Sara @ Home

And 6 Months Later...

2011-01-15T22:44:00.000-08:00

Holy Cow - I'm a slacker. 6 months since I've posted. Wow. Can't even begin to catch up on those. And I don't have the patience to try tonight. Here's a shortcut version:

August: Very pregnant. Very. Hoping for an early delivery. Didn't happen. Stayed very pregnant. And hot.

September: Introduced Baby John to the world on September 11th.
The delivery was uncomplicated. Yay. Not quite as fast as Paul's, but still fairly quick. I'd like to say painless, but that wouldn't be true.
The rest of September is a blur. There were lots of kids involved. And diapers. I think I ate and did a lot of laundry as well.

October: Life became a little clearer. Our new family of 5 starting figuring things out. We had Paul's 2nd birthday.

It was a dog-themed party. My favorite part was the birthday cake.

November: Family trip to Disneyland. We went with the grandparents, so Mr. D and I actually got to ride some "big kids" rides. We had a nice time enjoying the park before our annual passes expired.

December: Well, we all know what December is all like... especially with little kids. Presents, tinsel, lights, bows, and fun.
Mr D and I celebrated our "Craigslist Christmas". We decided that our gifts for each other all had to come from Craigslist (we are admitted junkies to the site). It was a lot of fun to track down good gifts and the barter a bit for the best prices. Next year, I told him, we should make it that all the gifts have to come from the "free section" of Craigslist. Kidding. Maybe.

And now. January. The decorations are down. The cookies are eaten (and on my hips), and I am regrouping the troops again. Getting a routine going. Or at least envisioning. This is the month to start fresh. Let's go 2011. Let's hope that maybe I will post a bit more to actually document what is going on with Sara @ Home.

Squash Overload

2010-07-03T21:47:00.001-07:00

As I've mentioned before, we planted our first garden this year. It's doing well. Surprisingly well.

And we've learned a few things too. Nine squash plants(zucchini and yellow)is about five plants too many. We have zucchini and squash all over the place. I have several 2lb. bags of frozen sliced squash, numerous bags of frozen shredded zucchini for breads, we eat summer squash at almost every meal, and the neighbors are currently all well supplied for their squash needs. We have a lot of squash.

This was yesterday's picking from the garden.

And here was today's.

Tomorrow when I see my family, "Happy 4th - here's some squash."

But if you notice, we have a couple peppers and some well ripened tomatoes. I now can attest that I understand what people are saying when they tell me that a store bought tomato can not rival a fresh, homegrown one. What a difference.

I have been pretty impressed with our gardening attempts - albeit it a little overwhelmed with Mr D brings in the haul every few days (or every day as in this week).

This week's dinner menu consists of lasagna (with zucchini), tomato and zucchini soup, grilled steak and squash, and probably a few more loaves of zucchini bread.

Summer Vacay

2010-06-22T14:39:00.000-07:00

Well here it is June already and I have neglected updating anything online at all. Such a slacker, I know. I blame it on being six months preggie with two little kids. It's not that I have nothing interesting to share.... I just don't have the brain energy to do so. I guess posting doesn't come as easy to me as it seems to for others.

So... fast forward two months. Let's see - lots of diapers changed, naps taken, messes cleaned up, a few trips to the park, several trips to the grocery store, and lots of laundry... yup. That just about covers it.

But last week, however, we took a family vacation. Packed up the kids and headed to the mountains for the week. It sounds like we roughed it... but we didn't. We rented a cabin (house) with another family and hung out by the lake. When there are six little kids all five and under - that is the way to go. We had contemplated doing the whole camping gig, but I am so glad that idea was never fleshed out. I had enough trouble sharing a room with the four of us, and a double bed with Mr. D. Yes, a double bed. I take up a double bed all on my own these days!

I realized on this trip how much vacations have changed for us in the past few years. Mr. D and I have never been globe-trotting travelers, but we did enjoy to get away once in a while, even if it was just locally. We still enjoy going away, but the idea of coming back refreshed and renewed just doesn't work out the same anymore. There's all the packing to begin with, followed by awkward sleeping arrangements (see above), kids not on schedule, a lot of work to feed everyone and keep everyone happy.

Now don't get me wrong, we had a really nice time. We had fun on the lake, playing with the kids, hiking outside. We love hanging with our kids, but it's not the relaxing getaway it used to be. But these are what memories are made of. Right?

April Cook-A-Thon

2010-04-05T21:29:00.000-07:00

Back in November, one of my friends invited me to come to her house and "cook for a month". We spent almost 12 hours making 23 different meals to bring home and freeze. It was a lot of work and honestly I came home thinking, "nope, not for me. That was exhausting."

But then through the next couple months I used my meals and realized that it was super convenient to pull something out of the freezer on those days where I don't know and/or don't want to make anything for the family. Plus it did save me money in the long-run.

So come January, she invited me to cook with her again. I agreed. Having a time under our belts, we planned better and streamlined things so we were able to make the process faster.

Well, the next few months passed and the past couple weeks we started talking about doing it again. I really like the cook-a-thon idea, but I didn't like the crazy long day at her house... especially now where my energy level isn't at its peak and being on my feet all day sounded wearying as well.

We planned out our meals and we (I) focused the list down to a more cost/time effective plan. Love my friend, but she can be way more ambitious than me. We were all set for today. I did my shopping. Had the list planned out.

But at things worked out, she wasn't able to participate. I thought about throwing in the towel then myself... but I didn't. I have to say I'm pretty impressed with myself.

Today I made 17 meals plus 4 homemade pizzas. My freezer is stocked.
I made:
* Chicken Enchiladas (x2)
* Meatball Casserole (x2)
* Meat Lasagna (x2)
* Creamy Chicken Lasagna
* Marinated Chicken Drumsticks (x2)
* Stove Top BBQ Chicken
* Pizza Casserole (x2)
* Sausage and Egg Casserole
* Mini Meatloaf: BBQ & Italian
* Pizza Roll-Ups (x2)

This is some of my kitchen in progress.

And my supervisor

And my mess

And now, my feet are tired. My kitchen is clean. My supervisor is sleeping. And I don't have to cook dinner tomorrow night.

The Big Owie

2010-03-26T22:12:00.001-07:00

The tale of my baby's first big boo-boo.

I was with my mom yesterday and we were getting ready to leave to grab dinner. I was a little hungry (read: pregnant = starving), so I was trying to speed the process up. Let's go here folks. I loaded up with my purse (x-large size, of course), my diaper bag, and the "out-to-eat" bag with toys. Plus Paul.

Yes, probably not my best judgment call here. But two trips was one trip too many when I wanted to go NOW.

So we're heading out of the house. I let Paul walk on his own. We are on the porch outside. The brick porch. That descends with two small steps to the concrete sidewalk.

I should have picked Paul up. Or at least held on tightly to him. But he let go of my hand and went for the steps himself. First step. Success. Second step. Not so much. I watch in slow motion as he misses the second step and falls face first onto the sidewalk.

I drop all my bags and rush to him - bleeding and crying. It is so sad. He has a sore on his nose, his eye and forehead.

And all this is the day before my mother's wedding.

To dispel all worries though, I must say, he recovered like the tough little boy he is. We cleaned up, went to dinner. He ate like a champion and was in good temperament.

Today he dressed up in his finest and showed off his boo-boos. We just told everyone that someone tried to snatch his pacifier.

And they should have seen the other kid.

This is how our garden grows

2010-03-23T18:30:00.000-07:00

We've been busy outside celebrating spring the past few weeks.

Getting our garden planted. Our inaugural garden. Such a test run. We have no idea what we're doing. At all. I'm sure our efforts are laughable to an expert gardener, but hey, we're a couple city kids, well, suburban kids, who think that produce comes from the grocery store.

Well so far we are off to to a promising start. I put seeds in the ground. And something has come up... and they aren't weeds. Surprisingly. While we were planting I kept telling Mr. D that if anything comes up, I will be shocked. He reassured me by saying that just about anyone can make something grow. Thanks. Helpful. I'll be the dummy who can't grow something.

Fortunately, I'm not. Lo and behold. We have sprouts.

And the sprouts keep growing.

We have lettuce, spinach, carrots, broccoli, squash, and zucchini.

Last weekend we went out and bought some pepper, tomato, and strawberry plants. They are in the ground now. And we are anxiously waiting to see when, okay, if, we will harvest anything.

This has been a great learning experience for Grace. She's helped plant the seeds and then loves to go out and check "her" garden.

Can't wait to serve some fresh veggies with dinner.

Or better yet, make something scrumptiously strawberry. I'm still optimistic.

The Latest

2010-02-24T20:28:00.000-08:00

Not quite sure where to start. It's been a while.

I'll start with the big news.

Cute picture, right? Makes sense, right?

So I thought I was going to be super creative and tell my mom about the new arrival by sending her an email with this picture attached. She had been asking me for some pictures of the kids that she could have at work, so I thought, "cute, I'll send her a few pictures and this one will be in it."

So I send the email off Thursday night and Friday morning, I'm waiting for a phone call exclaiming her excitement for the new grandchild. I turn on the computer looking for an email.

Finally an email reply comes back.

"Thanks these are cute. I put the one with “all” the grandkids on my desktop!

By the way, my dress ...."

And she goes on to talk about a dress she bought and weekend plans.

Say what? Where is the excitement? The congratulations?

Then it dawns on me. She thinks that I took a picture of my kids with my sister-in-law's ultrasound. "All" her grandkids that she knows about so far.

And now why would I do that?

So a little deflated, I had to write back and explain it a little bit further.

Her reply:

"WHAT!!!????"

Followed by an immediate phone call.

Yes, that's better. That's the enthusiasm I was looking for.

It would have been better the first time though.

So that's the latest here. I'm going to try to get back on track, since the TWO people who read this have asked me why I am a big slacker and don't write.

They Say Its My Birthday

2009-11-05T22:48:00.000-08:00

To celebrate getting older, I decided to go to the place where you can always be a kid! Disneyland!!!!

We had a great time. As I told Mr. D - we had a 10 hour adventure at Disneyland without any tears, meltdowns, tantrums, or arguments. It truly is a magical place!

We had so much fun with Grace. She is a stud when it comes to the rides. She went on everything we took her on and liked them all. Well, I don't think she was particularly fond of the really dark ones like Pirates of the Caribbean, but she didn't act too traumatized.

She went on the spinning tea cups,

flying rocket ships,

even the Matterhorn roller coaster.

But she still says her favorites are the "horses" (carousel). Wuss.

And to make my day even brighter, she took a picture with Tinkerbell! Our first character picture.

Paul was a good sport. He took a good 1 1/2 nap in the stroller, so he hung in there pretty good. He even rode his share of rides.

As part of my birthday gift, Mr D also upgraded our tickets to annual passes! Whee! Now we have a full year ahead of magical fun. I can't wait!

It was a really fun day. But exhausting. I'm not sure how some families do the multiple day Disney experience vacations. Wow.

I would say if I had to turn..., well, older... this was a great way to do it.

Halloween Pics!

2009-11-05T22:35:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to share some Halloween pictures... almost a week late. We had a fun time with my two little cuties playing at the church festival. I'll just let the pictures speak for themselves.

How I Scared the Neighbors

2009-10-28T20:21:00.000-07:00

So my neighbors hate me now.

Okay, so hate might be too strong of a word.

There was a disruption in the neighborhood and it centered around me....

and my dog.

Drats.

I haven't even had a chance to make friends... okay, acquaintances with these folks, and now they ~~hate,~~ ~~dislike,~~ okay, have a bad feeling about me.

And the problem is, it truly is entirely my fault. And I don't like being at fault.

Last week, I decided to take advantage of the warm weather and bring the kids outside and wash my car. Paul was in the play yard, Grace was scampering around, playing with the bucket of sudsy water, and I thought, "hey, I'll let Toby out of the backyard and he can run around a bit."

And here's the thing, Toby is a super well-mannered dog. At our old place, he totally knew his boundaries and I could let him outside and never even have a second thought.

Well, now he isn't quite as clear about boundaries and he really hasn't been out front much besides going for a walk.

So here I am washing away, keeping one eye on one kid, and the second on the other... when I realized that Toby has wandered away. Wandered away right up our neighbor's driveway. We are at the end of a cul-de-sac, so the neighbor is really somewhat across the street.

I call him immediately and he responded and ran right home. I glanced at the neighbors and it seemed no one was out and about, so I figured, "no harm, no foul" and didn't worry about it again.

A little while later, my old neighbor calls. My old neighbor, from my old neighborhood, where people liked me and I knew them, and trusted them. Oh but enough boo-hooing.

So now, I'm on the phone, drying my car, watching the kids AND the dog when I notice the neighbor's daughter is out, along with her neighbor's daughter, and it looks like a parent or two. They are all standing out and looking towards my house. I assumed they were just interested because we were all out and that isn't usually the case. I would have gone over and said something, but I was on the phone. I thought, "bummer, this is my chance to get to chat with the neighbors," but I really couldn't interrupt my neighbor who was telling me about her kitchen catching fire that morning. (I guess my story pales in comparison to that).

Fast forward an hour. We're cleaned up, inside, finishing lunch when the doorbell rings.

It's my neighbor. Who wants to talk to me. It didn't sound good.

And it wasn't. She goes on to tell me how my dog had run not only to their house, but into the backyard, scared her daughter, who ran to the neighbors. The neighbors all went out onto their upper deck to watch the big scary dog from their backyard. My neighbor was in her house afraid and went around and shut up her windows because of the big scary dog.

Sigh.

I apologize. Many times. I try to explain that Toby is very gentle and usually well-mannered.

I apologize again. I invite her to bring over her kids to meet him and they can see he is a nice dog.

And I promise it won't happen again.

But I'm still the reason that a "wild" dog was roaming the neighborhood.

We went over to their house the following day with Toby (on a leash!) to apologize again. But they were not home. We realized later that they had left for the weekend. We went to their neighbor's house as well, but nobody answered.

I know we should still go over, but now almost a week has passed and its awkward. But I guess not as awkward as living here for many more years and not making contact.

I just keep reminding myself that it took about six years at our other place before we really got to know all our neighbors. I just have to have patience.... or hope they all move!

2009-10-21T21:26:00.000-07:00

Happy Birthday Mr. Paul

It's hard to believe that it has already been a year since Paul Henry joined our family. It's gone by so fast. Much faster than it was with Grace. I realized this time that it is so fleeting that he will be a round, pudgy, kissable-all-over baby that I just need to soak it in and not worry if he is sleeping through the night, nursing too much, and just cuddle with him while he will still let me.

We had a delightful little birthday party for him last weekend. Really, I did keep it small-scale. Mr. D was very proud of my restraint. Even though I did inform him that I am keeping all the decorations because I am SO doing the theme again when he is older. I had so many ideas and fun activities, that just weren't suited for a one-year old.

Watch out! Paul is RACING to #1!

I came up with the theme idea based on his Halloween costume, which I had purchased a couple months ago. I figured why not maximize my use of it.

Paul had a great time...

getting into presents before the official "present time",

and then getting into more presents, and

showing off his cute outfit.

Then it was cake time! We had a near cake-trosphe. I purchased a race car mold on ebay for a great price and was so excited to make it for the party. However, after two stuck, ruined cakes, I had to give. I guess I should have tried it out prior to 9pm the evening before the party. So I came up with a quick solution... cupcakes!

They turned out pretty cute. Not a race car... but cute, I guess.

Paul wasn't too excited with his cake.

I know, probably cause it was a healthy banana cake without sugar, but "ppssssssth" (blowing a big raspberry) on that. I would rather have him not eat any cake then overload him with sugar when he hasn't had any yet. He had plenty of cake eating years ahead of him.

He also wasn't too thrilled with opening presents either. But Grace willing stepped in there.

Wait Paul! There's more presents to open!

All in all, we had a great time celebrating Paul's big race to one!

And what does the big #1 winner have to say?

I'll take that as a sign of a great party... to tired to comment!

Four Big Boxes

2009-10-06T20:52:00.000-07:00

On our doorstep yesterday arrived four big boxes. Just in time for Paul's birthday party. Well, not really FOR his party, but they will help.

We finally purchased barstools for our kitchen. Yay! I say finally, as if we've been waiting for years, rather than a few months. But, Mr. D has been looking forward to this purchase since we moved in. I'm not sure I quite understand his enthusiasm for eating at the island, but hey, they are pretty cool to have. And so easy to feed the munchkins too.

So he couldn't wait to bust open the boxes and set them up today before he left for work this afternoon.

He left the four big, empty boxes out with the disclaimer he would take care of them tomorrow morning. I was going to let him.

But then, I had a fabulous idea.

After I had finished cleaning the kitchen from top to bottom, and scrubing the floors, I had the great idea to cut up the boxes. Yes, in the same mentioned kitchen area.

But, I wasn't just cutting them to throw out. It was a fun idea. We built a house.

The kids thought it was pretty neat.

Grace even brought in her dolls and set up house.

I had her color the inside to add her decorative touch.

But now I realize, I have a big box house in the middle of the room. I wonder how long before the kids either tire or destroy the box house.

End of Summer Fun

2009-09-24T21:06:00.000-07:00

It's been busy these days. I keep waiting for creativity to strike so I can share something delightful and funny, but that hasn't happened. I guess I'll settle for the mundane, "here's what we're up to" post.

Why so busy?

I don't know. It just seems everything started up at once.

Mr. D's hours went to evenings, so that means that I am on kid-duty for most of the day AND night. That keeps me moving.

We had a couple playdates this week. We welcomed in the start of fall by celebrating 100+ degree weather at the nearby water park. The kids loved it.

Me? I'm ready for fall. My tan (what there was of it to begin with) has faded. I'm ready for jeans and socks. Okay, okay, I'll admit it. I'm tired of shaving everyday and making sure my toenails are done.

On Wednesday, we had Grace's appointment with the school speech pathologist to proceed in getting her into some speech therapy. I love my little dear to pieces, but her pronunciation needs help. Fortunately at the evaluation, it was determined that it is strictly intelligibility that needs work. She doesn't seem to have any deficiencies in language development or comprehension. I didn't think so, but it is nice to hear it confirmed anyhow.

And because I felt that I wasn't busy and getting out enough, I signed up for a MOPS group (Mothers of Preschoolers) as well as a weekly women's bible study at church. So we added those on our schedule this week. Yay for childcare at both of those events however!

And tomorrow we are heading to the fair with some friends.
Oh, and Saturday the kids and I are going shopping with my sister-in-law.

Whew! So at least I can't complain that I'm bored and lonely!

A Garden

2009-09-13T22:13:00.000-07:00

This was a corner of our backyard when we moved in two months ago.

