Family photos 2009 edition.

My sweet friend Heidi took these pics. She suggested a few locations, LACMA included. Is this not the perfect location? I am in luvre with the pillars and with Heidi! Thank you thank you! Check out the sidebar for more new pics.

3 kids in a tub!

So this is what we've been doing this week!! My little brother and his wife got to go on a much needed 7 day cruise and we got the Tagg-ster! :-) He's just a few months younger than Clare so it's been fun. But challenging at the same time - three is much harder than two! Don't they look happy? We love you Tagg. We'll miss you next week.

Worst mommy ever.

The other day I took Shea out to run some errands with me. Only in LA (ok, maybe not only, but especially in LA) does it take over 3 hours to go to 2 stores with a round trip of 9 miles. Agh. And I'd forgotten to take Shea to the bathroom before we left. So our last stop was Tommy's. (oh, Tommy's - delicious!) I got the parking spot right next to the glass of the restaurant and Shea wanted to stay in the car so I let him and would turn around and wave at him from 2 feet away as I stood in line waiting to order. He would wave back and smile and blow me a kiss. So I ordered and then went to talk to him while I waited for the food and when I opened the car door he was sobbing. He apparently really had to go to the bathroom and had had an accident, strapped in his seat in the locked car and unable to tell me! I felt so horrible!!!!! When we got home I told Chris what had happened and how terrible I felt. In the tub, Shea told Chris the story too - only he added the fact that his mommy, "used to be the nicest mommy in the world, but now she's the worst!"
Touche!

35 ??? !!!

Seriously? Is this possible? I can't believe I'm 35. I never imagined myself this old. Ugh!! I've been bugged about this birthday, until today that is. I got the most gorgeous flowers from Chris. The card said, "Happy Birthday, I love you. These are just the first of 35 gifts that will come over the course of the next few days. 35 doesn't sound so bad now does it?" Nope! I do think that 35 gifts might just get me through this birthday. :-) Can't wait to get my $70 gift card at Disneyland tomorrow, open some more cute, thoughtful gifts and then go to PF with my fam. Happy 35th to me! :-)

Rough Day

Her day started with what was apparently too many ounces of milk, as she lost them all over both of us a few minutes after breakfast.
Then she fell down when we were picking Shea up from preschool and got two majorly skinned knees, and then she got two shots to top it off.
Poor baby!! :-(
She was pretty proud of her 4 band-aids though and showed them off to everyone we saw today. I adore this little muffin, even on her roughest days.

The Peanuts Gang!!

Love, love, love this year's costumes. Thanks to daddy, as always, for the idea. Most adults could figure us out, but the kids kept asking me who I was. Apparently 'It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown' hasn't aired yet this year. :-)
The cutest Snoopy and Woodstock you ever did see, no?
I'll try to get some better photos of the kids' costumes this weekend. I love how they turned out, from the sides especially, you can really tell who they are. I liked how big and cartoonish my Lucy dress turned out and I love Chris' because I didn't have to do anything except draw on his forehead!! (Clare was kind of bothered by it though and Shea couldn't wait to wipey it off at the end of the night.) Overall, they were worth all the work and stress and we can't wait to wear them again this weekend. :-)
Happy Halloween!!!

Getting ready for Halloween

One of my favorite holidays. I love it!!! It's so fun to come up with costumes, make them and dress up and then of course, eat candy (lots of it.) What's not to love???!!!
So far we've made all our costumes (photos to come tomorrow!!) made fondant covered bat and jack-0-lantern cream cheese cupcakes, had a neighborhood party, painted pumpkins, had a ward party and dressed in our cute Halloween outfits numerous times. And we still have a whole week to go!!!
Yippee.

How many times????

Today Chris was messing around with Shea, you know that torturous daddy mix of wrestling, squishing, ticklingness?! Shea had fun for a while and then said, "Let me go dad! I want to go play." To which Chris replied, "What, the sky's gray?"
Shea: No, I want to go play.
Chris: You had a bad day?
Shea: No, I want to go play.
Chris: Your birthday's in May?
Shea: No, I want to go play.
Chris: Mom's in the way?
Shea: No, I want to go play.
Chris: I don't know if Kim has a sleigh.
Shea: No, I want to go play.
Chris: You like fish filets?
Shea: No, I want to go play.
And on and on and on....
I really think Chris did about 30 rhymes. Every single time, Shea said, No, I want to go play.
Finally Chris (totally out of rhymes) let him up and Shea gave him this completely exasperated look and said, "Geez, DAD! I want to go play. How many times do I have to say it??!!"
We tried to explain that he was being messed with, but he totally didn't get it and just really thinks his dad is hard of hearing. :-)

So delicious...

