Laguna Beach

On our way back from the Vegas drive, we made a little side trip to Laguna Beach for some ocean and relaxing to the sound of the waves. We had an amazing time.... Our balcony door opened to the crashing waves and we laid a beach towel out and enjoyed quite the room service picnic for dinner :)

 

Here's a link to the amazing hotel we stayed in. Rooms directly on the beach, amazing restaurant on-site, and the entire place is decorated like a surfer's paradise....

http://www.pacificedgehotel.com/

Presidents' Day

I was lucky enough to snag 4 tickets and a parking pass to take the monkeys to go see Disney on Ice and they had a blast! Amazing how expensive everything would have been if we had paid for the tickets ($69 each for 3 of us!), the parking ($10) and then all of the overpriced goodies inside... We even got to sit in a suite so the view was incredible... Brook spent the majority of her time teetering on my lap while trying to jump the rail and bum rush Minnie Mouse. Every time Minnie would get to our side of the rink Brook would scream and wave at the top of her lungs, "Hi Miiimi! Hi! Hi Miiiiimiiiii!!!" It was so frigging cute. They spent the end of the show inhaling a bottomless carton of popcorn with Mikey ears on their heads swaying and rocking to the music.... Oh to be a child again :)

Happy, Happy 2nd Birthday Miss Brookie!!!

 Happy birthday my funny-faced little love :) 2 years ago we dropped Bubba off to daycare and you were born just a few hours later!

Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

This is what I get when I ask my kiddos to pose for our Christmas card... Notice the nudity! Thank God for creative cropping!

:)

Christmas Decorating -- The Lights

I wasn't able to get many photos as our area went through a few doozy storms and we managed to get the outside lights up just in time for a nasty rainstorm to hit annd send us running inside :)

Been far too long...

It's been a while huh? This time of year is always so nuts for my family with all of our birthdays, our anniversary, as well as the holidays to contend with... Looking forward to breaking out the Christmas decorations this weekend and decking our halls. Hopefully the rain will hold off for a bit so we can go and find the perfect Christmas tree. I'll post a few pics once we get it all set up :)

That Time of Year Again

Anyone else heading into the busiest time of the year for their family? In the next 4 months, we will celebrate all 4 of our birthdays, Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas, New Years Eve, 8 close and extended family birthdays, and the birth of 2 close friends' babies. Stress and anxiety abound :)

Luke's B-Day is up first so I've got invitations ordered, waiting on arrival to mail out ASAP, the bounce house place booked, decor ordered, his birthday boy T-shirt is ordered, and I'm scoping out presents on my lunch hours. He made me a pretty good list this year, so if you need any ideas, feel free to ask.

Did I mention that I LOVE this time of year (since fall only really last here in CA for about 2 months if we're lucky!), but who the hell decided it was OK for it to be 95 degrees outside?

Planning ahead is key; if only I could remember to plan ahead?

:)

Gone for a while

Our vacation went great until the last day and then I think we'd just all had enough and wanted to be home... The aquarium was beautiful and breathtaking as usual and the kids loved the giant kelp tank which has always been my favorite. The beach house that we rented was prefect for the 4 of us and it was really nice to have a "home base" to go back to during the trip... It's just too difficult to not have a full kitchen with two small children on vacation.

Being able to blog and download my pictures on the new laptop was perfect and I'm so happy Hubs convinced me to pull the trigger before we left :)

Have you gone on vacation yet this summer? Where did you go? What was your favorite moment???

Luvs!
Mommy D

In Transit

We made it up to Vacaville yesterday in time to cook a yummy meal and settle in to watch a movie with Grandpa on travel day 1. I was kinda worried about the multiple stops before we actually touch down in Pacific Grove, but so far, it's been more than good.

We are on the road in our greatly appreciated extra cab, long bed F150 (borrowed from Grandpa John), the kiddos are comfortable and not crammed in with all of our crap like in the Camry, snacking on Pirates Booty and watching all of the cars pass by. While I am feeling very spoiled as I ride shotgun and blog at the same time! Rare is the trip that I don't do much of the driving, but who knew how much you could get done while sitting in the passenger seat? I've already updated my facebook, pulled directions to the place we are headed to for lunch (PHIL'S FISH MARKET in Moss Landing, CA), balanced my checkbook, finalized reservations for the hotel tonight and am know halfway through a blog post.... Crazyness and we are only in San Jose!

More to come from lunch.... Stay tuned for the best cioppino on the West Coast!

