Houston Part 3

I am finally getting to the end of the Houston series...I've been a little busy here of late.  You may need a refresher.  You can visit here for Part 1 and here for Part 2. 
Our last full day in Houston, we took off for the Space Center Houston.  We weren't sure how well this would be for entertaining Logan as several people had told us it was geared for older kids, but Jeff really wanted to check it out.  It was a little drive out of the city to get to the center and we got a little lost, but eventually found our way there.  (Who would think finding the space center would be so hard...) 
Our first activity, once we arrived was playing in the massive play structure.  This thing was as tall as the building (so probably 2-3 stories high) and was for children 5 and up.  Well, Logan felt that he was 5 that day and I asked permission from the guy manning the play structure if he could play if I went in with him (come on-I'm the size of a 2nd grader...it's not like I'm not gonna fit!).  The guy gave his approval so off we went into the play structure.  Logan was in LOVE!  It was full of balls and places to climb and Logan (with only a little help from me) climbed to the very top of the structure.  He even went out into these planet looking things that wibble wobbled while you were in them!

Yep-that's us up there!

"Hey-look!  There's Daddy!"

No Fear!

Next we toured the inside of a space shuttle.  It was only a mock space shuttle and it didn't have a tail end, but still was kinda of neat.

Inside the shuttle

Future astronaut?

 The cool thing about the Space Center is that it is actually a working space center.  They have tours that take you through the working facility.  This was actually pretty neat.  We even got to see astronauts having a meeting.  The tour also included a visit to Shuttle Park which is where they house shuttles after their missions are complete.

Logan was eating his chips even though we were told No Food on the tour...it's amazing what you can get away with when you are a toddler...

The International Space Station Mock Up

Space Shuttle Mock Up

Shuttle Park

Logan needed a nap...all this space stuff is tiring!

A very old space shuttle!

Sweet sleeping baby...

We stopped at Chick-Fil-A on the way home for a light lunch.  Jeff had never had Chick-Fil-A, but he loved it!  Logan really liked the play place and he did not want to leave.  That evening, we went to the suburbs of Houston to meet his cousin's family for dinner.  We ate at a delicious Italian restaurant.  They have two little boys that are just a little bit older than Logan.  The boys had so much fun!! (Although I am pretty sure the restaurant was glad to see us leave!)  Logan screamed bloody murder when we put him into the car to leave and the boys were so sad that we were leaving, one said "Don't take my baby!".  It was a great night spent with family we hadn't seen in quite a while!
We loved Houston and plan to take another trip back as there were so many other places we would have loved to go visit.  Logan did well on the plane ride back and Jeff managed to make it through security without being patted down.

Our Little Traveler

Memory Monday-Culinary Disasters...

I'm not a bad cook, but if I don't have a very good recipe that is where the problems arise...

Here are my two biggest culinary blunders.

When I was in High School, my mother gave me the task of cooking a chicken and rice casserole.  This is a family recipe of my grandmother's and my mom had made it a million times, but this was my first attempt. 

Here's the recipe:  (It's delicious if you want to try it!)

2-3 pounds of chicken
1.5 cups rice (Uncle Ben's Converted Long Grain Rice)
0.5 cup milk
1 can cream of mushroom soup, undiluted
1 can cream of celery soup, undiluted
2 envelopes Lipton onion soup mix

Roll chicken in onion soup, heat (do not boil) together rice, soups, and milk.  Butter casserole, salt and pepper chicken.

Put rice mixture in pan and lay chicken on top.  Cover tight with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 1.5 hours.

Pretty simple, right?!?  Well, you see, I misunderstood the very first sentence.  Here is what I did.  I opened my 2 envelopes of Lipton onion soup mix, added the water the packets called for and mixed them together in a bowl.  Then, I rolled the chicken in the onion soup.  That wasn't where the disaster occurred...oh no...I then added the onion soup I had just made to the casserole (because it said heat rice, soups, and milk).  The casserole was a big ole floating mess...
My mom arrived just in time and managed to drain the casserole enough so that it was still edible, but to this day I never lived this down. 
For those of you who would make the same mistake I made (it is easy to do).  If you decide to make this casserole, roll your chicken in the dry Lipton onion soup mix and discard whatever is left over...

My second cooking disaster was when Jeff and I were first dating.  I often cooked meals for him.  We had decided to grill out and I was going to make some mashed potatoes.  I've made mashed potatoes a million times and they are delicious.  This time, I did not have any potatoes on hand, but as I went through my pantry I found canned potatoes.  So I figured, I can make the mashed potatoes with the canned potatoes and save myself a trip to the store and the time it takes to chop up and boil the potatoes.  I made my potatoes as I always had substituting the canned potatoes.  They were disgusting!!! Don't every try to cut corners on mashed potatoes.  Every time I make mashed potatoes now, Jeff reminds me of the time I made them with canned potatoes...

