Octoberween

This month was super fun and festive.  My mom came into town and we took a trip to the pumpkin patch… ya know, like ya do.

We got super gooey and carved up some punkins.

I helped the kids carve, as to not let small children play with knives and such.  Carmen says mr. star eyes here was “super scary!”.

And Moseley’s pumpkin was just a fancy gentleman.

We made the typical holiday sugar cookies for halloween and Carmen took some to her school for the harvest festival.  Apparently they were one of the very few homemade items there.  Kinda sad that nobody bakes anymore.  I really love it.

Then for the big day the kids donned their alice and mad hatter costumes and got ready to go to the trunk or treat.  But not before a little tea party/photo shoot.

Just half a cup if you don’t mind…

Mose was so unbelievably stoked that he got his own cotton candy at the trunk or treat.  And despite the no lighting situation, I love this next picture because of the look on Moseley’s face.

My husband got really amped this year about decorating the trunk… which was nice.  He doesn’t usually give a care about holiday festivities or things like that.  He even got Nightmare Before Christmas going on the dvd player, and won a trophy for best trunk decor (Thanks Tami ;)).

Unfortunately said super cool decorations drained our car battery, and we had to get a jump from the Dobrons.

Later we set out to trick or treat the neighborhood.  Moseley was stoked about the candy, that is until someone jumped out and scared the daylights out of the poor little guy.  I have never heard him scream/cry in fear like that before.  It really tore me up.  I am still totally bummed it happened, although he seems to be over it.  It traumatized me so much I didn’t even get an instagram of his face. ;)

After that Mose was pretty much over it, and just wanted to go home.  Luckily we had already obtained quite a large amount of loot…

Which is making me fatter and fatter every second, one fun sized kit kat at a time.

Picture dump!

Since most of it is old news, there’s no time for a blog post for each of these.  So you get a major photo dump, just so I never forget this stuff. Yay!

Easter 2012

Girls Camp

Beach Camping in Ventura.The San Diego County Fair

Disneyland

New iPhone 5

Many, many summer beach days

Made some pillowsTried to get creative with the school lunches in an effort to feed my kids more healthily. 

 The baby bump at 19 weeks
And last but not least some shots of my majorly adorable boy.His horn can touch the sky.Hawk
The end.

Chicago

I just got home from a week long trip to Chicago, it was really cool. Probably a once in a lifetime kind of trip. My husband decided to he wanted to go experience the Ryder Cup (golf), and didn’t want to leave the wife behind. So he made the trip super extravagant to make me want to go on a golf trip with him. It was really nice. We flew into Chicago and immediately drove to Kohler Wisconsin, 2 and a half hours away. I have this sciatic nerve that starts in my back and goes all the way down my right leg. After a full day of travel that nerve was an angry dude. I was in pretty serious pain (it’s always worse when I’m pregnant). Once we got there though it was fun to just sleep in, do my fingernails, watch all the new fall shows on my laptop, and just relax. Plus I got to just hang with my husband which is always fun. We went to the Kohler Design Center, which basically had every bathroom fixture you could ever imagine… it may sound lame, but it wasn’t.  It was awesome.(I wouldn’t mind having a prairie flowers of the mid-west pedestal sink somewhere in my house someday)  (antique toilet in the history museum)

We even got the guys to do Zumba with us, which was awesome.  I was so glad they were in there for comic relief, because the class was painfully slow with no good music.

At night we went to fancy restaurants and tried crazy food creations. Fancy places aren’t really my style, but it was still fun to try new stuff. We went back to Chicago on thursday and got to stay in trump tower, which was so nice… I kind of can’t believe I got to stay there. (It’s the shiny one)

I saw R Kelly walking out one night which was cool, I couldn’t remember his name until I was inside though… so I couldn’t ask him for a pic. Plus he looked pretty scary, so I don’t know that i’d have dared anyway. The Chicago I’d had in my mind was pretty different than what the reality was. It felt like we were in new york city (now, I just need to go to new york to see if that city in my mind is anything like the real thing), everyone wore black business type clothes… so me and Autumn looked pretty out of place in our bright colored jeans and flip flops. West coast style is pretty far from Chicago, which is interesting.

We also went to blue man group one night.  It was gross, and cool, and funny. 

I wish we’d had a few more days to check out the city, but instead we spent a few days at the Ryder cup which was also fun. I got to see all the famous golfers up close (Tiger, Phil, Rory, Sergio, Bubba, etc) but we also got to see George W Bush, and Lee said Russell Crow was 2 people behind him in the line for the bathroom. Someone said “gladiator!” to him and he said hello to them in some sort of Australian accent. Plus the excitement of the tournament was just so cool to see in person. So much people watching to do. Crazy costumes from both americans and europeans. I wish I hadn’t been pregnant and always cranky (read hungry), and would have taken more pics of the outfits people were wearing. Kilts, morphsuits, american and british flag suits,  a whole group of Minnesota Vikings, and even a group of waldos. It was awesome. One thing that was not awesome… Cigars. What is the matter with people who smoke those things? They smell horrid, and the smell blankets the whole freaking golf course. I just feel like if there are 50,000 people around you, maybe not light up a cigar, just out of class? Nope, they did not care.
It was a really fun experience though and I’m glad I got to have a whole week to just spend with my husband. It made me miss my kids so much, and It really made me appreciate the time I get to spend with them every day. I really take for granted how cool it is to just hang with awesome little people all the time, and this made me realize that. I would so look forward to facetimeing with them, and have to say that technology these days is pretty freaking awesome. Those kids are so rad, and to be across the country and still be able to see their adorable faces for a few minutes was just amazing.

