Mommi Jewel

Little Drummer Boy

2012-01-05T04:59:51Z

Isaiah is doing all sorts of new things these days - I can barely keep up with documenting them!

Like this... What? I have no idea how he learned to do this.

Catch Up

2011-12-26T21:08:51Z

Things have been a little crazy here at the Briggs residence. You might have guessed that by the absence of posts since October. Maybe.

So many things have been happening. With the business, with Isaiah, with my heart. I will perhaps write about them all, but not today.

One of the things that have changed & severely hindered my ability to take awesome pictures of Isaiah is his newfound fascination with anything iPhone or iPad. It happened overnight it seemed. All of a sudden he could unlock our phones & the iPad, could open apps, close them open new ones, change to another screen, and PLAY the apps. It's pretty crazy to watch. If we let him, he would stay on them all day. But we don't. Mostly we keep him off the phones so we can actually use them, although it's not easy to use mine for pictures anymore because he just grabs & screams for it then. And the iPad, we try & hide it and only let him play when he cleverly finds it or when he is fussy & we need to take a phone call, in a long car ride, or honestly when we need a short break.

His Papa says we should take a video of him working on the iPad & send it to Apple because it's pretty awesome that he can do it all. The other day I said I needed to buy another iPhone so I can take pics & videos of him playing on the iPhone.

This will be a continuous struggle for us because we use these gadgets a lot for work.

Recently he's discovered how to take pictures. Here are his first photo shoots. I just had to save these before I deleted all the pics from my computer.

When I tried to take a pic of him being really cute at church, he caught me & took over.

Uh oh, he's waking up from his nap, better go hide the iPad.

Happy Anniversary

2011-10-17T05:02:27Z

I think I'm typing faster now than I used to. Because I have to. I just learned this week that the rest of the world has eliminated the double space after a period. I learned it after realizing my double spaces weren't translating through HTML while editing my new site. My world is rocked. Almost as much as when I learned that there was no 3rd comma when typing a list. I halfway do it the new way & halfway the old. I wonder if I'll ever be able to stop double spacing.

So my new website is going live as we speak. My designer & I started working on it towards the middle of the summer. Wow, it's been a long road full of lots of sleepless nights. And money. Even though I did most of the content (me & one of my employees that came in towards the end to help), it still cost the same amount as my original site.

Since last week I've seriously been considering changing my name. I've been thinking about for over a year (pretty much since I started it), but it's been more on my mind lately with the new site coming out. I want my blog to be respected among the foodie community as a source to find good restaurants, but who would want to go to CaterServe's food blog? Ughh, not me. I need a new name. A perfect one.

I need a new computer. A new phone. A headset. A van. New equipment. A full time assistant. A full time social media/marketing director. I have the people, I just need the money to pay for them. And I also need more time to spend with my son - I didn't take any pictures of him this weekend. :(

It was our anniversary yesterday - we made it a year!

We had an event that was a disaster (my first one yet). And Isaiah's babysitter (Nana) couldn't keep him overnight. We had to cancel our dinner reservations because of the disaster catering. Then we had about 30 minutes to eat our anniversary dinner at another restaurant. Then we had to drive to Sunnyvale to pick up Isaiah. Happy Anniversary!

But really we had some lovely moments surrounding the actual date, & it wouldn't be very like us if it weren't chaotic & unexpected so I think we're going to chalk this one up as a success.

Shape Up

2011-10-10T12:44:16Z

As you probably can imagine from my absence, things have been crazy busy since my last post almost a month ago. I can't really tell monetarily that I'm busier yet, but I'm sure that will come in time. Taking most of my time is this massive overhaul on my website. I'm converting it to Wordpress so I can make updates on my end as needed with restaurant & menu changes. I had no idea how big of a project it would be.

Isaiah is running & talking like crazy. He says balloon, knock knock, chash (trash), no, bye bye, hiyo (hello), nana (for his grandmother & for a banana), choos (shoes), sky, ball, tanchoo (thank you), mo (more & he signs it too!, muk (milk), top (stop), ni ni (night night), at (hat), eat, mama, dada, & he tries really hard to say BB's name. I should start keeping a list on my iPhone of everything he says or does that is extra cute because now I'm sure I'm missing a lot. He tries to sing. I will sing la la la la la la la la la (the scale). And he will sing la la, occasionally correctly matching the tone.

