More on Boys Clothes

I know not everyone thinks that dressing boys is as interesting or fun as girls but there's a lot of fun to be had when you dress little guys. At least it is so far in my journey as a boy mom. I realize that will most likely change before too long which is why I'm trying to enjoy having my way as long as it lasts.

I mentioned earlier that I really like Gymboree for Ethan because I like the layette lines and the price. The small sizes are easy to find on a good sale and if I pay $10 for an outfit and sell it for $8 when we're done with it then I'd say it's pretty affordable. On the other hand, if Ethan manages to get spaghetti sauce all down his back (how did that happen?) or a bleach mishap happens in an attempt to remove another tomato sauce stain from another shirt I don't sweat it. The Gymboree in Salem is a good one because they have lots of sale stuff. I don't think anyone around here is big on paying full price which I'm heartily glad of.

I really like Janie & Jack clothes because they're so classic and have cute little boy themes that rarely involve sports. It's refresing. They're also fairly expensive. But again, the small sizes are easy to find on sale and the resale is fantastic. I love Janie & Jack stuff for photos and church clothes. Can't beat them. Because they run on the spendy side I tend to buy J&J stuff in store only twice a year at the Season Finale Sales. Otherwise I buy used stuff from Ebay or clothing boards online.

A brand I've been turned on to lately is Mini Boden which has really cute baby stuff but even cuter bigger boy stuff. I have a feeling we'll be buying a lot more Boden as Ethan gets bigger. Boden is from the UK and has amazing resale. There's almost always an online code floating around and they have a beautiful incentive program called Refer A Friend where you can get $5 credit for giving 5 names and addresses each month. I give names and addresses of people whom I've sold children's clothing to on Ebay or clothing boards since I figure they might be interested in drooling over the catalogs like me and I want the credit!

Another brand I've really liked lately has been Baby Gap. The infant stuff is pretty cute but I can't wait for Ethan to fit the toddler boy pants. They have adjustable waists starting at 12-18 months which is uber important for my skinny boy. Gap can have fairly good resale value but it really depends on the outfit/pieces. I usually order online because the closest retail store is in the Washington Square Mall. I try to order when I know I'm heading towards Portland soon after because then I can return stuff in store and not have to pay shipping for any returns.

Pumpkin Patch deserves an award because they have super cute stuff AND their adjustable waists start as tiny as 3-6 months! I could kiss their designers for that fact alone. There's a retail store in the Clackamas Town Center up in Portland which I don't make it up to very often. When I do I definitely stop by! I haven't done much reselling of Pumpkin Patch but it seems to do okay but not great. Not sure why because I think they have really cute stuff. Pumpkin Patch is an Australian company so maybe it's just not as well known here.

It'll be interesting as Ethan gets bigger to see how my tastes change. Or more likely, how Ethan will want to dress. I've heard that boys are harder on clothes then girls so resale isn't as good as it is for girls and I'm not sure what I'll do if that gets to be an issue. Probably buy less and not buy with resale in mind. For now I'm enjoying dressing my little man.

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone had a lovely Easter despite the less then lovely Oregon weather. We started the morning off with Easter baskets which the kids delighted in and chowed down candy as fast as their little hands could get it to their mouths. I cheated and recycled some of the candy we got at the party on Friday since I figured we really didn't need more candy then the small packages of Peeps and small chocolate bunnies I bought. Ethan loved his big blue ball and Grace was very excited about her new Barbie Princess movie.

My Mom came down in time to go to church so we were a big group of seven this morning. We got to church early for the Egg Hunt which lasted about two minutes and then we did some Easter crafts before church started. After church we finished getting Easter dinner ready and welcomed a few more guests to the party. David's Uncle Ed and Aunt Diane came from Otis (tiny town outside Lincoln City), my brother came from Salem, and our friends James and Jessi came from Corvallis. Thankfully Ethan napped through all of dinner so I only had to squeeze 11 of us around our table. Our table seats 10 easily so I just put Grace on a corner sitting on the step stool which worked out pretty good.

