Do you hate America, hubby??

I wish I had been clever enough to think of this. Maybe I need to put a note like this in our bathroom...

Image from passiveaggressivenotes

Happy Dada Day

To my dearest husband:

Happy Father's Day, love. Thank you for the dedication you show to providing for our family each and every day, especially when it's hard. Thank you for making the tough decisions without complaint, for being a wonderful example to our two beautiful boys and for supporting me in my role as their mother. Thank you for continuing to strive to be the man that our children can look up to and emulate. You are awesome.

I love you mucho mucho.

Your BC.

To my favorite Dad:
Thank you so much for the love and support that you have shown me throughout the years. Thank you for being the man that I looked up to, and for constantly showing me the better path. There are a lot of times in my life when I have a choice to make, and I wonder what the right choice would be. That's when I think of you and imagine what you would choose. Then I know the answer. I'm so grateful for our strengthened relationship in recent years. It wasn't until I had children of my own that I started to understand you better and really appreciate you as a father. Thank you for being lovingly tough on me, because it has shaped who I am. I love you very much and am proud to be your daughter.

I tend to get emotional when I think of how blessed I have been with the wonderful fathers (and in-law's) in my life and I'm so thankful for each of them. I hope that you all have had a wonderful Father's Day. Love you!!

Is it in the genes?

Caution: Possible rant ahead. Proceed at your own risk.

So after being gone for three weeks, I get home to three bathrooms full of this. With a new roll either sitting on top of the old one or on the counter next to it.



Even ones like this where you just have to pull off the cardboard and slap a new one on there!

Seriously, is this part of the Y chromosome or something? Because if I had left the house in the hands of a woman, this would not have happened.

Anyone else annoyed by this? :)

Safe and Sound

It's good to be back.

I am happy to report that we arrived safely home last night (only 4:30am EST, ugh!) and the flight was a DREAM! We actually had a row of three seats to ourselves in the very back of the plane and it could not have been better. Eli and West slept for about 90% of the time, and it was just quiet and nice. I wish I had had a small point and shoot just to take a picture of them asleep like little angels on the plane, but I don't, so you'll just have to imagine it. I'll even tell you that for the last half hour or so, Eli slept on a couple of pillows on the floor. And I don't even care how many germs he picked up, because frankly, he was asleep. That's all I asked for. :) So all in all, a good return trip, miles better than the one out there.

And not to mention that I came home to a clean house. Thanks, love, you have no idea how much that means to me, especially since I know I didn't leave it in that condition! You're the best.

Now let's talk about my family coming HERE next time! I mean, come on, we've got Disneyland! You know you all want to! :)

Leavin' on a jet plane

Sorry, this is going to be long, but at least it's filled with pictures as well as lots of words! :) And while you read this, I'm on a plane coming home. I'm pretty excited.

These last few weeks have just flown by while we've been busy playing with family and having a lot of fun. There are always lots of laughs when we all get together, and I wouldn't have missed it! I'm just hoping that we aren't at this moment repeating the craziness that was our flight out here.

First of all, I knew it was going to be a challenge to have the three of us (Eli, West and I) in two seats for a five hour flight. But then throw into the mix the businessman that nearly turned green when he saw that we were his travel mates, and the stress level was bumped up a few notches. Then once the flight was going, Eli was much more behaved than West! (I was actually expecting West to be the easier one.) So I had to try and contend with making bottles while worrying about taking up too much seat room and hoping that West doesn't make too much noise while also trying to keep Eli from kicking the seat in front of him.

But the worst part was once we actually got to Cleveland! Here we are, landed, and it's raining outside. Okay, we can handle a little rain, right? Wrong. We taxi to our gate and are literally 20 feet from the terminal when the pilot gets on and says we have to stop and wait because they have this sensitive weather equipment that's telling them there is a possibility of lightning. Yeah, that's right, there's not any actual lightning, just a possibility of it, so they don't want anyone outside working the ground right now. He doesn't know how long we'll be there nor can we take off our seat belts to get up and walk around. Nevermind that we've already been in the air for 5 hours and my 4-month-old is soaking wet on my lap and needs a change badly (of course there's nowhere to do that on an airplane).

