"I'll show you how valuable Elle Woods can be!"

Let's do this December!

I'm having a moment of vulnerability, people. Have I ever told you about my theme song? I know, how Ally McBeal of me, right?

Whenever I feel like I need a dose of girl power or a reminder to be awesome, I listen to this and it makes me feel like kicking some ass and taking some names. I'm embedding the video here to give you context, but the song by itself is a bit more motivating.

This clip always makes me want to hit the stairmaster though, which is never a bad thing...

Things I don't want to forget about right now...

-The way the trees around here just exploded with color overnight. Reds, yellows, oranges.

-The shower of leaves that rains down from them when the breeze hits.

-Luke shouting, "It's a fall day?!?!"

-Austin's new-walker waddle, especially as he rapidly walks away from me, usually carrying something he's not supposed to have.

-How Luke cares for his brother when he's upset and how he looks after him by holding his hand or pinning him down so he can't get himself into trouble.

-Luke kicking his legs in the tub and Austin cracking up.

-When I tried to leave Austin in the crib and he wasn't ready to be left. He stood up and looked over the edge at me and put his head down sideways on the railing with his thumb in his mouth. He looked so much like a toddler and it struck my heart in an oddly poignant way.

-Luke singing, "Happy Birthday Jesus," a song he's learning for the school Christmas performance, unprompted in the car on the way home.

-Watching Austin do the "fast waddle' over to me, arms held up exuberantly to be picked up when I arrive at daycare.

-Luke's face lighting up and a shout of "mommy!" when he sees me come into his classroom.

-Luke coming out from watching a show with his dad and asking, "will you do night time with me?"

-The magic sleep inducing powers of a warm little relaxed body lying next to me in bed that throws my evening plans for productivity completely out the window virtually every night.

-The completeness I feel snuggling up to Luke and reading stories before bedtime or when I'm rocking Austin to sleep in his room.

-The way Austin savors his food; smacking his lips and enjoying every bite.

-How I can turn either of my boys' moods around with tickles or some other silly trick.

-Luke's imagination. Ships, pirates, race cars, scary octopus, rocket ships, going on missions, "the sea." "That will be perfect!" "Sure, mommy." "No no no no no no no, not that way...this way."

-Austin saying, "1, 2, 3 go!" and trying to sing his ABC's along with Luke in the car (that one caught me off guard).

The Party

We had a nice little family party to celebrate Austin's first birthday. Even though it was a small gathering, I still wanted to decorate. I went with a typical first birthday party theme, "Route 66/Vintage Roadside Americana." You know, totally in all the birthday party catalogs.

I was really proud of the invitations I made. Too bad they never actually made it off the computer and into mailboxes. Part of the problem was that I couldn't decide which one...the back was cute too, but I'm too lazy to try and pixelate my address, so you only get to see the front. I was pretty proud of them. Oh well, at least they get to live forever on the Internet!

I totally painted the sign behind Austin's head. At approximately 11pm... the night before the party... using random tubs of sample paint I found in the garage...while watching Pitch Perfect. Again, so proud.

Thanks Sommer for the birthday banner that keeps on giving!

Chevron napkins!!!

He was so into the cake that I couldn't get any pictures with his cute smile.

Found a way to bring a version of the invitation out for the world to see!

51 Weeks

Visiting friends in San Diego

At some point this evening I'll get an email that says my baby is 51 weeks old today.

They come every Wednesday and they are always a surprise to me. I'm pretty sure I stopped keeping track around 14 weeks this time around, so they are a nice mid-week reminder.

We ran out of formula last week and decided to just make the jump to whole milk. He took to it like a champ.

We haven't totally made the switch to sippy cups, but we've started the transition and he's cool with it.

I threw away the bottle drying rack on Monday. And the bottle warmer.

He isn't walking yet, but I expect that any day now he'll decide that dropping to his knees and doing a mad crab walk across the floor is yesterday's news and that will be that.

I find myself in awe of the things he can do and then I remember how old he is.

He has some fun semi-curls around the bottom of his head and ears. It's adorable and I don't really want to cut it right away.

He's quite pretty and is often mistaken for a girl, so the hair cut may have to come sooner than I'd like.

 I think he looks a lot like me when I was a baby, but I definitely see some of Justin in there too.

Some people say he doesn't look anything like Luke and other people say, "he looks EXACTLY like Luke." I guess he just looks like Austin.

I feel like I'm still trying to figure him out. I guess I forgot what this stage is like - the in-between not a baby/not yet a 24-7, imagination-gone-wild chatterbox preschooler.

I didn't think he looked as big to me as Luke did at "1," but now that I look at these pictures I guess he does.