There's nothing more delicious than lying in your bed on a Sunday afternoon just burrowing in for a good long nap after a really, really hard week!!! And then to hear the daddy reading stories to the kiddies in the next room. Ah!! Heaven!!

Team Puck??

Puck was so nasty in the first few episodes - but I totally forgot that I hated him when he sang "Sweet Caroline" last night. Oh my gosh. He's really quite the little hotty and he (if it was really him singing???) sounded awesome. LOVED IT!!!!!!!!

College begins...

They sent this home from Back to School night at Shea's preschool.

Seriously? I was dying!! Okay, I guess there will be no skipping homework for us!! :-)

Bangs!!!

I love them. She looks so much older. And I'm having so much fun doing cute things with her hair and swooping little bangs to the side. Now if only they were straight. :-)

One down!!

I'm making 3 Halloween costumes this year. I love, love, love doing big, fancy birthday cakes and homemade Halloween costumes for my kids every year. Last year I didn't make our costumes, it was too busy and I had to give it up and buy them - but I was soo bummed about it. So this year I was determined to do them. And I'm sooooo soooo excited. Shea's came out PERFECTLY! I can't wait for him to see it in the morning. I was so close to waking him up just now at 11:15 to see it. I resisted, barely.
This year's project is bigger than I've ever done before. I've never done three from scratch for one year. Luckily Chris' costume is just shorts and a tee-shirt. I don't think I could do 4, or at least not while starting one week before the first Halloween party!
Here's the mess after Shea's was done tonight. So I have a ton left to do this week, but at least there's one down!!! Check back for pics of the final projects soon!! :-)

Very serious!!

I can't remember what I was telling Shea the other day, but I was very, very serious. (Maybe it was about, looking both ways before crossing the street, not talking to strangers, or eating all mom's tootsie rolls. I can't remember. Anyway...) So I vaguely recall saying, "... and mister, I am dead serious about that!!!" To which he replied, "What does that mean?" I said that it means that I am very, very serious about this. End of story.
Until later that day when he wanted to go outside right that minute and he looked at me with a very serious face and said "Mom, I want to go out right now, and I am TED SERIOUS!"
I wanted to scold for talking like that to his mom, but I couldn't stop laughing. So now, he's Ted serious about everything!!

My favorite time of day.

I really hate the hours of 5-7 pm. I'm trying to make dinner, keep Clare happy (who is at her worst at this time), get Shea to do his homework (ugh!), eat dinner, read scriptures, do baths, pick up the house, do dishes, get ready to start work etc. etc. etc. It makes me CRAZY. (To be fair, Chris is usually home and always helps with some of it, but it still is so stressful!) I try to not loose it, to be patient and kind but I'm not those things very often between 5 and 7.
So I get through those 2 hours, and finally my kids are in bed and I'm happily (read quietly!) ensconced in front of my TV working away. After a few hours of TV and work time, I'm so happy to go in and check on my babies before I go to bed. They are so sweet and so cute and smell so good and are so warm and cuddly. I love those moments where all the stress and hurry and frustration of the day have melted away and all I can think about are how wonderful they are and how very, very much I love them. So on that note, off I go to kiss and snuggle my babes.

Glee

Makes me happy.
Other Glee lovers out there???
I was worried after episode 2, but since then it just gets better and better!!!
Can't wait for Wednesday!

Self portraits

Shea asked to play some games on my iPhone the other day. When I finally got my phone back there were 54! pictures of this:






I didn't include the 13 photos of assorted living room furniture or the 22 photos of his lovies or the extremely unflattering shots of me at the grocery store?? (How did he take those without me noticing?) I think he has a new favorite hobby!!

Phones in Heaven???

I put Shea down for a nap at noon today. At 1:30 he still wasn't asleep so I went in to see why he was still awake. This is what I discovered:

Mom: Why are you awake buddy?

Shea: Look mom, I have a bug bite, and it was hurting and so I said a prayer and it stopped hurting! But then I couldn't sleep, so I said another prayer. It didn't work, so I said another one. That one didn't work either, but then Heavenly Father sent you in here to help me fall asleep. .... So Heavenly Father did hear my prayer! (very excited!)

Mom: Heavenly Father always hears your prayers Shea, and he will always answer your prayers! I'm so glad you said a prayer today buddy, that makes me so happy. (etc. etc. etc.) :-)

Shea: (almost asleep) Mom, can Heavenly Father hear my prayers even when he's talking on the phone??

:-)
(Come on, I'm not on the phone that much!!)

If only...

This morning Shea watched me do an On Demand workout. After a while he joined in and we had a ton of fun together. He asked me why we were doing it, so I pointed out the women's nice, flat bellies. "That's why, bud, mommy wants one of those!" :-) And I explained that working out and eating healthy foods is how. So we finished the workout and I bent down to take off my shoes and he goes, "Mom!!! It didn't work! You're still round!"