The food was excellent. We had delicious Ham, Yummy Potatoes (seriously, that's the recipe name!), Mom made Sweet Potato Casserole, Strawberry Jello Salad, Green Salad, Fruit, Deviled Eggs, and Rolls. For dessert we feasted on Coconut Cream Pie, Lemon Meringue Pie, and Apple Pie. I'm stuffed and completely satisfied. I'll probably eat another bite of pie before bed though. I can't stay away from my favorite food!

I did take photos today but since those photos are still on the camera and I'm not in the photo editing mood I'll share these photos I took of the kids in their Easter clothes earlier this week. I took advantage of the beautiful sunshine early last week and got some pictures with halfway decent lighting. Enjoy!

Easter Party Egg Hunt Fun

My favorite inlaws in the whole world are visiting and had the chance to witness the chaotic fun of an Indoor Park Easter Egg Hunt and Party. When the time for the egg hunt came we separated the 3-5 year olds from the under 3's and let them at it. I was a little concerned that Ethan might not understand the whole thing but that fear was totally unfounded. Ethan was an egg finding machine! He had an entire bookcase to himself and even climbed up it to reach the eggs! He found more eggs then Grace did. Mostly because Grace was discriminating and only picked up purple eggs until she realized that the eggs were almost all gone and then lowered her standards to grab one yellow and one orange egg. It only took about 5 minutes for the kids to find every egg and then we headed back downstairs to open the plastic eggs and see what goodies they got. Grace was thrilled with all her candy and stickers and had a great time eating bright blue chocolate malt balls. Ethan tried a chocolate egg and stuffed the whole thing in his mouth in a gooey mess. All in all, we had a pretty good time!

Grace hunting eggs

Ethan climbing into the bookcase for his eggs

First bite of a chocolate egg

Malted Blue Egg Lips

"Boys Clothes aren't as much fun as Girl Clothes" And other Kids Clothing Myths

I have to admit that when I first found out that I was having a girl I was pretty excited. David, my Mom, and I headed straight to Mervyn's at the Salem Center Mall after the Big Ultrasound that revealed that we were having a daughter. We bought dresses to celebrate, including the dress that we ultimately brought Grace home in. I keep very little of my kids' outgrown clothing but that blue dress with the red ladybugs is something I'll always treasure.

Dressing Grace was a ton of fun and I discovered ways to dress her in fun clothes without it costing 3 arms and 2 legs. I have several strategies in buying and then sell her clothes on Ebay to recoup most (sometimes more!) then what I paid. I slowly learned the brands that we liked and held their value when it was time to sell. My favorite brands have changed a little over the years as I discover new brands and learned that yes $48 is an insane amount of money to spend on a dress but when I sell it for what I paid for it's not so bad.

When we found out that our second child was a boy I was pretty excited about getting to shop "the other side of the store" but really had no clue about boys clothes. We made the same trip to the Salem Center Mall (this time shopping at Macy's since I think Mervyn's had closed) and David was thrilled to pieces to buy football onesies. If you know me you know I'm not exactly into sports and it seemed like every other boys outfit I passed in the mall had a sports theme. Not my cup of tea. Even some of my favorite brands for Grace had awful selections for boys, but some surprised me with really cute stuff!

Right now I favor Gymboree for Ethan because A) It's cheap B) I love their layette designs and C) It's easy for me to find both in store, online, and in consignment stores. Some people think Gymboree is expensive but that's really not true. Especially if you're like me and have slow growing children who are fairly easy to buy ahead for. You just have to know the sales. Yesterday Ethan scored two sweaters for $4 apiece, an entire outfit for $8, overalls for $5, and a few other odds and ends with nothing over $5. It's even cheaper then Target or Walmart. It helps that I'm buying small sizes for him and there are always plenty of things left in the super sale bins.

I love shopping for Ethan, it's true that the boys have a smaller selection but I think that's because girls have so many more clothing options that boys don't have. It's a little more challenging to find the cute boys clothes but I think that's part of the fun.

