Well Hello May

Flowers from my love on our 11th wedding anniversary.

In the blink of an eye April is gone. It feels like this month was on fast forward, it can't possible be over already. May means school is ending and then (gasp) summer vacation. I am not prepared for May.

Even though I wasn't blogging as April sped by so fast, you bet I was taking pictures. Here's a few with updates about what we've been up to:

Cousin Friends

For the first weekend of Spring Break, Mimi and the girls and I went to see our favorite family up north (Jack and Chris stayed behind). Athena told her teacher we were going to San Francisco to see her cousins. I thought that was perfect. Alaine is my sister friend for going on 27 years now, so her babies are my babies "cousin friends" it makes perfect sense.

Stalking Aging Rockers

In the 80's Mimi was a well-known stalker of Duran Duran, and Alaine and I and all our friends admired her greatly for her notoriety. So, when we found out that half of Duran Duran would be signing records mere blocks from Alaine's house, we just had to go, with four little girls in tow.

John Taylor from Duran Duran said "Athena? That's a lovely name."

I was taking it all in stride at first but the moment we turned the corner and I caught glimpse of our teen idols, my heart skipped a beat and I felt 16 again. I couldn't even look directly at them, they were fantastic. Alaine and I nudged our cute children in front of the 50 year old rockers and they couldn't have been lovelier to them, making our hearts flutter even more wildly.

We were glowing for a few hours after that meeting. The girls thought we were absolutely crazy probably not the first time, or the last.

Stu and Jenny Jen in San Fran

An added bonus to visiting Alaine and her girls in the Bay Area is that now Stu and Jen are in San Francisco. Oh how we love our Uncle Stu and Jen is pretty awesome too.

They joined us for a great day in the city enjoying the Exploratorium, a hands on science museum, we explored bubble walls and magnetic sand and toilet water fountains and all sorts of other wonderous amazements.

Afterwards we went tromping around Fisherman's Wharf, watching the sea lions, riding the carousel, drinking hot chocolate and looking at all the fun touristy stuff.

Wind blown and tired of walking the girls crashed in Stu and Jen's arms on the way back to the car. Mimi and I were happy to have young backs to share the load with.

A visit with Uncle David

Right after we returned home from San Francisco, Uncle David came to visit us, sweetly choosing to spend his senior year spring break in Bakersfield. I, of course, made him make color glitter eggs.

My camera battery was dead to the world so I missed some awesome shots of all of decorating eggs (the Dude loved it).

David at first was goofing on the eggs, but a couple of eggs later...

...he totally got into it.

A visit to Long Beach

Thomas the cat looks on, but keeps his distance...

And, just for fun, we squeezed in a quick trip to Long Beach to get a few cuddles in from Aunt Barb and spend some time with family. Aunt Barb and Uncle Ron live about ten minutes from Chris' Grandma and always host us on our embarrassingly infrequent trips to see her. The kids love visiting Aunt Barb, she has the coolest toys stuffed in the rafters of her house, the ones I remember from my childhood - Fisher Price little people farm, Sesame Street playhouse (before there was an Elmo), WonderBlocks - awesome stuff.

A Happy Easter

Spring break concluded with a colorful and easy Easter celebration at home. I trotted out our lovely egg tree once again. However with the recent addition of a playful kitten who seemed to think this was one great big kitty toy, it wasn't as successful as last year. Many precious glitter eggs crashed to their death and the whole thing toppled over more times than I can count.

We started the day with massive Easter baskets from Grandaddio and Grandma Andre, and the Easter bunny left chocolate bunnies and hid eggs all around the living room which were batted around by our kitty all night long.

Then we got ready for church. My attempts at getting all three of my well dressed children happily looking at the camera failed, but...

add one incredibly handsome Daddy and you get my favorite photo so far this year, my new permanent screen saver.

The girls were delicious in their brightly colored sun dresses. We went casual this year and instead got dresses they will actually wear many more times. Athena added the hat and Mimi glue gunned a few fake flowers on at the last minute. Zoe couldn't be cuter if she tried.

After the service, our church had an "egg hunt" for the kids. It, uh, wasn't much of a challenge to find them, however. Each child was allowed to "hunt" five eggs each.

The Dude figured out right away that there was chocolate in these eggs, and tried to get around his quota by breaking them open and just fishing out the half melted goodies.

He also didn't think anyone would notice if he ate one or two of the jelly beans in the process.

After church, the girls started in on their bunnies which prompted a totally spontaneous and hysterical partially devoured bunny conversation that went something like this:

"Someone ate my ears?!"
"What??!!"
"I said 'Someone ate my ears!!"
"What?! I can't hear you...someone ate my ears!"
Followed by peals of laughter and then the whole thing all over again.

After Jack's nap, we went to some friends' house for an Easter BBQ. The Dude was allowed to hang out in a real ten-year old boys room and watch as he played video games. He was in boy heaven.

But we were able to lure him out eventually to the backyard with the rest of us. It was a lovely way to end our Spring break.

The Saddest Little Boy in the World...

...is the one who isn't allowed to play along with his sisters' tee ball league. Its so very hard to explain to a two year old that they are just too little and must wait until next year to even join the Pee Wee league. There just isn't any organized sports for two-year-olds, no matter how much they love bayball.

Tee ball may make the Dude sad, but the girls love it!

The Cutest Yard Sale on the Block.

