last day of may

I made it!  Now you probably won't hear from me for about a month. 

"Mommy, come look in my bed.  There's a jungle gym in here!" 

23 months

In only three weeks my baby boy will be 24 months, two years old! It feels like this was yesterday and this was the week before that.  Even though I miss my little baby and my baby belly I love my big boy even more.  He loves his mama more than anything and I cherish it.  Soon he will no longer hang from my leg and beg for me to hold him.  He is sweet and silly, and loves to be the center of attention.  "Mommy I did it" and "Watch this" are phrases I hear several times a day.  He is brave but cautious and is always on the lookout for new things to explore get into.  He loves to sing and dance and can almost sing the ABC's and count to 10, sometimes.  He says his name is Dackie Densin but still calls himself Bate(Blake his bff) in a video or picture.  At bedtime he asks me to sing the baby boy song, one I made up when he was still in my belly, and he sings along. 

To the tune of You Are My Sunshine

You are my Jack Jack, my little sugar sack
You are my baby, my baby boy
You know I love you, and I adore you
You're my Jack Jack, my little baby boy.

file under blackmail material and major cuteness!

I love coming home to this in my bed.  

first + last

Today was Ava's last day of preschool.  Even though she's only moving on to pre-k I still managed to well up with tears.  Sappy poems, saying goodbye to friends and a preschool where we have spent the last four years.  Just look how much she's grown...

Happy graduation to my Ava bug and happy birthday to Grammy!

It's been a long couple of days. I will return tomorrow. xo 

ten on tuesday

1.  I've been looking forward to summer all year and after Friday we are all officially on summer vacation!  Ava graduates preschool Thursday and has a party on Friday.   She's headed to pre k next year :)

2. Lily started swim team this week.  So far so good.  First meet is next week.

3. Scott just flushed another fish down the toilet.  These little sucker are hard to keep up with.  The current fishies have lasted the longest but we had some bad luck for a while.  Any suggestions on good fish would be appreciated.

4.  Yesterday Ava informed me that she wants to be a cowgirl when she grows up!  I love it!

5.  Jack is now saying "Ava" and "Lily" instead of "Ada" and "Yiye".  I'm gonna miss that baby talk.

6.  I booked a session for our family photos!  I am excited and a little nervous at the same time.  It's been four years since I hired a photographer and I'm a little camera shy now that I'm always behind the lens.  But I can't wait!!!

7.  I took all three kids to the salon to get their hair cut today.  Jack does not belong in a salon.  He is a crazy almost two year old.  He loves to get his hair cut however.  It's like he's in a trance.  He sits very still and acts as if he's going to fall asleep. 

8.  I have not been swimming in almost two weeks.  I miss it.  I crave it.  I will swim next week.

9.  Lily is a Brownie!  After two years as a Daisy, she has bridged over to a Brownie.  Her troop had an awesome luau last weekend to celebrate. 

10.  I love my iPhone.  I love that can make calls, text, blog, surf the web, email, map directions instantly, check the weather, listen to music, track my running, read the news, find restaurants in my current location, occupy my children with games, reserve a redbox movie, order Chipolte, see wait times for my favorite rides at Disneyland, but my favorite thing about my iPhone is the camera. Documenting just a little bit each day.

first and last

Friday was Lily's last day of first grade.  I have a second grader now!  Every year seems to go buy quicker than previous, and this year was no exception.  I think we missed out on a few months somewhere.  She is a bright, creative and talented girl.  We are proud :)  I love to capture these first and last days of school.  Look how she's grown....

12 weeks of summer

Well, I'm still up so it still Sunday right?  I couldn't wait any longer, I had four hours of Grey's Anatomy to get through. Worth. Every. Hour. Grey's does not disappoint!  A nail biter for sure. 

It's Ava's last week of preschool but Lily is officially on summer vacation!  Woo hoo!  So today we sat down and made our lists for our summer photo challenge.  The idea is photograph 12 completely random subject, one each week.  I'm excited to get the creative juices flowing.  We each came up with our own list but I was quite surprised how similar a few are.  This should be fun :)  Tomorrow we will finish up our summer activity calender.  Send fun ideas this way!

Ava
1. Castle
2. Chair
3. Flower
4. Backpack
5. Map
6. Notebook
7. Purple
8. Lights
9. Doggy
10. Calendar
11. Picture
12. Hat

Lily
1. Pink
2. Watermelon
3. Cart
4. Table
5. Cupcake
6. Caring
7. Flower
8. Picture
9. TV
10. Bear
11. Door
12. Bread

Mommy
1. Pink
2. Boys
3. Water
4. Bubbles
5. Berries
6. Music
7. Hands
8. Love
9. Girls
10. Book
11. Hot
12. Green

almost...

I almost did it....20 straight days of blogging, then yesterday, I forgot!  It's been a crazy week, next week will be the same.  May is just crazy busy, but I love it. 

So look who made the headlines again.  This is the cover of the Chandler section of the AZ Republic.  We are proud of our daddy!

Read the article here:  Chandler firefighters teach teen about being a paramedic

Burning the midnight oil....will blog tomorrow :)

Look what Lily brought home. A beautiful canvas of nyc and the twin towers. This is her third canvas from art class and I believe it's now my favorite. 

ten on tuesday

1. I am busy this week.  Putting together the slideshow for Lily's class, working, parties.  Its' a crazy week!

2.  A phrase Jacks been saying "I like it!"   Adorable!

3.  Ava had crazy hair day Monday. She wanted braids and hair paint.  Tomorrow is backwards day and Friday is water day.  She's been waiting all year for this!