The Prep

*Clean out car and car seats (no week old Cheerios or pirates' booty from April allowed!)
*Pack mondo bag for all 4 of us, try to make it all fit in one bag
*clean house so when we return exhausted, we can crash, not clean (re-visit idea of cleaning lady... Oh how I need you!!!!)
*Empty garbages, an 80 degree house that smells like week old diapers is NO BUENO
*Kiss big, spoiled pup: sad she can't come with us, set thermostat to keep DIVA comfy
*Write out, scratch out, re-write packing lists: panic over forgetting something
* Sit, chill, and enjoy a beer... Anything forgotten (other than baby bear or Lukey's B) can be replaced, the only thing that matters is time with my babies.



*** See you there! ***

Trip highlights and photos to follow as soon as we can figure out how to fit all of our crap into our car :)

Father's Day @ the River Cats Game

The game was great, aside from it being pretty hot outside (thank GOD for umbrellas!!)and everyone had a blast! I took a bunch of photos so here are a few to tide ya'll over :)

2000 HITS!

We did it! Well, the majority of those hits are probably from me logging in to post, but who the hell cares! My cute little munchkin worshipping site has achieved 2000 visits! Yay for us!

SUPER GAMMY!!!

After both kids coming down with the flu last week and puking all over every soft surface in the house, the hub and I managed to both catch it at exactly the same time, laying us both up to the point that "SUPER GRANDMA" had to step in and save the day earlier this week...

We both were shaking with fever, not able to keep ANYTHING down and still had two munchkins that felt great and wanted to play. In true super trooper fashion, my mom was there with bells on in a flash! It's hard for me to imagine NOT having my parents there for me whenever/wherever. Their support is so amazing and so appreciated and so selfless that I can't truly explain how lucky I really am.

Anyway, my mom showed up at my house like super nanny with a bag of their favorite foods in hand after a shaky call begging for help feeding/bathing/chasing my super active children. She plopped my icky-sick butt onto my couch and ordered me to let her take care of everything as daddy-o couldn't even make it out of bed except to puke. Food, games, baths, teeth and bedtime all handled, she demanded to do the dishes (like I'm going to say no)and then headed home leaving me a quiet house and the chance to head off to bed and finally pass out.

She's amazing ya'll, a true rock star of a mom and grandma...

A day in the pool

Cheap entertainment rocks! A $10 kiddie pool, $2 worth of goggles for both squirts and a beautiful sunny day, who could ask for more!

I'm bad and I've neglected you!

I've been patiently waiting for photos from the wedding to post and after some technical difficulties I have a few to share, of my kiddos of course! I can't get over how handsome my little guy looked in his mini tux! ENJOY!

Why I love weddings

* I bet I'm not the only one who cries at each and every wedding I attend
* The glitz and glamour of it all is enough to make anyone feel like a princess
* There's nothing like wedding cake.... YUM!
* Watching a bride and groom dance together for the first time and witnessing the looks exchanged is magical
* I love the teeny little ring bearers and flower girls: They make we ALMOST want to have more babies :)
* Watching love gush from a crowd of family and friends is incredibly humbling
* They always seem to make me want my hubby more and more, and I LOVE seeing my cargo short and flip flop adoring man all gorgeous in a suit :)

Pictures to follow as soon I can get my camera plugged in and the photos downloaded!

The Weekend

So the Davis Picnic Day thing was a bust...

We made a valiant effort to pack a picnic, dress the kids comfy and get down there, but the traffic and weirdo Gods were against us. For my hubby, if a trip starts out with 30 minutes of bumper-to-bumper traffic, count it as a bust. He was actually texting me from the drivers' seat that "Davis and traffic suck," and he wanted to just keep driving straight to Vacaville and find a park for the kids to play in there...I asked him to suck it up and try to muscle through just a drive-by to see what the campus looked like and we'd decide then.

We were totally expecting this:




But got a lot more of this than we wanted:







We were watching beer pong tournaments on the lawn of the frat houses across from the campus, and were amazed to see kids kicked back in lawn chairs in the center divide enjoy a few beers and acting like they were tripping and falling in front of the oncoming traffic!! How fun, NOT!!!

We kept driving.

By the time we hit Vacaville, Lukey Duke was beyond antsy to get out and run... We parked at a park by Grandpa John's house and saw a beautiful site... A baseball field, open to run on, with the bases still in the ground! Most fields are open to the public but rarely do the little league coaches leave the bases, so we took full advantage of the rarity!


Check it out!

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