Halloween Festivities

Dylan's preschool halloween/pumpkin day party... enjoying juice with his best school friend, Preston (pronounced pWeston by Dylan).
Make and Take Halloween Party at Serena's house, complete with backyard trick-or-treating stations, a pumpkin cartoon projected in the backyard, and an eyeball pinata. Pretty fun stuff.
Mama and her little munchkins all dressed up and ready for candy! (Dylan is a racecar driver this year and Addie wore Dylan's pumpkin costume from when he was 16 months old).
San Diego Halloween weekend with family. Pumpkins behind the kids are the ones that Dylan and Ryan did together.
Who's this cute little pumpkin?

Trick or Treating in Ryan's aunt and uncle's neighborhood!


P.S. Today is the 5 year anniversary of when we found out we were pregnant with Dylan. Happy Conceiveiversary. No announcements like that this year for us.
But one of my best friends had her baby girl (baby #3) today. Welcome to the world, Taelyn!

Hoppy Easter

Took the kids to the Americana to meet the Easter Bunny. Dylan was all smiles and Addie was terrified of the big.bad.bunny.
It was pretty funny actually.







Addie on Easter morning before church. She got a special purse from the bunny and she loved it. But I think she still wouldn't be too keen on the bunny if she saw him just yet. Maybe next year.

My Valentines

I'm trying to focus my energy on what is important, what is positive.

This Valentine's Day I focused on the small gestures towards my family to remind them that I love them. It was a good day. A simple day filled with smiles. Just what we needed as a family.

Our Holidays at a Glance

Dylan and Addie enjoyed the holidays this year.
They met Santa at the Americana Mall, which was pretty impressive.



We spent two days at Disneyland with Ryan's family, complete with the Pixar Parade that knocked Dylan's socks off!



Then we went down to San Diego up through Christmas Day.
Dylan had fun waking everyone up on Christmas morning, opening presents, and giving Addie a present he made and wrapped by himself:



On the day after Christmas, we headed up to Lompoc to spend a week up at Briana's sister's house, where Dylan soaked up some time with his cousins and Addie popped out her second tooth.

Here's some footage of the cousins helping bring the presents into the livingroom for opening:

Happy Halloween

Addie's first Halloween...
Had a costume all ready for her, but never put her into it. It was just too hot for a fleece bunting peapod costume this year.
So she donned her brother's old pumpkin hat and just was as cute as a... well, a pumpkin!

Halloween Party

Last weekend we went to a halloween birthday party for Rowan (3) and Lila (1). There were about 90 people there and we had a lot of fun! Even Ariel came (hired by Ana and Thom for their daughters... what a treat!)

Thom, Anamara, and the birthday girls all dressed up as mermaids. Thom made a pretty good King Tritan!

Dylan (dalmation puppy) brought his girlfriend, Rowan, some daisies for her birthday.

I went as a bunny. I searched high and low all over town for a pink grass hula skirt to complete my ensemble. But there were none to be found. Next year I'm going as 'hula bunny' - so watch out world!

Ryan went as 'Joe Sixpack' which was just hilarious. I couldn't stop laughing on our way to the party in the car. Dylan just thought Ryan was going as a 'hairy man' with the mullet wig, which cracked me up.

Keira and Jacob were just too cute for words.

And here is Addie's nanny, Bonnie. She's from Alaska. Went as Sarah Palin with her husband as her 'moose'.

Happy Mother's Day

For Mother's Day this year, my sweet husband brought me a lovely bouquet of flowers, which was so big that I was able to separate it into two vases. Lilacs, Roses, Orchids, Lilies, to name a few. So many of my favorites. And the fragrance: Wonderful.

Tomorrow after church we are planning to go have a family picnic at the Huntington Gardens over by the Rose Garden or perhaps the Shakespeare Garden, which both are in full bloom right now. Dylan can play on the grassy hill and run around while Ryan and I rest on our blanket together, enjoying the perfect 75-degree-California-weather that is forecasted for tomorrow afternoon.

And on Monday, as a VERY special treat (for all of us, we've decided), we are having our house deep cleaned. We both are pretty tidy people, who like the house in order as much as possible, but things have been sliding a bit in the past few weeks and it drives us both nuts. I've been dreaming of how lovely it will be to have spotless bathrooms, kitchen, and bedrooms again - all at the same time.