Marcus & I took this huge trip to Austin for a weekend. Huge for us because that was our first trip together. I wrote all about it, but I haven't gotten around to posting it yet. Soon I hope.

One of my biggest concerns lately is getting my body back to a moderate version of what I want.

A few months ago I tried the Paleo Diet. I loved it. BUT I got really overwhelmed with the massive cooking, planning & shopping it involved. Feeding your family is like having another job. I would start the weeks off well with lots of groceries in the fridge (that cost a lot of money) & then I would cook a meal or two, my crazy life would happen & then I would end the week with wasted food in the fridge. And that's not even touching exercise. Bottom line (& I don't apologize for this) is that if I have to choose between work & cooking (or cleaning), I'm going to choose work every time.

So after evaluating many alternatives (cooking not so difficult & expensive food, counting on leftovers from catering events, continuing to eat out the longer I continued evaluating...), I decided to try out this meal program a dear friend of mine told me about called My Private Chef. It is a local chef that has a passion for providing healthy, easy, & affordable food for everyone. You can pickup or have delivered all of your meals for the week frozen. You just pop each one (labeled with what it is) into the microwave for a few minutes & eat. I figured there would be missed meals because of client meetings (had one tonight) & catering events & I could use those missed meals to feed Isaiah & get me through parts of the weekends (program is M-F 3 meals a day). The monthly cost to do this will be less than what we were spending on groceries.

After all of my evaluating - I realized 2 things: I need a plan. I can't just go get a bunch of stuff & wing it for the week. And I don't think it's possible for me to plan & execute healthy fresh meals for my family at this point in my life. So I am thrilled at the possibility that this program will work! I'll let you know. Maybe.

All Better

2011-09-16T05:52:52Z

Does he look mad? Because he totally is. In the middle of our second & last night in the hospital, he started standing up in his jail crib refusing to sleep there any longer. I put the rails up in my bed & let him sleep in my arms.

He screamed bloody murder if I tried to put him back in the crib later.

As soon as the doctor told us we could leave, he started saying, "Bye."

And as soon as I put his shoes on, he bolted to the door.

Marcus left an event to come pick us up & we've been home ever since. Isaiah's appetite & energy are back to normal. And I have my giggling, mischevious loving son back.

It was pretty sad seeing him all hooked up & trapped, & yes it really sucked being there for two days. But being in that hospital, I couldn't stop thinking of how blessed we were that it wasn't worse. I hold him tighter every time he lets me.

We are blessed.

Still Here

2011-09-13T15:10:37Z

First Time Hospital Patient

2011-09-13T03:14:07Z

My dearest son is lying in a hospital crib next to me hooked up to IVs & monitors & respiratory assistants. It's so sad. We are here for the night. Marcus is at home gathering things for our stay like toothbrushes & clothes & a soft blanket for Isaiah.

The breathing issues started last night. He woke up every half hour crying. We held him & softly coaxed him back to sleep. I stayed home with him today & Marcus ran some errands for the business.

He struggled through his nap & was very lethargic & although he didn't cry, he also didn't smile or talk as he normally does a LOT. When I noticed his chest caving in when he breathed, I got a little concerned & decided to email his doctor a video if his breathing. Shortly after she responded, "You need to bring him in."

Marcus stopped washing dishes & came over. I threw clothes on me & Isaiah & gathered my computer & his bag.

It wasn't soon after we arrived that they called him back. Some dumb assistant came in & checked something & said a certain number had to be at a certain point. I asked what that meant & she said it was good. I didn't pursue the reasoning any longer. The doctor came in & listened to him breathe. She was almost immediately certain that we were going to the ER. It sounded like he was having a hard time breathing in, that the problems were coming from his throat rather than his chest. Which meant it wasn't congestion rather it was swelling of the vocal cords - narrowing of his airways - croup. She confirmed it & sent us to the ER.