Then it looked like this as we (meaning hired help, not myself) dug out part of the slope that made up our yard.

But now, we have this.

Oh, and this.

But back to this.

This is going to be my garden area. I am so excited. I am imagining all sorts of fresh veggies, maybe some fruits. Some succulent berries or crisp lettuce. Saving money, feeding my family, teaching the kids about nature. How fun.

One problem.

I don't know how to garden.

Yet.

My thumb isn't looking anything green so far. There's no dirt under the nail. It's one step from being manicured.

Okay, maybe not that bad, but really, I'm not sure even where to begin. Good thing I have some time until spring.

Of course, I'm assuming I should wait until then.

Save While I Spend

2009-09-02T22:50:00.000-07:00

I am on a mission to save a few dollars these days. Of course, isn't everyone it seems. It has become a bit of a game now to see how good of deals I can score.

My last trip on Sunday was a winner - I purchased a gallon of milk, hairspray, a Glade candle, two jars of Welch's jelly, and hair dye. I paid $1.44 out of pocket... PLUS, I earned $13 towards a future purchase. Mr. D was waiting in the car for me with the kidlets and he said he always can tell if I made a good purchase because I come out grinning.

I have a Target trip planned tomorrow... hopefully I come out grinning again!

Also, to save some money, I haven't had a dryer for the last month. Our dryer gave up for good, and we are hoping to find a good deal on Craigslist. I love that site. We have found a few leads, but they have been snatched up before we could get to them. Our recent 100+ degree weather has been drying my clothes "super-fast" as Grace would say, so I haven't had any concerns. Yet. When we get our quasi-fall season sometime, then we'll have to get serious in looking for a replacement.

So with the money that I'm saving here and there, I'm using to start decorating the house. Even though we are unpacked, the rooms just don't have a "Sara-touch" yet. I need to add some finishing touches here and there. I have a lot of empty wall space that I didn't have before. The paint is just kinda "blah". I have a list of things to do, but I am trying to remember "one thing at a time" or rather, one room at a time.

Ok, the point of all this rambling really is to share that I found a super-cute bedding set for Grace's room.

I found it on a few websites, all around the same price. But then I found that one of the websites I considered, also listed their products on ebay. Brand new and sealed. I scored it for $20 less then I would have paid through their real website. Not including what they would have charged me for shipping. Sweet. See, I can save while I spend.

That's what I'm telling Mr. D at least.

Paul-iwog

2009-08-20T22:43:00.001-07:00

In honor of Paul's 10-month birthday tomorrow, here's the latest on my little man.

My little happy man. He is (generally) such an easy going guy. He likes everyone. Likes to clap his hands. He says "Dada" and "Mama".

He's a big boy - not a surprise there. He is already in his 12-month clothes. He loves to eat everything that I give him. He really hasn't turned up his nose at anything yet. Loves fruit though - which is funny cause we couldn't get Grace to eat for years. He will chow down cantaloupe, watermelon, and grapes like nobody's business.

He has 8 teeth already, and I think that there might be more on the way. I think the back molars might be on the move cause I think I can spy the little marks on his upper jaw. I'm hoping that is the case as he hasn't been the best sleeper lately.

I was so proud of my man for a while there. Around 7 months or so he started sleeping most of the night through. I thought I was going to have it made in the shade as Grace had basically just started sleeping through the night at 2 years! But then.... he changed his mind and seems to be more on "let's wake up a couple times during the night and then rise up nice and early for mom!" He's ready to play usually around 6:30am. I'm not. Especially when I just was up with him at 5am.

And now, Paul-iwog is on the move. He started crawling a couple weeks ago and nothing holds him back now. Well, nothing except for his baby cage.
He typically will play in there for quite a while. But when he's done... well, he's done.

And now, I have two months to plan for his birthday party! I already have the theme picked out. But I'll leave that for another story.... oooh... the suspense.

Getting It Done

2009-08-13T22:49:00.000-07:00

So after I bared my "dirty" secrets yesterday, I wanted to share that I was moved to action today. Between Grace and I, we got things done.

I have a clean and non-eek bathroom now! Yay!

Clear the Air

2009-08-12T21:04:00.001-07:00

Things are finally starting to feel more normal. Hallelujah! I am getting back into a routine - my Type A-ness just demands a routine. I am back to making my meal schedules, laundry is under control, and the house doesn't quite look like it has been hit by a tornado.

But I have a problem. I have to overcome some bad habits that I've created during these past few months. It started back when we put the house on the market. In order to keep the house looking good - I had to skip some of my heavy-duty cleaning in order to do general pick-up so frequently. Then, in the process of moving, I threw my hands in the air and gave up trying to keep things clean, and then after we moved and were still unpacking, I figured, why bother right now - what's the point?

Well the point is now that I have a dirty bathroom. I'm eeked out by my own bathroom. So I need to get my hands out the air and back on the scrub brush.

Ok, I really wasn't going to go on a diatribe on my cleanliness here, but I guess I needed to confess in order to clear the air... or should I say CLEAN the air.

But I'm working on these bad habits. I did some cleaning today in our living area. I also disposed of the pile of stuff that had been lingering in the corner for weeks. (The pre-move Sara would never let things linger for weeks.) We had a garage sale at my mom's house a couple weeks back and I brought back a box of some stuff that didn't sell, and a box of stuff I filched from my uncle, along with some random things like signs, tape and stickers. So I finally grew tired of looking at it, and cleared it out today. I gave myself a good pat on the back.

And just for fun, I'm going to share my garage sale signs that I threw out today. I had several people comment on them. I had fun with them.

The Cat is Out of the Bag.... or House

2009-08-07T20:50:00.001-07:00

So I have to admit something that I have been having a little bit of guilt about the past few days.

We recently had a household squabble. There was some shrieking. Some hiding. I kept the kids close to me.

And then...

Mr. D threw out the cat.

Her new home is outside our front door.

And I feel a little guilty because I didn't do much to stop it. I just watched, and to be honest, deep down, I'm rather glad.

Poor Kitters.

See, this cat isn't a real people-person kind of cat. She hides most of the time, isn't very friendly, and frankly, isn't even nice looking. She doesn't have the proper hygiene skills that a cat should have - she gets matted, dirty, and I have to wipe her bottom. Seriously, I have enough bottoms to wipe without adding on a cat's.

We had an incident a few weeks ago that involved pee-pee in Paul's room, poo in the office, and well, an unhappy Mr. and Mrs. D. The cat had been wearing its welcome thin the past few months. Okay, really, the past few years. Basically since I've had kids. I could tolerate her before the kids. But now, she's just in my way. Buying food and litter just aggravates me, and I generally kept her around cause I didn't know what else to do with her.

Well, now, I guess Mr. D solved that for me. However, I still feel a twinge of guilt when I see her sitting in the front planter.

But at the same time, she doesn't seem to be that perturbed. Maybe this is a good thing for her. You know, some fresh air, dirt in her paws, she can wipe her bottom in the planter rather than in my baby's room!

Yes, I think this is a good thing for her...It sure is for us!

The End of the Fish Party

2009-08-04T22:40:00.000-07:00

Okay, so seriously, this is it in regards to fish party nonsense. I promise. However, I did get all the pictures from the party loaded and I just wanted to share a few more. And then we'll move on to more exciting topics, like, cleaning up my office, organizing closets and how I've been line-drying all my clothes lately. I think my neighbors are probably thrilled seeing Mr. D's tightie-whities hanging out to dry. Or better yet, Paul's diapers. Nice. See, this has been out of necessity rather than a big environnmental or cost efficiency move on my party. Our dryer broke down the day before the "fish party."

Fish party...Oh yeah... pictures.

Here you go. And maybe things were more interesting when I was just talking about the party. I know I've really hit a fascinating topic when I brought up underwear.

The birthday girl!

Our "Ocean Oasis"

My Seashell Candies

Cake Time!
Ocean Cake

Fish Cake

Next, time for presents. One of the favorites was a bride/princess dress-up kit. Here is Princess Grace

The princess opening more packages

And, last but not least...
The Family

Fish Recap

2009-07-30T23:02:00.000-07:00

So I know, everyone is waiting on pins and needles for the "fish party" recap. I know friends, I have left you hanging. But here's the thing, I don't have all my pictures yet to really thoroughly give the proper recap this event deserves. See, I was so busy being the proper hostess, baking off fish sticks, and keeping the "ocean water" punch filled, that I passed off picture-taking duty to a friend, who takes much better pictures than me anyhow. Well, my friend took them on her camera, and still has them. I have a handful of pictures on my camera, but nothing too outstanding.

But the party. The party went really well. Grace had a blast, and that's what matters the most. We set up a little "ocean oasis" in the corner of the backyard with Grace's new birthday pool and some other water activities that we have. The kids had fun playing in the water.

Meanwhile, I was prepping lunch, which consisted of, yes, you guessed it... fish! We had grilled pacific snapper (and chicken for non-fishie people), fish sticks, as well as all the other lunch-type items. My cakes turned out good. I made one shaped like a fish and the other was an ocean-scene. The ocean cake was prettier, but the chocolate fish cake tasted better!

I had fun decorating up the house with fish, nets and streamers. We did get the live goldfish for the tables outside. Unfortunately, the heat and the fish didn't quite work out. As I was told, "You have a sleeping fish outside.... permanently sleeping." After that the other fish came inside to hang out. By the food. I found that a little ironic as I served up fish sticks next to him.

All in all, we had an "ocean of fun!"
I promise to post better pictures when I get them from my friend. I am anxious myself to see them! Okay, so maybe I'm the only one waiting on pins and needles.

Happy Birthday Grace

2009-07-23T21:47:00.000-07:00

As of 12:34am this morning, I became the mama of a 3 year old. Today we celebrated Miss Grace's birthday. Of course, the REAL celebration is this weekend at that fish party I've mentioned. (sigh, still so much to do). But, we did have a nice day hanging out with Grace.

We first went to Party City and bought her a $.50 pinwheel. That was all it took for a bit of happiness. Actually, she had been given one last weekend at a birthday party, and yesterday it blew out the car window. So, we told her we would get her a new one today.

Then we went shopping. Well, shopping for mom and dad. :) Kohl's was right next door, so now mom and dad have new duds for the fish party. Hey, the kids have new outfits, why not us!

We headed home and I threw together a quick dinner.

And then Grace opened one of her birthday presents.

What is it?

A pool! With fish on it! (what a coincidence!)

Then after dinner we went out and got frozen yogurt.

Yum!

Well, except for Paul, who got to eat green beans and rice!

And ran around the fountain.

After the sticky treat,

we headed home to the bath. And I let Grace play with the bathtub jets for a little while.

Look out - the bubbles are taking over!

All in all, it was a nice day. I think Grace was a little confused that she was three today, and not three at the party coming up. She told us no for a while that she wasn't three yet.

But then I guessed if she figured gifts and treats were part of the deal, she would go along with it.

Happy Birthday Grace!

Stop Mocking Me

2009-07-21T22:17:00.001-07:00

My to-do list is mocking me. It is busy laughing at me cause it is getting the best of me, gosh darn it.

I had great hopes for today. Today on the to-do list I was going to take Paul to his 9-month appt. (nine months! already!?), come home, put some of the ~~junk~~ stuff away in the office, now that Mr. D has installed some nifty shelves for me in the closet. Then I was going to make my shell candy for the "fish party" that is coming up, make dinner, write up my shopping lists for both general groceries as well as party food ingredients.

Well,I had ambitious plans. I dabbled in all these things, but really didn't accomplish all that much. A couple boxes put away (still many more piled up around me as I speak), half a grocery list written, a few trays of candies made, and I only managed to get Paul to his appointment - didn't bring him home. Just kidding. But I was late to the appointment...that will support my to-do list mocking.

Yes, remember that small-scale party I am hosting for my daughter. I have a problem. I am admitting it now. I can't do small-scale very well. Incapable. I surrender. In this super-size culture, I want to "Go Big." Bring on the molded candies, two different cakes (one shaped like a fish, the other decorated like the ocean), streamers, murals of fish on the walls. Don't stop now. I am going out to buy little fish to put on the tables. Real fish. Again, I admit it. Problem.

But it's so much fun and I get so excited. Then I talk to my friends who fuel my ideas. Heck, my husband suggested live fish. See, its not just me.

But yeah, I have a lot do before Sunday. I'll get those to-do's whipped into shape!

Six Weeks Later....

2009-07-15T22:37:00.000-07:00

Boxes, Boats, and Birthdays... OH MY!

So its been six weeks. Six weeks of unpacking, rearranging, vacationing, budgeting, and planning. I'm not sure even where to begin in describing our activities ranging from my ongoing battle with the internet provider (finally resolved - approximately 12 calls later) to our crazy boat trip where we lost the entire tire from the trailer! Yes, the tire fell completely off while traveling on a major highway. In between those times we unpacked a few boxes and tried to make this house a home. Oh, and I took care of two kids who were trying to adjust.

So here it is in a nutshell.

Obviously, to begin, we moved.

The move went very smoothly. The house is great. Fortunately for my sanity, it is not a fixer-upper like our last place. Of course there are still things we want to fix and need to do still, but it is inhabitable.

A week after we moved, we took a vacation. It was preplanned - we wouldn't have picked this timing per say. However, it was great. If anyone recalls, last year we took this same trip. But this time, we stayed in the motel on the marina. 110% improvement over the skeezy motel. (which still make me shudder to think of). We had a great time on the boat with our friends and their 4 kids. Yes, we had 4 adults and 6 children (all 4 and under!).

We not only survived, but had a good time, excepting our tire blowout on Mr. D's truck along the way.

Just wait though, the aforementioned tire loss is yet to come.

We came back home. Unpacked a bit. Had company for father's day. It was just my family. I told them to ignore the boxes. They were kind enough to do so.

We unpacked some more.

Then we planned a two-day back-to-back boat trip with friends (two separate groups of friends). Day one boat trip didn't quite come to fruition - see the tire loss mentioned above.

Good news though. We did find the tire... on the opposite side of the freeway on the very far lane. It was crazy, and a story that would take me longer than I have energy to type tonight. But we did do the day two trip and had a good time.

We celebrated the 4th of July. We went to a local park with some friends from church. Snacked, danced to the band, and watched the fireworks. Grace and I enjoyed them by ourselves because we were separated due to a late potty run. It's okay, we enjoyed them nonetheless.

And I've unpacked some more. Painted. Hung draperies....

And decided that we should hold Grace's 3rd birthday party here in a couple weeks. It was going to be small-scale. (Note "going"). It was just family, but then there was that friend to ask, and that friend, oh them, oh, and their 4 kids... etc. Its okay though. I keep telling myself that. I have to because I swore up and down to Mr. D that I wouldn't be stressed so that he was comfortable with this party.

But how cute is this on the invitation (which of course had to be hand-made)
"All the fishes of the sea are celebrating that Grace is three!"

Grace is so excited for her "fish party" as she keeps saying. I can't let her down. So this weekend is party planning focused because the following Sunday is fish party day.

So that's what I've been up to. Whew, and boy am I over formatting all these pictures too!

Time To Go

2009-06-02T16:54:00.001-07:00

I mentioned to Mr. D today that we have been living in someone else's house for the past four days. The sale of this home closed Friday evening. Our new home closed today. So for those four days we were without a home. It's a strange thought.

Well obviously though, it is all done. Whew. I can now understand why they say moving is up there on the list of traumatic life changes. Not just the physical moving part, but there is so much emotion and stress tied into the whole process, especially when you are buying and selling. I think in all the paperwork I signed away my firstborn child. Poor Grace.

But I did it. I packed up the house. We are set to go.

We thought we were set on Saturday.
Then we thought we were set for today (Tuesday).
BUT we are now set for tomorrow.

Yes, it's tomorrow. The truck is rented. Manpower is recruited. And we are loading on up and moving on out.

It's a good thing. And this has definitely all been a God thing. Every step of the way. I think that is what is keeping me from being overly sentimental about leaving is that I really have peace about this decision and move for the family.

But I'm still a little sentimental. This house has so many firsts:
- My first move away from my parents
- My first home
- My first attempts at cooking and home decorating
- The birth of our first child.... and our second
- First Christmas' together, first steps, first meals

I could go on.... but I will refrain. I so wanted to dig up some old pictures from when we first bought this place, but well, they're packed. Along with everything else.

I am looking forward to when Grace doesn't ask if "people" are coming over. (People meaning realtors, repairs, inspections, and everyone else who wanders through your home). Also, now when she is looking for something, she just gives up and says it's in the boxes.

Soon, sweetie, it won't be in the boxes.
I hope.

I don't know yet, but my money is on the fact that packing is easier than unpacking!

Bone Tired

2009-05-13T22:15:00.000-07:00

So the moving is coming along. We are two, possibly three, weeks out - depending on the close of the escrow. It has been such a busy last few weeks. Mr. D was right when he said that I wouldn't be sad about leaving our house... I don't have time to be sad right now.

Of course his reason for why I wouldn't be sad would be cause I would be doing the "happy dance" over getting into the new house. Now don't get me wrong, I am super excited about this new place, but I am a little more emotionally tied to our current place than Mr. D. It's just how I am. This is really only the 2nd place I can remember living, so its really no wonder that I have planted my roots rather deep.

So this moving business is tiring. I am, what they say, bone-tired. Perhaps the fact that I have been up with kids the past few nights doesn't help either.

Mr. Paul-liwog has four, count them, FOUR teeth all cut on top right now. Poor guy. He's doing better now that they have all cut through, but the last week was not fun at all.

Then there is Miss Grace. Miss Mommy's-Bed is she should be called the last few nights. She has decided that she would rather sleep in Mommy's Bed. I feel bad, but we just can't start this right now. I am still up nursing Paul at least once a night and I don't need Grace in bed with us too waking up when I have to nurse. Besides none of us sleep all that great when we're all in one bed.

Okay, maybe they all do, but Mom doesn't. And we all need Mom to get some sleep.

So back to the drama. And yes, its been drama. She has been waking up and just crying and crying and crying for Mommy's Bed. I have tried all sorts of methods to deal with this from firm discipline to cuddling with her for a while in her room to just plain ol' cry-it-out sister. Nothing has been the magic solution yet. I'm hoping that consistency will just pay off eventually for me. I hope. For all of our sakes.

So not to leave on a sour kid note - here are some adorable pics we took on a day trip back in April. Yes, I haven't been posting enough to get them up in a timely manner. But don't worry, we haven't changed that much in the past couple weeks.

My 30 Day Challenge

2009-05-03T20:46:00.000-07:00

Two weeks ago my agent called to tell me that he recommended that we take our house off the market for the time being. We had two homes down the street going for less than ours (same floorplan) and it probably wasn't the best time. I said fine - I was tired of the constant picking up for the past 50 days.