Oh, and for those people that do like sports clothing for their kiddos you'll be happy to know that I do buy one football outfit for Ethan per year. I'm also in the market for a cheap (under $5) Detroit Redwings hockey outfit in size 18months in time for hockey playoff season! Oh, and I'm pretty sure that I have one soccer and one basketball outfit for him this summer. I'm sure I have YEARS of sports themed clothing coming my way so for now I'm enjoying other themes :)

18 Months of Pure Joy

Ethan turned 18 months old today! Oh how I wish I could push the pause button on him because he's such an adorable baby and I keep seeing more and more flashes of little boy and I'm just not ready to give my baby up. He's perfect just the way he is :)

Here's a snapshot of what he's up to:

He weighs just under 21lbs according to my postal scale (have you ever tried to get a wriggling 18 month old to stand on one of those things?!?)
He's about 31" tall
He wears size 12-18 tops and 6-12 shorts and 12-18 overalls and pants with the waist rolled
He wears a size 4 shoe
He absolutely refuses to keep any hat on his head
He sleeps on his tummy most of the time
He still adores balls but is also starting to get into cars and makes the cutest car sounds
He also loves to play with baby dolls and put on jewelry
He's obsessed with toothbrushes and toothpaste
He's finally talking a little (see previous post about Baby Signs)
He smiles and laughs a lot
He eats pretty well and seems to change his mind on foods all the time. Some days he likes beans and others he doesn't.
He really likes shoes
He gives kisses and hugs
He follows his big sister everywhere she goes and wants to do everything she does
He loves to make raspberry noises still

I could go on and on because he's so much fun and definitely All Boy despite his love of flashy jewelry and silk capes. It's so much fun watching the differences between him and Grace and appreciating that boys can play with dolls in addition to more manly construction toys. He's pretty well rounded thanks to his sister's toys, but Grace has benefited from having a brother as well. She'll actually play with balls now (she still cringes when one is thrown towards her), and will play cars as well.

Cherry Blossom Photos 2009

By some miracle I managed to get the kids dressed and in Salem with parking 10 feet away from the capital mall this morning at 9am. I was hoping that the morning light would be softer but had no luck. The morning sun was pretty harsh and all the shadows make things even tougher. Oh well, we had a lot of fun for our $.35 in change for the parking meter!

Grace loved it every time the breeze came by and the petals would fall. Ethan loved the water fountains. He was so excited about them and couldn't stop looking at them and pointing to them while talking in excited baby talk. Grace was a little more cautious of the water but she was brave enough to stand next to Ethan.

The first year I got cherry blossom photos I got some really good ones. That was in 2007 when Grace was a toddler. We tried again last year with awful results. The weather did not cooperate one iota. It rained all week and poor Grace about froze to death during the 5 minutes I hastily took pictures of her. I didn't even try to take photos of poor Ethan who was bundled up in the stroller with blankets piled on top of him.

This year I was thrilled to have a few days of sun to choose from. I figured Monday morning would have fewer people to dodge which is why we went today. There were lots of other people out with cameras but we were able to dodge most of them pretty easily. It's such a beautiful day that I'm sure it will be pretty crowded this afternoon!

2008 Freeze Fest with Mighty Wind:

2007 Gorgeous and Sunny!

Baby Signs

Ethan has really caught on to baby sign language lately and it has made our lives so much easier. Instead of tantrums we now see a smiling little boy looking up at us with big blue eyes and making the sign for "milk". I can't even describe the difference it can make when I don't have to guess what he wants or is trying to communicate to me. The "guess and check" method is tiring for both of us. He'd cry and I would try to fix the problem by handing him his sippy cup, a snack, change his diaper, give him a toy, etc. while he frantically shook his head No until I hit upon the answer. Talk about exhausting for both of us when this process repeats itself 10 times a day.

His first sign was "more" followed quickly by "milk". He has a favorite picture board book and loves to look at it and show me all the signs he knows. So far here's the list:

More
Milk
Kitty
Doggy
Shoes
Eat
Ball
Fish

Here he is doing the sign for Kitty because he was excited to see our cat Boo:


We're working on:
Baby
Please
Thank You
Flower
Cracker
Car
Pig

He usually repeats a sign when I show it to him but sometimes it takes awhile before he uses it on his own. I'm exhausting my memory from when we did this with Grace so I'm going to have to look up some more signs for him.

In addition to signing he's really trying to say the words as well. That's the whole point of course, but it's exciting nonetheless! Here's his small vocabulary of words:

Mama
Dada
Ball
Fish
Kitty
This