So an hour later, the airport finally gives the go-ahead and we drive 4 seconds to the terminal where we can start disembarking the plane. By this point I was pretty much done. Luckily I got to get out, change West, and finally meet my mom and Jeff. It was nice to just have someone come up and say, "Here, let me take your things and you just rest!" So thanks, Mom, for getting me at the airport and letting me just relax, like I hadn't been for the last 6 hours. :)

So yeah, like I said, I hope we don't have any kind of repeat of that situation. But luckily this time our flight will be at about 5pm, so the boys will be pretty worn out from the day (I hope) and so there will be lots of sleeping, methinks. (Knock on wood just in case.)

Here are some more fun pictures for now, until I can get home to really edit them! :)

Nana, Grandpa, and the grandkids.
We were so excited to get pictures of them all together.
And this one is with no head swaps and everyone is looking! A miracle! :)

Cute little Aidan! He looks exactly like Emily, it's so funny.

Eli had these 3-D chalk glasses on all afternoon, he just loved them.

Jeff pitching at his baseball game. We had a lot of fun watching him play! He's always been a good athlete.

All in all, it was a great trip! But I'm sure I'll be glad to sleep in my own bed tonight. I'm just not looking forward to all the actual work I'm going to have staring me in the face tomorrow morning! So if I don't emerge for a while, that's why. :)

Picture time!

Wow, we've sure been busy! As you know, me and the little boys are visiting my family for a while, and we've been having so much fun. And I actually have some pictures to share this time! Novel idea, I know.

Nana and West

Nana and Angela

Me and my little "CHEESE"-saying monkey.

We went to this great little cafe down in Hudson yesterday -- me, Eli, West, Nana and Angela. I had the amazing lobster bisque soup! Yummy. And we had fun taking some pictures. Speaking of eating, West is seriously putting on some pounds lately. I keep telling Nathan he won't even recognize the behemoth that I'll come home with as his baby! :) I'm just glad he's getting up in the percentile for weight, our doctor was slightly concerned. So that's a good thing.

Gorgeous Angela

The other night we went out on a quick walk around my parents' neighborhood. Think a wooded trail. With a double stroller. Yeah, not my smartest moment. :) But at least West had a good time bouncing around like crazy! I had to snap some quick shots of Angela while the sun was setting out there -- totally amazing light. This one is a good one. But I feel so handicapped without my real photoshop (my mom only has elements) and so it's not what I'd like it to be. But I'll work on them when I get home later. I swear, Angie is such a babe and she loves getting her picture taken. That's definitely a win-win situation for me. :)

We also got to go to one of Jeff's baseball games. That was a lot of fun, but not as much for Eli as I would have thought. Of course, I know he has the attention span of a gnat, but I thought he'd at least like to sit and watch the 'big boys' play baseball. Wrong. All he wanted to do was search for rocks for his 'rock collection' and run out onto the field to play. Shoulda seen that one coming. :) But he did get his chance to run the bases once the game was over, and it looked like he thoroughly enjoyed it.

Jeff running to 2nd base

Then sliding into 2nd

And sliding home to score!

Eli running the bases. :)

And of course, it wouldn't be complete without the kids stealing my camera and taking silly photos! I'm sure these aren't the last that I'll find on my memory card...

O-HI-O!

Eli, West and I are in Ohio visiting my family for a while. Man, there's nothing like it.

And the best part? My older and younger sisters are coming out too! We're going to live it up!!

Pictures and all that jazz to come, I promise.

While you're waiting, you may want to check out SewMamaSew's May giveaway! There are tons of participating websites that are giving away great handmade stuff. And I'm getting so much inspiration to make some things of my own when I get back! Awesome. :)

Aubree's Senior Photos

I had the opportunity to take some photos of Aubree, Nathan's cousin. I can't believe she's already graduating from high school! When Nathan and I got married, she was still in junior high. It sure makes me feel old, haha.

Aubree is just pure fun -- she has a quirky personality that I enjoy and is one of the most artistic people I know. Seriously, the things this girl can create with her hands would blow you away. She certainly got her dad's artistic talent, which is a great thing. And she's beautiful too! What a package. :) Enjoy this sneak peek!

I just *love* the way this one turned out, with her wisps of hair. :)


Thanks for letting me take these, Aubree! I hope you had as much fun as I did. :)

Let's Play Catch-up!