The next day we received an offer on the house.

That Tuesday, two days later, we submitted a counteroffer with the contingency that we have to find a house. And we made an offer on a house.

Our counteroffer was accepted, but we didn't get the house.

We gave it another shot - did a search of the area before backing out of the deal on our house.

Last Tuesday we submitted another offer. We found out Thursday that we got the house.

We are now in escrow, closing in what's that? Oh yes, 30 days!
Folks, I guess that means its time to pack.

So that's the 30 day challenge. Pack up my belongings and move them about 10 miles southeast.

I realized in that in my past 30 years of living, I have never really moved. I grew up in the same house and when I got married, I basically took the clothes out of the closet in my bedroom and brought them to my new house with Mr. D. I put a couple boxes of books in my car and called it a move.

Even when I helped Mr. D move into our current home in his bachelor days - the move consisted of a truck with a small trailer. There was a bed, a dresser, couch and a few odds and ends. I think the neighbors must have chuckled, or cringed, when they saw our sad move-in.

This time, however, it is going to be quite a bit different. I've had 8 years to accumulate things to put in cupboards and hang on the walls, as well as 2 kids who come with several containers of outgrown clothes, numerous stuffed animals, cribs, changing tables, swings, and playpens.

Tomorrow the challenge is: Pack Books. Gotta start somewhere.
I'll keep you posted friends.

Happy Easter

2009-04-13T14:30:00.000-07:00

So not only is it already April, but it is already mid-April. Wow. That seems to be the common opening for me these day - "wow, its been so long and I haven't updated." Maybe I should just use that as a title for this blog. sara-who-updates-once-a-month.blogspot.com.

Anyhoo.

We had a wonderful day yesterday. We went to church in the morning (on time!) and enjoyed a great service celebrating the Jesus' resurrection and our salvation. We then headed to Grandma's to eat too much and enjoy family time.

We also learned a few things yesterday.

1. House hunting doesn't stop just because its Easter. I received three phone calls from realtors yesterday regarding the house. One of whom seemed put out that I told him we were celebrating Easter with our family and not showing the house today. After that, I just let the calls roll to voicemail.

2. I think my kids are the cutest. Especially when they are matching. I think I'm going to start matching them for every special occasion. Okay, probably not. But so cute, don't you think?

3. Peeps are gross - at least according to my family. They are strange, sugary concoctions that will outlast the nuclear attack with the twinkies. Even Grace knew where they belong.

4. I love my kids. Okay, I already knew that one. But I just needed an excuse to post more pictures!

The Gateway Cosmetic

2009-03-26T21:29:00.001-07:00

So my one fan told me I haven't updated. I guess I should be flattered I have a fan. Thanks fan.

So the house, the kids and the sickness have been keeping me from updating. As my mom used to say when I was growing up, "I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired." Well, it's not that bad, but we have been passing the cold around the house. Well, the girls have been anyhow. Amazingly Mr. D has avoided it, as has Paul.

The house is still for sale. We are more than halfway through our 90 day listing. I think at the end of the 90 days we are going to pull it down for a while and rethink and pray about what to do. We have been going around in circles with our association and the State concerning the sad burned-out hill behind our home. We may end up investing some of our own funds into landscaping, or even more desirable, a nice block wall. If that's the case, we will definitely end up staying put for a while.

So that's the house and the sickness. The kids are good too. I think of cute and clever little stories about them to share, but then just never get around to typing them out. And they aren't so clever and cute two weeks later.

But I've got a cute one for tonight. Yes, it's actually from tonight.

So there's this show on TLC called Toddlers & Tiaras. I've never actually watched the show from start to finish, but have caught enough tidbits to get the gist. It's a beauty pageants for the diaper-wearing set. These little girls are fluffed, styled and made up with oodles of ribbons, lace, make-up, and fake hairpieces. They look like little walking and talking dolls.

There have been a few times when I shake my head as I flip past the show and wonder, "who does this to their 2 year old?"

Well, we don't go as far as the spray tans and false eyelashes around here... yet. We're just sticking to fake curls for now. Grace was super excited to go to bed like this.

I'm not sure why I feel a little guilty about rolling up my 2 year old's hair in sponge curlers. Perhaps I am subconsciously telling her that her straight hair isn't cute enough? Or are sponge curlers the gateway cosmetic and next week I am telling her to stand still until the eyelash adhesive dries? Or is this the start of a lifetime of beauty regimes aimed to improve one's appearance. Really, I think Grace's mommy over analyzes to a fault and the fact is that I just want her hair to look cute and curly for the family picture tomorrow.

Next week we'll introduce her to the eyelash curler.

All These Photos

2009-03-07T20:38:00.000-08:00

My computer is getting old and tired. We've had it for about six years - which is what, like 600 in computer years. Plus I realized that it is bogged down with pictures. Serious amounts of pictures.

My mom has a box full of pictures of cute little Sara-baby. She made me an album of my childhood a few years back - taking the best of the yellowed photos, which didn't amount to too many. My life from 0-2 years is depicted in about three pages of photos.

My kids?
Grace can review her life from 0-2 years in about oh, 1,000+ pictures. On second thought, we took about 1,000 pictures alone when we made the 2008 calendar of her last year. Granted, I went back and deleted about 1/3 of those, but still, that was just ONE month.

It's a little overwhelming how to handle all the photos.

My goal for now is to go back through them - weed out the blurry, unflattering, screaming baby shots. Okay, I may leave a few screaming baby shots - I don't want Grace to grow up thinking she was smiling all the time. I don't want to edit her a new reality.

After that, I need to back them up to my external hard drive. I've been printing the best of the best each month and putting them in photo albums. I know many people feel that is passe - but I can't break the habit yet. Besides, who wants to sit in front of my computer and review pictures? I need to be annoying mom and bust out photo albums.

So what does everyone else do these days?

I keep trying to catch up on my photos, but then there are just more there waiting to be downloaded, saved, and printed.

What a Surprise

2009-03-02T21:18:00.000-08:00

Kids are just little surprises all the time. Like a box of chocolates - you never know what you're going to get.

Last Friday I had an appointment to take Grace in for a hearing test. Since she seems to be a little delayed with her language skills, our pediatrician recommended the test just as a precaution. I could have told her as Dr. Mom that Grace's hearing is just fine. She can instantly recognize the theme to her favorite cartoons from the other room. But then again, there are times when she just doesn't seem to hear me tell her to pick up her toys. And I'll be standing right next to her. Funny how that works.

Anyhow, back to my Friday. Grace woke up at the crack of dawn, okay, 6:20, but way too early. She was cranky, and wanted to eat right away, so we did breakfast and then we had to start getting ready to go. However, her crankiness wasn't soothed by yogurt and peanut butter toast. She didn't want to go upstairs, she didn't want to go potty, she didn't want to get dressed. It's taking all my self-control to remain calm with her.... through gritted teeth.

Finally she gets onboard with the fact that we ARE getting ready, and we ARE going to get dressed, and we ARE going bye-bye. Fortunately, Paul took a nice long morning nap while we got ready.

So we're ready. Finally. And running late. What else is new?

We get to the medical offices. I'm not sure where the Audiology department is located. I'm maneuvering the beast of a double stroller through hallways and on elevators. I find the office. And the doctor has been waiting for me. Yes, cause I'm late.

I apologize. Tell her I was lost... blah,blah,blah. She doesn't look too amused as I squish my beastie stroller into her office.

She hesitates.
"Did you get the letter," she asks me.

What letter?

"The letter that recommends you leave small children at home or bring a companion because you are going to have to be in the test room with Grace. Will your baby be quiet?"

I hesitate.

Who knows? I look at Paul, wide-eyed from his morning nap, and think, "Lady, your guess is as good as mine."

"Let's try it," I tell her. Oh, and I didn't get any letter. I promise.

So we go through all the tests. Grace gets prodded and poked. She takes it all in stride. She even smiles and interacts with the doctor. We leave Paul as we go into a sound booth to listen to noises. He waits patiently, playing with his little chew toy. Never making a peep.

The doctor tells me repeatedly how great my kids are behaving. She says most 2-year-olds don't like to sit still and have things stuck in their ears. And the baby is so good too she mentions.

I don't know what to say. Should I tell her that I suspect that these are some sort of pod children that resemble my own in a freakish way.

But then like I said, kids are just a surprise everyday. I never know what to expect... and sometimes, it can be a pleasant surprise.

There's A Lovely Backyard View for Sale

2009-02-24T20:44:00.000-08:00

So I still haven't caught up on American Idol... but here I am updating. Check me out.

Anyhow, we made it through the first weekend of having the house on the market. We cleaned a lot, straightened things up, hid the undesirable things in the house like baby potties, hampers, and excessive toys. We pulled out the "company" couch pillows. And then we waited for the phone to ring. And waited.

Surprisingly we did get three calls for showings.

I don't think we have an offers coming down the pike though.

Call #1
A young couple with a baby, and a rather snooty realtor. They breezed in. I let them look around downstairs while I went upstairs. I hear them rustling in the blinds leading to the backyard. Then in less than five minutes, they are leaving. "Thanks", says snooty realtor. I think they took one look at our lovely burnt, treeless hillside, or perhaps it was the train that was passing at that time, and they ran. Can't say I really blame them.

Call #2
They are expected between 11 and noon on Sunday. I'm waiting. Mr. D took Grace down to the park so they were out of the house. It's 12:30pm. I'm waiting. I happen to get up with Paul and walk by the window. I see a white SUV slow down in front of the house. I figure that must be them. I discreetly glance out front. Sure enough, the white SUV has pulled over just down from our house. Then the phone rings. Miss Realtor tells me that they are planning on moving on from this area. It won't work for her client. Wow. Now they are just driving by and seeing our backyard view and fleeing.

Call #3
While I was waiting for Callers #2, I received this third call. After our prior disappointments, I didn't have high hopes. This was the best one of the bunch. (Yeah, doesn't say much). It was a mom and her teenage son. They at least went through the entire house. Albeit, quickly. My feeling from them was that they were going through all the available houses in our community to get a feel of what's out there. They commented when they walked in, "oh, we haven't been in this floorplan yet." And then they went on to say that they weren't real serious yet.

So that was our first venture in home selling. A lot of rush and a lot of waiting. And Grace got a lot of park time, so she was thrilled.

The trick for me will be keeping the house spit-spot clean all the time. I'm just betting on not getting any weekday calls, or else I'll be in trouble. I will have to do more than just hide a baby potty. I'll be shoving dirty dishes in the closet too!

Catch-Up - It's Already Mid-February!

2009-02-17T21:19:00.001-08:00

Wow. I am so behind in cyberland it's not even funny. Between the kids, the house, and American Idol - a girl just can't keep up with everything. Actually, I'm behind on my American Idol watching as well, so I'm really slipping up.

The kids are good.

Mr. Paul has decided to be super-baby and start teething. The boy already has two teeth cut and he's not even 4 months old yet. We've had a few rough days with cranky boy. Its just a change from his normally sunny disposition.

Grace is 2 1/2, full of energy, and hears the words "gentle" and "soft" about 1.5million times a day. It just doesn't seem to register that Paul is small and fragile. Okay, so she's proven he's not that fragile. I feel so sorry for the kid - he gets manhandled sometimes. Rather, toddlerhandled.

So what's really been keeping me busy though is the house. We decided to roll the dice and stick it on the market. We don't want to move far, but there's some neighborhoods 10 miles out or so that are quite appealing to us. We've been mulling over it for a while now, and it seems that the time may be right (even though the economy doesn't seem to show it). But we've been praying about it and are comfortable with whatever happens. So we've spent the last couple weeks giving the house a quick face-lift, particularly in the master bath. It was a little grungy. But a coat of paint, new faucets, and a thorough bleaching on the grout - it looks pretty good. I am still recovering from yesterday's bleaching though.

Thursday is the day the house will go up. We'll see what happens.

More Book

2009-01-27T20:27:00.000-08:00

Like any good mom, I want to encourage my kids to love reading. I want to foster a love of learning. I hope they will experience the thrill of getting lost in a good book, turning each page with enthusiasm wondering what will happen next. Okay, so I've indulged myself in many flights of fancy through a good book.

So like a good mom, I'm encouraging Grace to like books. Actually she doesn't need much encouragement. She would be perfectly content to let me read book after book after book all day. Whenever I happen to sit down during the day on the couch, she heads over to her cupboard that has her downstairs books and brings me a book.

"Book. Book"

"Okay Grace, one book."

We read "Hop on Pop" for the 5,300,302th time.

"Okay we're all done."

"No. More book. More book. More book."

She's very persistent when it comes to her books.

So she was thrilled when she discovered the library on Monday. It was her first visit. She could have stayed there all day bringing me book after book from the seemingly never ending collection.

She now has her own library card.

We checked out 7 books. (Between Mr. D and myself, we've already read them all at least 12 times each).

I hope she understands that these books have to go back to the library.

But I'm sure I can help any misunderstanding by checking out more books. More book. More book. More book.

Saturday - Market Day

2009-01-24T13:20:00.001-08:00

So in the past few months, Saturday mornings have become my new grocery shopping day. Back in the day, b.c. (before children), Mr. D and I used to go together, usually on Sunday afternoons. We would buy scads of boxed cereal cause it was always on sale and I had coupons. Then Grace came, and we would still all go together. The times I went by myself, were lonely - I missed my company.

Then came the new wee one, and it doesn't make as much sense to load up everyone to go to the market. So I've been going Saturday mornings and doing it myself. Here's my little secret - I'm not so lonely anymore. Rather, I enjoy my little excursion out by myself. I get up, plan my meals, make my list, bring my cup of coffee, and roam the aisles. The cart isn't full of boxes of cereal anymore - rather better foods (mostly) that I try to feed the family.

I really started to reevaluate what we were eating when Grace started to eat solids. Suddenly the frosted, sugared flakes didn't seem like the best choice. We also started shopping at the healthy food store, where the most well known cereal is Kashi.

My goal has been to make more and more of our foods rather than buy packaged. I've been making granola and bread for a few months now. My next goal is tortillas. Mr. D has requested pretzels also. I would love to find a good recipe for crackers. My attempt at graham crackers a while back didn't turn out so well.

The one thing I figured out when learning how to go shopping well and help meal preparation is plan my meals for the week. I plan exactly what I'm going to make and then shop around that menu. It helps me so much in shopping wisely and having more time during the week because I don't have to figure out what to make and if I have the right ingredients.

So this week, the family will be enjoying, or at least, eating:
Monday - Brown rice with diced steak and peppers
Tuesday - Baked Tortellini with peppers and zucchini
Wednesday - Tortilla Casserole
Thursday - Dijon Chicken and pasta
Friday - Hawaiian Pizza on whole wheat crust (I love my breadmaker!)
Saturday - Creamy Rice, Chicken and Spinach dinner
Sunday - finish up all the leftovers in the house

Plus, I'll make a batch of beef barley stew to have in the house for lunches during the week. I've been doing that lately - making a soup to have on hand for lunch or to supplement dinner.

I'm all shopped now for the week. I had a lovely trip to the store this morning. They had a great price on cheese, so my little cheese-hounds at home are satisfied as well.

Good for a Chuckle

2009-01-22T21:46:00.000-08:00

Oh no I didn't... back to back entries. Woah - this is getting crazy now. What? Am I figuring out how to handle two kidlets these days. Okay, I won't go that far.

But today was a boring at-home, so I don't have any fascinating tales of adventure or exciting photos to share. So instead, dear friends, I thought I would share just some of thoughts that have made me chuckle today.

* How I spend all day trying to get my son to burp and my daughter not to. I swear, she's a teenage boy in disguise. She belches like a grown person, then grins like she's the greatest thing since sliced bread. Through her giggle, she mumbles something that resembles "'cuse you". I repeat, "Excuse ME". She grins. And belches. Lovely.

* I hear Mr. D outside with Grace before he leaves for work. She's helping him give the dogs and plants fresh water. I pause when I hear him saying repeatedly, "Moron. Moron." Really Mr. D? Sure she's only two and doesn't get everything, but c'mon, a moron. Then I realize what he's really saying is, "more on. more on." Grace was in charge of turning on the faucet for the hose and he was repeating her two-year old sentence structure. Moron. More on.

* I haven't come up with a good excuse yet why we gave our children the initials G.E.D. and P.H.D. I guess we have higher expectations for Paul. Maybe Grace will marry well. But honestly, both have middle names that are family names and they just worked - I can't help what their initials spell. Well, I guess I really could have helped it, but I chose not to.

* My daughter has a sixth sense. It's her sense of cheese. This kid seems to always know when I'm taking cheese out of the refrigerator. Suddenly next to me I hear a very persistent little voice, "cheese. cheese. cheese." pause. "peease." This morning, she shared her slice with dad, from whom she inherited said sixth sense. They were both so pleased to have finagled cheese out of mommy-the-cheese-hoarder. But cheese is expensive - they can't just be gobbling it down. They don't seem to agree with me.

So of course, all my stories again revolved around the wee ones, but that's the way things go most times around here. It's that or talking about my laundry folks. And laundry isn't that exciting usually. But, I have been adding some lavender essential oil to my drying cylce and my clothes smell yummy.

Okay, so maybe laundry can be thrilling.

And they grow up so fast...

2009-01-21T21:42:00.000-08:00

Paul is 3 months old today! It has just flown by. He's getting so big - outgrowing some of his 3-6 month sleepers already. He stretches out and they get all taut. It's sad to pack them away so quickly. He's still so good natured. He puts up with the "tough" love from Grace... for the most part. He's sleeping pretty good too - he will go a good 6 hours before waking up (usually around 2-3am) and then will go back down until about 7am - or when Grace comes in the room to wake up everyone.

Speaking of the Gracie-poo, I'm ecstatic to announce that she is day potty-trained. Big girl panties by day... and well, diapers still by night. But I am thrilled with her daytime accomplishments. I don't even have to do the hour-by-hour potty runs with her - she can come tell me, and BEFORE she goes too. As we go to the potty, she tells me "Gee dry. No poopoo, No peepee." That is her mantra. She repeats it all too often - in the store, at the park, to the cashier. She's then will show me everything that will get wet if she has an accident - she points to her pants, her shoes, her socks.... did you know even her hairbow will get wet if she goes peepee? I guess there's no holding back when she's gotta go.

That's the latest from kidsville.

And now, in no attempt to segue, I'm just going to talk about how pleased as punch I was with my last CVS shopping trip. I scored BIG time. Check this out.

Some of the items above include: 4 packages of batteries, three eyeshadows, two mascaras, 3 greeting cards, hair spray and body wash... plus more.

