Big House Big Heart 5K: Mission Accomplished

We did it! Team Tomalia completed the Big House Big Heart 5K race! Little Zander got his personal best time at 1 hour and 5 minutes.

Here he is preparing for the race. Such focus!


At the entrance to the race there was music and a big balloon arch marking the starting line.

And we're off!


I decided to make Z his own shirt with a race number painted on, as he would certainly eat anything I tried to pin on him.


Crossing the finish line.


See? We really were there in the Big House. The race was really well organized, with free food and drinks at the finish line and everything. It was my first time in the stadium, so it was pretty cool to run through the tunnel onto the field. Probably the closest I will ever get to playing football!


Thank you to everyone who donated! It was a great event to participate in, and all your donations helped to raise money for a wonderful organization.

Race Day Approaches - One Week Left

One week and counting until the Big House Big Heart 5K fundraiser for the Lamaze Family Center!

Due to Tori's old shoulder problems acting up again (boo!), Jason has decided to move from the cheering section into Team Tomalia (yay!).

Here we are on a training walk. Zander seems to think there is a basketball event involved. I hope he isn't too disappointed.



A huge THANK YOU to everyone who has donated so far. There is still time for more donations! This money will help support Lamaze’s mission which it carries out through community outreach programs such as the Miscarriage and Newborn Loss support group, scholarships for childbirth classes, and underwriting the teen childbirth classes.

To make a donation, click here and select "Tori Tomalia" from the drop-down menu. All donations of $25 or more are 100% tax deductible and go directly to Lamaze Family Center Ann Arbor.

Zander Prepares for his First 5K Race

On October 4, Zander will be participating in the Big House Big Heart 5K race to raise funds for the Lamaze Family Center.

Here he is trying out some new running shoes:


The plan is that I will push him in the stroller until I get tired, then we will trade places. I guess he better learn to walk before then.

Zander is pretty pumped to get the chance to support this non-profit organization. Here's what he had to say about it:

"Thanks to the classes my parents took at the Lamaze Family Center, I had a great birth, breastfeeding was a breeze, and I made a bunch of awesome friends at the Mommy's group. Thanks, Lamaze, for helping to make my first year so fantastic!"

At least I THINK that is what he said. It kinda sounded like "mamamadadadwhatzzat?" but you get the idea.

Seriously, though, Lamaze is a great organization that supports families from pregnancy to preschool. Donations will help support Lamaze’s mission which it carries out through community outreach programs such as the Miscarriage and Newborn Loss support group, scholarships for childbirth classes, and underwriting the teen childbirth classes.

To make a donation, click here and select "Tori Tomalia" from the drop-down menu. All donations of $25 or more are 100% tax deductible and go directly to Lamaze Family Center Ann Arbor.

Thank you, and wish Zander luck - 5k is a long way to crawl!

Birthday Bash

On August 18, 2009 Zander celebrated his first birthday. Jason's family came down from Owosso to join us for a bbq and cake.

I think I have started a tradition for our little family. The birthday hat. It is made up of all Z's favorite things from the year.

- white for mama's milk
- blue water for bathtime with dada
- spirals for rotini, the first food he ate until he puked
- "pages" for books (he loves his books)
- the colors of the hat are the same as Puppy, his security toy
- an elephant's trunk on the front (he sleeps with a stuffed elephant)
- green blades of grass, which he loves to pull up and eat (unfortunately)
- three bells for out little family of 3.






I don't think he really liked wearing the hat, but he tolerated it so we could snap some pictures.

Next we sang "Happy Birthday" and ate a delicious cake that Vicki made. Zander did not so much blow out the candle as try to grab it, so I ended up helping him with that.





Next it was time for presents!

Zander was thrilled by the tissue paper.


Yum - envelopes!


Delicious - a puzzle piece!


Oh boy - books!



By the way, this is what the garden looks like now. It is producing some nice veggies and abundant potatoes. I think we are going to end up with a ridiculous number of squash, as the vines are taking over everything.

The Knight Learns to Crawl

Zander's means of locomotion has earned him the nickname "the knight" because, like the knight on the chess board, he cannot go in a straight line. He goes sideways, backwards, rotates and scoots, but does not crawl in the conventional way.

Until today!

This morning he took two tentative crawls forward. Then later today, at a going-away/summer-baby-first-birthday-bash, he took five crawls. This evening he went halfway across the room.

Congratulations, Z!

As I mentioned above, today was Z's first birthday celebration. Some dear friends are moving back to England (boo!) so they were having a going away party. Their son just turned 1, so they made it into his birthday too. Then we realized that our whole group of mommy-friends all have first birthdays this summer, so we made it into a big birthday bash. It was super fun, and incredibly hot outside! Unfortunately, my camera punked out on me (perhaps because the air was dripping with humidity), so I have only one picture.



As you can see, we let him party in just his diaper because of the intense heat. If only adults could get away with that!

Zander feeds himself cottage cheese

Oooh! More cottage cheese on my shorts!! Yummmmm.

Pool Party!

Zander attended his first pool party! Check out his cute little swim diaper.



Speedo baby!




Prune feet!




No more pictures!

Economic Collapse = Gardening

The current state of the economy has strengthened my desire to become self-sufficient. As a child, one of my favorite TV shows was "Good Neighbors", which gave a wonderfully romanticized view of living off the land. Possibly the best thing about owning a house is that I now can finally plant a real garden.

I may have gone a bit overboard, but here's what I planted:
- tomatoes
- sweet corn
- sweet tomatoes (cherry tomatoes)
- yukon gold potatoes
- Russian banana potatoes
- sweet potatoes
- ummm... another kind of potato
- bell peppers
- sweet peppers
- kohlrabi
- arugula
- sugar babies (mini watermelon)
- casaba melon
- soybeans
- bush beans
- pole beans
- eggplant
- zucchini
- lettuce
- butternut squash
- brussels sprouts
- broccoli
- yellow onions
- dill
- pesto basil
- red basil
- garlic chives
- oregano
- aloe (not for eating but for burns etc)
- sunflowers (not in the garden, but as part of a living fence)
- marigolds (an attempt to keep bugs out of the garden)

I can't walk outside without gazing at it. What a beautiful sight.


Our house came with a mature apple tree and pear tree so if things go well I will be making all sorts of fruit things to eat all year! Watch out, soon I'll be buying goats and chickens and making a solar-powered generator.... actually that sounds like a great idea!

Thankfully Zander is pretty happy hanging out in the yard watching me work and entertaining himself - for a little while anyway!

Mysterious Giggling

I put Z down for a nap this afternoon and several minutes later heard giggling. I peeked in to discover that he had lifted up his shirt and was tickling his own belly.

My First Mother's Day

I guess you could say that my first Mother's Day began shortly after midnight, when I arrived home from Kzoo to find that my wonderful husband had cleaned the entire house. While I did not successfully transfer the sleeping Z from the car to his crib without waking him, it was only a short bout of screaming and nursing before he was out again.

I spent the first 11 hours (amazing!) of my first Mother's Day in bed, with my beautiful child handed to me a few times for nursing. He spend part of the morning sleeping with me in bed (so cute) and the rest playing with his dad.

Then I had a lovely brunch of scrambled eggs, waffles and sausage and did NOT change an incredibly stinky diaper.

The big event of the day was Zander's first experience with paint. My original plan was to make the standard hand-print-foot-print-I-love-my-mommy thing. It quickly became clear that my curious little boy would not allow something so mundane to happen.


Zander, enjoying our backyard, has no idea what fun is about to take place.