Whoever he turns out to be, I can't imagine our lives without Austin! He is pure joy!

 

Shell Beach near Pismo.

Santa Monica Pier

Soccer practice with big brother



(Is it possible to rotate pictures inside Blogger? This has driven me crazy for years. Years!!! Don't make me go back, edit and re-upload, Google!)

Woodies on the Wharf in Santa Cruz

Fourth of July - this is my favorite face.

More Conversations with Luke

Conversations with Luke (Age 3.5)


On Leg Hair:

Luke wanted me to put my legs in the bathtub the other night. As he tried to "swim" under them like a tunnel he made an observation.

"Mommy, your legs are spikey...like a dinosaur."

And then he proceeded to try to clean them off with a wash cloth. "We need to clean them," he said.

For the record, it had only been 2 days since I had last shaved, which is kind of a marvel and really only because it's summer.


Diabetes:

Upon finding a syringe at the bottom of the refrigerator.
Luke:  What's that?
Me:  This is a syringe, it's what daddy uses to take medicine for his diabetes.
Luke:  When I get big, I'm going to use one of those just like daddy.
Me: Oh no sweetheart, you don't want to use one of those. You don't want to have diabetes.
Luke (pouting): You tease me.
Me: What?
Luke:  You tease me about not having (gibberish) like daddy.
Me:  Oh Luke, diabetes means you can't eat any sugar. You love sugar, remember? (He always tells me he loves sugar - so not awesome.) You wouldn't want to have diabetes because then you'd have to eat less sugar.
Luke: Oh, okay.

A little bit later Justin comes out to go to work. Luke stands up, sticks his finger in his dad's face.
Luke:  Listen daddy, you can't have sugar because of your 'beeds.' You not eat any sugar okay?

Things I've Done in Heels

How do people get out of the house for work everyday on time with multiple children?
 

And now for a little segment called "Things I've Done in Heels."

Okay, that's probably misleading. While I do wear heels a couple of times a week, they are usually wedges or a 1-2 inch Mary Jane heel, which isn't all that impressive. I can most often be found in ballet flats.

In this particular instance, however, I was wearing a low kitten heel. A pretty obnoxious black/white dotted pointy toed kitten heel with turquoise accents that I found on clearance at Target (can't imagine why) and had to have. They're amazing. I digress.

95% of the time, when I arrive home from work I throw my laptop, purse on the dining room floor and immediate dive into Mom mode. Making dinner, giving hugs, changing diapers, clearing the table, baths, bedtime routines, etc. I usually don't change out of my work clothes until much later in the evening, which means I sometimes have my "heels" on for several hours after work. (Unless they're wedges, in which case, those bad boys hit the floor with aforementioned lap top and purse.)

This brings me to the point of this "Things I Did in Heels" segment. Here are my recent claims to fame.

1) Cleaned carpet covered in animal poop
Last night I came home and soon discovered that someone (thing) had left feces all over the boys' toy area (perfect). Gross. My money's on the dog. I quickly found myself crouching down in my pencil skirt, blouse and kitten heels armed with clorox wipes, paper towels and a can of Resolve. That's number one.

2) Ran through a vineyard
Shortly after an uneventful dinner, Luke headed outside with my dad to drive his mini-John Deere Gator. My dad came in and announced that Luke had headed out toward the back of the property, driving through the vineyard by himself (he's 3) and my dad wasn't feeling up to chasing him down. I got up from the table and bolted out into the vineyard. As I was running through the weeds, dried grass, spider webs, etc. I looked down and realized that the kitten heels were a poor choice for this job. An unexpected 1/4 mile run later I was finally back in the house and made the smart choice to change into post-work appropriate footwear.

What have you done in your "heels" lately, super moms?

My dear, dead friend

One of my favorite friends left this birthday comment on one of my instagram photos a couple of weeks ago. I'm still laughing about it. I love her.

Follow me on Bloglovin

Nine Months

I can't believe he's nine months old. I know, parents always say these things, but it's completely true.

I've tried really hard to savor all of the baby-ness this time around, but now that it's almost gone, I feel like I missed it somehow. I know I didn't, it's just that overnight my baby turned into an-almost toddler.

 

He tries to communicate. I swear he can say "hi mama." Which, if I'm really being honest with you, really sounds like:  "ahhh, ma ma ma" but he waves at me while he's doing it, so therefore it goes in the baby book* as "hi mama." Same with "baby," "brother," "bottle" = "ba ba ba ba ba ba." Although he did crawl over to Justin in bed the other morning and say, "da da."

Basically, he's a genius.

