Christmas 2010

We had a great Christmas vacation (wrong word- that implies relaxation) in both NorCal and AZ. More to come...

Nicholas Cordon

Our little boy is 3 years old, as of yesterday!

He is such a funny, smart little guy full of personality. He keeps us busy and laughing all the time with his funny observations.

We were so happy to have him join us 3 years ago.

Kiki's 3rd Birthday Party

We had so much fun at Nicholas' party this year. When I was deliberating over a theme I tried to think of what he likes the most of all- waffles! A close second is his friends. He is a very social kid and loves his friends. He remembers everything about everyone, including what color their eyes are and their favorite color. And last of course, his favorite thing to wear- Pajamas. Put 'em all together and you get a Best Friends Birthday Breakfast Pajama Party!

We had a great time, and Nicholas was in shock that he got to keep all the cool new stuff.

As a side note- it was nice not to have to get all glammed up myself while trying to get it all ready :)

California Christmas

I am all for a warmer winter season, but this is getting ridiculous!!

Grown-up Christmas List

Besides "no more lives torn apart", and all that other good stuff, I'd really love these for Christmas...

(J Crew Jammies)

And anyone who knows me knows I'd die for my initials monogrammed on the pocket!!

Nicholas has a new favorite Christmas movie. Here is the link to the original clip followed by his rendition. The first time he did it was hilarious. Once we busted out the camera he knew he was being funny so its not as good but it is still pretty funny. "Aw I've been kissed by a dog"
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pq9hBEvFNlM

Thanksgiving in CT

We were so excited to make a trip out to CT for Thanksgiving. The night before I was so nervous/eager to head out at 6 am that I slept only two hours. I couldn't understand what I was so nervous about considering I have flown millions of times on flights even longer, and the boys are pretty good about going places too. When we woke them up at 4 am to go to the airport I noticed Ryker was gagging. I sat with him for a second to make sure he was ok, then he smiled at me and I thought nothing more about it. We were waiting at our gate to board when Ryker walked up to me crying, and I picked him up. Seconds later, he threw up his breakfast all over himself and me. Jared took him to get cleaned up while I scrounged around my bag for a new shirt. We wrote it off as a fluke and got on the plane.

Well, it wasn't a fluke because he was sick two more times on the flight. Once we got to JFK we were desperate to wash our clothes and take a shower. The next day was Thanksgiving, so we made our typical holiday meal, but neither me nor Jared had much of an appetite. That night Jared was sick, the next night my brother was sick, the following night Nicholas was sick, and then the last night to round it out me, my mom and my dad were sick too. All in all, not a bad way to keep off the holiday pounds.

But it wasn't all bad... We had a really fun time spending time with my siblings, watching movies, and we even fit in a little girl's afternoon at the mall. We were disappointed we couldn't do the city one day, but it was very relaxing and enjoyable nonetheless. I appreciated having a washing machine, not to mention tons of people to help entertain my kids or clean up. We saw the movie Tangled and loved it. We even got a tiny bit of snow one afternoon, so we grabbed our snow gear and ran outside.

Best Marriage Ever

What could be a better combination than Christmas and Disneyland?!

Ryker's Firsts

This has been a fun week for Ryker. It seems like all of the sudden he has crossed the threshold from baby to toddler. He had his first haircut on monday, and seems to be learning some new words every day. For the sake of preserving our memories, we have tried to write down his favorite things to talk about.

Rykie's words

Ball

Football

touchdown

fumble

up/down

on/off

all done

amen

mama

dada

opa

mamma= grandma

purple
Green
yellow
red

bread

water

more

please

shoes

elmo

no!

choo choo

mine

uh oh

cheese

banana

cookie

cheerio

pasta

pooh

bear

dog

buzz

yee-haw

show

pat-pat (his name for Little Einsteins)

all the characters from Backyardigans

toothbrush

eye

go

bye-bye

hi
Jesus
Temple
Bed
Boom Boom
Diaper
whoa
lights

Friends

Some weeks, like this past week, can be just plain rough. I am grateful to have good friends to bolster me up when I'm feeling down, and encourage me when I am feeling disheartened. (A little distracting with fun activities doesn't hurt either)!

Jen, Courtney, and not to mention Jersey and Westin; we are so glad they came this year!

Karyna and Macy, who are always up for anything, especially if it involves the beach.

Nicholas' preschool class, who all happen to be kids he calls his friends, even before the classes started. He loves talking about them and being super silly, especially with Gaige, his partner in crime.