Well, at least he didn't say fat. *Sigh* If only one 30 minute workout did it! :-)

Family Summer Fun

We loved, loved, loved having our daddy home this summer. I think Chris and I have made our peace with not making a ton of money when we're done with all this school - for me it's because my babies will have their daddy home all summer, at every school break and after school every day. I'm looking forward to hanging out like this every summer!

We went to Sea World for two days:

We went to the beach:

We went to Disneyland:


And we discovered a cream puff store -a whole entire store just for delicious, fresh, cream puffs! An entire store. Just down the street. It's a dang good thing that we just discovered it now and not 2 years ago or I'd have even more weight to loose.
We all enjoyed them immensely!!:

Pre-school!

He has been asking the entire summer if it's time to go to Clover yet. Well bud, it's time!
And he LOVES it! When something is extra delicious, he calls in de-yumster, and he came out of his classroom on Wed and said it was de-funster! And then asked if he could go every single day. Well, yes, my sweet, you sure can. :-) I'm so glad he loves school, and hope it lasts a long time, since he's got, oh, 20 or so years ahead of him still.
It was hard for me - a real elementary school is much different than a neighborhood co-op where I'm the teacher half the time! I definitely had tears in my eyes, but Chris forbade me from shedding them in front of him and by the time we got home where I could have a good cry, it had passed. Now we're just happy for him. Yeah for pre-school. (He even loves his homework!)

Sharing a chocolate milkshake!

Delicious!!

Sexy bugs

This is the first thing Shea said to me when I had dragged myself out of bed this morning:
S - "Mom, we really need to get some bug spray today."
M - "Why buddy?"
S - "Because the bugs are going to be really sexy outside!"

I told him that I was pretty sure that's not what he meant to say and asked him where he heard that. He said that Handy Manny was going on a camp out yesterday and he forgot the bug spray so he went to Kelly's and Kelly gave him some bug spray because the bugs were going to be sexy.

I guess I'm going to have to look up that episode and figure out how bugs are sexy (since I'm sure he didn't mean, as in the above photo) and I'm definitely going to have to figure out how to get him to stop saying sexy!!!

Sick and bored...

Poor Shea is sick today and just lying on the couch watching TV. Though sick, he's still as funny a kid as usual. I was in the other room working when he yelled, "Dad, dad, you've got to come see this!!!" I went in expecting to see a toy commercial, but this is what had him so excited. He went on about how, "It uses every drop, so none gets wasted!" That's my Shea.

Naughty!

I guess the wall is my fault. I wrote her name and the date on the wall where I'd marked her 18 month height. Stupidly, I didn't wait until she wasn't watching. I didn't think anything about it.
I turned my back and found her addition to my wall...
I guess I just need to consider myself lucky that this is the first time my walls have ever been colored on!! How did I know it would be Clare?? :-)
Not even 4 hours later she found where I kept the markers, and made herself "pretty." She loves to watch mommy put on her makeup and LOVES when I let her put on "lips." So hey, the marker was pink. She was sooo happy about this. She thought she looked just lovely! :-)

His newest look.

18 months

Sassy!
At 18 months Clare is a petite little thing. She is 30 inches tall (7th percentile) and 20 pounds (3rd percentile). But she packs enough sass for a child 5 times that big. :-) She also has a monster appetite and out eats Shea at every meal so we'll see how long this petite thing lasts. Although she is sassy and definitely knows what she wants and doesn't want, she is so much fun right now. She follows "SheaShea" as she calls him, around and tries to do everything he does. One of my favorite sights is to see him holding her little hand and walking along with her. My hands are always full of stuff from the car to the house, so he "protects" her and holds her hand while they're walking. I love it!
She talks a lot! She parrots pretty much everything we say and even said her first prayer the other night by just repeating what I said. It was too cute.
She carries her teddy around all the time and will lay the blanket down, wrap the teddy up, tell us all to shh, shh, rock her for a minute and then do it all over again.
She can also be found with a phone in her hand pretty much any moment of the day, carrying on the sweetest little jibberish conversations with "Bampa."
She weaned herself this past week. We were down to only one feeding right before she went to bed and we had a few weird, out of routine nights and all the sudden I realized that it had been 3 days since she'd nursed at all and boom, that was that, she was done. I was sad that I didn't get to savor that last sweet tender cuddle but happy that I now get to sleep through the night!
So that's our girl right now. You never know if you'll get screaming, time out, hating sassy pants or sweet, singing & dancing chatter box. Either way, she's an adventure and I wouldn't trade her for anything in the world!!

Sweet

Her first french braid!!