A Boy's First Crush and other happenings!

Benjamin's got a crush, and I'm not talking orange soda here, either! Benjamin has developed quite an affinity toward a young lady at our church named Lexi. He first took an interest in her at his birthday party. Her mom is really sweet and I'm starting to get to know her through play group and our class at church. Lexi is actually eight! She has two younger brothers closer in age to Benjamin, but he always follows her around! She ended up getting to come to play group today since Belton schools were out. It's pretty cute to watch Benjamin light up when she walks in the room. At a recent play group where she was also there, she held his hand and that was all he talked about on the way home! She is a pretty cute girl, Benjamin's little friend Cade also noted that "Lexi is pretty." She has certainly turned a couple of little heads her way!
Jonathan has started talking our ears off. He says "Dada," "Buh, buh, buh" and "uhduh, uhduh." Dada was his first word. We're working hard on "mama" now.
In other news, I am done with the massive consignment sale that I took part in over the weekend! I also scored some great deals for the boys. I discovered these huge consignment sales after moving here. All of the girls at our church do them and they told me how cool they were. I got a bunch of cool Gymboree & Baby Gap stuff for next to nothing. I love dressing the boys in all of the fun clothes from the cute places like Gymboree, Janie and Jack, Baby Gap and Talbots Kids, but it gets so stinkin' expensive, especially when they grow as much as they do. So these consignment sales make it easy to get the good stuff way below retail. David even noticed how much better the brand name jeans are that Benjamin wears. He is still wearing the size 2T Gymboree jeans (going on the third winter in them) that I just took the cuff out of to make them last one more year. Even David noticed how remarkably they have held up! No doubt, Jonathan will wear them, too.
To compare what I saved, I looked at a recent retail purchase form Gymboree: I bought the boys matching holiday sweaters, Benjamin a heavy winter coat and Jonathan 2 pair of socks, all totaling around $100 (but I had Gymbucks, so I only spent $50).
Now, at a recent consignment sale I bought: 1 pair brand new (with tag) Gymboree jeans, 2 pairs Carters jeans, 1 pair Levi's jeans, 2 lightweight jackets, 4 sets holiday pajamas, 3 blanket sleepers, 12 Gymboree/Gap/Flapadoodles/MisTeeVus shirts (several came with the matching socks), 1 heavy winter coat for Jonathan, 1 pair brand new Tommy Hilfiger sneakers, 3 pair sweatpants, 1 pair lined dress pants, 3 holiday sweaters and 3 long one piece Gymboree rompers. All of this was less than $250! And all was very good quality, these sales are very strict about their standards.
It pays to be a smart shopper! These clothes will get us through the whole winter and probably a good chunk of next winter, too!
I know a lot of other moms read my blog so I wanted to give this info out. I wish I had known about these sales when B was a baby! Here are the ones I have gone to (one is local in Austin, the other is national with sales all over):
Just Between Friends Sale (National): http://www.jbfsale.com/
Mommy & Me (a VERY well done event, the planner was soooo organized and on top of it, great venue also, lots of space):http://mommyandmesale.com/
All of these sales have presales for consignors and first time mommies. I'll warn you though, consigning was a lot of work! More than I expected. But, I did make a little moolah and the presale pass alone was worth it.
Sorry to ramble! Just really want to get the word out about these AWESOME sales! I live for a deal!