Ryan, kudos to you for making this year a perfect Mother's Day!!! (and I think he's just as excited as I am about the house getting cleaned)

Note: Too bad my son is too young to understand how great a gift it would be for him to just take a daily nap (he's nearly given them up entirely and I find myself begging for just a few minutes off my feet each afternoon now - never mind the modified bed rest orders folks... how can you do that with a toddler, I ask?!?)

Update: Today was fabulous. We ended up having lunch after church with some friends, then over to the gardens where we took some family pictures and rested on a picnic blanket while the boys played. And as a bonus, we went out for some ice cream before heading home (Dylan had his first very-own cone!). And tonight Dylan ate his dinner nicely and went to bed at 7pm without too much of a fuss.
I'm one happy mama.

A Candy House

A few of Dylan's highlights from our Oregon trip:

-Dylan helping grandpa make a fire in the fireplace
-Driving the boat with grandpa
-Making a candy house with grandma (gingerbread house)
-Staring at the candy house, eating the candy house, talking about the candy house
-Bathtime in grandma's huge spa tub (ok, that was one of my favorites too!)
-Pluto and Mickey Mouse movies
-Walking in town by the boat docks
-Christmas morning!
-Cooking with grandma
-Sleeping in everyday until after 10:00 (ok, another of my favorites)
-Chasing grandma's kitties around the house
-Singing "Pop Goes The Weasel" in the car with grandparents (over and over and over and over again)

Happy New Years

This morning after watching the Rose Bowl Parade on TV, we showered up and headed up the street to see the floats in person. This year we didn't get as close as last year, which was a bit of a disappointment.
We did see the bands up close as they rounded the corner and gave their routine one last hurrah. My favorite was the Marine Corp band (made me proud to see them play), the South Dakota State University band (they were funny), and the Illinois band (very enthusiastic!)
Dylan enjoying a few minutes up on daddy's shoulders, checking out the floats.

Christmas in Oregon

We just returned from a 10 day trip up to the Oregon coast, where my parents live for part of the year since they've retired. Their log-cabin house is incredible and very comfortable, which made it not only hard to wake up each morning while we were there, but also very hard to leave yesterday.

This is the house - viewed from the lake on our boat-ride between rain storms (FYI, Oregon gets something like 70 inches of rain a year!)
Here we are on my parent's boat, snuggled up and enjoying the time outside!
Dylan loved "driving the boat" with his grandpa (who he calls his Tapa).
Dylan in front of the Christmas tree that my parent's got for us to have downstairs during our stay and wake up to on Christmas morning.
Time to open presents... Ready, set, go!
Lots and lots of presents.

Sidenote: When we arrived at LAX yesterday, we ran into the paparazzi at the baggage claim. Who were they looking for? None other than Larry Birkhead (the daddy of the late Anna Nicole Smith's baby). As I stood waiting for our bags, I chatted with the camera-man for TMZ who said that the celebrities actually tip the press off themselves to get publicity. Gotta love LA.

Christmas Cutie

A Christmas Visit

Last Saturday Ryan's parents came up for a visit and to celebrate Christmas together. Dylan enjoyed the plethora of gifts, his and ours, excited to open anything and everything.
His favorite gift: a Cars racetrack. If he could have taken it to bed with him, I'm sure he would.
Grandma brought me some cookie cutters, along with some sugar cookie dough and a variety of colored sprinkles.
For as many sprinkles those suckers had on them, they actually turned out pretty good. Dylan, of course, was very impressed with the product!

Deck the Halls!

We ventured out on a mission today as a family: Find a new tree. We found one. But only after 6 hours of wading through store upon store, trying to find what tree went with what box and what price tag.
We settled on this one at good 'ol Target. Love that place. I should have known better and not bothered with Home Depot, Walmart, and Kmart with the holiday shopping frenzy out there.
Dylan had fun in the stores, touching all the trees with us as we felt for one that wasn't too 'fake' feeling (he copies everything we do). And we found a couple little gifts to wrap and put under the new tree for him, which will be fun to add later tonight once it's 'trimmed'.
And he even went down for a nap without a fuss once promised that the "tree would be up and ready to decorate together" once he was up from his nap! He smiled and said, "ok, mommy!"

Drumroll

The past couple weeks we've been alright despite our lack of posts here on the blog. But we are back... and with news to share.

We are pregnant.