Matt and Mykel; Nicholas is pretty much in love with Mykel, and its hard not to be! She entertains the boys and me all simultaneously.

And of course, each other. Some days we don't play as well together, but there's always a cute moment or tender comment to make me smile.

Last but not least, family. The boys love their family, and especially enjoy monthly visits from Grandma and Grandpa. I'm still picking the Pop Rocks out of the carpet from the last one :) They remember everyone, and Ryker begs me to skype with "Opa" or "Mamma" all day long.

Happiness Is...

What is happiness?

Having two cute boys to cuddle with

Figuring out how to do "shooter" after 2 years of trying

Sweet smiles after a nice long nap

and... awesome beach days in the end of October!

Lazy week

We took this cute video of Ryker after family night last week on temples...

This week I did a whole lot of nothing. I wasn't feeling great and had little motivation to be as busy all day as we have been the past month. Despite feeling nasty I was glad to have the time to be centered in my life again, focusing on my kids and home and doing some fall cleaning, both physically and emotionally.

I'm sorry to everyone for being MIA. We're back!

Buddies

Due to an extended "June-gloom" period, we are finally having a summer... in October.

We went to Disneyland again (woo-hoo!) last week with Jared, and even got to the beach on saturday for our best beach day of the year. Who'dve thought it would be 75 and clear?

Lately I have been so happy to watch these two little guys play together. Now that Ryker is walking perfectly and talking too they are having a lot of fun.

Having a brother so close is the best- like a built in best friend every day.

Goodbye to the Garden

I spent the last four months trying my hand at gardening. I had always wanted to try to grow my own vegetables and develop a bit of a green thumb. I had a small plot in our complex that allowed me to experiment with growing tomatoes, peppers, and zucchini.

I feel like I learned so much, especially by doing it the wrong way. I learned to plant earlier, prepare the soil weeks in advance, water less on the leaves, find a plot that doesn't have nasty soil, how to avoid blight and other fungi, and more importantly to not expect a big return on my hard work the first season!

All in all our garden yielded mostly tomatoes, many of which were eaten by bugs (slugs!), or knocked off the vine prematurely by helpful neighborhood kids, in addition to a lot of basil. Our peppers never quite germinated except for a few that got gobbled. Bummer. It wasn't cheap, but I am glad I got to have a trial run before we can have a garden at our own home someday.

Go Bruins

Today Nicholas and I had a much needed father son outing. He has been asking to watch football for months and I always told him that football was on a break. Well after seeing it on TV for the last 3 weeks he finally convinced me it was time to go.
On the way there we listened to Surfin USA about 28 or 29 times and we are both experts at the lyrics if anyone needs to know them.
Once we got there we had to make the half mile trek through the golf course (if you have never been to the Rose Bowl it is surrounded by a golf course where everyone parks). On the way Kiki loved running up a hill, stopping at the top, and then sprinting down them. At the top of every hill he would look at me and say "this is big boy activities." Not sure what that means or where it came from but everyone who heard him thought it was hilarious. The other funny part was through the golf course they had one of those huge storm drain wash thingys (forget what they are called) with water running through it. Nicholas decided this was the cheyenne river and told everyone all about it.
Once at the game he had a blast eating licorice, grapes, and cookies. He enjoyed the game for awhile until it became just to darn hot. He really liked me dumping water all over him and it got us through until half time when we decided we had enough fun. So we walked for 25 min's back to the car picking up sticks and playing in the sand. Below is the video of a touchdown celebration. The first is a touchdown but the camera was so zoomed in I had to take a second video of Nicholas up close. In the first one you can hear him cheer and the 2nd is his dance.



***My absolute highlight of the day was while walking to the game Nicholas looked up at me while holding my hand and said out of the blue "Daddy, you're my best friend." So I of course cried in front of 100,000 people :)

Potty on the Brain

Nicholas loves Pooh

All this talk of friends getting potty trained made me want to revisit our own opinions, advice, and helpful hints, if not to help others then just to remind me when next fall rolls around! (Get ready, Ryker!) Much of this came from my own research and my mom as well.

-First things to look for:

1. The child tells you after they've gone wet/whatever

2. They tell you while they're going

3. They tell you before they're going- ready!

-We put the toddler potty out a bit in advance, just so it becomes a familiar piece of furniture. Let them sit on it if they say they want to go, but don't let it become a toy.

