Maximus and Daddy's Day Off

All last week, as well as today, Max's usual daycare provider has been closed so she and her husband could go on a cruise. Because of that, we sent Max to the daycare center that Emma goes  to for the week last week. While we could have sent him there today as well, we decided that instead of paying for a single day at the daycare center, we would just keep him home. So I am using one of my personal days from work to stay home with him. I should add that I would be staying home regardless, since I do work from home. However, having a two-year-old at home while trying to get some real work done would be pure madness. I would be spending a majority of my time just trying to keep him from the computer keyboard, or keeping him from turning the computer off.

Our day started out fairly well. We dropped Emma of at daycare at her usual drop-off time, and then we returned home where I fed Max his breakfast of key lime pie yogurt and toast with peanut butter and strawberry jelly. Max decided to be helpful and volunteered to get into his booster seat at the table, something that he oftentimes resists doing. When he was done eating, he played with his toys a bit. Then while running into the kitchen, Max tripped over the leg of one of the chairs and fell head-first into the corner of the kitchen cupboards. While there was much crying, fortunately he did not see to be too injured. We then sat and watched TV for a little bit before heading out of the house for some errands.

[caption id="attachment_245" align="alignright" width="225" caption="Max was a good boy while getting his haircut."][/caption]

Our first stop of the day was to get a haircut for Max. It had been about five weeks since his last haircut, so he was due. Max did an excellent job sitting up in the chair at the hair salon. In fact, he hardly moved at all when getting his hair cut. Because he was so good, he got a sucker when he was finished.

The two of us then drove over to the Mall of America where we needed to find some birthday presents for Mommy. We spent a couple of hours wandering around the mall, finding some presents, and eating lunch. As we were walking around the third floor of the mall after eating lunch, I heard someone calling my name from behind me. I turned around, and after a moment I recognized the person calling my name. It was Julie, the manager of the Hardee's restaurant I worked at when I was a student at the University of Northern Iowa. I think the last time I had seen Julie had to be in 1998 when I worked there briefly during the summer between teaching jobs. We chatted for a bit until Max started pointing ahead, indicating that he wanted to get moving. We then parted ways and Max and I continued out shopping, picking up some birthday presents for Mel before returning home so Max could take a nap.

Shoe Shopping

This weekend I realized I was in need of a new pair of shoes for everyday wear. I was shopping at a mall Monday with my wife and kids and decided to look for a new pair of shoes. After getting my foot measured and discovering that my shoe size is 13.5 or 14, not 13 as I have been wearing for as long as I can remember, I looked through their selection for a pair of shoes I liked. After finding one, the salesperson went in the back to see if they had it in my size. Unfortunately they did not. I was not really too surprised by that as 14 is not a very popular shoe size.

That evening when we got home, I downloaded the Zappos app from the Android Marketplace. This allowed me to look through the vast selection of shoes that Zappos.com carries, filtering for the type of shoe I was looking for and for my size. After narrowing my choice down to about ten or so different pairs of shoes, I made my selection and placed my order, all from my smartphone. It is really amazing what one can do with technology these days. After placing my order, Zappos.com upgraded my shipping because of a tweet I wrote about them. And because of that, my new shoes arrived already today.

After this wonderful experience ordering shoes online, I do not know if I will ever feel the need to actually go to a shoe store to order shoes again. By ordering shoes for my gargantuan feet online, I have found that I have a much larger selection to choose from. And with free shipping both ways from Zappos, I do not even have to worry about the added expense of returning a pair of shoes in the event that they do not fit.

Fun at the Mall of America

With Mel out of town all weekend visiting a friend in Iowa, I was alone today with the kids. Maximus never seems to be happy when he's home with me, so he, Emma, and I all went to the Mall of America today. Emma always seems to want to go to the mall, mainly because she likes going to Nickelodeon Universe. When we got there around 10:15 this morning, she wanted to go on the carousel. Normally when I go there with Emma and Max, I put Emma on the carousel and then Max and I wait for her ride to be done. This morning however, I decided that Max might want to ride the carousel. So I strapped him on a horse next to Emma's. While waiting for the ride to begin, Maximus appeared to be pretty happy on the horse, but when it began moving up and down and going around, he got a worried look on his face which quickly turned to a scared look. Fortunately he didn't cry, but I thought we shouldn't go on the carousel again right away.

After our carousel ride we went into one of the Nickelodeon Universe stores where Emma looked at almost every item they had. She found a SpongeBob SquarePants dog tag with her name on it that she wanted, but we didn't get one. I was disappointed that they didn't have one with Max's name on it. After Emma had investigated every square inch of that store, the three of us set out in search for the Fossil store so I could get the battery in my watch replaced. As it is located on the second floor, we took the elevator up one level and began walking around the mall. We didn't make it to Fossil right away though. As we approached Macy's, Emma told me that she needed to go to the potty. We entered Macy's to find one. We ended up going to the third floor to find a restroom, after which Emma said she wanted lunch. So we ended up eating lunch before making it to the Fossil store.