My total?
$6.27

I'm serious. And I got $4 back in ExtraCare Bucks. Granted I did have $10 in ECB to use towards my total, but I still did some smart shopping there. Those batteries? Free baby. Now Grace's Christmas toys can actually do what they were meant to do. Her "Mommy I Can Swim Doll" can now start swimming in the bath rather then just floating.

Thankful Thursday

2009-01-15T21:23:00.001-08:00

I'm feeling pretty thankful this Thursday, so here's a Thankful Thursday list for ya'll.

I'm thankful for:

1. my hour of "Sara time" I'm enjoying. Kiddoes are in bed asleep and hubby is still at work. I love my family, but I also love sneaking in an hour here and there of alone time.

2. my freshly scrubbed floors. Today I got down on hands and knees and scrubbed up all the grime from the Santa Ana winds, as well as the loose plastic pine needles and scattered glitter from Christmas. I love clean floors that don't turn my socks grey.

3. our DVR. Seriously. I love this thing. Plus I love the fact that Mr. D finagled it out of satellite company, making our bill $5 less each month while keeping all our services. This thing has brought tv watching to a whole new level for me. It's so freeing. I don't have to worry about when something comes on - it does it for me. I worried that getting it would make me watch more tv, but rather, I find I'm actually watching less, and better quality tv. When I do sit down to watch it, I don't have to channel-surf and settle for just "something." I get to watch something I already requested. It's amazing.

4. my working internet. I've been fighting with it losing connection EVERYDAY. It was driving me mad. All it took was a simple 20 minute call to the company and so far it seems to be fixed. So easy, and I put it off for so long.

5. the fact that my daughter is alive and well and didn't drown in the bathtub. I had to leave her alone for a few minutes while I tended to sad, crying Paul. When can you leave your kid in the tub unattended and not feel like you're a bad mommy?

6. that tomorrow is Friday, and Mr. D is off, and the house is clean, so we can do something fun and I don't have to feel guilty!

7. and of course, I'm thankful for these guys.

Thanks for the Christmas Gift - I'll Save It For Summer

2009-01-13T21:20:00.000-08:00

So I'm driving Mr. D bananas right now. He can't figure out why I haven't opened and played with my Christmas gifts yet. Actually, he still brings up the birthday gift from November that hasn't been used yet.

But, this is what he doesn't understand. I can't find the time to play with my new "toys". The gifts he's referring to are going to take some time to figure out. I have a external hard drive to back-up our pictures on, an ice cream maker, and new bakeware - which means cleaning out my old stuff and finding room for the new stuff. I've worn the new pajamas, put on the cologne, and scuffed up my new slippers already, so its not like I put all my presents in a corner and forgot about them.

But he wants me to open up the rest and play. I think he just wants ice cream and cookies if you ask me.

But its the time factor. I can't figure out how other mammas do it. Between the kids, the house, mealtimes, and laundry - I'm pretty much busy all day. When naptime comes, I have a plethora of "Sara" activities to choose from (which include the above plus keeping up with my Bible study, emails/blogs, photo archiving, etc.).

Well hopefully by July I will have opened up my new gifts.

But... I haven't run out of time to share cute kid photos. I just can't resist.

Paul is getting so big - he weighed 15 lbs at his 2 month check-up! He's already outgrowing his 3 months clothes. He is the smiliest baby ever. He is quite the charmer.

Grace is learning to be a great big sister. She helps with Paul, sings to him, shows him his new toys, and even shares her bracelets!

Disneyland!

2009-01-07T21:59:00.000-08:00

As a true So-Cal gal, I *heart* Disneyland. I didn't get to go much as a kid, but once I was old enough to work and buy an annual pass, my love affair flourished. In high school, my friends and I would go and hang out, buy expensive ice cream cones, watch the Electric Parade, and eat sour balls (well, except for the green ones cause those taste funny).

Then in college, I was there on the weekends in my vintage dresses swing dancing at Carnation Plaza. I would still buy expensive ice cream and sour balls too.

I met Mr. D and he gamely bought an annual pass and would accompany me to the Happiest Place on Earth, or at least Anaheim, CA. However, he never did quite share my infatuation.

So it had now been over TWO YEARS since I visited the Magical Kingdom. A few years back we stopped renewing our passes since we weren't going out there enough to warrant the cost. The last time we went I had won free passes at work. I was pregnant with Grace. I can pinpoint that visit because I felt uber-guilty that I went on Space Mountain anyhow. I just couldn't pass it up... maybe that explains why Grace loves all the fast rides.

Well I have been hankering to visit D-land for a while now. Mr. D kept telling me that we should wait until Grace is old enough to appreciate it (since its freakin' expensive to go at full-price). Then I was pregnant again. Then we had a newborn. He just kept bringing up one excuse after another.

But I found a loophole!

Thanks to Disneyland, in 2009 you get in FREE on your birthday. Yes, F-R-E-E. So how did Mr. D get to celebrate the big 3-2 on January 3rd? Why, only with Mickey and friends. He got in free, Grace and Paul are both still free, so we just had to splurge for a ticket for me.

It was the best birthday I he ever had!

Post Christmas Wrap-Up

2008-12-30T14:29:00.000-08:00

Howdy friends. Now that Christmas has passed - the cookies have been eaten, presents unwrapped, the tots have already broken their new toys (kidding!) - I am back. I think. I am still planning on limiting my computer time - especially in the mornings, but I am hoping that overall I'm on course to managing my time better.

It's been great this last month - I have been dedicated to getting up each morning (preferably before the kids, but that doesn't always happen), getting dressed and cleaned up right away, going downstairs and making breakfast for the family (Mr. D has been in hog heaven - he loves breakfast, even if its pretty basic as I've been doing). But the key has been I've been sitting down with Grace (and Mr. D if he's home and awake), and we spend breakfast together. (Before, this is typically where the tv came on and I would do other things while Grace ate breakfast with Dora). Its really made a world of difference in how the day proceeds. We eat breakfast and I've been reading to Grace a little from the Bible. She nods and looks like she understands. I figured its never too early to get the Word straight from the source.

So as much as I love the holidays, I am excited to get into "regular" life. That sounds strange, but I haven't really gotten to get into a routine with Grace and Paul. Mr. D was home for so long and then the holidays came and changed things up. And anyone who really knows me, knows I love things organized and scheduled. I like my routines.

But I digress. Our Christmas was great. We were able to spend time just the four of us in the morning and relax over breakfast and open our gifts before going my brother's house for see my family. Grace was OVERWHELMED with gifts. My family was very generous, and she not only got to open her gifts, but Paul's as well. It was cute - she would open up something for Paul and hold it up to him as if he cared. (As demonstrated as she opened his stocking Christmas morning).

Paul was a doll baby and was so content being passed around from grandma to great grandma to auntie and back again.

But of course they say that you don't need to worry about gifts with kids when you have boxes. So true, so true.

Electronic Restriction

2008-12-18T20:41:00.000-08:00

So I've been MIA in the virtual world lately. As I tell my hubby, I put myself on "electronic restriction".

In an effort to focus on getting into a routine with the young-uns, keep the house in order, and prepare for Christmas - I made a new rule: no television or computer until 3pm. I know that the computer is a stealthy time-waster during the day. I leave it up and running and then during the day, I'll just "pop on" to check my email, message boards, or blogs which then leads to 15 minutes here, 15 minutes there.

As for the television - that is mostly for Grace's benefit. I had been feeling "mommy guilt" that I was using the tv too often to keep her distracted. She likes it - I got things done - it seemed like a win-win, except for the nagging in the back of my mind that there's a reason I am staying at home with the kids... and its not to make sure that the kitchen is spotless (or my email is up-to-date!). Also, now that I'm back to the nursing routine with Paul - its so easy to turn on the tv and zone out. And often, get caught up watching something after Paul has finished and is snoozing away. So now, while I'm nursing, I've been including Grace by reading or coloring with her. Now, I would call that a better win-win for us.

All in all, my rules have been working out pretty good. I actually thought it would be a little harder to keep the tv off, but Grace has really only asked for it once or twice and then was easily distracted when I said no.

So between my "restriction" and Christmas planning, shopping, wrapping and baking - I've been neglectful in my updates.

However, baby Paul is doing great. He will be two months this Sunday. Its gone by so fast. He's started smiling and cooing. It's so much fun. I find myself relishing so much more than I did with Grace. With her I was so nervous, was trying to balance work and motherhood, and was so anxious to get to the next milestone - I missed a lot. But Paul is pretty laid back, so he lets me enjoy things much more.

So that's the rock under which I've been hiding. We're looking forward to Christmas around here. Grace loves the tree, the lights, the goodies, and knows who all the gifts are for under the tree - especially the ones for "Gee" (that's what she calls herself).

Well off to clean up my mess from baking Chocolate Toffee Bars - and I think they need a taste-test as well!

Just One More Week

2008-11-24T21:49:00.000-08:00

Mr. D's five weeks of vacation from work (yes, five weeks, I've been a lucky and spoiled new mama) is coming to a close. He has to go back next Monday. It has been great having him home to help with the kids and to just hang out. I've been able to stop and relax and let the house get ~~dirty~~ lived in and just enjoy this time. It's been worth it too.

So today we enjoyed a fun day at the park feeding the ducks at the park, the "ucks" as Grace calls them. Our neighbor came along with her four kids (which include 3-month-old twins). The "ucks" enjoyed some PB&J, the kids had fun at the playground, and the moms enjoyed some sun on the park benches with the babies while Mr. D helped herd the three older kids.

We then enjoyed lunch at Chipotle. Yum!

Tonight, after dinner, the kids had bathtime. Long overdue bathtime.

It's embarrassing to admit, but Grace didn't get a bath all weekend! We were out late both Saturday and Sunday evening, so when we got home, Grace went straight to bed each night. Eh - she's a kid. They don't need a bath EVERY night, right!? I know we used that rationale growing up - especially if we happened to go swimming during the summer. That easily replaced bathtime.

After baths, both kids went to sleep at decent hours, and Mr. D and I enjoyed frozen yogurt. It's been a nice day. I'm going to wrap this up and pray that Paul lets me have a nice night's sleep too!

Goodness, Gracious

2008-11-17T22:29:00.001-08:00

GREAT BALLS OF FIRE!!!

Wow - what a weekend - Southern California was on fire. Literally.

With the Santa Ana winds and hot, dry weather, we are used being on "fire watch" around here and seeing the latest blazes on the evening news, however, it is a whole different thing when it's at your back door.

I was enjoying a lazy Saturday morning - baby on my lap, talking on the phone with my mom, when Mr. D comes in from the backyard. "Get off the phone and go get dressed. You've gotta get out of here. There's a fire."

I dash upstairs and while pulling on my jeans, peek out the window. OH.MY.WORD. The hill behind our house is on fire. I could feel the heat on the window pane. I dash downstairs grabbing things here and there as I go... the pile of clean laundry on the bed, a pair of tennis shoes, diapers, my hairbrush. It was a pretty interesting pile of things that accumulated by our front door.

I look outside again and the flames are licking the top of our concrete block wall (Thank God it's a concrete wall!). Mr. D is pulling the dogs inside. I'm getting ready to leave, then, almost as quickly as it came on us, the fire ate up everything in its path and moved eastward along the row of houses. There wasn't even time for the firefighters to show up and put out the flames. So the fire moved along the perimeter of our neighborhood community. Some of the houses on the other side weren't as fortunate as us and our neighbors. There are about 16 burned and/or damaged homes.

This clip shows some of the damage to the homes. It's devastating - especially when they are our neighbors. I may not know them personally, but there's a connection. It could have been me.

Anyone local knows that this fire, which started in a tree less than a 1/2 mile from our home, then traveled to numerous cities and destroyed hundreds of homes, evacuated thousands. It was a crazy couple days watching the news and following the fires. I am so thankful for all the friends and family who called to check up on us and offer any help we needed. Again, I have to thank God that we didn't need any help.

This is our backyard, showing the smoldering hill behind the fence. In retrospect it would have been cool to get a picture of the flames, but you know, priorities - had to prepare to flee for safety!

This is our backyard from yesterday. The smoldering is gone, but the layer of ash is still back there.

Bring on the Vermonster

2008-11-13T22:40:00.001-08:00

Mr. D and I have officially started our post-partum diets. Unfortunately my body doesn't follow the "you can eat whatever you want and lose your baby weight as long as you're breastfeeding" motto that I hear some mamas claim, so its back to Points we go.

So what better way to have fun while dieting, but watch this. (World's Best Places to Pig Out). Thanks to the Travel Channel for sharing this valuable information to two hungry folks.

We learned about where to go to eat a 3-pound hamburger paired with 5 pounds of french fries; gagged while watching patrons inhale hundreds of oysters in one sitting; and found out when we travel up to Northern California, we can stop in and indulge in a stack of 5 pound pancakes.

Mr. D's personal favorite on the list was Beth's Cafe, which serves 12 egg omelets.

Meanwhile, my sweet tooth was wooed by Ben & Jerry's Vermonster. This is what we are talking about:

For those who take their passion for ice cream to staggering extremes, participating Ben and Jerry's scoop shops have an ice cream container more their size. Served in a plastic bucket, the Vermonster sundae is big enough to give even Godzilla an ice cream headache. It takes 20 scoops of ice cream, four bananas, one fudge brownie, three chocolate chip cookies, four ladles of hot fudge, 18 scoops of toppings and loads of whipped cream to create this sinful concoction.

Yes! I seriously would give this a try. Of course, I don't think I could eat it all, but boy, does it sound good right now.

Wow - three days of dieting and I'm already drooling over a monster size bucket of ice cream.

From the Homefront

2008-11-02T21:23:00.000-08:00

Week two and everything's still a-okay on the homefront.

Mr. D is still fulfilling his role as wonder-husband/father and taking care of things while I enjoy some downtime to recover and relax.

As I just mentioned, I am actually taking it easy and trying not to fulfill the role of super-mom. Instead, I've been enjoying lazy mornings in bed that I have missed for the past two years.

Grace loves her new little brother in her sweet, slightly rough two-year old way. She loves to kiss on him and hold him, and keeps us on our toes watching out for baby Paul.

Paul is still a doll-baby. He's been such a good baby so far - doing what babies do best: eating, sleeping and dirtying diapers. He hardly cries or fusses. Now, while this all sounds like mama bragging - what it really is is mama relief. I kept telling Mr D that not all babies are a challenge, but he didn't believe me.

So that's been our house lately - pretty lazy. For example, today, Grace hung out in pjs all day; I didn't put on make-up (gasp!); and my big accomplishment was cleaning the downstairs bath and doing some laundry.

Oh, and wait: speaking of laundry - one little baby causes a whole lot more! We've yet to master diapering a baby boy without having the occasional (frequent) accident on clothes, blankets, bedsheets, etc.

Oh, and I must share some cutie-patootie pictures from Halloween. As a rule, I am not a fan of October 31st, except for the fun on dressing up. So, dress-up we did and we took Paul on his first big outing to our church Hallelujah party. He wasn't too impressed as he slept through the whole event snuggled up in my wrap.

Baby Announcement

2008-10-24T21:12:00.000-07:00

Introducing Paul Henry

Born October 21, 2008 at 9:32am. He weighed in at 9lbs and was 21 inches long.

Our baby boy has arrived. We're home and getting settled.

So now, the scoop - how it all went down.
Here's the nitty-gritty details.

So people aren't kidding when they say the second labor can go quicker. From the very first contraction to that last final push, it took 6 hours. Compared to the 18 hours it took with Grace, I would say I improved my birthing performance.

I woke up at 3:30am with contractions - I stayed in bed timing them out to see if they were real and regular. They were - already about 6-7 minutes apart. I figured sleep was no longer an option, so I got up around 4:30am and went downstairs. I decided to use this time to finish up my ironing and write some thank-you cards for baby gifts. I found I could write a card, get up, have a contraction, and then write another. How much sense they made, I can't guarantee. Fortunately, I only had about 7 to write. I called my mom to let her know that today was the day, and then realized that I should probably get Mr. D going and get ready myself.

6am - I wake up Mr. D. He gets moving. Contractions are starting to come closer - about 5 minutes apart. Starting to get more serious too. The back labor starts. I sigh. Not a good sign - Grace was a posterior baby, and the back labor was insane, as was the pushing. Every contraction after that, I tried to lean forward and roll on my ball or bed as my midwife instructed, and I prayed that the baby would turn if he needed to.

7am - My mom shows up to pick up Grace. I am finishing getting my bag ready, combing my hair, and of course putting on some make-up. Can't go into delivery without a little mascara. Starting to struggle a little more through contractions. Definitely in "laborland" - rather spacey and having trouble concentrating. I'm still rambling through the house getting Grace ready and throwing random things in her bag and my hospital bag.

8am - We are finally getting on the road. I dread the car ride. Fortunately its not too bad and thank God we didn't hit too much traffic. We arrive and check in at the hospital at 8:30am.

8:30am - We arrive to check-in. They send us to the first room to get an initial check. I know, to make sure I am truly in labor and ready to head to delivery. I could have told them that was the case, but we wait. And wait. A nurse comes in to take vitals and asks me way too many questions. I try to be chatty, but its hard. I do remember actually apologizing for not being more chatty. The nurse leaves to get the midwife. Finally. We wait a while longer, and I start feeling pressure. I tell Mr. D - he goes out and tells one of the nurses. All of a sudden the midwife is in my room and finds that I'm 9 cm and my water is ready to break. I then got to ride up to delivery on a gurney - first time rider. Wheee.

In delivery, they check me again. My water breaks and they find that little Paul made early bowel movement - there was meconium in the water. They had to call Newborn Intensive Care staff to be on site for the delivery to clean him out after birth to make sure he didn't get sick from swallowing any of the polluted water. The staff arrives - I'm ready to push. It took about 5 pushes and baby was out in the world. To say I was a bit dazed at the speed of everything is an understatement.

So that's the birth part of it all. I couldn't have asked for a smoother delivery. Recovery, however, was a different story.

In brief - as if I'm making any of this brief, I experienced post-partum hemorrhaging about 4 hours after delivery. When I got up to use the facilities in my room, I experience some intense bleeding and blood clots. As I remember it all, I sat there sweating from head to toe, staring at a blood splattered wall, as the nurse asked me somewhere faintly in the background if I was okay. All I could answer was No. No, not at all. I can't get up. The room started to blur. Then there were all these hands and voices telling me to keep my eyes open, to smell this, to sit here. Then over it all, I would hear Mr. D's voice repeating the instructions. He told me later that I was only responding to his voice.