Warning: This is pretty long, so proceed at your own risk of boredom! :)

Hey there everyone! I hope you're all having a great start week. I thought I'd do a little re-cap of the last couple of weeks, since I've been MIA. Sorry! But we have been busy and I'm still recovering from our trip out to Utah to celebrate Renee's (Nathan's sister) graduation from the University of Utah. (I swear, the laundry never seems to be done!) So yeah, lots going on!

So a little while ago, Nathan's company got to have a huge bowling event put on by Junior Achievement. It was a fun opportunity for me and the kids to go meet some of Nathan's co-workers and Eli got to bowl too! He was so excited all day, he kept saying, "First is the store, second is pictures and third is the BOWLING STORE!" (Oh, and he loves for us to make a schedule for him about our day's events, so he knows what we're going to do that day. So we're always saying First is.... Second is.... Third is.... etc.) I don't think he really understood that bowling wasn't a 'store' until we actually got there. He had a lot of fun and loved all the attention. Plus, he loved hanging out with dad! So cute.




Then last weekend we were off on a whirlwind of a vacation (if you can call it that, lol). We left early Thursday morning and drove to Utah for Renee's graduation on Friday. It was fun to get to see a lot of Nathan's family and celebrate Renee and her great accomplishment. We're really proud of her!

The graduate:

Renee and her boyfriend Lewis:

The Lakeys:


This is how excited they are for Renee to graduate:


And this is how excited Renee is to graduate!


The whole fam (plus Lewis, lol):


Three generations:
(and don't worry, West is fine, just slipping down a little)

So all in all we had a great trip! On the way back (driving home on Mother's Day, which could be a whole other post on its own), we met up with my sister and her husband Jed and all road-tripped back to our house. Ali and Jed came to stay with us while they went to Disneyland for Jed's birthday on Tuesday. Did you know Disneyland lets you get in free on your bday? Ah, to be newlyweds again and have that kind of a life where you can just pick up and road trip to Disneyland for your birthday. These are your "good ol' " days, Ali and Jed, enjoy them! :)

So while they were here, we decided to go to the Wild Animal Park in San Diego. We had a blast! It wasn't busy (being a Monday) and the weather was warm, but breezy. That's what I love about being down in San Diego, it's such beautiful weather!

Here's Eli at the petting zoo. He loved getting up close to the animals and kept talking to them. It was so funny!

In this one he's saying, "You're a handsome girl, aren't you? Aren't you? Yeah, you're a handsome girl." Jed, Ali and I were dying laughing.


Jed, Ali, Eli and the handsome deer. :)


Eli was really excited to be a worm and Nathan thought West would make a good one, too!


Some neat animals we saw on the tour, which I can't remember the name of now.


The cool lions snoozing in the shade.


They had the biggest, coolest paws!

Then the next day, while Ali and Jed were at Disneyland, Eli and I made him a birthday cake. Eli was so excited to help blow out the candles and couldn't wait until Jed and Ali got back to help celebrate. He was a little bummed that we didn't do balloons and streamers, but it just wasn't in the cards for that day. :)

Jed, Ali, West and Eli


Blowing out the candles

Thanks for coming out, you guys! We had a lot of fun! And to anyone else who is thinking about visiting Disneyland and needs a cheap (ie: FREE!) place to stay, just know you're always welcome at our house.

That pretty much wraps it up! I did have my very good friends come out to visit me from Mission Viejo but I was a dork and forgot to take pictures! I mean, come on, how did I do that?? But I suppose it was a crazy week and my mind was pretty much gone by that time, haha. But I loved getting to catch up with Tracy, Jessica and Marisol. And Eli was on cloud 9 getting to play with all his good buddies. So thanks to you guys for making the trip up to see us! We love you and miss you. :)

And I'm excited to post some pictures from a senior session I did while we were in Utah. Nathan's cousin Aubree is graduating from high school this year (Eeeek! I can't believe she's that old!) and so I got to take some fun photos for her. Be on the lookout for those soon!

Have a great night peeps!

Bah!

I know, I know, I'm in serious need of a new blog post. Well, this is going to have to tide you over for a while, and it's not going to be much. :) We've got family visiting (Happy Birthday Jed!), just got back from a mini-vacation to Utah for Renee's graduation (Nathan's sister) and I've got work up to my eyeballs for a little while.

SO, I promise to have a brand-spankin' new post coming soon, chocked full of pictures and laughs and fun stuff. So hang tight. That means you too, Summer, heehee. :)