After lunch we resumed out quest for the Fossil store. I however took us in the wrong direction. Before getting to Fossil, we stopped at the Disney Store where Emma looked around quite a bit, although we did not buy anything. Eventually we left the Disney Store and located Fossil where I had the battery in my watch replaced. Even though I knew the battery was dead, I had still been looking at it and kept wondering why time didn't seem to have passed. Now I will once again know the time.

By this time, Emma wanted to go on a few more rides. Before we got to any of the rides though, we saw that SpongeBob SquarePants and Squidward Tentacles were making an appearance, so we got in line so Emma and Max could see them. I was worried that Max might be scared of the large costumed characters, but he did fine. He even tried to grab SpongeBob's nose.

After getting their photo taken with SpongeBob and Squidward, we made our way to the Rugrats bumper cars. The last time Emma rode in the bumper cars, she ended up getting stuck in a corner. This time she did much better. She ended up riding the ride three consecutive times. She would have gone again if I would have let her, but I thought that three times was enough. I was amused the first time she rode the bumper cars today listening to all the parents along the side of the ride shouting to their kids to turn the wheel one way or the other and to press the peddle. I was among those parents doing this.

Before leaving, Emma wanted to ride on the carousel one more time. She wanted me to ride with her. I wasn't too sure about that since that would require Maximus to ride on the carousel again, and he really did not like his first experience on the ride. I relented though, and the three of us all rode on the carousel once more. This time though, I put Max on a horse that did not go up and down. He did much better this second time on a horse which was more limited in its motion.

Finally we were about ready to leave the mall. On our way out we walked by the LEGO store. Unfortunately Emma wasn't paying attention to where she was going, and the ran right into the corner of one of the support columns outside the side of the LEGO store. She was in a lot of pain and cried as we walked through the mall toward the exit. As we were close to the exit, we walked by Häagen-Dazs, where two employees were giving out small sample spoons of ice cream. The tiny spoon of ice cream had the effect of making Emma feel much better. Just to be sure though, they gave her another sample. She was doing much better for a moment until she ran into Max's stroller. She was once again whining as we made out way to the car. Finally leaving the mall a little after 2:00.

Both Emma and Maximus ended up falling asleep on our way home from the Mall of America. Maximus even stayed asleep when we got home, so I was able to put him down for a nap where he continued to sleep until I woke him at about 4:45 for dinner. Both kids had such a busy day that they each went to sleep fairly easily tonight. I am actually surprised that I am still awake considering all the work I did wrangling the kids today. I even walked over 14,000 steps today. More than 10,000 of those were at the Mall of America. I think I will go to sleep once I finish writing this.

Buying Tangled

Yesterday I picked up a copy of Tangled at our local Target store. It is going to be a present for Emma for Easter. There were several options available to choose from. There was the DVD-only, the two-disc combo pack with the Blu-ray and the DVD, and finally there was the four-disc combo pack which included the Blu-ray 3D and the digital copy as well as the 2D Blu-ray and the DVD. While we do not have a Blu-ray player, I decided to go with the four-disc combo. We did buy an HDTV earlier this year, so it's probably just a matter of time before we get a Blu-ray player. We will not be buying a 3D TV in the foreseeable future, but the digital copy will be nice. It would be nice if Disney sold a combo pack that had all three formats of the movie with the exception of the 3D disc, but I guess that would just complicate things. Besides, with the five-dollar coupon I got online, the four-disc combo pack cost the same as the two-disc pack.

New TV

We finally did it! After putting up with a television set that has been going bad since even before we moved to Minnesota in July 2008 we have finally purchased a new television. We will be replacing our normal old television with a new high-definition television.

For the past few years, we have been putting up with a television in which the very top of the image is distorted. The only time this does not cause problems is when something is presented in widescreen. In those instances, the distortion is in the black portion of the image. However, when watching sports it can be very difficult to read what the score is or to see how much time is remaining. It also makes it difficult to play some video games. We have been saving up for a while, both cash and Best Buy gift cards. We didn't quite have enough, but the TV we wanted was on sale at Best Buy this week for about $150 off the regular price, so we couldn't pass it up. Unfortunately none of our area Best Buy stores had it in stock, so we ordered it online. It should arrive at the store to pick up by Wednesday.

Now we have to decided what to do about our satellite account. If I read the information correctly, it looks like we will have to pay DirecTV an extra $10 each month to get an HDTV signal. I suppose we could also look into what Comcast has to offer. All I know for sure is that we no longer have to make sure whichever package we get has the Discovery Health Channel as it was taken over by the Oprah Winfrey Network. It looks like a lot of the programming from DHC has moved to FitTV, so maybe we need to see about getting that channel now instead.

Maximus Walks

Today Maximus walked on his own for the first time. Oh, he has taken a couple of steps without any support, and he has cruised along furniture for the past several weeks, but today he took several unsupported steps. To celebrate, we went to Stride Rite and bought him a pair of size 6½ shoes.

Nine Months Old

Maximus turned nine months old today. I can not believe that it has already been three-fourths of a year since he was born. In no time at all, he will be one year old.