-Don't reward with toys/food, etc. just stick to praise; if you do otherwise they will go to the potty just for the prize, not the satisfaction and pride of accomplishment. Its called the overjustification hypothesis. What, useless Psych degree?!

-Potty training begins when they are ready. Jump on the opportunity rather than waiting until it fits your schedule.

-We dedicated a good week to be at home as much as possible with no pants on. The fewer barriers to making it to the potty, the better! For this reason we chose a toddler potty rather than a toilet cover, because the more comfortable going to the potty is, the more likely they are to use it. Its all about making them feel confident and comfortable going!

-Accidents can happen, but try to minimize them by being really close to home, and working on the aforementioned comfort issue. The first few days they will go to the bathroom a ton, and over time the trips will consolidate. Nicholas seriously went 40 times the first day, no joke.

-Don't read stories/dance/sing to them on the potty; it distracts from the real reason and they will say they have to go just for the fun time! (we made this mistake :) Once Upon a Potty-never again!)

- Stick to diapers/pull ups at night until they are dry for a while. Being dry at night is the last step. No use shattering their confidence! It will set you back.

-We didn't do pull ups during the daytime. They have the same feel as diapers, and could be confusing to kids. Go cold turkey, and never look back. Underwear all the way!

-Once they are on their way, keep in mind they may not always tell you when they need to go. I would ask Kiki every hour or two, and have him go every time before we left to somewhere.

-If all else fails and they seem like they're not ready, just drop it and try again later! You have to be committed 100% but they need to be ready too.

First Day

Who doesn't love the first day of school?

Mexico Cruise

Jared and I had the best time on our cruise last week. The stops were Cabo San Lucas, Mazatlan, and Puerto Vallarta. We didn't do any excursions as we planned on maximizing our relaxation and beachfront time. We left the kids with Grandma and set off on a whole week together!

We sailed out of the lovely San Pedro, smelling of gasoline. Not the most picturesque, but we had to document it anyways!

Our first day was at sea, with a formal night. It was so fun to dress up and wear high heels for once! I loved my dress and hopefully I'll find some excuse to wear it again.

We went to see the ice skating show that night.

Gotta love random towel animals... (pictured: the dress and high heels!)

The first port was Cabo, which was our favorite. The weather was super muggy and hot, but we loved swimming in the clear water at a perfect 80 degrees!

The beach we went to was Lover's Beach.

more towel animals...

In Mazatlan we went to a resort to play in the beach and pools. It was so fun to play in the ocean for hours. Puerto Vallarta was not as exciting as it was almost 100 degrees and 90 percent humidity. We were instantly sweating. We went to a local shopping mall and just soaked in the local vibe.

Our last two days were at sea. Our favorite activity was ice skating. Considering we were pretty much the only people under 45 on the boat, we dazzled all the seniors with our mad ice skating skills. We even attempted a few lifts.

The last day was cold, cloudy, and windy. Fortunately we had lots to read and were focused on relaxing before getting back to real life.

We definitely missed our kids and were ready to see them when we got back. Fortunately they didn't forget who we were, and appeared very happy to see us. Although, I'm sure the Froot Loops we brought them didn't hurt :)

Day 90!

We can't believe it is finally over!

Of course, now it feels like the days flew by. We are so glad that we did it, and also a tiny bit proud that we finished the whole thing. We only cheated out of a few yoga sessions, but were otherwise consistent.

Jared- I'm glad that is over! I did the exercises consistently throughout the 90 days but gave up on the diet after about 6 weeks. So I got the muscle mass I wanted but didn't lose the weight I was hoping for. I did lose 10 pounds and feel a lot better so I'm happy overall with the results. We did the lean portion this time which isn't as intense but it still kicked our butts plenty. Plus we figured we would do the classic version in a few months so all in all it was a good time.

Paige-

I am glad I got the results I did, and I hope that in a few months we'll be up to trying it again. I don't feel like I look drastically different, but I reached my goal of maintaining my weight and gaining muscle mass while toning. The hardest part was the time commitment, but the best part was the metabolism boost and feeling abs!!

Little Things

Some days I feel so grateful and blessed for all the little, but largely significant, things with my boys.

(he loves pasta)

I am so grateful that I have boys with busy, health bodies and active minds.

helping Regalio fix the tub, BYOT (bring your own tools) style

I am grateful they have cute little friends to be silly with

trying on sunglasses at Target

and I am grateful that they like to play, hug, eat, share, sleep, and go anywhere with me.

with Dr Kivitz, his fave

Halloween costumes we wear all day long

my handyman