Family Outing.

We had a nice day out. I really need to do some grocery shopping. Since I've been menu planning and just buying what we need, that means at the end of the week there is pretty much nothing to eat in our house. It's kinda sad when we get to that point, but it's good that we're not wasting stuff like we were before. I was too hungry to even contemplate going to the store and buying something to cook, so we were totally bad and went to McDonalds for some chemically altered, deep fried ground chicken dipped in artificially flavored high fructose corn syrup.

MAN I love me some Chicken McNuggets dipped in Sweet and Sour sauce!

We took our lunches and decided to head on over to the park since it was such a nice day. Originally, the plan was to hit the park where we did our maternity photo shoot, but we hadn't packed a bottle for Bubba, so we went to the one next to our apartment complex. It's small, but there are picnic tables and trees, so it would do. While we were there, we decided it was too nice a day to just end it there, so my husband ran home (literally - our apartment is very close to the gate seperating our property from the park) and grabbed a bottle from the fridge.

Have milk, will travel.

While we were waiting for him to get back, I wheeled the stroller over to the playground area. It was empty, so what better opportunity to try putting the baby in the swing for the first time?

I think he was slightly underwhelmed. I pretty much held his hands and rocked him back and forth for a while, not really being brave enough to let him go while it was moving. I let his hands loose just long enough to snap a couple of photos to commemorate the event, then my husband was back and it was off to the nice park with the lake and the ducks.

...To which of course we never made it! We got sidetracked looking for a Starbucks (more badness, which surprisingly, we never found) and then on a whim elected to check out the new San Tan Village mall (shopping center? outdoor mall?) instead. We hadn't been there in a long time, so we wanted to see if a) there was a Starbucks (there wasn't) and b) if any cool new stores had opened (they hadn't).

If anything, it was a nice walk to window shop while still enjoying a beautiful, overcast day. We stopped by the children's play area to give Bubba his bottle. They actually have two - one for the bigger kids and one for the babies/toddlers. The latter was where we opted to rest. Poor Bubba, there was so much going on he couldn't decide where to look! He really had a hard time concentrating on drinking that bottle. I also realized then how dependent I am on the Boppy. It's freaking HARD to feed him without it! I gave him the first half, then passed him to his dad so I could rest my arms. He drank a bit more, then decided he'd rather chat than finish his bottle.

As you can see, it was a delightful conversation that they had.

We also picked up this little number:

Seriously, how cute is that hat?

When I met my husband, he had a Nike one just like that. It was AWFUL - all sweat stained and it made his head look really small. I finally convinced him to toss his "chapeau" (it was too gross to give to Goodwill) and he's been cracking jokes about how stylish they are when he sees someone wearing one ever since.

So we're walking by The Children's Place and dang if all the boy mannequins in the window aren't wearing the stupid things. We wander in and sure enough, they have them in baby sizes too. I put one on the baby to see what it would look like, and we were sold. Best $5.50 we spent all day.

(that round pink thing behind Bubba's head? My headband. Doh - not cute!)

For the record, I put it on his head straight, and somehow, he managed to get it turned to the side like that, and like that is how it stayed. My kid's got STYLE.