So I was rushed back to bed, hooked up to an IV, and pumped full of pitocin to start uterine contractions. Really? Again? I remember telling the doctor that this was all supposed to be over already. I had contracted, pushed, and been stitched up again. I wasn't supposed to have a doctor all up there again. I think I got a chuckle. Or maybe I thought I did.

Well by this point, my hair and make-up I did that morning were shot.

I spent the night being pumped full of pitocin and saline, but I did stop bleeding. It was quite the experience. By the next morning, I felt much better. I was able to stand and not feel faint. Mr. D said he knew I was back to myself when I got up to comb my hair, put on a little mascara and straighten up the hospital room.

We left that afternoon to come home. Since being home, we've been relaxing and adjusting to our new family. Paul is doing fantastic. Right now I just need to switch his nights and days. He thinks its party time at 1am. I am blessed beyond words by my husband. He's been great - helping out with Grace and getting me to lay down and relax. That alone is a tough challenge.

So that's the story of how Paul arrived. He's such a sweet baby, but of course aren't all babies sweet miracles.

Update

2008-10-14T22:15:00.000-07:00

Quick update.

Still pregnant.
Very pregnant.
38 weeks, 5 days.

Countdown: 10 days til due date.

I've been busy getting ready for baby. The nursery is pretty much ready for him. Clothes have been washed. I'm working on packing bags for me and Grace. I would like to clean the house one more time. We'll see how that goes.

Oh, and while trying to finish this to-do list, I'm battling a cold. So hopefully I'll be able to shake that before I have to try to shake out this baby. My dear, sweet baby who is probably going to weigh 10 lbs!

So that's what's going on. Grace and I have had some fun adventures lately and I wanted to post pictures, but it just haven't made it to the top of the to-do list.

Maybe sometimes this week.

Or maybe not. Maybe I'll be having a baby!

All Gone... They Are in the Trash!

2008-09-29T16:22:00.000-07:00

Grace made a big decision this weekend. She threw her pacifiers in the trash. She's a big girl now.

She's a big girl now who has had a hard time sleeping the last few nights.

Mr. D has been telling me for the last few weeks that we should take the pacifiers away. She was only using them at naptime and bedtime, so I wasn't as worried. But then again, you're talking to a girl who sucked her thumb until she was 10! So Grace with her pacci addiction had my sympathies.

But I agreed - the longer we waited, the harder it would be, especially with the new baby coming. But I kept putting it off. I told him I wasn't ready for this decision.

So he made it for me. The sneaky Mr. D. Saturday afternoon he and Grace come bounding upstairs with big news. Grace threw away her pacifiers.

Say what?

They had been watching Nanny 911 and it was an episode where the nanny had the kids throw their pacifiers away. Mr. D asserts that Grace was intently watching this happen, so he asked her if she wanted to throw hers away. Supposedly she went up to her bed herself, got them out, came down and threw them away. So that's the story.

Really?

I believe him. I don't think Grace would go along with the story if it wasn't the case. She was quite proud of herself too. For a while. As bedtime came closer, I think she began to rethink her actions. By the time we put her in bed, she realized she had been influenced by the evils of television.

She went to bed relatively easy, but the middle of the night lasted forever. I was up with her for about two hours trying to get her to go back to sleep. Then Mr. D took over for an hour or so and finally got her to sleep.

Surprisingly though, Sunday night went much better. Last night she woke up once, calling for me. I went in to comfort her, and her water cup was almost empty. I told her I would go fill it up... took my time, and by the time I went back, she was asleep again. Yay!

I had a friend tell me that it is usually harder on the parent to take them away then it actually is on the child. I proved her right.

Quick Update

2008-09-22T22:24:00.001-07:00

I figured I should check in and prove I'm still around and full of baby! This past week was a doozy. Grace had a cold which she passed on to me as if I haven't had enough difficulty breathing lately. So between feeling worn down with the cold and suffering a few mini-meltdowns of feeling unprepared for baby, I didn't get to play online.

However we are getting are ducks in a row now, or rather our diapers and onsies in a row. After scouring Craigslist for days, we have picked up a changing table, a glider with ottoman, and a Moby wrap (always wanted to try one with Grace) all for under $100. Love it.

We also bought the bedding for the nursery. Take a peak - I know you want to. Of course, I didn't buy ALL the accessories to make it look like little animals have overrun the room. But, Mr. D did insist we order the little rocking chair so Grace has a place to sit while I'm with the baby. It was our splurge purchase for the room. It all arrives Friday. I can't wait.

Today we are going to do some major reshifting in the nursery. I have a truckload of books that I need to move. Currently, there is a bookshelf in the room, as well as a bookshelf in the closet - both full of books. The plan is to move the larger bookshelf into the closet, and move the smaller one out of the closet into Grace's closet. I'm going to fill the larger one as full as I can get it with books, but the one in Grace's room I need to use at least one of the shelves for her stuff. And I see the time coming all too quickly when both little ones will need their closets for themselves... I'll just worry about that when the time comes. So I'm off to shuffle around books - the goal is also to thin out... but I don't know how successful I will be at that.

Cookies and Cards

2008-09-10T22:28:00.000-07:00

Baby demanded cookies today. Demanded. Stuck his little foot out against my tummy and said "give me cookies."

Specifically pumpkin chocolate chip cookies.

So you know, I had to listen.

And I had to indulge. To satisfy the baby that is.

But they are whole wheat pumpkin chocolate chip cookies. You see, the whole wheat makes them okay - nevermind the sugar and chocolate.

In other happenings I finished my baby thank-you cards. The lovely women of my bible study threw me a little shower and blessed me with some adorable outfits.

I've been on a card making kick lately - not that I know what I'm doing. I wing it as I go.

The problem with being crafty is that I find myself working at night after Grace goes to bed and I stay up too late. I need to be more disciplined and get myself to bed on time. Its tough though because after spending all day with Grace, I relish my "me" time. I really know that I should be seizing any sleep I can get these last few (six!) weeks before I'm on newborn schedule again. So, now that it is 10:45pm - I guess I should heed my advice and head to bed.

Pooltime Moment

2008-09-05T09:18:00.000-07:00

I had a "Sara" moment yesterday. One of my moments when it feels like my world is just falling apart and I forget how to cope. I felt tired down to my bones, the house needed to be cleaned, and I had promised Grace that we would play in her inflatable pool after nap and lunch - and she wasn't going to let me forget it. I sat outside with her trying to be patient as she asked me to wind up one of her pool toys for the hundredth time and fighting back yawns and tears.

Thank God for my husband. I called him at the office.

"Do you have a minute?"

"Are you having a moment?"

Pause.

Sob. "Yes."

He talked me through it. The world isn't falling apart. The house isn't that dirty. It all doesn't need to be done right.this.minute.

Again, God knew what He was doing when he gave me Mr. D.

I was also able to enjoy my favorite part of pooltime with Grace.

When she's all finished, I hold up a big beach towel and she steps to me. I wrap the towel all around her and pull her to my lap. She lets me cuddle and love on her without a squirm. We sit and watch the trees, airplanes, and birds. I tell her she's going to be my little girl forever and how much I love her. She grins at me and laughs when I kiss her. We sit there and I realize how precious these times are and file them back into my memory. This is what should make up my "Sara" moments.

Hi-Ho Hi-Ho A Painting We Did Go

2008-09-03T15:11:00.000-07:00

WHEW!

We definitely labored this Labor Day weekend. We spent all three days painting and painting... and painting. My poor husband who hates painting was a trooper and helped me out tremendously and little Grace was very well behaved as well which helped. It just took one incident of sticking her hand on the wet wall to learn that when Mama says, "wet, no touch" she means it. We didn't even have to discipline her for not listening - her distaste of all things dirty did the job for us - she then stayed clear of all the walls.

So we tackled the family room. I liked the color, but felt that just that room wasn't enough.

Mr. D sighed... but knew deep down I was right. Really - he knew.

We continued to the front of the attached wetbar.

But I felt that I still needed to continue the color somewhere else. The front door entry was a good spot - nevermind the challenge of painting the vaulted ceilings. Mr D pretended he could no longer hear me at this point.

Actually, to my credit, I told Mr. D that we didn't have to do it in this round of painting, but he was on a painting mission and wanted his preggie wife (and her preggie emotions) satisfied. I really would have been happy even if we didn't paint the entry.... but we he did.

So its done.... in a way. I think bringing the color to one of the walls in our dining room would really tie the downstairs together. Mr. D says I can think all I want cause he's not painting again for a good few months.

I count the weekend as a success. The computer is downstairs (which I love) - the nursery-to-be is still a mess, but I can tackle that next weekend.

Still Preparing

2008-08-28T20:29:00.000-07:00

We have a game plan for this weekend. A game plan that includes baby preparations! Yay! I need this game plan to take action so I can stop feeling completely unprepared for baby boy's arrival in less than two months.

So here's the plan. It starts with painting the den on Saturday. This is what its looked like for the past two weeks.

So how does that figure into baby preparation? No, baby isn't going to be sleeping in the den. Nor do I believe he will care what color the walls are, but it is a chain of occurrences.

The den gets painted Saturday.
Then, on Sunday we can move the computer desk downstairs. It will be replacing the small corner table.
Once the desk is downstairs, obviously, the computer and all its fun accessories will follow.
This will open up the upstairs room for the nursery.
And it comes back to the baby!

Once we get that desk out, I can clean out the closet. Move the cat - somewhere. Where? We haven't decided yet. Fortunately the room doesn't need to be painted. We can hopefully find a cheap dresser/changing table on Craigslist and I plan to peruse some baby stores on Monday for a bedding set.

There, done.

Sounds easy, right?

Park Fun

2008-08-24T20:59:00.000-07:00

Contemplating the ducks

We had a park-filled weekend. Friday, we visited the park along with my friend and her husband who were in-town visiting. We figured if Grace was cute enough they'll have kids soon too. I think she passed the cute-test.

Then today we went to the big park for a birthday party. This park not only has ducks, but horses and a train! Grace went on her first pony ride. She was a little intimidated (okay, cried and yelled) at first, but once the pony started walking along she thought it was pretty neat. She doesn't say "horse", but the whole way home she made her horse-noises to tell us about her adventure.

Then we rode the train too. Its a good 15 minute ride around the park and even goes through a tunnel. It was fun.

The not-so-quite fun part of our day was the temperature. These days its doesn't take much for me to glisten (sweat like a pig), and I was hot today. I'm not talking HOT like "oh look at that hottie", but more like, "oh that poor lady is having a hot flash". I managed though. On the plus side, even with all the heat, I didn't experience much swelling. Yay!

So here's Grace's first pony ride, and yes, the round, pink, glistening lady is my 7-month pregnant self.

Domestic Day

2008-08-18T20:39:00.000-07:00

I felt so domestic today. I got up this morning - washed, dried and folded a load of diapers, did the ironing and cooked up fun stuff in the kitchen. I made Crunchy Granola (from this site) - I am officially hooked on it. I also baked some whole wheat bread - which finally came out soft and oh, so yummy. In addition, I made a batch of lentil soup to have in the fridge for the week.

I think I figured out what I need to do with my bread. Since I couldn't manage to work with yeast the old-fashioned way, I bought a breadmaker a while back. The bread came out much better, but not fabulous like I envisioned. Doing some online reading, I found quite a few people let the machine do all the dirty work (kneading) but then do the final rise and bake the bread in their ovens. It made a huge difference in the way the bread baked. So that's that.

Oh, and in a completely unrelated subject that I can't even segue to - I can't wait for Grace to get a little bigger so we can play dress-up. I was doing some more cleaning out today and found a bunch of items that I would have been bonkers over if my mom had them for me when I was a little girl. A few of the items in this eclectic collection include: my purple 8th grade promotion dress complete with flowers and tulle under the skirt; a green velvet formal from Homecoming; a couple 60's dresses from vintage shops, reminiscent of Marsha Brady; a large girl's Hawaiian mumu; a pair of flats that have been spray-painted gold and covered in glitter; and several 40's era dresses. I hope that Grace enjoys playing dress-up as much as I do did. I'm seriously going to win some cool points there.

Nesting Continues

2008-08-14T21:11:00.000-07:00

Not to speak for all pregnant women, but there is a reason that I shouldn't be making decisions while gestating - they aren't always the best choices.

Tonight - 7:30pm

This was Grace's room. After spending the afternoon baking cookies for Mr. D, I decided around 5pm that I would go clean out Grace's closet. Really? 5pm? You think that's a good time to start a major cleaning project.

Yes, it won't take me long. I'll get dinner around 6pm.

Really? 6pm?

And I was right. It didn't take me long. Not long to take everything out of the closet and make a mess.

At 6pm, I left the room along with my child who had stripped down to a diaper (it was hot upstairs), was wearing bunny ears from Easter and chewing on an empty bottle that was supposed to be in the Goodwill bag.

We had dinner by 6:20pm. But then instead of our evening walk, I had to go back upstairs and figure out what to do with the mess.

Some of it went back into the closet to be dealt with at a later date (hopefully tomorrow), some of it went into the office - soon-to-be nursery (mostly baby stuff that I wanted out of Grace's closet), and the rest is sitting in the hallway waiting to go downstairs into the Goodwill pile.

So I made some progress - just probably wasn't the best timing in the world. But again, let me remind you - pregnant. Pregnant and starting to worry that new baby boy is going to be sleeping in an office in pink pajamas because I wasn't ready in time!

Oh, and this was Grace's room at 8:30pm before bedtime. See, I pulled it back together.

A Hair-Raising Experience

2008-08-10T20:28:00.000-07:00

Or should I say, a hair-ERASING experience.

Grace received her first haircut today. I know, she didn't have a whole lot of hair to begin with, but it was getting quite scruffy looking, and well, to coin a phrase, mulletey. (mullet-y). I couldn't let her continue to make that fashion faux-pas, so we pulled out the scissors this afternoon.

Before pictures. Show us that mullet baby!

So here's the thing that I should mention about me and using scissors. I really shouldn't be allowed to. I am left-handed, but I can't cut left-handed. Having grown up through public schools that only offered right-handed scissors, I learned to adapt to cut right handed. However, these cutting skills get me by, but I don't boast of my scissor wielding expertise. I still can't get over when I took Home Ec in jr. high, and my teacher had to help me cut the fabric straight.

So today I came out armed with sharp scissors (in my right hand) aimed at my precious little baby in her chair. Oh, and Mr. D videotaped the whole experience - that didn't help my nerves.

I go for the bangs first. I have experience cutting bangs at least - I've trimmed my own many a time.

I get through the bangs okay. Next, the back.

What I am hoping to do is even it off on the bottom and give her more of a level bob. I go for the first cut (which has to be saved for the baby book of course). Oops. According to the videotape playback the quote goes, "(nervous giggle), I think I took off too much".

So Grace's bob is a little shorter than I planned, but I have to admit, it looks much better than the scraggly mullet.

After pictures.

Not too bad, but I don't think I'll be opening up Salon Sara anytime soon however.

A Big Thank You

2008-08-07T13:01:00.000-07:00

Its been thank-you card central around here. I promise, this will be the last post about Grace's party. Pinkie-swear.

But since I went through all the hoops in doing the invitations and the party-planning, I couldn't send out some sad thank-you's. I had to finish off the safari adventure. You know, bring it full circle - the "circle of life" like Lion King.

Okay, so I'm being a little dramatic. But I am happy with my thank-you cards. I took the same concept from the invitations and reversed it. I put the animal paper in the outside. On the inside I used a plain sheet of cardstock so I could handwrite the actual thank you. Then I tied the invitation closed with a piece of raffia with a little card attached that said "Thank You".

Now here's where I have a hubby that gets too involved. (Just kidding of course, I love his involvement). His great contribution to the thank-you card concept was to think of the thoughtful gesture of including in each card a picture of Grace playing with the new gift she received from said person. Great idea - in concept. 2.5 million pictures later I'm over it. Plus, I needed to get them out. So, there were a handful of thank-you's that simply included a picture of Grace from the party. (The one I posted last week of her wearing her safari hat). I tried hard to get good pictures for everyone, but my model wasn't always cooperative.

Here's a few of the more cooperative pictures.

Cooking with her new pots & pans (and hat)

The cool bubble machine

Putting money in her new piggy bank (and cleaning out dad's change fund)

New clothes!

And one more... just to show her "naughty" side

The Need to Clean

2008-08-03T19:42:00.000-07:00

The aftermath.

This past week I had to recover from our previous party-filled weekend. Seriously. It took me all week. Well, I had to recover plus I came down with a cold, and I had an additional day of babysitting duty as well.

All week I've been staring at boxes piled up full of deflated jungle animals, leftover craft supplies and extra balloons in one corner, while in the other corner sat a stack of birthday gifts that needed to find homes and corresponding thank-you cards written.

While driving me crazy all week, this mess has also instilled in me "a need for clean" in the house. I have this incredible urge to go through every room and rid it of extras, clean out the things we don't use, and organize the things we do use. So today, call it early "nesting" or a God-given energy burst (kick in the pants), I spent the day organizing. On this rare Sunday, Mr. D had to go into work. We went to church together this morning, came home, I fed Mr. D some lunch (the last of the leftover hamburgers!), kissed him good-bye, and got to organizing.

I have convinced Mr. D to give me a cupboard in the garage where I can store my ever-growing collection of party supplies and crafy-type stuff. Once I secured the valuable cupboard space, we measured it and went off on a storage bin shopping spree last Thursday. In the Target aisle, we pulled out different sizes of bins, stacked them, turned them, restacked them, so I could make sure I maximized my space. I ended up purchasing about 8 bins of varying sizes.

And the bins have been sitting next to all of the aforementioned piles from Thursday to today. They've been taunting me of my disorganization. So today, I had to do something about it.

Of course, before you organize, you have to un-organize. I emptied out our hall closet - also known as my catch-all location. This is the place where I quickly hide things when company comes over (or I'm in the middle of planning any sort of event, holiday, etc.). Its a good thing I live in California where people don't wear coats, but most of the time when I have company over, I wouldn't be able to hang their coats in there because they wouldn't fit along with the baby potty chair stacked on top of the ironing basket, next to the table arrangement that didn't look quite right with my tablecloth, and the sad everyday couch pillows that were thrown in there to be swapped with the "company" pillows.

So the closet spilled out.

And I got to organizing.

I feel much better now. The closet is neat and tidy. I was able to empty it out some so I can actually access most of the items. Some items found their way to the goodwill box, and others to my new storage bins that are now filled, labeled, and waiting for their new garage home.