Stories from an Undomestic Goddess

Those who know me are well aware that I lack in the domestic department.  Even my husband knew what he was getting into.  He told me early on in our dating life that my house (which I had decorated to the best of my abilities) looked like a bachelor pad.  He also often would vacuum my house while I was at work...I know it's a sad, sad tale...

When we lived up north, I hired a maid to deep clean our house 1 or 2 times a month so that I only had to tidy up and do minor cleaning as needed.  It was wonderful!  Especially with a new baby in the house.  When we moved down here, we moved into a little duplex that took 30 minutes tops to clean from top to bottom, so no need for a maid.

Now we live in a house down here (still renting unfortunately) and it is not so easy to clean.  I really try to keep up with the floors because you never know what Logan is going to drop and then stick in his mouth after it has been on the floor.  (He especially likes to line his crackers on the floor and eat them one by one...)  That being said, the folded laundry rarely gets put away, the dust lines all our shelves, and the dishes often pile up in the sink (even after running the dishwasher daily).

Logan went to day care yesterday and I had no plans.  Deep cleaning the house-here I come!  I scrubbed, mopped, washed, put away laundry, sorted toys, dusted, and vacuumed (with our sweet new vacuum) every room in the house.  EXCEPT the kitchen...after 3 hours of cleaning (I told you I really cleaned!), I could not bring myself to tackle the kitchen.  I instead sat down and worked on a few photo books and just generally relaxed a bit.

I picked up Logan from day care.  He looked so cute when I got there, but I had left my phone in my car, so I couldn't get a picture.  He had a snake costume on.  He apparently loved the costume and would not take it off!  Ha!  We came home and played a bit.  Then he started acting funny and was crying and being very clingy, which is not typical for him.  I could tell something was wrong.  I thought maybe he was hungry so I began preparing his dinner while carrying him around since he wouldn't let me put him down.  As I was pulling the milk out of the fridge, Logan opens his mouth, sticks his tongue out, and vomits all over me (and my spray tan), the kitchen floor (luckily uncleaned), and then proceeds to vomit again.  Poor little guy didn't know what was happening.  This is only the second time he's vomited!  As he's whimpering, I cuddle him and go fill the bathtub.  Into the bathtub he goes.  He had the most pitiful look on his face, but he let me wash him and cuddle him in his towel. 
I mentioned that I had spray tanned today and getting a spray tan wet before showering can be bad.  As I was bathing Logan, the bronzer was all over the edges of the bathtub and my arms and chest were looking splotchy.  After Logan's bath, I tucked him into our bed and took a 60 seconds shower to rinse off the spray tan.  It had been on long enough to tan my skin, so I was just washing the bronzer off.  Then I took Logan into the living room and we cuddled until Jeff got home. 
Logan was obviously fine after throwing up (although I did call day care to check that he didn't have any major head hits or anything out of the normal today) because he perked up after about 45 minutes and ate a whole can of ravioli, a half carton of yogurt, crackers, and lots of water and then proceeded to run around our house like a crazy man!  Not sure what upset his belly, but his not feeling well was very short lived, thank goodness!

Once Jeff was home, I decided to cut coupons because I was going to grocery shop after Logan went to bed.  I'm trying to be better about saving money.  As I'm cutting coupons, Logan runs to the couch and starts eating the coupons!  Really, he kept grabbing them and sticking them in his mouth and ripping them like a puppy playing with a roll of toilet paper!! (I mentioned Logan was being crazy last night, right?!?)  After Jeff and I attempted to corral him and stop him from taking the coupons, I gave up.  There was no coupon cutting and no grocery shopping done last night.

The kitchen's still dirty too...

Not funny, little man. Not funny!

I haven't blogged about "Mommy" stuff here of late, so here's a post for all you out there who LOVE "mommy" posts.

Logan is almost 2 and I just can't believe it.  Every day it just amazes me how much he has changed in the past year.  He runs but last year, he wasn't even walking yet!  He now understands movies and laughs at or tells the characters "nononono" when they are being bad.  He has favorites items now that he lugs everywhere with him (including a cute little cat his babysitter gave to him).  He now zooms around on a train that he could barely stand up to push a year ago.  He is beginning to understand right from wrong...

Kind of...

