T-Mac and the Boogers

How do you feel about the fact that my daughter sang herself to sleep with “Poker Face”?  Do you feel any better knowing that it was the Glee version?  I do.

Filed under: Sophie on August 31st, 2010 | 3 Comments »

We have been enjoying our passes for the Oakland Zoo… it is close enough that I am willing to drive there myself, and there are rides and a park for Sophie.  It is also not so big that we get too tired and cranky before we see everything.  A couple weeks ago Liz and I planned our play date to the zoo (she has been good about getting me out of the house!).  Another friend joined us, so there were 4 kids under 1 1/2 and then Sophie… it was fun.

I love the frog room, though I don’t really like frogs, but there are so many in each case, and the sit right at the front of the window so the kids can see them.  Sophie jumped over the lily pads about 200 times… she loved it.  Luckily everyone else had lunch to eat, so we didn’t slow them down too much.

This is the only stroller I can get Vi to regularly fall asleep in… she fell asleep around the giraffes and was out until we left the park…

It is great that with my season pass they give me free ride passes as well.  Then I just ration them out every time we go… and now that Sophie will ride by herself it is a lot easier to tolerate, no standing in line only for her to wimp out when it is her turn!   We love our little field trips.

Filed under: My crazy life, Sophie, Violet on August 29th, 2010 | 2 Comments »

Jeff has this thing he does, it is usually VERY annoying.  He tells you to get ready, then refuses to tell you where you are going.  He just says, “It’s a surprise.”  Often times the surprise is walking around Costco, or Target, so something to get us out of the house.  So when, on Sunday, he asked his parents to watch the girls Wednesday night, I was curious, but when he said it was for a “surprise” I didn’t question it too much.  I figured we would probably go out to dinner and see “Inception” as he has been dying to see it.  Last night, before we left, I asked, just in case, where we were going, and he seemed shocked I didn’t know… he said we were picking up a picnic dinner and dropping off the girls.  Now I was really confused.  Until we drove up to the Pavillion and I saw the sign for Dave Matthews Band!  Yea for this surprise… much better than a trip to Costco (and I love me a good trip to Costco!).  He had bought the tickets 3 months ago, and I was shocked he kept it a secret that long.  Impressive… Jeff has been to several DMB concerts, but I have always wanted to go, and the Pavillion is so nice and close, and basically next door to the babysitting in-laws house… it was too convenient for him to pass up.  We had a lot of fun, though, there was more smoking at this concert than at the Doobie Brothers concert, and I find that ironic.

(PS I am not looking super cute in the glasses, but my eye has been having problems… and thank goodness the concert was last night as my eye has now swollen to the size of a small plum… yuck… )

Thanks for the super fun surprise baby doll!  Loved it, it was such a good time!

Filed under: My crazy life, Odds N' Ends, The Mayor on August 26th, 2010 | 5 Comments »

My best friend from high school got married this last Saturday.  It was a beautiful day, and I was so, so happy that I could be a part of it all.  Vi and I flew out to Utah Thursday night, and back Sunday morning… it was a fast trip, but I got to participate in all the wedding festivities.

Friday, my mom took me shopping… fabulous, it was a lot of fun to get new clothes and spend time with my mom, just the two of us (well and Vi), we don’t get to do that all that often any more.  I also got to see my uncle Steve and some of his family, they were in town for my cousin’s babys blessing… if you caught that.  It was nice, I got to see a few people, even though I wasn’t there long.  Violet spent her time opening about every cabinet door in my parents house, it was her favorite activity…

Violet also REALLY wanted to play with my aunt and uncle’s dog, Boo.  But she needed me right next to her, so the pictures are from bad angles.  She did make Boo a little upset, Vi kept pulling his hair.  Though, that dog is severly spoiled, so maybe it was good for him.

Saturday was a long day.  I made it to the temple barely on time (a little late, but still before the sealing), and realized I only knew 1 other person besides family there… and the family was so busy all day (but so nice, they made sure I was doing ok and not too lonely!).  The ceremony was so great, Bethany’s grandpa sealed her and Jake.  It is so sweet when the sealer knows the couple.  Bethany looked beautiful and so happy, I love the feeling in the temple, there is such love and peace, and such a feeling of comfort.  It is also nice to remember those feelings (as my wedding day is all a blur).