I hope this wont be the last post of 2012… but I make no promises. :)

so…

Since the invention of instagram I have  almost given up on this whole blog thing, but I look back through it and am always so glad I have done what I’ve done so far, so maybe if I do a recap post of the last year… I won’t feel so overwhelmed when thinking of doing a post.  yeah.  That’ll work.
Since I posted last in march a lot has happened.  I had another miscarriage right after our Hawaii trip, so that kind of sent me into a tailspin, being that the dr had no idea what the problem was (it was the second one in a year). I jumped into my Zumba class full force and got my measly little class of 3 to grow to maximum capacity of about 25 Zumba Divas.  It was amazing and magical.  I can’t describe what it’s like to get up in front of a group and just leave it all on the floor, but it’s life changing.  I loved those ladies for their energy and inspiration.

At the end of June the YMCA closed it’s doors and my Zumba class ended.  I had only found out a few weeks before that I was actually pregnant again (for the 3rd time in a row).  The new gym that was supposed to give me my class back never opened, and it was actually a blessing disguised as a bummer.  I don’t think I would have had the guts to walk away from that class on my own… because it was that amazing.  However my doctor has told me I am not allowed to do any exercise that jolts my body, including jumping or running.  I was also feeling really sick all the time.  I worry that I could have unintentionally done harm to the baby, by not letting myself quit Zumba.  The ending of that class made my choice for me.   I have been wanting to have another baby for so long, it was really the best thing to happen.  It forces me to slow down and just grow a person.  I  miss teaching a lot though… and will do it again after the baby is born.

I am happy to say that I am 21 weeks along, and so far it looks like I’ll be having another baby girl at the beginning of February (apparently the only month I’m allowed to have babies).  I am super happy to have the barfy morning sickness behind me also. To not be worshiping the porcelain gods anymore just makes me feel so much better. Although, I get big so fast, that my hips are already starting to ache at night… dang it.  I’ll all be worth it though, the second I get to hold that wriggly baby and wrap her up into a little muslin burrito.  Excited!

My kids are growing up so fast!  Carmen started 1st grade this year.

Moseley started 3 day a week preschool.

I can’t get over how cool it is to watch your kids transform from babies to toddlers, then onto full fledged kids.  It doesn’t get old.  In fact sometimes I wish I could slow it down.  Carmen is getting smarter and more beautiful by the day.  Moseley has a really good grasp on the english language now and is always saying or singing something that makes us smile.

Lastly, I went on our girls trip a few weeks ago with a few of my friends. We went to Newport beach. We shopped, ate good food, stayed up way too late and slept half the day, went to the beach, took forever to get ready… so we all looked perfect. It was really nice.  I feel lucky to have such close friends here for me when my family is so far away.

And that’s it… practically a year in a nutshell.  Next I will post about my Chicago trip.  My internet and my washing machine are both on the fritz until thursday… so I might just be able to get it done. :)

to commit to memory

Moseley is getting to that funny stage… where he is old enough to talk, but not too old not to be hilarious all the time.  He doesn’t get regular naps because carmen’s kindergarten pick-up schedule is ruining my life (not really, but it is so annoying to have early pick-up day on wednesday).  Anyway he still gets tired enough every few days to need a little nap so he has found this spot on the couch that is his favorite.  If I ever can’t find him, and I am thinking he’s got to be getting into trouble because it’s too quiet in here, it’s not because he is trashing the house like Carmen would have been at that age, it’s because he’s burrowed down in the soft cushions and is taking a little siesta.

The other day he was eating fruit salad out of a tupperware and he says “I LIKE  kewets (carrots)!”  Hmmm… I think he was talking about the kiwi but he does like carrots, even if he wasn’t near any at the time.   Once in Hawaii, he came and climbed up to the kitchen bar and says to me “I want bacon and eggs, mom”.  It was so random, being that it was dinner time and there was spaghetti being cooked right in front of him, it really cracked me up.  I gotta say though, I do appreciate a man that knows exactly what he wants. :)