Yuppers. We had thought we'd wait to share the news with the world for a few more months, but as the morning sickness hit earlier than even before (last time around landing my tail in the hospital with hyperemesis for 4 days as soon as I rounded the 7 week mark), we decided we couldn't really hold it in any longer. So with the Thanksgiving holiday and recent travels to see family, we shared our news and now are excited to now share it here. So keep us in your prayers. All FOUR of us now!

I know the nausea is a sign of a healthy pregnancy and blah blah blah. But it still is nausea. And if you know me at all, you know how I dread nausea, especially the all-day kind. But I'm thankful for good friends and loving family. It's good to have that. And with the Thanksgiving holiday, I'm thankful for that more than ever.

Dylan gets excited when we talk about it, trying to wrap his little mind around the news himself, sharing it with others, proclaiming shyly: mommy. baby. tummy.
And there you have it.

p.s. Our friend, in knowing how I currently feel about food and just getting home from traveling this week, brought us some food for the next couple of days when we got home tonight. She's a good, good friend. We are blessed. So blessed.

Halloween

Grandma got him dressed up in Ryan's old clown costume from his toddler days as we finished up carving the pumpkin the night before.

Getting all lion-ed up for trick-o-treating time with mommy and daddy in the neighborhood. Grandma had some experience making a good lion face with makeup, so she was nominated to do the job (and did a good one at that!)


The little lion feeling coy with his costume on!


Coming down the stairs, pausing to giggle through the stair railings at daddy and mommy!
Heading out for some candy. He only had the energy for about 10 houses, but did pretty well.

And please note that this little man said his trick-or-treat line as "keepa feet" this year. But he sure had his little roar and thank you's down, making his mama proud!

Stop! Turkey time!

This week something got into me, making me want to explore Turkey-themed crafts with my little artist.

On Sunday I traced Dylan's handprints on some drawing paper and let him 'color' on them. Then I cut them out and pasted them on some bright green paper for contrast. Dylan was mighty proud of our creation.
Then tonight I got inspired to try out this little craft and recruited Ryan to cut out all our shapes and traced little footprints and handprints. It was quite a feat to actually glue the project together at the end, as Dylan was so excited about it that he kept crawling on me and making it near impossible to finish. But it turned out cute, if I do say so myself. And who would have thought a daycare/work day would end with a successful craft-time as a family.
Now all we need is some Fall weather to go with our fall crafts!

6 years ago today...

We have a tradition that we watch our wedding video each anniversary. That day would be TODAY. It seems almost unreal that it has been 6 years since Ryan and I were married. And tonight (like last year) we celebrated by going out for a nice dinner with just the two of us (only happens about once a year now, it seems) at Ruth's Chris. What a treat! I couldn't bring myself to initiate going out for such an extravagant dinner, so Ryan made the reservations for us. (good man, good man!)

Our friend Kathy stayed home with Dylan while we went out. It was a very productive evening for them, as they reportedly went out for a bike-ride (see picture) and ate a nice big dinner (good job Kathy!)

The two of them had so much fun, that she insisted that we go back out after we got home from dinner. So we changed our clothes, put on some walking shoes, and went out for a long walk, just the two of us. When we got home, we paused before coming inside, peeking in through the window at our friend and little boy snuggled on the couch, reading books and putting stickers on each other's foreheads. We stood outside there like flies on a wall, watching them for a few minutes, commenting to one another about how cute they were and how we were so thankful for our dear friend to love our son so much.

And later on, Dylan being in good form, decided he wanted to play dress-up with mommy's jewelry, which was quite the show.
(note the sticker on the forehead, bracelets on the ears for earrings, and necklace on his head as a headpiece!)

He was quite proud of himself.

Happy Mom's Day

For Mother's Day Ryan asked me what I would like to do. I thought about what would make the day special for me. Digging deep I realized what I really wanted was a simple day with my family. We ended up driving down to Mission Viejo to meet Ryan's grandparents and Aunt Nancy for a picnic at the park there. It was a beautiful afternoon and Dylan really enjoyed playing on the incredible playground there. Later, after a nice nap, we all took a long walk before dinner.
And it got even better as I opened up the freezer to find a lovely (and you'd understand the depth of this gift if you knew how much I adore ice cream) Baskin Robbins ice cream cake.
Yeah, that was a nice touch. Good job, Ryan.
We've been devouring that little cake since Sunday. It's nearly gone but I'm going to savor that last piece tomorrow after my workout.