The girls helped with a joint yard sale with our neighbors across the street. We got rid of a few things and the girls lived their dream of having a lemonade and brownie stand. We didn't really advertise, just posted a couple of notices on Craigslist and posted signs around the neighborhood. And the girls made signs and jumped up and down trying to flag down any car that drove by. It was a lovely day, we sat in our front yard in the shade with our friends, drank lemonade, ate brownies and realized we live on a really quiet street.

Just as we split the $11.75 the girls made from their stand, the ice cream truck rounded the corner. Seriously, the timing could not have been more perfect (grumble). Even though it was past 4:00, the girls were allowed a popsicle treat each for all their hard work.

Okay! I think you're caught up with my crazy popsicle loving crew! If you have read this far, and I know of only a few who will, thank you! I'll try not to fall so far behind again.

Track and Field

My little Athena participated in her first ever sporting competition - a regional Lutheran School Track and Field event held at our local high school. It just happened to fall on the Saturday morning of the week that Chris (and Mimi) were out of town, otherwise it would have been an all day all family event. In fact, many of the more experienced families were camped out - full on tents and chairs and serious tailgating going on.

As it was, it was just me and three little ones trying to help me lug a blanket, two chairs, a cooler and my camera bag across the parking lot and a football field and to the nearest available clearing. As I was setting up, Jack took off towards the goal post. I caught him and brought him back to our blanket, that lasted about three minutes before he decided to run right onto the track minutes before the first race was suppose to start. Much to my chagrin, the announcer made a purposeful announcement over the loudspeaker reminding us to "keep the track clear, please!" Yea, trying, sorry!

I know of many families who have two year olds that will stay near them and not go tearing off in any direction, but, unfortunately that is not my two year old. It became quite clear that this wasn't going to work, I am only just one Mommy after all.

Luckily, Athena's first event didn't start for 45 minutes, so we hightailed it over to our local drop in play care center where Jack could run around like a madman for $8.50 an hour (he loves it there) and whisked back to the event just in time to line Athena up for the Kindergarten Girls 50 yard Dash.

The little girl with the rolled up sleeves won by a landslide.

Athena came in fifth place.

She didn't qualify for the relay race, but she still had two more events: the standing long jump and tee ball distance.

There were a couple of moments during the day where I felt my competitive spirit bubbling up in me, imagining a huge victory for my child. This day was not about that and I had to stiffle the urge to shout "Run! Baby! Run!" at the top of my voice when the starting gun went off.

Athena didn't care about winning. She just wanted to have fun and the purple "Participant" ribbon came in the best color anyway.

She was far more interested in capturing as many ladybugs as possible in the field.

This one she named Lala.

The ribbon ceremony -
where many a Kindergarten girl was
disappointed by the blue first place ribbon.

Zoe was bored to tears, and besides wearing down the battery on my phone playing puzzle games, she got some significant spinning time in.

This was dress yourself day, and she did, right down to the accessories and criss-cross of her Sketchers. My baby's got style.

We didn't stay for the awards ceremony or the relay races. Right after our picnic lunch I started feeling so guilty about not enjoying the beautiful day with the Dude. So we packed up, went to get our little guy and spent the rest of the day waiting to jump on Daddy when he finally came home - with presents!

Ahhhh Spring!

It's true we haven't been pummeled with ice storms and blizzards this winter, and we don't need to bundle up in three layers just to go outside like we used to, but we do get weather here and it isn't sunny all the time. In fact it has been quite rainy and overcast since November. Our backyard has been a bleak, wet puddle, and temperatures are low enough that its, you know, uncomfortable to be outside.

Just lately though there has been a dramatic change in the weather. Its' a bright and sunny land once again. The children go to school with sweaters on and come home sweaty. Spring's warm blanket is on us and we are drawn outside - loving every flower bud and sun spot and fragrant breeze.

Chris and I both had very stress-filled work weeks, so we used the weekend to cocoon at home and bump around our house. Except for that birthday party I forgot about, we had no plans, just watched some sports on t.v. - Giants beat the Dodgers and then (sigh) Kentucky lost the Final Four.

I could not stop taking pictures of my minis this weekend, perhaps it was the dappled sunlight, the green green grass, or just their pure beauty. I don't know but sometimes I'm obsessed.

Athena declared it "the best day ever" but we didn't do anything, just played outside, and oh yea, got Tangled delivered in the mail as part of our Disney DVD membership.

And speaking of mail deliveries...Chris' early Father's Day present arrived (I know, three months early - but there was a 20% off sale) and he spent the better part of the day putting it together. He painstakingly documented every step so that I could blog about it, but I can't find the chord to his camera, so I'm not putting the pictures here (sorry, my love!).

Beer, barbeque and baseball - what else does a Chris need?

Chris is raising his son to appreciate the three B's of summer. The little Dude insisted on wearing his SF Giants hat today to, seeing his Daddy wear one and the guys on t.v. At just two, and with very little prompting on our part, he can recognize the differences between Bee Ball (bastketball), Bay Ball (baseball) and Foo Ball (football). He's such a Dude.

While the scent of grilling steaks filled our backyard, the girls played hopscotch and the setting sun cast long shadows everywhere.

The only thing funnier than watching my awkward baby giraffe play hopscotch is watching her hula hoop - seriously needs to be captured on video.

Athena's jumps were quite graceful and accurate.

Welcome warm and lovely Spring!
We'll enjoy you until the heat drives us back inside again.

Boy Trifecta

Spiderman
driving a bulldozer
dozin' some balls...

...trifecta of awesomeness!