While flying home from hawaii, we must have signed up for the freak show plane ride from Kauai to Oahu, because there were many interesting characters.  Carmen was leading the way down the isle when she came across an older asian gentleman who was continuously smacking himself in the back of the head with his hand.  Carmen looks over at him like he was from mars (to be honest I was too,  what the heck is wrong with that guy).  Then not two rows past that there was a grizzled old cowboy with one eye.  And no he did not have an eye patch on  just a gruesome skin patch where his eye should have been.  Carmen takes one look at that and immediately grabs her eye in horror.  He just says “Move along, little girl” to her, and we proceeded to our seat.  Later she was asking us about it.  We explained that it is not polite to stare and point out people’s imperfections, which was why the man had talked to her at all.  She is such a tender hearted sweet girl, she got so embarrassed that she had done that, that it made her cry.  We obviously told her it was ok and to be fair,  I can’t say I blame her for reacting.  I mean what kind of cheap tickets did we buy to end up on the plane with these crazies?  Ha ha ha (I really am joking)

In our bed at home we have pillows that we sleep on, and then we have a bunch of other pillows to pile on top to look pretty and fluffy (you know, like we girls do), and those only get used if we are reading in bed.  The other day we were just shutting off the light and this is the time when we throw all those other pillows off and snuggle down into bed all sleepy.  On this particular night I hear Lee chuck a pillow across the room and hit the far wall, which was followed by “awwwwe man, that was MY pillow.”  all pitiful sounding.  I was laughing so hard, maybe it was just because I was so tired, but it still makes me laugh to think about it.

(I know I already posted this picture, but it deserves a little more play because my husband is so cute.)

kauai

 

We had a really great time in Kauai last week.  My favorite part would have to be the shave ice, I am a little obsessed and we ate them every day.  We also got to lay on many white sand beaches.  I love the sand in Hawaii.  Here the sand is black and dirty and pretty much cannot be shaken off ever.  In Hawaii it is like the texture of graham cracker crumbs and just falls right off of everything.  Makes you almost want to take a big bite… almost. ;) Kauai is so green and beautiful.  I loved the scenery and every time I would get an awesome view, I would just think “It would be impossible to stay mad in a place like this”.

There were so many chickens and roosters, that love to come cock-a-doodle-do right outside your window in the middle of the night.  Luckily you get used to it after a few nights.  But they were like pigeons or something, just everywhere.

I got a bad bout of bronchitis that wiped out my voice for most of the week, which made it hard to catch up with old friends when your voice sounds like a 60 year old smoker with emphysema.  Luckily all I had to do was lay on beaches, because I would have had a hard time teaching a zumba class like that.  I had a great time catching up with our college friends.  Kat and Mikey let us stay at their huge beautiful home, and it was really awesome.

It rains every day in Kauai, but we still got plenty of sun.  And don’t think I left Hawaii without getting a spam, egg, and Portuguese sausage breakfast.  Apparently my kids “do not like SPAN!”  Ha ha, can’t say I blame them.  That stuff has a weird texture.

One day we took a nice long bike ride up this trail along the beach to this beautiful secluded beach called Donkey beach.  The guys went nuts trying to do tricks of the sand shelf that had formed, and it was hilarious to watch.  Carmen couldn’t quite make it back to town on her bike, so her loving daddy put her on his handlebars and carried her bike as he rode, all the way back to the bike rental shop.  He is the best.  Speaking of him being the best… Have I mentioned lately how awesome my husband is?  He is.  He would wake up early to get the kids breakfast so I could bask in bed reading and sleeping while the sea air wafted in my widows?  He also would also take the kids down the beach and play with them while I sunbathed.  He would put them to bed at night.  He would find me shave ice whenever I needed it.  I just love that guy.  How did I get so lucky?

Sorry my pics aren’t synced up with my story, but man that would just take way more effort than I am willing to put in.

 

sleep sacks

To try out my new serger I found this tutorial on pinterest…

Source: thismamamakesstuff.com via Niki on Pinterest

and had to make a bunch as baby gifts.  They are all made out of vintage T shirts.  I went a little crazy, and still have a few more I want to make,  but I don’t have THAT many friends having boys.  So, yeah, if you get some of these from me in the future when you get pregnant with a boy… act surprised. ;)

birthdays

Moseley turned 3 on the 24th of February.

He got a mario bros cake.

This little bandit opened a bunch of his presents while no one was looking… and he wore the wrong shirt to bed, since that day was, in fact, his birthday.

 

Carmen turned 6 on the 26th.

Carmen was the star of the day at school, since her birthday was coming that weekend.  She handed out squinkies to all of her friends.  She was very excited about her alice and wonderland cake.

 

This vid is not super exciting, but the kids had fun bursting out of their rooms in the morning.

 

valentine

I found this idea on pinterest, of course.  Valentine’s day was so fun back in elementary when everyone exchanged valentines.  I think its even more fun making home made valentines for Carmen’s class.

lemons

We have these two lemon trees in the back yard.  They are magic.  One that has been bearing fruit since we moved in… which makes pink lemons, and a baby tree that up until just recently hadn’t born any fruit.  We finally picked a yellow lemon off of it today and cut it open and wouldn’t you know it… Green lemons!

For reference… here are our magic pink and green lemons next to a run o’ the mill costco lemon. :)

See I told ya… magic.

Ok, so the pink may just be a grapefruit hybrid, and the green is probably some sort of lime hybrid, but that still seems pretty magic to me.