The luncheon was DELICIOUS… it involved strawberry stuffed crepes and oh, yummy!  The people at my table were nice and friendly and it was fun to learn more about Jake from his friends. 

That night my Dad  performed (if that is the right word) the ring ceremony.  I think this is the part that Sophie would have loved.  The princess coming down the aisle with girls throwing rose petals.  Sophie would have thought that was pretty fabulous.  Then we went straight to the reception.  Violet was pretty worn out at this point, she hadn’t really napped when I was gone in the morning.  I am glad that she held out until the end!  Anyways, Bethany was beautiful, and I am so glad that I was invited to share in her special day.  The last few years I have had 2 people on my “whenever they get married I have to be there” list.  Bethany was one of those people… and I am happy I was there to see it happen!

Filed under: My crazy life, Odds N' Ends, Violet on August 24th, 2010 | No Comments »

Oh My Goodness… 1 lowly month away from having my baby turn 1!!!   It is coming so quick.  Violet is getting to have a funny little personality.  She talks a lot… lots of jibber jabber and lots of funny little screams, especially in her car seat and stroller.  She will stand without help for a long time, but still doesn’t have the best of dynamic standing balance (aka her walking isn’t so steady).  She is eating so much stuff, and will try anything but still loves ice cream the best.  Her favorite activities involve pulling all the ziploc baggies out of their boxes and scattering them on the floor, and (as you can see in the picture) getting into the fridge.  She pulls out all the yogurt.  It is cute, as soon as she hears the fridge door open she hurries over to get inside before I close it.

I took her on a flight, just the 2 of us, and she was really good.  She slept the whole way there.  On the way back things were good until she saw people walking in the aisle.  She really just wanted to stand in the aisle and bounce up and down.  She is such a fun girl.  Still so easy going and willing to go along with everything.  I love it, and will be sad when she decides her ideas are better than mine.  She loves playing peek-a-boo… but more of a chasing version.  She peeks over a chair or leg or other obstacle and thne when you see her she scurries around to the other side of the obstacle and peeks for you there.  So cute, and she has the cutest giggle.  I love that Sophie loves her, and tries to have her play princess games with her all the time.  She pretends Vi is the prince, and then tries to dance with her, but Violet’s balance isn’t that great, so the game doesn’t always end well.

She is a lot of fun, we love her, and I have 1 month to mentally prepare for her birthday, I am not sure I am ready for it, it came up on me so soon!

Filed under: Violet on August 23rd, 2010 | 3 Comments »

While the cousins were here I had planned a sewing project for them.  They have been doing sewing “classes” with my mom, so I picked a beginning to intermediate project, a purse/tote.  Unfortunately, I will not be linking to the tutorial I used as it had AWFUL directions (you should thank me… it really made little sense, which is too bad, the bag was cute).  I ended up really only using the dimensions for the project.  It was fun though.  I also had them make fabric flowers using this tutorial.  This tute was VERY helpful, and I really liked the end result, they were cute.  I had the girls put the flowers on pins so they could move them from their bags to their sweaters or to a headband or something if they wanted…. I think they might stay on the bags, cute.  Here is a picture of the finished product with the creators!  I know Kylie is covering her face, but the lighting was best in this picture.

Filed under: Odds N' Ends on August 23rd, 2010 | 1 Comment »

Jeff headed up to High Adventure with his Teachers last weekend and Violet, helpful 10 month old that she is, decided to help load up the cooler.  Alas, she was distracted by the massive piles of ice. 

She sucked on that ice for a good 10-15 minutes.  When the one chunk fell on the floor, she just got another out of the cooler and sucked on a new one.  How she held onto that ice for so long, I will never know, she is tough… it was pretty cute, her sitting on the floor next to the cooler, eating the most bland snowcones ever… silly girl!

Filed under: Violet on August 13th, 2010 | 1 Comment »

Can I tell you all about a chore that I REALLY dislike?  Folding laundry.  It isn’t the actual laundering part I dislike, it is just the folding.  But this has caused me some problems.  You see, what I do is wait and wait and wait to fold laundry (I procrastinate those things I dislike, what do you do?) and then, when I run out of underwear or can’t find my favorite shirt or need my work clothes I decide that I really do need to fold everything (because looking through baskets of clean clothes in the morning hours is ridiculous).  By this point in my life I have set myself up for a LONG afternoon/night of folding laundry… like at least 3-4 loads of it.  But see, I have had visitors… so this time I had 6+ loads of laundry to fold… that is right, monster loads.  So the big girls were napping and the little girls tried to help and FINALLY…

My mother would most likely be disappointed with my procrastination, but it is all done!

