T-Mac and the Booger

This Labor Day we headed down to Monterey with the in-laws.  It was nice.  I wasn’t sure that Sophie would like the aquarium, but she really did.  I was pleased, it made the whole weekend better.  We drove down on Friday night, with a quick stop to pick up Jack Cust bobbleheads:

The next morning we headed towards Monterey to walk around,  Sophie got to participate in her favorite activities, playing with Dad and pushing her own stroller.

Then we headed over to Dennis the Menace playground, which was HUGE and a lot of fun.  We tried to take some pictures with Dennis in honor of my Dad, who WAS a menance, per all the people who knew him growing up.

 

Anyways… pictures of Booger at the playground:

At the aquarium, our day started not so great, we had prebought tickets, and then, realized we had left them at home… yuck… we will be going back some time soon.  Anyways, besides cool animals, jellyfish and lots of other cool stuff, they also had more Chihuly art in their “Jellyfish as Art” exhibit… crazy coincidence.  Sophie loved the area where you pushed buttons and seal/dolphin/whale sounds played… and punched buttons for about 15 minutes straight, just running back and forth to each different player pushing all the buttons.  We got to see everything, but the aquarium was CRAZY busy, apparently other people thought that fish would be fun for Labor Day.  Here are some pictures of us at the aquarium (sorry for all the pictures, but really they are for the grandmas, not you!):

Filed under: My crazy life on September 3rd, 2008 | No Comments »

So, this week has been HOT. At the end of last summer Jeff and I bought the Booger a little play pool on super sale, and I finally got it out for her to play with in the 105 degree heat. I decided to blow it up while she was napping, as it seemed like she would be annoying if she was here with me while blowing it up. So I laid it all out in the living room to blow it up. After her nap Jeff brought her out and she was ecstatic! Then she came and got me, dragged me to see her new toy and squealed… literally squealed with joy. After a quick detour for a hose that actually fit into the “fountain” part of the pool she discovered a new love in her life. Here she is LOVING her new toy (you need to zoom in on the second one to get the true experience of her happiness!):

Filed under: Sophie on August 29th, 2008 | 2 Comments »

Last night Jeff, Sophie and I went to the Chihuly exhibit at the de Young Museum with Jeff’s grandparents. Everyone I had talked to insisted that we go see it, and after seeing Sharyn and Grandad’s recent Chihuly acquisition we decided we should go before the exhibit left. So the five of us trekked into the city and saw some of the coolest glass art EVER. I love glass and this exhibit was so cool. Also good, it was colorful enough to keep Sophie’s interest and not long enough for her to need to run around (the museum wasn’t letting strollers into the exhibit because it was so busy). Anyways, if you are in town, you should try and get tickets (I hear they are hard to get, but seriously, try) this exhibit was well worth the drive and all the traffic. Here are some pictures of my favorite pieces:

This was a giant “garden” it had a little bit of everything that he makes, the reeds, flowers, balls… it was very cool.

And this ceiling was amazing… he has also made something similar to go under the bottom of a pool… when I am rich I want this ceiling on the bottom of my pool:

Filed under: My crazy life on August 23rd, 2008 | 1 Comment »

I promised the results of our awful day of car shopping later, and now, later has arrived. Now, it isn’t my cousins car that gets 33 miles to the gallon (or so I hear), but we love it, and it has the required 3 rows of seats. In addition, to make us feel better about our seemingly obscene vehicle, it has a DVD player (for the time my kid decides movies are interesting), electronic folding 3rd row seats, a 6 CD changer and (something I did not know existed) seat AC, for the times you just can’t unstick your rear from the leather seats. We really are just happy it was under our price cap, looks cooler than the minivans we were considering, and holds more than 2 slim guests in addition to our not so slim family of 3. So now for your viewing pleasure… our new (to us) Expedition!

Filed under: Odds N' Ends on August 18th, 2008 | 1 Comment »

My kid loves her Dad… and I love that she does, although it totally disturbs me that she knows how to plug the headset into the controller, should a 16 month old know things like that?

A story, that I wish I had a picture of, in the nursery room this last Sunday Sophie once again proved that she knows more than we give her credit for. She went up to the little sink, “turned on” the water, “filled up” her glass, “turned off” the water and took a long swig afterwards. Totally cute. Unfortunately, or maybe not, I don’t take my camera to church, besides which, that would probably be considered “bad.”

One last picture for Grandma Phillips… here is the other new dress that you gave the Booger.

Filed under: Sophie on August 18th, 2008 | No Comments »

Today, my sister-in-law (is it still my sister-in-law if she is married to my husband’s brother?  Is she my husband’s sister-in-law?  I don’t know the proper etiquette on that… I digress) and I hung out, so that she would have a break from a 3rd A’s game in a row… so we had a girls afternoon.  I found this idea for an apron made out of a dishtowel, super cute, but we could NOT find cute dishtowels, or at least any that we had to have.  So we used hand towels, we figured that as long as we liked them it didn’t matter.  You may also notice they are pretty similar, but when you find a good idea, you stick with it!  We think they are pretty fabulous, though I have decided it is a good idea that I went into the OT field and wasn’t a model.  Anyways, here we are with our new aprons…

I had a really great time, and I hope Rachel did too, it was fun having sister bonding time, as, well, she is the only one I have, and it is too bad she lives 5 hours away.  Come back and play soon… I always have projects on the back burner!