So I have accomplished step one in my need to clean. My next target is the entertainment unit. It has two cabinets underneath the television. I want to designate one for Grace, so I can store her books and puzzles neatly in there for her to access. Right now, one cabinet has movies and other randomness, and the other has my CD collection (which is organized alphabetically in CD holders) but also my empty cases with liners. What do I do with these? Anyone?

So now that I'm organized and can see my floor again, I am struck by how dirty it is! Yikes. Time to do some dusting, mopping, and shining this week.

Our Safari Adventure

2008-07-28T21:05:00.000-07:00

So I know everyone is waiting to hear - how did the safari adventure go? Was it a success? Well, friends, we did it. And we all had fun. And we're still recovering.

Saturday night we wrapped up prep work at 1am. Hit the hay and was up and at 'em at 6:30am. We loaded the truck and my Jimmy and was at my mom's by 9am to drop off Grace. We were setting up at the park by 10am. Right on schedule. Score. We were moving the last few boxes out of the way and taping down the dang elephants on the table one last time at 1pm when the guests started arriving. Whew.

We had a great time. There were about 15 children (and we didn't even have to rent any of them to make it look like Grace has friends!), 40 adults, and enough food for 100 (I always overbuy!). The weather was great - although a little windy which didn't help my grandiose decorating plans. Even duct tape couldn't hold down the ornery inflatable animals in the wind. Oh well. It was pretty to begin with.

We had the kids decorate safari hats, there was a pinata, and lots of bubbles. The bubbles were a huge hit.

And of course, the cake. I ended up making a tiger cake, which looked a little like an orange kitty, but you know what, it was midnight and that is not my cake-decorating finest.

But I've come to find out that really the talk of the party was the refrigerator. I guess it's not the norm to unplug your fridge and bring it out to the park. That's my husband for you. There's no mountain too tall for him. I have to preface though - it isn't a full-size fridge, and it wasn't from our house. It's about a half-size fridge, and it was from our garage. And hey, the fruit was cold, coleslaw chilled, ice frozen, and the tiger-cake still had its "roar" because of it. Like Mr. D told me today - "you gotta give me props for the fridge." Yes, Mr. D, - I will give you "props" since we are from the hood, and you have mad skillz.

And now, on to some more picture goodness.

Happy Birthday Grace

2008-07-22T13:42:00.000-07:00

My little girl is 2 today!

Time goes by so fast. Sometimes at night when she's asleep I sneak into her room and just watch her and realize how precious she is and try to drink in the moments and remember her like she is now. It gets hard sometimes to remember details from just these past two years.

I never wrote down my whole birth story. I wanted to, but was caught up in caring for a newborn. I tried to go back after a couple months, but facts were already getting fuzzy. Some things are still crystal clear however. This is what I learned and will remember in preparing for this next baby's arrival.

Staying at home for a long time is a good thing. My house is much more comfortable than the hospital.

Don't eat during active labor. Don't worry - hunger will be the last thing on my mind for a while. Just because I only get ice chips in the hospital does NOT mean I need to go grab a sandwich before heading into the hospital. I will only revisit that sandwich a few times later.

Reread "Birthing from Within". Skip over the new-agey mumbo-jumbo, but remember some of the pain management techniques. They actually work.

Don't hold it against the nurses when they promise the baby will be here before midnight (or whatever given time they feel will encourage you along). They are just trying to help and can't help it if my baby is gigantic and posterior (sunny-side up).

Pray. A LOT. It will keep my mind focused and give me peace.

Regardless of what lessons I learned, Miss Grace was born healthy at 12:19am on July 23, 2006 weighing in at 9lbs, 1 oz. It was such an amazing experience. What I find even more mind blowing is the glimpse of God's great love for us when we have our own child to love.

Plus, He has equipped us physically with these wonderful hormones that help "blur" the labor process so much that we willingly decide to go through the pain again for more children. Its truly amazing what our bodies are capable to endure.

I'm getting caught up in my own ramblings of birth. Its one of those topics that I find so fascinating and I am so thankful I was able to experience it naturally.

So in honor of Grace, here's a quick look back at two years ago. Happy Birthday my dear!

Dirty Forks, Vines, and Cakes

2008-07-22T13:31:00.000-07:00

So... something I never thought I would say, much less write:

"I just ate my cake with the fork that I used to scratch your foot."

Never did think that would happen.

I was the recipient of the foot scratch, not the cake-eater. Fortunately.

In other less disgusting things, Operation Jungle Party is still underway. I have my to-do list itemized out for each day this week so I can systematically complete tasks with the goal of avoiding total meltdown at Saturday, 10pm when I wail, "and the party is tomorrow....." So far, so good. Today on the list is making my vines.

I'm taking twine and cutting crepe streamers and draping them over the twine to create a vine-like look. Some streamers I'm twisting, others just letting fly. We are going to hang the vine-rope across the center of the gazebo (27' - you can refer to the map, if necessary). I have some inflatable monkeys that will then hang from the rope in the vines.

I am also going to make another trial cake today. This will be the third! I want to make the cakes rather than purchase them to avoid all the preservatives and make it somewhat healthier. I'm trying to use whole wheat pastry flour in lieu of the white flour, but I don't want to serve a cake that's too dense. I have decided that I'm going to make one chocolate sheet cake, and then two lemon cakes in my animal molds that I bought. That way I have plenty of cake and still get to make some of my animal shaped cakes that are so time consuming to decorate.

So I've tried out two different lemon cakes - one was too dry, the other was pretty good, but I'm not 100%. But, since chocolate will probably be more popular anyhow, I'm going to try it out today. I've made it before, just never with the whole wheat flour. We'll see!

Oh, and I should do some housework today also.... but that's just not as fun as party planning!

Safari Party

2008-07-15T20:19:00.000-07:00

Lions, tigers, and bears... oh my!

Grace is having a wild safari adventure for her birthday bash this year. We're having it at a local park. We have reserved one of their large gazebos. It's less than two weeks away and I am in planning mode.

Invitations went out last week. I was pretty happy with them. I decided I wanted to make them myself, so I researched online and visited Michael's to come up with a plan. For my first attempt at making invitations from more than fancy stationary, I think they came out nice. Its trifolded black cardstock. On the inside, I attached animal printed paper. In the center is a piece of vellum that has all the details. For the front we found these nifty little foam crafts of animal heads (that Mr. D so patiently glued together).

We spent yesterday at the park measuring the space so I could draw up a layout. Yes, that is the level of my planning craziness. I need a map. Today I laid out a map on the computer and it is oh, so pretty. This isn't the best image of it, but you get the idea.

I'm not even going to justify it either. Either you understand why I need this, or you will think I'm nuts and my explaining won't make a difference. My husband thinks I'm nuts, but he humors me anyhow. Just wait thought, he will appreciate it once we show up to set up on the day of the party and all my tablecloths are cut to fit, my paper crepe vines are just the right length, and we know exactly where everything will go. Hmm...I guess I'm trying to justify it after all.

Next in line is planning the menu and cake. Menu will be pretty straight-forward picnic faire. Burgers, hot dogs, chips, watermelon, corn on the cob. Cake on the other hand has yet to be decided. I would love to make a few different animal shaped cakes (tiger, monkey, elephant) using the fun molds, but I don't know if I might be biting off more than I can chew. I could always order a cake, but that's just no fun. I think if I can keep the menu pretty easy, I can spend the time on the cake.

It should be fun. The decorations and party goodies that I ordered online are set to arrive next week. We bought little plastic safari hats for the kids to decorate and wear. I can't wait!

Waiting for Folding: Four Loads

2008-07-13T23:20:00.001-07:00

I have just broke my first cardinal rule of laundry. My mother would be so ashamed right now.

In my laundry room, sitting on top of the washer, is my laundry basket. My laundry basket that is overflowing with four load of clean, unfolded laundry. Yes, four. I have washed and dried four load of laundry and piled them all in a basket for folding later this evening. Well, later this evening came and went, and yet the laundry is waiting. This is my number one rule of keeping on top of the laundry - when it comes out of the dryer, fold it. Don't pile it. Take 10 minutes and fold it.

Why don't I listen to myself?

I have an excuse of sorts though. I have been neck deep in planning Grace's birthday bash. We decided to celebrate her 2nd birthday at the park and invite everyone. We didn't do much for her first birthday, so Mr. D wants to make up for it this year. I had to get all the decorations ordered online so they would arrive in time. I have spent hours searching for the best prices and best discount codes available online, and then compared them to availability and prices to our local party stores. Madness.

But, decorations are ordered. Invitations have been made (by hand) and sent. This week: food. I am planning on posting how super cool the invites turned out too. Stay tuned.

Independence Celebration

2008-07-06T11:57:00.000-07:00

Happy 4th, err, 6th of July. Well, better late than never. That's my motto typically these days - I seem to have lost any time management skills I used to possess. Being out of work, and on a toddler's schedule really messes things up.

Anyhow, I digress.

We had a nice celebration of the our nation's Independence. It started off rather slow. Mr. D decided to celebrate our freedom by repairing my car. See, we don't have to be told who will fix our vehicles and when. We have the privilege to do it ourselves. Okay, he'll do it himself. I'll watch. And send Grace to help.

He finally finished up, and we cleaned up and headed over to a friend's house to set fires and blow things up. Our friend lives in a city where fireworks are legal. Here in dry and dusty Southern CA, there aren't many cities left that allow personal fireworks. Most people head to parks to watch large scale shows. But we celebrated old-school with some sparklers and fountains.

Grace dug the fireworks. I wasn't sure how she would react, but after a few loud squeals and explosions, she was ready to light her own.

Some of the other (older and wiser) kids wanted to give her a sparkler, but we decided just to let her watch this year instead. She'll have plenty of other opportunities to play with fire when she gets older.

All in all, it was a nice time. We saw friends, ate some grilled burgers, set off some firecrackers, and realized just how blessed we are to live in such a great country.

A Trip to the Lake

2008-07-01T18:08:00.000-07:00

It was a hot and sweaty weekend. We packed up our gear and left our 95 degree temps for the lake - where we had even warmer temps of about 110. We took Showdog III (our boat - the name, silly story) to Lake Mohave in Nevada.

We left bright and early at 5am (okay, more like 5:45am) on Friday. We carpooled with another family who have a 10 month old. Crammed like sardines - three across the front of the truck (the husbands and the wife), and me in the back with the babies, we headed off for our 5 hour trek. It went fairly smooth: babies cooperated, truck cooperated, we got breakfast at the Denny's with the slowest. service.....ever. We arrived in the small town outside of our destination and drove up to the motel (that title is even questionable) where the rest of the group (two other families) were staying. Upon looking at the rooms - I wished we were staying at a Motel 6. At least they leave the light on for you. And perhaps have windows that lock! So after much debating about should we stay or should we go now - we decided to stay. Our options were limited after all. There's not much within a close proximity and that's why this place manages to stay in business while charging $65 a night! $65 so I can fear my safety and wear flip-flops in the shower!

Okay, okay, enough about the skeezy motel. We finally launched the boat launched and got out on the water. Its about 2-ish at this point. And honestly, I'm done! Finished. Nothing left. Running on fumes.

Here's the recipe: Take only three hours of sleep (one day maybe I'll actually do my packing before the night before), mix that thoroughly with travel weariness, add a dash of motel drama, and a good heaping of pregnancy - allow to bake at 110 for about 1 hour and you will have a bonafide tired and cranky mommy.

So Friday wasn't exactly a blast for me. I ~~chilled out~~ roasted on the beach while counting down how long until I was going to get air conditioning and sleep.

Fortunately, as soon as my tired body hit the spring loaded, saggy mattress at the skeezy motel, I was out like a light. Almost 8 hours of sleep later, I felt like a new person - ready to hit the beach.

Saturday was much better - your typical day at the river. Lots of suntan lotion and lots of bottled water. The non-pregnant people rode the jet skis and inner tubes. I did venture out in my maternity swim suit (yee-haw) and played in the water with Grace. It was nice and relaxing.

Sunday we spent some more time out in the water before calling it a day to try to make it home by dinnertime. Of course dinnertime is relative - we didn't get home until almost 9pm. Why do trips home always seem so much longer? Without the anticipation of fun - we all just realized how hot, tired, and dirty we were, and how much work we have waiting for us at home! Actually, the trip home wasn't that bad - we chatted, laughed, cleaned up explosive diapers. An explosion that warranted removal of entire carseat for cleaning. That's my daughter - boy can she poop! But we all made it home safe and sound - albeit a little sunburned (no thanks to my suntan lotion).

So that was my weekend. Here's proof.

Playing in the "kiddie" pool

Singing "Itsy Bitsy Spider"

Family Self-Portrait "Showdog III"

Dancing Machine

2008-06-26T20:46:00.000-07:00

"She's a dance, dance, dance, dancing machine.
Watch her get down, watch her get down."

Meanwhile, we all stand around in a circle, "Go Gracie, Go Gracie."

Grace went through her first day of Dance Class for Tots. A better title would be Organized Chaos for Tots. Imagine 15 adorable (mostly) girls running around in pink (and purple) leotards to Lion King's "I Just Can't Wait to Be King". And then finish with a loud "RAWR".

The fact that they managed to do any sort of organized movement was impressive to me. Of course, Moms are all on hand to help guide their little ones.

Grace did.... okay. She was a little hesitant. She was fine until the music got loud and the teacher was talking over the music, and the little girls were yelling over the teacher and the music. Then it was a bit overwhelming for her. But when the music stopped, Grace was the first one to clap her little hands and yell "YAY!". As if she deserved all the applause for hiding behind Mommy's leg.

I didn't realize how fancy little leotards can get either. I went out and bought Grace the standard pink leotard. She wore it proudly with her little chubby legs hanging out. I thought she looked cute. But then we show up and there's skirts, and glitter, and tulle and hairbows galore. Poor plain Grace. I told Mr. D and his comment was "so next week you'll have a skirt for her then." Not necessarily. (Well, maybe).

No cameras were allowed in the studio, so I can only show Grace pre-dance class. I think she might need a skirt next week.

Clothes Shopping

2008-06-24T21:49:00.000-07:00

I don't know what I wore during my last pregnancy. I must have worn the same three outfits over and over and over because that seems to be all I have in my closet. About a month ago I pulled out my maternity clothes from last time and gave them the once over. I realized a few were unfortunately already too small (thanks hips for spreading), some were too career-oriented since I had to work during my last pregnancy, and some were just downright hideous. (What was I thinking!?)

I had to make a few trips to Motherhood Maternity - in my opinion they have the best options and quality of clothes. Their prices are comparable to other known discount places like Target or Kohl's, but the clothes fit me better. So three trips later, I think I have a decent maternity wardrobe. I've learned to shop for the basics this time around and not fall for cute things (that will be hideous two years later) and things I may only wear for two months (anything somewhat fitted now will no longer fit by month eight or nine). So I have a couple pairs of capris that will match a handful of tops, throw in a couple dresses, and of course a pair of lounge pants and I'm good to go. I did buy a pair of shorts too - this staying at home all day forced me to it. It's been 150 degrees each day (okay, maybe only 95), but its hot and I still have the summer to get through.

I hated spending the money - I thought the second time around I would be so thrifty pulling out my old clothes and reusing them, but unless I wanted to sit around the house chasing a two-year old in long sleeves (again what was I thinking!?) and slacks, I needed to splurge.

This afternoon when I went shopping, I wised up though and brought my mom along. Thanks mom for buying one of the outfits for me. Aren't moms great! She watched my wild indian while I tried on clothes and then bought me some of them. In return all I had to do was bring dinner over.

When Did This Happen?

2008-06-22T22:58:00.000-07:00

Sometime this past week I woke up pregnant. I went to bed knowing that I'm expecting and woke up showing that I'm expecting. Grace gets a kick out of lifting up my shirt and looking at my belly. Then she lifts up her shirt and looks at her belly. Our bellies are about comparable in fact.

Okay, so her belly is cuter. She doesn't need to rub it in.

All Swelled Up

2008-06-19T22:24:00.000-07:00

I was a pretty good pregnant gal last time around. I didn't have many complaints. I worked practically up to the date (okay, a week before because my boss was a nervous-Nelly and practically kicked me out) and I never even had to take a sick day. I didn't suffer from some of the common complaints like heartburn and indigestion. I slept like a rock up until the night before Grace made her appearance.

In fact, I wish I could have a night's sleep now like I did when I was pregnant. I haven't slept like that since. Sigh. I miss that deep-sleep that ends when my body wants it to, not because a toddler is tapping on your leg. But, I digress.

However, this is not to share that I'm Super-Preggie or anything. I would say Fortunate-Preggie is more like it.

Actually in reality, I should have been called Sausage-Preggie. Seriously, while avoiding all the above mentioned ailments, I swelled up like one of those giant Mickey Mouse balloons from Disneyland. We're talking the huge ones that might sweep a kid away if he holds onto it without parental supervision.

I just about threw a party in my office when I managed to wiggle my wedding ring off around 7 months. It had been a source of concern for weeks. I had tried ice, butter, oil, soap, lotion all without success. I would tug and tug until my finger turned red and swelled up more. Finally, one morning in the restroom while washing my hands I managed to wiggle it off and it remained off until after the blessed baby arrived.

Shoes became a distant memory to me, much like my skinny jeans - which are now a memory fading into a oblivion. I hung onto my strappy sandals until they would leave crater-sized imprints on my feet. Then I was forced to wear flip-flops. To work. That was a low point. And, flip flops I had to buy a size bigger than my typically petite size 9 feet.

So the point of my swollen tales? It has already started. I'm barely five months and I've said aidios to my wedding ring. The moment it felt tight - the bad boy found its way into my jewelry box. And after surviving these last few days of record-breaking heat, I can feel the tell-tale tingling in my feet and up my ankles. So sexy, I know.

Well at least I can wear flip flops now in my new mommy job. And I still have the size 10 ones hiding in the back.

Things That Made Me Smile

2008-06-17T20:16:00.000-07:00

So today started off a little disappointing. Mr. D was called into work 4 hours early today - 8am rather than Noon - and since he doesn't get off until 10pm or later, I wasn't going to see him much today (and also putting me on all-day Grace-duty!). It was a bummer - I thought we could have a nice, relaxing morning together (and maybe I could sneak in a bathroom cleaning while he played with Grace). But no, plans changed. And anyone who knows me, knows I don't always adapt immediately when plans change. I'm learning though. Some might call it maturing.

So I decided today rather than moan and groan, I would have a good day, and maybe even crack a smile. So I found some things that made me smile today.

* My daughter REQUESTING a nap. She usually goes down around noon, and today she was ready for it. I was on hold with Kaiser (for 30 minutes!) about a bill I received in error, and she was sitting on my lap. She would look at me, look at the phone, and then point upstairs. I finally got off (problem resolved - yay!) and I asked her if she wanted to take a nap. She said yes and off we went. Sweet.