Easter Traditions

Today is a special day. And yet it signifies so many different things to so many different people. Some see it as a day for consuming boatloads of candy, dyeing eggs, easter bunnies, petting zoos, feasting on good food with family, and egg hunts. I enjoy all that just as much as the guy next door, but I want our focus to be on commemorating the resurrection of Jesus after his crucifixion. Sure, the candy and egg coloring parties are fun and exciting, and I loved watching Dylan discover the "hidden" eggs on our bi-daily hunts this weekend in our living room for plastic eggs filled with pretzels and raisins (ok, and a few jelly beans, cause you gotta let the little guy have candy here once in a while!)
But what does Easter really mean?

In years past we loved the Easter Sunrise Service that our church in St. Louis held in Forest Park. It was cold, bitterly cold, but awesome to watch the sun rise over the park, with the choir behind us belting out Halleluia.
If the weather itself didn't raise the hair on your arms, the music sure did. It was incredible.

I want Dylan to grow up knowing the origin of the traditions we embrace each year as a family. What does it all mean and where do these fun, yet seemingly silly, traditions come from?

Here is what I found out and what we plan to instill as our own traditions in the coming years:

Easter Eggs: In Medieval Europe, eggs were forbidden during Lent. Eggs laid during that time were often boiled or otherwise preserved. Eggs were thus a mainstay of Easter meals, and a prized Easter gift for children and servants.
Orthodox Christians in the Middle East and in Greece painted eggs bright red to symbolize the blood of Christ.
This year we dyed and decorated Easter Eggs with our friends Ana and Rowen (and made cookies).

Easter Bunny: Hares and rabbits have long been symbols of fertility. The inclusion of the hare into Easter customs appears to have originated in Germany, where tales were told of an "Easter hare" who laid eggs for children to find.
Dylan got an Easter Basket from each of his grandmas, which he has throughly enjoyed (and to be honest, Ryan and I were just as excited because that meant we could raid his candy this year. Because a 21 month old doesn't need too much candy, right?)

Easter Parades: After their baptisms, early Christians wore white robes all through Easter week to indicate their new lives. Those had already been baptized wore new clothes instead to symbolize their sharing a new life with Christ.
In Medieval Europe, churchgoers would take a walk after Easter Mass, led by a crucifix or the Easter candle. Today these walks endure as Easter Parades. People show off their spring finery, including lovely bonnets decorated for spring.
I want us to have a family tradition of taking a post-dinner family Easter walk around our neighborhood. Walks are an important and much looked-forward part of our daily, evening routine, and I think it would be a nice variation of the "parade" tradition. This year it is overcast and rainy here, but we will do our best.

Reflecting on our Savior's gift:
For our sinful pleasure, HE GAVE THE FATHER HIS PAIN.
For our pride, HE GAVE THE FATHER HIS HUMILITY.
For our violence, anger, and rebellion, HE GAVE THE FATHER HIS GENTLENESS.
For all our wrongs, HE WAS WRONGED.
And yet He loved us. AND YET HE FORGAVE US.

And that, my friends, is the bottom line. He died, and rose again, giving us the gift of life.

Happy Easter!

Rose Bowl Parade

Happy New Year to everyone. This morning after watching the parade on tv, we gathered up the stroller and cameras and walked up the road to where the Rose Parade ended (yeah, it seriously ends just up the road from our place, which is pretty cool).

We found a loop-hole in security through the park fencing and were able to walk amongst the incoming floats and horses, take a handful of pictures, and listen to the last hurrah of the bands and floats as the parade came to an end. We even saw the characters from the Star Wars floats hanging out just next to us and one of the storm troopers in the first-aid booth.

All these years the floats looked pretty on tv, but they really were gorgeous in person. And the incredible smell of so many flowers was lovely (which you can't get from seeing them on tv).

This shows some of the incredible detail. Every inch was covered in some natural kind of leaf, petal, seed, you name it!

Couldn't resist taking some pictures of the underwater themed float from the "City of St. Louis!"

Later we found out that the security, etc. had assumed that we had local resident passes (which we actually didn't because our actual street wasn't blocked off) and so we freely had the chance to mingle before baracades and such were put along the edges of the floats for when the general paying public was admitted for viewing. Pretty neat stuff.