Filed under: My crazy life on August 14th, 2008 | 3 Comments »

My daughter thinks she is in charge (it could be true, but I am not willing to concede just yet, she is only 16 months old for heavens sake).  She decided while we were car shopping (details of the results to come) that she was going to drive.  While we were looking at features of various cars she climbed into the front seat, turned the wheel, pushed buttons and tried to find where the keys fit.

Sophie also has a tendency to point to you and then point to the place where she would like you to be.  While Andy the Manny was still here we were walking by a bench.  Sophie walked over the aforementioned bench climbed up and sat down looking pleased.  Then she pointed at me, and then pointed at the bench, staring me down until I had sat down in my appointed place.  She continued to point at Jeff and then Andy.  As soon as we had all sat down, she clapped her hands with joy… she sure knows what she wants.

Now she thinks she is the mom.  Or maybe just any mom in general.  She holds her little baby doll in a cradle position and shows the baby clothes, bottles and pats her head to comfort the little baby girl.  And then come the shoes.  She dons my shoes and then takes the baby doll or Pig around the living room, comforting them every so often.

I am sad I don’t have other pictures… but I thought while I was writing about this picture, I should document some of the cute things for me and the grandmas.  Besides, while I enjoy the Olympics, you all can be reminded that I am still here… just otherwise distracted!

Filed under: Sophie on August 11th, 2008 | 1 Comment »

Filed under: Odds N' Ends on August 7th, 2008 | No Comments »

So, after the family reunion we headed back to my parents house for the rest of our vacation. Sophie was able to play with my cousin’s dog, Boo. She wasn’t sure how she felt about him, but she did play with him a little, we are making progress.

That Saturday we headed up to Park City to watch the Flying Aces Aerial Jump show… it was cool. There were 4 jumps, and at one point there were 2 people jumping off each of them at the same time. You can see the one jumper practicing right above my Dad’s head.

They were doing some very cool tricks, including an Olympic winner who performed his gold medal winning “Hurricane”- 5 twist and 4 flips or something insane like that.

It was cute, every time the skier landed in the water Sophie would go, “OOOOH.”

After the show Jeff went to do the zip-line. You can see where he started his run, right to the right of the ski jumps at the top of the mountain.

Here he is smoking the competition.

Sophie kept herself entertained at the playground.

We had a lot of fun, but it is so sad how you always feel like you need a vacation after the vacation, and I can’t believe I am back at work again… how many days until Labor Day?!?!

Filed under: Odds N' Ends, My crazy life on August 7th, 2008 | No Comments »

So our trip to Utah was fun. This time we were headed up near Ogden for a family reunion at Allen Ranch. It was cool. The ranch was big enough to hold all 76 of us who showed up. That is right 76. This was a reunion for my dad’s side of the family, he is 2nd of 10. Reunions are always a big deal, it is super fun, crazy and MESSY.

Here is a picture of one side of the ranch, you can see the 3 “ponds” one of which most people felt good going in, and the big one that several people slid into on the giant slip ‘n slide. There were more camping areas up behind where I am taking this picture… we were everywhere.

We got to the reunion late Tuesday night… a day and a half into the action. We hung out a little before going to bed and then the next morning joined in the fun. OGO took Sophie out for a ride on the pond… powered by her Uncle Andy.

Sophie took over her 2nd cousins bouncer as a throw back to her baby days… I don’t know why she loved it, but she did.  She wanted to play in it all the time.

Andy and Jeff spent many hours throwing things: horseshoes and ring toss washers mainly, and Sophie wanted to play also, which involved a lot of creative throwing to not hit her and still win the game.

Sophie played in her “pool” got super messy and had to change into a new outfit… I believe she got through 3 outfits the first day… water, dirt and poop… yucky!

Then the big boys started playing… my dad and his brothers are crazy together… or at least all their wives think they are. They pulled out the water balloon launcher and tried to hit this target:

Not Alan, the cooler in front of him… for the record I think that one person made it in the bucket (later, many people joined Alan in the field in order to catch the balloons or hit them with baseball bats making it more difficult to hit the target). Here are some pictures of the water balloon-ers and the line of people waiting to try their luck at hitting the target.

To make things more interesting for all of us in the crowd… we scored the balloon tosses with a very reliable and fair system… thumbs up or down:

Some people felt that water balloons needed a different target, so these three cousins decided Andy needed to get wet and spent the whole day targeting him… somehow they were always soaked and Andy was always dry!

After lunch the next activity started. My Aunt Annette made PVC marshmallow blow guns for everyone and a giant fight ensued. It looked like it had snowed. Unfortunately, between the water balloons and marshmallows all our shoes were covered in sugary messes… it was fun anyways!

My Dad, cousin Gillian, cousin Darris, Aunt Annette (the reason for the craziness!)

My Dad took Sophie down the water slide 2 times, and that was all she would do. He had to work hard to not end up in the pond with her, that is why his legs are covered in grass.

The reunion was full of lots of fun conversations, Family Feud, TONS of kids running around and an awesome card game Wizard. It is always great to see everyone, their kids and visit, without having to be anywhere else. Thanks Jeff, for letting us go.

One last picture, of Sophie and her Great-Grandma Phillips.

Filed under: My crazy life on August 7th, 2008 | No Comments »