4.  I'm keeping this for future blackmail material.  He gets dressed up by his sister all the time :)

5. Jack will be 23 months tomorrow...really?

6. Ava went to bed tonight, once!  This is a bid deal.  She is our little night owl.  After everyone else is sleeping she usually appears 2 to 20 times with some comment or request.  Ahhhhh......

7.  I posted this link a while back on facebook.  They have an app for my iPhone, quite convenient while shopping.  Today I came across this.  Yuck!

8. Related to the above links...have you seen this or this?  Good stuff.

9. 18 days of  blogging!  Woo hoo!

10. Random weekly iPhone photos. 

 

field day

Do you remember field day when you where in school.  It was an exciting event.  I loved the gigantic ball we would race pushing down the field.  It was like three times our size.  The mile run was my least favorite.  It was much different for Lily, more games less track and field, but they had a blast!  By far the favorite event of all was the good old tug of war! Lily class one their first round but were defeated in the final.  The championship team had some big kids!

Check out this hot daddy! Today he raced. 

Today I had tea with beautiful friends to celebrate expecting arrival of a beautiful baby boy. 

Ava with the iPhone. I love how she captures all my pieces. I have never seen my ear from that perspective :)

my distraction

When I began blogging four years ago it was all pretty new. I followed a few scrapbooking blogs, a few photographers blogs and a few mommy blogs. Then the blogging world grew. I followed my family and friends who started blogs (yay!), photographers for inspiration, cooking and design blogs....my favorite list kept growing and growing. I was a lot to keep up with. Then I discovered google reader. It changed everything about my little blogging world. I didn't have to visit each blog individually. I can subscribe and each new post comes to my feed. I love it. What a time saver. Now for a while my reader got a little out of control...hundreds of subscriptions. Who has time for that? Over the past couple years I have narrowed my reader back to only my favorites, although a new favorite pops up every once in a while. I can even view my reader from my iPhone. Now my distraction has become quite convenient.

So if you don't subscribe to google reader or some other feed what are you waiting for?
Maybe I'll put together a list of my favorite blogs for a future post :)

behind the lens

I'm always behind the lens.  So just to prove i was here.....

ten on tuesday

1. I love power yoga! I have always enjoyed a little yoga in my workouts but in January I started taking power yoga. This is not yoga for sissies! Your resting pose is down dog, no child pose here. We do inversion…headstands, hand stands, and pigeon pose on the wall. It’s fantastic. My upper body is stronger than it’s ever been. One thing I love about the class is the instructor inspirational lessons. Yesterday she spoke about expectations in others. How she would often get disappointed or angry with others based on her expectations or realities. Living within her realities and not judging people for their own was something she was working on. It was a good lesson for me. I am sometimes critical of others based on my own expectations. Something I hope to let go of a little.

2. Ava wants to be a kangaroo when she grows up. I forgot to blog this last year but don’t want to forget. She no longer wants to be a kangaroo….she doesn’t want to grow up!

3. My son has become impossible to photograph. If he sees ant type of camera he reaches for it and says “see it, mama see it.” It’s driving me crazy! I am missing all those candid moments because he is obsessed with looking at the lcd. I sure hope this phase passes quickly.

4. I am a taxi mom. I drive one big girl to school five days a week. I drive one little girl to school three days a week. I drive one little boy to the gym three to five days a week. I pick up both girls from school. I drive one to swim 4 days a week, one to ballet, one to tball, play dates, birthday parties, running errands, etc… there are some days when I don’t leave the car until the sun in down. Here’s a little peek over my shoulder of the morning drop off. These kids crack me up!



5. We are officially all forward facing in the car. After Jacks little barforamma we had to play some musical chairs. He ended up in his sister’s seat for the week while his was decontaminated. When his seat was installed it went in forward. It was time. He was ready, he is strong, and almost two. Look here for car seat recommendations and please make sure yours is installed by a professional like Scott! Most car seats are not installed or used properly.

6. Saturday was Scott's half birthday. Honestly, I didn’t remember until today but Saturday was crazy! Happy half birthday daddy…you’re catching up to me!

7. We’ve reached an important milestone here…..Jack will watch an entire movie! {insert sigh of relief here} After months of running around after this busy little toddler I can finally clean the toilet, or make dinner, or sit on the couch and cuddle. This is big! Lily watched just about anything at a very early age. Ava was about 20 months before she became obsessed with Curious George. Jack has had a short attention span for any TV. He would watch Elmo for about 5 minutes. But last week he took me over to the DVDs and asked for “memunks” or Alvin and the Chipmunks the Squeakquel! He sat and watched the whole movie! Now he walks around the house screaming “Aaaaaalviiiiiin!” It’s hilarious!

8. I’ve been shining my sink  for four months now. It feels great. I’ve made some good habits that somehow got lost in the busyness of daily life. I’m continuing to add more and plan to really stick to it and declutter this summer. So far I get up and make my bed, get dressed (no shoes), throw a load for laundry in the wash, make breakfast, empty the dishwasher (at lunch if we’re short on time), hit my hot spot, fold laundry and put away before the end of the day, fill dishwasher throughout the day, start it every night, shine my sink. A few things I’m working on making more consistent…hitting my hot spots throughout the day, laying out everyone’s clothes at bedtime, checking my calendar every morning and night.

9. Do shop at www.etsy.com ? I do find some things that I just can’t pass up but mostly I love to look at the creativity out there. A couple of my friends have darling little shops you must stop by!

http://www.etsy.com/shop/lullabylofthttp://www.etsy.com/shop/shirkdesigns

10. It’s been 4 years since I started this blog. Look how far we’ve come….

random

More random iPhone photos from last week.  Can you believe I've taken 589 photos with this thing. I use it almost everyday.