Filed under: My crazy life on August 13th, 2010 | 1 Comment »

Actually, as always, this post is more about my kids, but the teenagers were there and so the title is not entirely untrue.  Sophie was much more adventurous with feeding the animals this time, which was good, otherwise there is very little to do at the Little Farm section of the park.  It was a little busy when we were there, but the animals were still eating… good thing they have no problem eating celery and lettuce all the live long day!

From L-R: Sophie and Kristy feeding animals.  Sophie jumping for joy… or excitement and trying to get me to hurry up.  Violet looking at the cow warily, it already had tried to lick her once!

L-R: Violet trying to see the GIANT piggie.  Kylie giving you a small example of her smirk… we have learned these last few weeks that she gives a MEAN dirty look!  Sophie, who won’t pose any other time, decided posing against the open door of a moving train would be fun… she is just so cute though!

Violet tried to learn some new skills from the cows this trip.  She is a master of her tongue, but this cow is able to clean out his nose with his tongue, compare the skill!  (By the way, this kid ALWAYS stick out her tongue… it is hilarious!)

Filed under: Odds N' Ends, Sophie, Violet on August 10th, 2010 | 1 Comment »

This summer we have done a couple new things, the joy of not working full time… though it does strain my creative mommy side a bit more than just planning afternoon naps and lunch!  During a hot spell this summer (I know we had one, I just can’t remember it… oh California summer, why are you letting me down?) Sophie asked to go play at a park with water.  Grammy tried her darnedest, but the places she went had turned off their summer water (we got rain and seem to STILL be in a drought).  So, the next day, Liz and I met up at a park in Clayton that has a water feature.  The kids had a good time, but the water only stays on about 30 seconds, and the button to turn it on is too hard for the kids… almost too hard for me.  I had bruises on my thumbs to prove it.  Either way the kids had a good time.  Sophie ran around entertaining the babies, and Violet and her buddy Holly sat in the spray of water being entertained.  JD toddled around being all grown-up.  It was a lot of fun, afterwards we decided to get frozen yogurt, it was way too hot for the playground.  Perfect way to end a summer play date!

The playgroup that I attend regularly did summer Friday field trips.  I was bad about attending, but this was an activity I had been wanting to do for a while.  We went to Contra Loma Regional Park.  There they have a pool with a sand walk-in (basically a swimming pool/beach hybrid).  I had heard how disgusting Contra Loma had been from those who grew up in the area, but I couldn’t imagine why all my friends kept going if it was so nasty, so I thought I would give it a go.  It was so much fun, and really clean.  There was grass to sit on and leave your stuff (and a friend borrowed a giant tent from her swim team and we used that for break time), then, when you first step into the pool there is just shallow water with tons of sand.  It was perfect, all us moms and babies sat in the shallow water and we could keep an eye on the older kids playing around.  The sand went out about 10 feet, and then it faded into the pool bottom.  Kids weren’t allowed in the deep end, past the rope, unless they had passed  a swim test, so Sophie had a visual reminder when to stop.  It was great (and she isn’t too adventurous without a buddy to push her).  Mainly Sophie sat with her buddy Kate and they scooped sand into buckets and then dumped it out.  Occasionally they would venture out to the deeper water, and then come back to shovel a little more.  Best day ever.  I had to force Soph to leave, she loved it so much (but the tears had come on and things were definitely bugging her… if she napped it would have been nap time).  Besides my burnt back (forgot to sunscreen me, though I was smart enough to get the girls 2 times at least) it was a lot of fun, and we will definitely be going back again, sooner than later, if the warm weather would ever come back.

I was unprepared and forgot my camera to both occasions.  So thanks to Liz for the pictures of the Grove and thanks to Melita for the cute pics from Contra Loma, she is always there with her camera, and is so good about capturing the kids there.  Thanks ladies!

Filed under: My crazy life, Sophie, Violet on August 6th, 2010 | 1 Comment »