decorated is so warm and cozy.  Now that Ryan is older, I am love watching him get so excited over Christmas as well.

Ryan was born two days before Christmas, 12/23/13, so naturally, he is my best Christmas present ever.  Obviously, that year, he really didn't enjoy Christmas.  His favorite part was being swaddled and sleeping.  Last year, with Ryan being one, I thought he would get into it a little more.  But, he didn't care about the tree or lights...just the boxes from presents.