* Getting that bathroom cleaned afterall. Plus the master bedroom and Grace's room.

* Enjoying a plate of nachos with jalapeno cheese (leftovers from our Father's Day get-together) while watching Gilmore Girls. Yes, I will admit it. I have a problem when it comes to this show. If I am available at 2pm during the week, I'm watching ABC Family. I call it my "lunch hour" break. There's probably a group for people like me - GGA (Gilmore Girls Anonymous). We come to break the habit of watching sappy shows about mom and daughters, but instead talk about who Lorelai should have been with - Luke or Christopher and how Logan was just not good enough for Rory, and catch up on all the pop-culture references we didn't get during their speedy conversations.

* My daughter's laughter while we sprayed Toby (the dog) with the hose.

* My daughter wearing a bowl on her head. Of her own choosing, I should add. (Bad picture due to camera phone!)

* Enjoying a nice homecooked meal with Grace while watching Toby play outside. Then, Grace asking for seconds on her salad. Lately she's on a salad-kick. She would always want some of mine (we typically have a small green salad with dinner), so I started making a small one for her, and to my surprise she eats it up. All it is consists of is romaine lettuce with a little Italian dressing. Today she ate it all up and then asked for more. I didn't know that 2-year olds eat salad.

*Oh, and having the following conversation with Grace probably about 50 times today:
Grace: Da-Da? (Interpretation: Where's Dad?)
Mom: Daddy's at work.
Grace: Oh-No!

That would be the end of the conversation until something else reminded her of Da-Da and we'd go through it over again - verbatim.

So I found quite a few things to smile at today - not including the obvious ones like I have a great family with a wonderful husband; blessed beyond belief with our house and the fact I don't have to work; our health; a new baby on the way. It makes the little unplanned things of life seem so unimportant.

Gratuitous Grace Gallery

2008-06-16T20:23:00.000-07:00

So I really haven't had many gratuitous Gracie photo galleries lately. Don't you admire my restraint? Actually its probably more laziness on my part. I was so good at capturing her every move at first - well, the non-moves that is, but lately keeping up with her is enough work.

So I kept the camera nearby and captured a few of her numerous moves. Come, spend some of your day with Grace.

Potty Time... for the baby. Grace disappeared into the bathroom and I found her with her stripped down dolly on the potty.

Then she smiled for me. Thanks to Daddy for teaching her how to "smile".

Time for some art appreciation.

But wait, there's a phone call now.

Really, Mom, this is private.

And, we're done!

I couldn't resist sneaking in and getting the sleeping Grace. I risked waking the sleeping ~~giant~~ princess for the sake of capturing her in peace and quiet. I had to resist blowing a raspberry on that belly sticking out!

No Laughing Matter

2008-06-10T20:41:00.000-07:00

Okay, so I make a crack about my dead fish and eating salmon, and what happens? Today I get attacked by salmon.

Okay, not really by salmon, but by the can containing the salmon. We're talking serious bloodshed here people.

Here's the tale of why I won't make fun on my dead fish anymore.

I'm making dinner - Cheddar Salmon Quiche - if you're interested. I open up the can of salmon. Empty salmon in the bowl. I move to throw away the open can and somehow drop the can (blaming that on pregnancy clumsiness), which had the lid partially attached to it. The jagged opening of the lid lands right on my big toe.

The gash is pretty long and deep. There's blood and me not coping well with the blood. I stood there for about 30 seconds just saying, "oh no" over and over. Actually more like, "ooooohhhhh.....noooooooo". As I watch the blood pool on my newly scrubbed kitchen floor.

I stood there long enough to attract Grace from watching Barney to come over and also say "oh no". So we're both standing there saying "oh no". Where's Mr. D when I need him? He's my logic when I have none.

Well, I wanted to get the quiche in the oven since I was already running late getting dinner started, so my answer was to take a handful of napkins and wrap them around my big toe. I continue making dinner when I realized I was still dragging blood across the floor. Not good. Answer? More napkins.

I finally get the quiche in the over and sit down to properly clean up and do something with my wound. It's okay - it was only a two band-aid emergency.

So I rescrub the kitchen floor and make up a dramatic tale to explain to Mr. D the quantity of bloody napkins in the trashcan.

And the moral: don't joke about the dead fishes.

Bye-Bye Billy

2008-06-08T20:31:00.000-07:00

R.I.P. Billy the Fish

May 2005 - June 2008

Billy the Beta lived a long life - much longer than I ever thought. When we bought him to live in my office for work, I suspected he would hang around for a few months - tops. I was surprised when each Monday I would come in and there he would be swimming around.

Then he came home with me to live in my kitchen. I enjoyed his company - well, as much as you can enjoy a fish's company.

My favorite Billy story is that of his second chance at life. I cleaned his bowl one day, and not thinking, grabbed the purified water from the fridge. After I filled the bowl, dropped Billy back in, did I realize that the glass was frosty to the touch and Billy was in shock! I scooped him out and back into the warm water. He just floated without movement. Sad, I waited. He still floated. With remorse for being responsible for his demise, I scooped him and and carried him to his final resting place in the toilet. I dumped him in and went to flush. With one last look, I reached for the handle. What's that? He's swimming! It's a miracle! Billy went on to live another year with his new lease on life.

Unfortunately, Billy is no longer with us. My kitchen is a little quieter. Mr. D says we will replace him, but it won't replace the memories.

Let's pause for a moment of silence.

Great. Who's thinking salmon for dinner?

Relationships

2008-06-05T18:07:00.000-07:00

We have new neighbors moving in next door. Its really an answer to prayer - they are a family from our church who have two kids, plus two on the way (twins!). Their daughter is three and son is two - just a couple months older than Grace. She's about 6 weeks ahead of me in her pregnancy. How exciting. I'm hoping that we can all get along and Grace might have some playmates. There really aren't any little ones around us, nor in our family, so Grace is pretty used to playing alone. It sounds so sad, but its not so much that she's lonely as she needs to learn to play with others.

Plus, Mr. D and I have been "dating" another couple from church. We joke that getting to know another couple is like dating: when do you call, is it too soon to get together again. Fortunately, the other couple makes the same jokes - so they "get us". I don't know about other people, but it seems to be so hard to find like-humored people. I meet many like-minded people, but like-humored is different.

This is how see it: like-minded - you have fairly similar beliefs and values. Obviously, I don't have to see eye to eye with someone on everything, but having similar values and outlooks on life helps things along. Now, like-humored - we can laugh and joke about the same types of things. I can tell the story about seeing the grandma in Target who had a muffin-top, (I am not making this up), and they'll laugh at it. Or cringe like I did. As a sidenote, grandmas shouldn't be wearing low-rise jeans and short tops. Really. Actually, its not a look that flatters anyone, but I don't usually see in in the 70+ age group.

So that's the latest in our relationship life. The ups and downs of moving into new stages in life and meeting people along the way.

New Beds for Everyone

2008-05-30T20:54:00.001-07:00

We are sleeping in style around our house these days. Mr. D and I decided to splurge in the purchase of a much-needed new bed, and Gracie has been upgraded to a toddler bed.

With the onset of the new baby, we decided we should start to transition Grace out of the crib. Since she never won the World's Best Sleeper competition (actually I think she finished close to last), we figured we should get an early start. We found a listing on Craigslist for a great little bed for her, and saved ourselves a few pennies in the meantime.

The transition is definitely still in progress. We hit Grace with a double-whammy though. In getting the "big girl bed", we also told her big girls stay in the their big girl beds all night, not with Mommy and Daddy. (Plus Mommy and Daddy don't want any wet diapers yet on their new bed).

She threw a big girl fit about that for a few nights.

I think she has resigned herself that she's not getting in our fancy, smancy new bed, but she's still paying me back. I was up with her three times last night putting her back to bed. I felt like my newborn had already arrived!

So I'm tired and haven't been able to enjoy my new, giant bed. Here's Grace enjoying it for me! (And yes, she mushed the pillows all up during our photo shoot.)

Oh, by the way, in other news....
IT'S A BOY!

How I Get Gracie to Eat

2008-05-27T21:18:00.000-07:00

Just add avocado.

I swear this kid has eaten more avocado in her mere 22 months here on earth than I probably have in my many more months alive. She loves them.

I can't complain. There are worse things for her to eat.

Tonight for dinner I made a baked barley dish with onions and mushrooms. It was just us girls tonight, so I dish it up and we sit down to eat. Grace wasn't too interested. She picked out the mushrooms, deeming them "ick" and played with her food.

So I thought, I could add a little cheese. Cheese usually solves most problems for both her and Mr. D.

Cheese didn't do it - besides picking out the pieces here and there.

So I thought, "Do I give up on dinner and offer something else?" Oh, but wait, Mama has another trick up her sleeve. "Grace, do you want some avocado?". Affirmative response.

So I take half an avocado, mash it up along with the barley. Bingo. She scoops in and starts eating away.

My toddler has an unique taste in cuisine.

Jet Setting Party Animal

2008-05-18T15:21:00.000-07:00

Wow. It has been two weeks. Missed me much?

We had our exciting adventure to Washington DC last week for my friend's wedding and this past week we have spent getting back into the groove, doing piles of laundry, and pretty much kicking back since Mr. D took the week off work.

Traveling with Grace turned out to be much better than anticipated. I've decided she's going to be a jet-setter and party animal. I'm in trouble.

She loved the traveling part. The airplane ride was exciting - well for the first 3-4 hours. The last hour not so much. But I was feeling the itch to get moving too, so who can blame the kid. Even then, no tears. We only have to use our portable DVD player (AKA, our back-up relief pitcher) for only an epidsode of Go, Diego, Go and a little bit of Wonder Pets.

Then the hotels. Whee - elevators, running down hallways, Mom and Dad always in the same room with her. She was in heaven.

Oh, and the Metro. She loved riding on the train.

Everything was just so exciting.

So when she's off traveling the world when she grows up, she's also going to be dancing the nights away. I'm worried.

She was the life of the party at the wedding. She danced and danced and danced some more. If Mom and Dad sat down, she would take us by the hand back to the floor. I wanted to take a video of her with her fancy moves. My daughter now does the "Raise the Roof". Sweet. But I didn't think of it til she was somewhat winding down for the night. She danced until the party ended at 11pm.

Unfortunately, my pictures didn't even turn out the greatest - my flash was turned off for half of them. I'm usually much better at documenting our travels, but multitasking between being in the wedding and helping with Grace, made my photo skills suffer. Fortunately, I think my mom had some good ones on her camera, but I haven't seen her to snag them yet. So I guess some of these medicore shots will suffice for now.

The Family

Dancing Away

There's a Reason I Haven't Posted

2008-05-01T22:59:00.001-07:00

So I haven't been very good at posting lately. But before you give up on me, I have some excuses. And they are good ones too.

- Nausea

- Fatigue

- Irritability

- Excessive trips to the restroom

Oh wait, those all sound so familiar. As if I experienced them sometime in the past couple years. Oh yes, its coming back to me.

It's a baby folks.

Yes, Mr. D and I are excited to announce that we've been blessed with an addition to our family. I'm due in late-October - putting me at almost 15 weeks right now. This first trimester has been a rough ride. But I think I have put the worse behind me... well, for now. There's always that ninth month... oh yeah, and delivery isn't exactly a party.

We're very excited. Only a few weeks before we find out if our baby will be wearing pink (which we have a lot of in boxes), or if it will be a boy who wears pink!

We're getting Grace ready for her new Big Sister role. She has a cool shirt - that's the first step.

I think she's a little concerned about the prospect - all that sharing that is in store for her.

Mommy and Mean Group

2008-04-24T22:24:00.000-07:00

So I thought "Mommy and Me" groups were supposed to fun?

Then why did I leave so stressed out?

A neighbor of mine invited me to join her at her "Mommy and Me" group. It consists of a group of a dozen or so moms from her church that bring their children ranging from 1 - 5 years old and let them play at a park. My understanding is that the moms get to socialize and the kids run themselves ragged on the playground.

Nice in theory.

Then Grace and I show up. And it looks to all like I raise my daughter in a cave. Any socialization she had disappeared.

She didn't want to play independently on the playground. She needed "mama, mama, mama" (her repetition, not mine) with her to hold her hand.

She didn't want to go down the slide.
She didn't want to play with the other kids.

Oh, but wait, she spotted a boy with a ball. She wanted the ball. But, she didn't realize that might involve approaching the boy. "Mama, mama, mama" wasn't going to get the ball for her. Then the boy dropped the ball seemingly more interested in another activity. "There Grace, there's your chance." But, my daughter moved too slow and soon the ball was swooped up by another youngster. "Sorry kid, that's the way it goes. You snooze, you lose."

That pep-talk didn't work so well. Now we have tears, my little red-headed, red-nosed ~~pill~~ daughter wanted the ball. Sigh. I try to get her to calm down trying to look like a calm mother myself all the while I want to crawl into the nearest jungle gym and hide. I haven't learned to take childish fits in stride. I haven't learned to accept that my child won't always be well-behaved.

So we forget about the ball. The tears dissipate. For now.

Later on, she wants something. What? I still don't quite know, but it warranted tears again in Grace's world. This time I told her to learn some words and then I could help her out. Okay, maybe I just thought that. But really, the pointing gets old sometimes. I feel like I live in a game of 20-Questions.

So fortunately, she calmed down again. Long enough this time I was able to make a polite exit without carrying a screaming child under my arm like I had envisioned earlier.

We get buckled in the car and head home. Grace is asleep in two minutes flat. I sigh. I shed a tear or two. A fun-filled morning I tell you.

Just a Game

2008-04-17T20:32:00.000-07:00

So, because I don't feel like writing a real post, and nothing all that exciting happened today, and because I was tagged by Lyndsay, we're going to play a game. A get-to-know-me game - cause that's what everyone wants to do - get to know me.

Rules of the game:1. Post these rules of the game first.2. Each player answers the questions about themselves.3. At the end of the post, the player then tags 5 people and posts their names. Then the tagger goes to the blogs of those who have been tagged & leaves a comment letting new players know they’ve been tagged. The tagger asks them to find the memo and instructions back at his/her blog.

And on to the fun...

What I was doing 10 years ago: Going to college and participating in the swing dancing craze

Five things on my To Do List today:
1. Thursday AM Bible Study Group
2. Make dinner
3. Clean upstairs bathroom
4. Pay bills
5. Take Grace to the park

My Favorite Snacks
1. Ice Cream
2. Wheat Thins
3. Peanut Butter & Honey Sandwiches
4. Popcorn - air popped
5. Homemade cookies

Things I would do if I were a billionaire: Travel with my family. Create/Support a charitable cause - there's so many in need that I don't know what my cause would focus on - but it would help someone, somewhere.

Five of my bad habits:
1. Worrying what others think
2. Snacking
3. Watching stupid TV (those reality shows suck me in) too often
4. Staying up too late when I know I need my rest
5. Talking too loud (I'm just going to leave Lyndsay's answer - it fits me too!)

Five places I have lived:
1. Anaheim, CA
2. Corona, CA
... and that's all folks

Five jobs I’ve had:
1. Waitress
2. Student Office Assistant
3. Teacher's Assistant (for all of about 2 months.. and then I changed my major!)
4. Administrative Assistant (for a now debunked e-company)
5. Marketing Manager

So that's me in a nutshell.
As far as tagging - I don't really have any blogging friends, so I'll leave that part out!

My Fruitless Efforts

2008-04-16T22:12:00.000-07:00

My dear little Grace.

My dear little girl who will not eat fruit. Will not touch it. I've snuck mashed bananas into her breakfast yogurt, but that's as close as I can get it to her. I don't suppose fruit flavored yogurt counts.

Whole fruit? Forget about it. Other than avocado - which she would eat for every meal if I let her - she won't eat other fruits. I've offered grapes, bananas, apples, strawberries to no avail... and that's just in the past two days.

I've recently become aware of how bad the situation has become. So I must spring into action and get this baby some fruit. Stat.

I've tried to be sneaky. Yesterday I took out the peanut butter to Grace's excitement. However, instead of putting it on the usual cracker, I put it on some apple pieces. She looked at the pieces, touched the peanut butter (to make sure that's what it was I suppose?), picked up the piece, put it to her mouth. "Yes!" I thought. "I did it."

Then little miss realized that it wasn't a cracker or rice cake underneath, spit it out and refused to try it again. Grr. Baby: 1. Mom: 0

Today I diced up some fresh strawberries nice and small. I asked Miss Thing if she wanted cottage cheese. Big surprise, she did. I mixed in the strawberries. I thought this might pass. She picked up her spoon, enthusiastically dug in. After one bite, she realized something wasn't right and pushed it away. Baby: 2. Mom: 0

So my next plan is to go back to basics. I'm going to go buy my almost 2-year old some baby food. Maybe this is where I went wrong. In my attempt to bypass jarred baby food altogether (which I was quite proud that I did), I don't think I put enough emphasis on the fruit. She does well with other foods, but I guess I didn't puree up enough peaches, pears, and all the other p-foods babies eat.

So I'll try it now. Hopefully that might be something new and she might be intrigued enough to give it a whirl.

She eats her other meals with gusto though.

Saved by the Beep

2008-04-11T21:19:00.001-07:00

I'm going to go crazy soon if Mr. D doesn't get home from work and help me.

It's driving me mad. Slowly. Soon you'll find me sitting outside in my backyard in the dark with my dog. Just sitting and waiting.

The battery in our smoke detector is going bad and its letting me know. Every minute or so. Every high pitched beep. Reminding me to change the battery.

It's driving me crazy. I can't do anything about it. The smoke detector is at the top of our vaulted ceiling some 15 feet up or more. Mr D forbade me (via my whiny telephone call) to try to get up on the ladder to try anything. One look up there and don't worry, my two feet will remain on the ground.

But he's gotta get home and do something!

I am so thankful that my friend invited me out tonight to shop and have dinner. If not, I would have sat in the house and been a raving lunatic by this hour.

However, my daughter, the one who wakes up if I ~~type~~ breathe too loud in the next room, she's sound asleep. Not a peep. I'm shocked. I thought it would keep her up. Or at least wake her up after a short while. Thank God for that.

So he should be home soon. (beep) Any minute now. (beep). Any minute now.

Her Mama's Hair

2008-04-08T22:51:00.001-07:00

I know that I've neglected my hair for too long when the comments go from:

"Oh, look, she's got her mama's hair"

to

"So where does the red come from in your family?"

Not good. Plus, the ash-brown roots sneaking in are a big warning sign.
Well, a visit from my friend Loreal fixed it tonight.

Gracie's back to having her mama's hair color.