He started crawling about 6 weeks ago, started pulling himself up on stuff a few days ago, and took his first steps cruising around furniture while holding on last night. We lowered the crib this weekend. Whoa. Rome wasn't built in a day my friend. Let's take this physical development down a couple notches, 'kay?

He cried when I closed the bathroom door and wouldn't let him go in. Then he tried to find another way.

 

I guess Luke was around the same age when he started doing this stuff, it just seems so...fast.

He has seven teeth. SEVEN! And eats pretty much everything, including small pieces of steak, chicken, rice, pancake and any number of other things we happen to be eating that pass the "can I give my baby ____" Google search. Actually, I finally looked up "what CAN'T my baby eat?" The list was much shorter.  I've heard tales of these children. Children who eat. He's taken to eating the food that we buy for Luke when we go out to eat. This is a good thing, because Luke only eats about 15% of it, leaving a lot left for little brother to enjoy.

He weighs a little over 18 pounds.

 

He's a sweet little love who likes to fall asleep holding my hand. He holds onto your arm, shoulder, back, or hair when you carry him on your hip. He's a thumb sucker. He has the biggest smiles, especially for his big brother. He loves the bathtub and the swimming pool. He is generally a content, easygoing, flexible and happy baby...until he doesn't get what he wants. Then he lets us know.

Trying to make out with Uncle Mike.

I can't believe we'll be coming up on a year old soon. One. This is crazy.

* This statement implies that I have one and that I actually update it. I do, but it's still in the packaging. Luke's baby book wasn't filled out until a couple of weeks before Austin was born. What I do have is a five-year"one-line a day journal" that serves as a running log of our days and as a stand-in baby book for milestone moments. Just to clarify. :)

Conversations

As you may know, Luke started pre-school earlier this year. He's only there two full days a week, but it's been interesting to watch him navigate a new social community and find out what those relationships look like to a three-year-old.


Conversation #1:  Respecting Your Teacher

Setting:  In the car on the way to school. The week before I had observed him goofing off with some of the other boys when the teacher was trying to read a story to the class.

ME:  Luke, I know you like to have fun with your friends at school, but it is very important to listen to the teacher. We need to be respectful and do what she asks. So, what are you going to when you are in "circle time" and teacher asks you to sit nicely?
LUKE:  Play...with...EDWARD!!!!!!

Clearly more conversations need to be had on this subject.


Conversation #2:  Self-esteem

Setting:  Luke's room, getting ready for school. For several weeks he has told me that a boy named Christopher tells him that he "is small" or "a baby."  For the record, Luke is one of the tallest boys in his class, so I think "small" is really a metaphor for a certain milestone Luke has not yet achieved. (Largely due to his mom's lack of motivation and fortitude. It's coming. Swear.)

LUKE:  Christopher says "I am small."
ME:  Well, do you think you're small?
LUKE:  No, I not small. I is big. (Grammar is a developing skill.)
ME:  Let me tell you something buddy. In life, you'll see that there are kids who like to say mean and hurtful things. These things are not true and you do not have to listen to them. You ARE big. So... you think you are big. Mommy and Daddy think you are big. Grammy and Grandad think you are big. And, Nonni and Papa think you are big. We ALL think you are big. So, who are you going to believe?
LUKE:  Christopher.

Avila Beach

I never know where to post stuff. I always feel like I come here to post random thoughts or personal crises that I'm dealing with and I save other stuff about our lives for This Vine Life. The problem is, too many people I deal with on a work-related basis know about This Vine Life and I over think what I post there. Ha ha. I miss this relatively anonymous space over here.

 

So, here are a few pics of my beautiful boys. These were taken at Avila Beach, CA. My in-laws took us there for a quick overnight trip celebrating their anniversary a few weeks ago. My awesome brother-in-law Jeff is becoming a pretty good photographer, so of course I jumped at the chance to utilize his talents.

 

Austin is now 7 months and Luke is almost 3 1/2. I love these boys!

 

 

 

I love this shirt. One of my few purchases ever on ebay. "Woody shirt." It's gone through both boys and I couldn't be happier with the investment!

 

 

Story of My Life

 

 

In fact...I might have had more than one awkward dinner conversation where stuff I knew about people from the Internet slipped out and my true stalker tendencies were revealed. (It's not really stalking, more like Proficient Google Skills or Journalistic Curiosity.) Fortunately it wasn't about the people I was having dinner with, but rather about people they were friends with in real life and I was not...which in retrospect might have been even more awkward.

I have also had a couple of awkward moments in the doorway of a co-worker's office where I wanted to mention something from her blog...the blog I only know about because I googled her one day...and had an internal dialogue with myself to keep my mouth shut. Awkward lingering ensued.

Yup. Thanks Internet. You've added a whole new dimension to my social anxiety disorder.