Remember that train I said he is zooming around on?  Yeah...well...he loves to zoom it right into Mommy's feet and then laughs hysterically when I wince in pain.  Why do toddlers think running items into your feet, hitting, biting, etc. is so funny?  I know that Logan has not been taught this by his Mommy and Daddy.  We teach him that all these things are wrong through telling him no (rarely works), timeouts (sometimes works for 10 minutes), taking items away (this seems to work the longest), and showing him that giving love is always better than those bad things.  Yet he still laughs when he bites my shoulder after bath time.  He runs around the house giggling as he tries to hit Jake (the dog) and gives an evil smirk (ok this is a little cute...) when he runs his toys into your feet.

I know the "experts" say that the toddler is just testing their boundaries and seeing what your reactions will be.  When does this end?!?  I want my child to be loving and gentle.  He is a good little guy around other kids (unless they try to take his food...but that is a whole 'nother blog post) and his daycare teacher told me that "Logan always uses gentle hands" when he is with them.

I guess I'll just keep trying.  Eventually he'll learn that these things are not funny.  Right?...

"Bahahahahahahahahaha" 
The evil smirk...

Houston Part 2-Minute Maid Park

Now for the real reason we made the trip to Houston!  Checking off stadium numero 7!  If you want a refresher on the beginning of our trip, click here.  Our 2nd day in Houston was devoted to baseball and baseball only!  We started our day with a light lunch of fruit, yogurt, pastries and coffee (milk for Logan) at the hotel's coffee shop.  Our hotel was thisclose to Minute Maid Park.  (really!! It was only 2 blocks away!).  We put Logan in his stroller (with his bunny in hand) and headed off for a morning tour of Minute Maid Park. 

Let me tell you, I did not have high hopes for Minute Maid Park.  It is about as boring as boring gets on the outside.  You have to be right in front of it, to even see a sign that tells you the building is Minute Maid Park.

Yep-that's all the signage there was...

This is the view of the outside (might I note-from our hotel's window)  I told you we were thisclose)

I should not have judged the book by its cover because once inside, this place was pretty awesome.  Probably still not at the top of my list of favorites, but not at the bottom.  So the cool thing is that the stadium is actually build into an old railroad station.  Once entrance to the stadium is actually the old train depot.  It has been restored and is gorgeous.  We must not have taken a pic of this for some reason though. 

This is the original train depot building that is connected to the stadium

Now, I'm going to give you a quick tour of the stadium in pictures.

The stadium took many of its features from other old baseball stadium architecture (such as the Citgo sign (Fenway) and the flagpole in the field (Yankee), etc.



Tal's Hill



Logan was upset about something here...We were touring the EXPENSIVE suites (you wouldn't believe how much they charge for these things!! No wonder they never fill them...)

The "Choo choo"  It runs across the track (by an actual train engineer at the beginning of every game, when a home run is hit, and if the Astro's win the game)

View from up high

Jeff standing on the field

Family photo at Minute Maid Park

Logan practicing walking out of the dugout for his future baseball career... (yes Mr. Otter does have a Cardinal hat and Pujols jersey on!)

Logan had no interest in looking at the camera...

Closer view of Tal's Hill

The gas pump that keeps track of Home Runs hit in the stadium

Logan standing in the visitor's bullpen

Logan was keeping this girl entertained with his stories!

Leaving the tour

We left the tour and headed home for lunch, but on the way we saw this

"What in the world?!?"

Upon closer inspection, we realized it was foam machines with a whole bunch of toddlers playing in the foam!  We had happened upon Toddler Tuesday at the park across from our hotel!

Logan was in heaven!

"Do you see this?!?!"

"Where's Logan?"

"Here he is!"

Logan lost it when we it was over.  He was screaming "Bub-bles!  Bub-bles!" and crying hysterically as we carried him back to the hotel!!

We went back to the hotel for lunch and naptime, then it was off to the baseball game.

Logan in his Pujols jersey

Logan loved the Mickey statue

Go Cards!!

I'm excited for this game!!

The view from our seats.  (We had awesome seats!)

The Choo choo going across the tracks.  I had to yell at the cotton candy man to move his behind so Logan could see it at the beginning of the game!!

If you look REALLY close, you'll see former President Bush and his wife Barbara front row, center field.  This picture really doesn't do it justice.  We were just a few rows back and diagonal from them.  Kinda neat!

 Unfortunately, the Cards lost.  Logan was most definitely the happiest Cardinal fan in the stadium because he got to see the Choo choo go across the tracks 3 times!!!!  (One at the beginning of the game, one when they hit a home run, and then at the end of the game when they won)  Logan was such a good little boy at the game.  I only had to take him up to walk around for 2 innings and he sat and enjoyed the game the rest of the time!