_________________________________

So, its been a long time. Honestly friends, Grace has been putting me through the wringer these past few days. She has been testing if the word "no" really has any meaning in our house. I keep hearing my mom's words ringing in my ears "Be consistent and firm."

Mom, I'm trying.

Little Blonde Girl

2008-04-01T22:03:00.000-07:00

Grace was adopted by a 2nd grader at the park today.

When we arrived to play (read: burn off energy before dinnertime), there was a group of young girls involved in an elaborate make-believe game in the playground. It was cute to listen to them - reminded me of my years of imaginary play.

They took a break at one point and the group scattered. These young-women-in-training already knew the ropes, and a group of them went to the restroom together. A couple remained and Grace decided to make some friends.

She went up to them and starting babbling away in her own special language she has. They seemed interested. One little blonde girl in particular. She wanted to pick Grace up. (Don't tell Mr. D, but I let her). Then she asked if Grace could play with them. I said she might be a little young still for that. So instead little blonde girl hung around us. She helped Grace slide. They played on the teeter-totter together. She told me about 2nd grade, about her mom having a new baby, and how she knew Grace was a girl because she was wearing pink. (I guess the mullet is still asexual).

We were having a pretty good time. Then little blonde girl told me that I looked like her grandma.

Say what?

I told her that her grandma might be a little older than me. She asked me how old I was.

Pause. So I think, "do I lie to her", knowing full well that when I told her 30, I might as well tell her 101.

I can't lie to a little girl. I tell her 30.

She looks at me and smiles, "my grandma is 30 too."

I kept waiting for her to say "April's Fools."

She didn't.

Well that little girl must have a great looking grandma.

Saturday Morning Breakfast

2008-03-29T10:12:00.000-07:00

We don't usually do breakfast in our house. Breakfast as in something other than cold cereal or toast. And Mr. D loves breakfast. So this morning, he hasn't been feeling 100%, so I thought I would treat him to his favorite: pancakes. When he woke up, I had eggs grilling, bacon sizzling, and made-from-scratch pancakes waiting to be made.

Since my stovetop was pretty full with the eggs and bacon, I decided to pull out my electric skillet to make the pancakes. It's a bit of a pain to pull out of my cupboard, but it does make much nicer pancakes, so I went for it.

So glad I did too.

What was sitting on my electric griddle, nestled in the back, in a bowl that was stacked on the griddle?

Only my $100 bill I lost a month or so ago.

I KNEW I didn't lose it. I had put it away in the drawer that I thought I had, but it must have somehow slipped out and fallen into the cupboard below. Onto my electric griddle. The one that I use once in a blue moon when I treat Mr. D to breakfast.

So according to Mr. D, the moral of the story is make him more pancakes.

Infomercial Sucker

2008-03-27T22:15:00.000-07:00

I think I want this.

I'm not usually swayed by infomercials on TV, but I saw this one twice while watching Top Chef last night. And I'm intrigued.

I'm getting old. I'm not the young lass I once was, and my heels have been the first to suffer. I'm sure our house of ceramic tile probably doesn't help the situation much. I remember as a young girl watching my mom scrape, rub, and mess with her heels. I thought, "I'm glad I have nice heels."

Well that was then, and this is now. But the difference between my mom and I is that I'm not invested enough to scrape and rub every night. I want a miracle tool.

And here it is - the PedEgg. Okay, maybe not a miracle. Okay, fine, it probably doesn't even work, but it looks neat.

And just for $10, I get TWO. One for each heel I suppose? Where do I call?

When Mommy Kicks Herself

2008-03-25T21:47:00.000-07:00

I could kick myself. I would, if I were flexible enough.

As I've mentioned earlier, we are planning a trip to DC in May. I was online last Friday searching for fares. I found a good deal, and was getting ready to book it. But, I wanted to make sure it was the BEST deal. So I combed through dozens of sites just to make sure. It was. Great.

Then I realized that I was late. We were supposed to be at church by 5pm - Mr. D had to drop off some supplies for Sunday before the office closed. It was almost 4pm and I wasn't ready.

No biggie. I'll book the tickets when we get back home that night.

Well, after several errands and a stop at my mom's house, it was almost 10pm by the time we arrived back home. I didn't feel like doing tickets. "I'll do it tomorrow," I thought.

Saturday passed. Sunday was Easter.

Monday. Okay, today I'll book the tickets. But to my suprise, not only did I miss out on the good deal, but the best deal I can find now is $60 more per ticket. Dang. I sheepishly told Mr. D who shook his head, but fortunately didn't say much more.

So I'm holding out for another day. I read somewhere online that Wednesdays are the best day to buy tickets. We'll see.

Oh, and are you wondering where Grace's super-cute Easter pictures are? Shame on Mommy. I didn't take a single picture of her all dressed up in her Easter dress. I just have pictures of her post-church, lunch, and nap in her Easter-casual wear to find Easter eggs. This is the best that I can show.

My Lack of Sleep

2008-03-20T22:15:00.000-07:00

....Due to sleeping at the foot of the bed.

My little Grace is not the best sleeper. A combination of genetics and indulgent parenting, she never has been, and as she has taken many traits from her grammy, may never become one. We do our best with her, but each night without fail, she awakens at some point between 1-5am crying and needing comforting. Our comforting is typically bringing her to bed with us. Our motto, the less sleep we lose, the better we feel.

However, the wrench in this plan is when Grace is out of sorts. If she's not feeling well, our wake-up call comes around 11pm. Then she is in bed with us all night - tossing, turning, flipping, rolling. Its amazing how this little person can take up the majority of a king size bed.

For the last two nights Grace has had a cold. She's congested and coughing. My wake-up call came at 11pm last night. Actually, I hadn't even gone to sleep yet. I should have. I should have taken the opportunity when it was presented to me. But I didn't.

So she's in bed between Mr. D and I as usual. She's rolling, coughing, and snoring. And moving closer to me. Next thing she's on my pillow. She's squirming closer. Before I knew it, she had taken over my spot. I was going to move her, but she was sound asleep, and honestly, I was scared to wake her. She's intimidating at 2am. So instead I scooted down to the end of the bed and curled up sideways.

I was booted from my pillow by my little 25-lb. baby. What's with that? And what did I do? Tried to sleep at the foot of the bed. Restlessly.

And what's worse? I obviously didn't learn my lesson because its 10:30pm now and I'm typing instead of catching up on my sleep. Maybe tonight will be different. Grace can sleep at the foot of the bed. The footboard will catch her.

Potty Epiphany

2008-03-16T21:41:00.000-07:00

Even through nobody without a child would care, and even those with children probably won't care much more, we have been celebrating all weekend.

What gives cause for such clapping and exclamations of joy?

Only dry diapers!

Little Miss Grace has had a potty epiphany. She gets it. Now, that's not to say she knows how to signal us yet, but she knows what to do when she's on it! Friday we went all day in the same diaper. Dry diaper, I might add. Of course I took her to the potty about every hour, but she did it. (Insert shouts of joy)

But the icing on our potty-cake was when we got home from Costco yesterday with a dry diaper. And made it through church today with a dry diaper. My joy runneth over.

We're making progress, slow though it may be. She did poop her pants today, but as soon she did, she started whining at me. I was in the kitchen and looked over at her.

"Grace, do you have to go poopie in the potty?"

"ooh-ooh" And she started trotting off to the bathroom on her little chubby legs.

When we got to the bathroom, she had already started her business, but she wrapped it up on the potty.

Now this may have been way too much potty information for most, but we're excited around here.

Listen to Mr. D

2008-03-14T17:32:00.000-07:00

So I was going to write a thrilling tale about how I spent my morning making homemade food for Grace and how easy, nutritious, and cost-effective it is to make homemade baby food. Of course, she is pretty over the "baby food" stage, but its still nice to have some cooked and pureed/finely chopped veggies on hand in the freezer to supplement her meals.

But, then my morning was interrupted by my little rascal, who only needs 10 minutes to wreak havoc.

Mr. D is perpetually on my case for not screwing lids on things completely; whether it is the toothpaste, jar of mayonnaise, or, say, my mascara.

He has also advised against letting Grace go through my make-up bag as a diversion when we're out and about.

Okay, okay, Mr. D - you win. Your advice fell on deaf ears, and now I have mascara to scrub out of my carpet.

My little make-up artist.

Bubble Baby

2008-03-13T21:26:00.000-07:00

Grace learned a new trick today - how to blow bubbles.

:Beginning gushy mom talk:

It was so cute. At first I was blowing them for her, but she took over, and was doing pretty good. She managed to dribble bubble solution all over herself, but when she would get a good set of bubbles blown out, she would stomp her feet, point, and mumble something that resembles "babables". As a gushy mom, I will take that as bubbles... Or baby... Or ball. Well, it started with a "buh" sound.

We were playing at Grammy's house, and unbelievably, Mom came unprepared. I thought I had it all: snacks, clothes, diapers. But, no camera! How dare I leave home without it.

But, thanks to the trusty camera-phone, I can still show off Grace in all her bubble cuteness.

March Table and Bunny Ears

2008-03-12T10:32:00.001-07:00

So I finally got around to updating my coffee table. Yes, I know it is mid-March already, but we just wanted to live out our love a little longer with our Valentine's decorations. Not really - I just didn't get myself up to Michael's to pick out some new foo-foo things to use for decoration.

But I made it up there this past Sunday, and put it all together yesterday. I'm happy with it. I like the springtime feel. So here it is in all its glory:

Oh, and while I was at Michael's, I couldn't resist picking up something for Grace.

Please excuse her rugrat-ness. It was an at-home playday yesterday. Focus on the ears. She likes them too. We're trying to get her to hop like a bunny, but she just raises up on her toes instead. Close.

Stupid Human Tricks

2008-03-06T21:46:00.001-08:00

Tonight's dinner conversation

Me: "So can you flare your nostrils? Show me."

Mr D: "Yes, but can you?"

Me: "But of course. And I don't think you can roll up your tongue."

Mr. D: "What makes you think that. I can, and I will."

Me: "Oh but you can't roll your 'R''s. Rrrrruffles have rrrrridges."

Mr. D: "Okay fine. But you can't alternate blinking."

...This then led into a side conversation about whether a wink is still a blink. I thought he should have said alternate winking. You can't alternate blinking because you use both eyes. But then, like a square is still a rectangle, he feels that wink is still a blink.

Back to the previous conversation. We then covered ear wiggling and lip curling.

Now, mind you, Grace doesn't talk yet, so this was strictly an adults-only conversation. But even though she couldn't participate in the fun, she did initiate the whole conversation by flaring her nostrils while she was eating. Yes, there is reason behind our insanity.

Water Baby

2008-03-05T22:22:00.000-08:00

This is what happens when I send my daughter outside to help Dad water the yard.

Soaked to the bone, and lovin' it.

We're looking forward to summer here at home. The way Mr. D keeps talking, I have a feeling one day I'm going to go outside and find both of them running through the sprinklers in their swimsuits.

While I look on.... with a camera!

A Dream's Tale

2008-03-04T19:59:00.000-08:00

Anyone who knows me well in real life has probably had to endure me telling them about my crazy dreams. I have very vivid and detailed dreams, and I like to share them.

Now, I understand that the only thing more dull than listening to me tell you about my dream would be to read about my dream. Don't worry, I won't go into details, but it is the context of the dream that interests me for this post.

Last night I dreamt about the plot of a story. I wasn't in the dream, but rather I was witnessing the story as if it was from a book or movie. It unfolded as if a narrator was reading it out.

When I awoke, I wondered if it was actually a good enough plot to write out. In my fantasy time I have toyed with the idea of writing a book of some sort, but only if the right story came to me. Okay, honestly, I'm not that driven, and don't want to work that hard at it. It's a "toying idea" not a lifelong desire of mine.

But my dream plot was a murder mystery, and I don't feel like I would want to delve into that genre. But it was an interesting concept for a dream.

I think instead if I want to write, children's books are the way to go. Short, easy words, simple plots. Who couldn't handle that?

Outwit.Outplay.Outlast

2008-02-28T22:14:00.000-08:00

I was played tonight by a 19-month old. Played like a fiddle.

It was a usual evening. We had dinner together. Dad and Grace read some books while I cleaned up the kitchen. Then I gave Grace a bath. We played, scrubbed, and then got out and into jammies ready for bed. A hug and a kiss and off to beddy-bye for Gracie-poo.

Grace was thinking otherwise.

She started crying as soon as I left her room. Not unusual. I went back in, and before I could even say "lay down", like a good trained dog, Grace flopped down in her crib, grabbed her binky and laid there.

"Night-night sweetie. I love you." I gave her a pat and went to leave.
Loud crying began. Not a normal, evening whimper. Full-blown, unhappy baby cries. I go back to pat her. She feels clammy. So I think maybe her pj's are too warm. I change her jammies - she seems happier. We try it again.

"Night-night". No go. She's crying. I stand there and rub her back. She quiets down. I think she's going to relax and go to sleep. She better - Survivor starts in 15 minutes. Well, she relaxed all right. She relaxed and dirtied her diaper.

Okay, so I try this again. I change her, pat her, love on her, and put her down.
I leave the room, and the wait a second. Wait for it - yes, the crying ensues.

I go back in. I check her. In trying to figure out what she needed, I asked her if she wanted to eat. Instant cheers.

So I get her up and take her downstairs, while muttering about how this isn't a good idea and I'm setting myself up for a bad habit.

I put her in her highchair. To her credit, she did drink a big glass of milk and ate a good portion of yogurt with cereal and a bit of toast. All while watching Survivor. I think she's rooting for Ozzy judging by her enthusiasm.

So in terms of Survivor, I realized I had been "Outwitted" and "Outplayed". She got to stay up a bit longer. (However, I do think she was truly hungry - the rumbly in her tummy gave her away when I was upstairs with her.)

However, she was not "Outlasted". I had the last laugh when she went back to bed at commercial break. The mommy-tribe had spoken.

Park Photo Fun

2008-02-27T21:20:00.000-08:00

It was a beautiful day outside today. It was the kind of day that made me want to shave my legs, put on some tanner, and wear a skirt. Rather than deal with all that bother, we decided to walk down to the park instead.

Last summer I started to wonder if Grace was going to be a city girl through and through. She had no interest in the outdoors; she wouldn't walk on grass, much less play at the park. But, she's come around. Now, she is thrilled when we say we are going to go to the park and starts doing the sign for "swing" over and over. And over.

When we get to the park, she has developed a playtime routine.

First, we go to the horse. Giddy-up, giddy-up. I typically sing her the Bonanza theme-song as she trots. It's a real treat.

Next, the teeter-totter. Sorry, no pictures for this one. Dad, Mom, and Grace all teeter and totter together. I'm sure we're good entertainment for passerbys.

Then a ride on the swings. The first of many. While on the swings, we say "wheeee" over and over. It's pretty cute.

When swinging is done, she tackles the slide. The slide requires a lot of climbing and coaxing from the folks. She'll get part way through it and then get distracted. What ever happened to the old fashioned slides? Climb up. Slide down. Now its climb, crawl, go through the tube, then slide.

After a few more rounds of this playtime action, Mom and Dad are usually done, so we blow kisses to the park and say good-bye. We then unleash the dogs who waited patiently (mostly) outside the play area.

And just because this has been a gratuitous photo post. Here's one more.

Lost and Found

2008-02-24T21:17:00.001-08:00

It's been a while. I've been mulling. Actually, I've been mulling for the past two weeks.

I had a list of four items that I had misplaced, not lost, just misplaced. It has been on my mind constantly. I don't ~~lose~~ misplace things often, and when I do, it bothers me. Hence, the mulling.

So what items could possibly warrant such concern?

In order of least to most importance:
* Pacifier Pod
* Mittens
* Silver Bracelet
* $100 bill

Pacifier Pod:
Say what? Yes, a pacifier pod. This nifty contraption velcros to the side of a bag/purse/belt and holds a pacifier. Yes, I have a "binky baby" and it is most helpful when I can find said binky at the right time. Well, Gracie lost her paci purse a few weeks ago. That one I counted as lost, not misplaced, because she has a habit of playing with it in the car, and I had a feeling it fell out at one point. Besides which, I searched the cars and play area thoroughly. So I forked over the $7 and bought a new one Saturday. Item #1 - Solved

Mittens:
Poor little Gracie had lost her mittens, and didn't know where to find them. Okay, so her mom MISPLACED them. I knew I didn't lose those suckers. I checked the laundry, the stroller, Grace's dresser, even went so far as to unfold all of Grace's blankets and make sure they didn't get folded in by accident. No dice. So in my mulling it came to me yesterday to check my sweatshirt pockets because I thought about a walk we went on a few weeks ago when Grace decided she didn't want them on anymore and I pulled them off for her. Sure enough, there they were in the sweatshirt pocket. I don't know when I would have worn this sweatshirt again, so yay for not finding them until next season. Item #2 - Solved

Silver Bracelet:
Grace received this beautiful silver bracelet when she was born from some family friends. She is just now big enough to wear it, so we put it on her for church a few weeks ago. While, she may be physically big enough to wear it, she isn't mature enough. She kept pulling it off and playing with it, so we took it off and put it in her diaper bag. Yes, I know, things have a way of falling into the black hole that resides in the bottom of a diaper bag. So, we couldn't find it when we thought about it a week or so later. I searched that bag countless times. I searched the closet where the bag was. Then, a couple days ago, I went into my jewelry box to pull out some earrings. I stepped away, put on my earrings, and paused. I went back, opened up the box, and there, next to my silver hoops, was a silver bracelet. I must have scooped it up and mistook it for something of mine and tossed it in my box. Item #3 - Solved

$100 Bill:
I am not proud of the following. Mr. D's grandma gave us $100 for Christmas to get something for the family. I took the bill and put it with a Home Depot gift card we had when we went to purchase a new sink. When it turned out we didn't have to buy the sink, I put the card and money back in the envelope where I had other gift cards from Christmas. Or so I thought. Unfortunately I don't have a flash of brilliant recollection for this story. I can't find the money anywhere. I have looked through my wallet, purses (all of them - even though I know which one I was using), Mr. D's wallet, the car, the diaper bag, and all the drawers where I keep any sort of bills, coupons, etc. Alas, no money. Yet. I still have hope.

When we were first married, I collected all of our important tax paperwork and put it in a blue folder. I put this folder in a special place to keep it safe until it was time to file. At filing time the blue folder was nowhere to be found. I tore our house apart. As a new bride, I was so embarrassed. We had to get duplicates of our paperwork and it was a bit of a hassle. Two years later, I was doing some work in the kitchen and found the special place, with the blue folder. So who's to say that the money is only in a special place waiting to be found.