Today we took Max to Sears to have his photo taken. As usual, they did an awesome job. Max once again cooperated for the photo shoot. The hardest part of the whole thing was deciding which photos to get prints of. Fortunately we have them all on CD so we can make more prints later if we decide to.

After getting the photos ordered, we walked around the Mall of America a bit. We had to get Max some new long-sleeved T-shirts as most of the ones we have for him are too small. All of his 12-month shirts have now been put away to be replaced by 18-month and 2T size shirts. Max is one big boy!

A Visit From Bill

For the first time since we moved to Minnesota, my friend Bill came for a visit from Cedar Rapids today. He originally planned on arriving around 9:00 this morning with the hopes of using our Wi-Fi to take a test for an online class he is enrolled in. However things did not work out as planned. Because of flooding, Highway 52 was closed somewhere between Rochester and here. When Bill took the detour, he ended up getting lost, and I had a hard time giving him help since his cell phone reception was poor. Bill noticed that he was running low on gas, so he returned to Rochester to refuel his car. While there, he stopped by the Rochester Public Library to see if he could connect to the Internet there to take his test, but by the time he got logged in, he was late for his test. Bill finally arrived at the house shortly before 1:00, four hours after he expected to be here.

Neither of us had eaten lunch yet, so we went to Ho King, a local Chinese restaurant for lunch. Afterward we stopped at Target, where I had a couple of things to pick up. As Bill enjoys comic books and comic book stores, we then went to Source Comics and Games in Falcon Heights. We went there because it is one comic book store in the Twin Cities that I know of, having visited there once before when I was in the area for a business trip several years ago. We then returned back to the house, stopping to buy a carbon monoxide detector at Walmart; the one we had in the basement stopped working today, so it needed to be replaced.

Bill left to return to Cedar Rapids around 4:30. He having quite a long day, with his very long drive here. Fortunately his return trip should go much better as Highway 52 has reopened.

The Quest for a Swing Set

My mother has expressed interest in purchasing a swing set for us for Emma and Maximus to enjoy. We started our search for a swing set at the Kmart in Oakdale as we knew Kmart had them on sale and that was the closest location to our house. Emma picked out the swing set that she wanted and we proceeded to check out. Unfortunately we learned that the store was out of stock of that particular swing set model. After consulting their computer, we were informed that the Kmart in West Saint Paul had that swing set available.

Not knowing how to locate the Kmart in West Saint Paul, I tried entering the address we were given into our TomTom. The TomTom however did not recognize the street name, so I just picked the next closest Kmart that it could find. We ended up at a Kmart in Saint Paul. They too did not have the swing set in stock. This time an employee at the customer service desk actually called a couple other stores to see if they had the swing set we were looking for. The West Saint Paul Kmart, the one we had previously been referred to, did not have any, and neither did another of the closer Kmarts. We then decided to give up our quest for the time being. I hope we are able to locate a swing set, because I am sure Emma would enjoy playing on it.

A Functioning Dishwasher

If you have been a regular reader of my blog for the past year, you may recall that on April 10, 2009, I broke our dishwasher by tripping over the open door in the dark of the night. The dishwasher had never really worked too well, so we did not want to invest any money in repairing the door so that it wouldn't leak. Instead we simply stopped using the dishwasher, and washed dishes by hand since then. We had considered buying a new dishwasher but when I learned that the government would be having a rebate program for purchasing Energy Star appliances, I decided that we should hold off on buying a new dishwasher until we could get the rebate.

Last Monday the state of Minnesota opened up its appliance rebate program. The website and phone lines were both down for most of the day, but in the afternoon, I was finally able to get through on the website and register for a $150 dishwasher rebate. I consider myself to be pretty lucky as all the alloted rebate funds had been reserved by 9:00 the next morning. So Saturday, after attending a birthday party for one of our nephews, Mel and I bought a new GE dishwasher from the Sears appliance store in Woodbury. The salesman who worked with us, who from our conversation I gathered to be a high school senior, was very helpful and did a fantastic job. This afternoon the dishwasher was delivered and installed. We didn't bother to wash our lunch dishes today in anticipation of the dishwasher's arrival. I can not wait to get it fully loaded so we can give it a proper test run.

ThinkGeek Action Shot of the Month

I know it's been a long time since I have blogged, but I have been quite busy with both work and home life. I also haven't had much to write about lately. I do have some news to share now however. A few weeks ago I submitted to ThinkGeek.com this photo of me wearing my geek T-shirt holding Maximus moments after he was born. Last week I was notified by ThinkGeek that my photo was their action shot of the month! Not only did this come with the honor of having the photo in their monthly newsletter email, but it also came with the award of a $100 ThinkGeek gift certificate! I bought a few things last week. I got s a T-shirt for Emma and a Monty Python killer rabbit plush for Max. I have yet to buy anything for myself though. There are a few things I am thinking about buying, but they are all out of stock at the moment. Hopefully when the items I want are in stock, ThinkGeek will be having a sale that I can take advantage of, getting even more benefit out of my prize.