The receptionist made sure to inform us that usually the visit was much more expensive than the doctor was charging us. Great because apparently Marcus's insurance had been cancelled, & he forgot to tell me. I was planning on getting insurance soon but only to get better coverage & coverage for me.

When they took us a back, a swarm of doctors & nurses came in & took Isaiah to be treated. First they did an epinephrine treatment. Then steroids. Then they were gone; they had to wait a few hours for the treatment to work & to see if he would require more.

We watched Miss Universe. Our favorite was Miss Venezuala, but she didn't make it to the top 10. Our second guess was Angola & she won. Marcus joked with the nurses the next few hours about how he was too busy to follow their instructions because he was watching the girls. I told Isaiah to pay attention to the girls when they would threaten another treatment.

The first set didn't take, so they gave him another, told us he was staying, hooked up an IV so he could get fluids, & moved us to a room upstairs. We decided Marcus would work the event in the morning & I would stay with Isaiah. Thank goodness I brought the computer; I prepared lists & labels for food & sent Marcus on his way. He went to get us dinner & a bag of things I requested. He returned & said goodnight.

Here we are together. It's quiet now, but soon either the nurses will return to check him or he will be startled by his cough & wake up crying.

My poor baby.

The Actual Haircut

2011-09-09T03:15:36Z

I guess it's taken me this long to process the haircut. Sometimes it was like looking at a different baby. Now looking back at the old hair - it's like looking at a different baby.

Here is the haircut in pictures...

All the Briggs boys go to the same barber. It makes me mad because he's in Mesquite, & Marcus refuses to even think about going to anyone closer. But then sometimes it's cute to see them all with the same guy, who is very kind & good with the boys. He said he should start giving Marcus a bulk discount.

He whimpered a bit here & there, but for the most part he let the man do his thing & kept his torment to himself.

Half of his head is done.

Poor poor boy...

This little girl kept hanging around us and BEGGING me to play with my iPhone. She even pushed the button on my phone for me & tried to grab it. I finally had to be not nice anymore & tell her no. I had to take 1,000 pictures of my son's first hair cut! So glad I made that decision.

Well, Isaiah likes it.

Haircut!

2011-08-26T06:13:35Z

So I haven't been very good at posting because I haven't been very good at uploading pictures from my phone because my phone is so full of pictures & videos that every time I want to capture something new, it wants me to delete something first. I could just take a moment & remove all of the videos from my phone, but I'm afraid that somehow there's one that didn't make it to my computer & if I delete it, it would be a memory lost forever. Apple, please release that everything is on a cloud thing soon.

But I absolutely had to do something now because we're taking Isaiah to get his first haircut tomorrow. Agggghhhh!!!! (What's the proper typed version of a scream?) I'm so so sad about it. I loved burying my face into his hair while I held him. I love that Isaiah's hair (well the front anyway) was exactly like my dad's.

But alas, now it's definitely growing into half Willy (my dad) hair & half Marcus hair. And it's more & more Marcus every day, so much so that the Willy part just looks silly.

So we're going to get it evened out tomorrow. I might cry. I mean look at this!

Golf Game

2011-08-14T05:16:45Z

We went to Top Golf yesterday with my nieces, nephew, one of their mothers, BB, Isaiah & Marcus. I was very upset that we were going because I have never been, & I imagined it would be hot & miserable. Plus sometimes I'm just pretty anti-social & anti-leave-the-house. But I loved it! It was really fun & kindof special to share something (even in the smallest capacity) that is important to Marcus.

Isaiah just chilled most of the time with his aunty & cousins, which was awesome.

Top Golf is a pretty genious business idea. I wish I had thought of it.

Golf is really really hard. I have a new huge respect for golfers. It is such an unnatural stance & set of movements. I don't know if I'll ever master it, but now I'm really interested in trying.

Marcus got up to shoot after me. After my miserable attempt (All I've ever played was putt putt), what he did was amazing. Very sexy actually.

BB seems to have a natural golf gift.

We also figured out a good way to keep Isaiah's milk cold.

And then, it was Isaiah's turn.