Max can read. He taught himself. It's really impressive. I've probably already blogged that info, but it never ceases to amaze me. He sometimes reads the books to us during story time which is quite a fun turn of events. Yesterday, he played pretend bedtime with Vivi and read her some of her favorite books. It was really sweet to listen to him.
Max's first week at Steve & Kate's camp went well. He seemed to really like the food, especially the ice cream and honey sticks (sugar?!) He also spent a lot of time in the clay studio making multiple coil pots with lids and beehives. Our deck table in now covered by his artworks.
Yesterday he made bow tie pasta — just like his daddy eh. He ate half of them raw while on the way home.
It took me a few days to notice that Max placed the little painted wooden Mongolian king and queen I brought back for he and Vivi in the odd little window sill in my closet which looks out into the backyard. It makes me happy to see them there so I left 'em. Charming!
A post dim sum hug! Feel the love love love.
Hey you, look at me, I'm in Paris. Yep that's the Louvre. I know, I know, I'm one lucky little boy. Wish you were here. I can't wait to eat some pomme frites after I check out Mona and her friends. Au Revoir.
The lower right tooth popped out and onto the top of his tongue while he was talking to his buddy Jaewon. It's really small, tiny actually. So small that we had trouble keeping track of it. Mr C almost lost it yesterday afternoon and we panicked that it had slipped out of his pocket and fallen between the boards of the deck. Imagine how we were panicking, it's his first tooth and the fairy hadn't had a chance to come yet! Fortunately we found it, in the kitchen.
Max told us weeks ago that he didn't believe in the tooth fairy. He said matter of factly a few different times that he was pretty sure we were the fairy. He told auntie Lulu too, while they were at the theater watching the movie Marmaduke, that he didn't believe in the tooth fairy. So were weren't too worried about having to pull off some fairy caper. In fact we started being down right silly about the whole thing, though for the record, we never fessed up to actually being it. We told Max that since it was a money exchange assignment it was likely that Ben Bernake was coming to take his tooth. Max seemed interested in the chairman of the bank of USA and was pleased that Ben would be setting the going rate for a first tooth. It turns out after all that, Max isn't entirely sure if the fairy is real or not and since so many of his friends are convinced of the fairy's existence he wants to believe too. Max started to work a new explanation where both Ben and the fairy were coming. So we played along with that and encouraged it too.
Last night Max and Mr C wrote a single note to Ben and the tooth fairy requesting that they don't take his first tooth. He really wanted to keep it, but he also wanted the prize money. He left the note under his pillow along with the tooth. In the morning he found two gold dollar coins and his tooth in a different little bag — the note was gone. Max thought it was so weird that they took the note. He laughed and laughed and just kept saying isn't that weird? Why would they want the note anyway? That's weird, right? We said it was a one for one trade. Since the fairy only leaves money if it gets to take a tooth, we figured this time it took the note as payment. He thought that made some sense. Pretty amusing all this made up stuff. But hey now Max can name the Chairman of the Federal Reserve, impressive!
ps. While staring out the window of Tartine this morning Max read a store sign across the street which says "wash and dry" and then he asked me what they wash there. Instead of answering I asked him what he thought they washed and he said coins. I was intrigued and asked why he thought that and he said because he'd seen other similar signs for "coin wash and dry." Now that's a whole new take on money laundering!
We all had an amazing time partying with our preschool family friends both at Jaweon's and at Tessa's parents lovely Sonoma homes. They threw a perfect July fourth afternoon pool party. As you can see no one had more fun that our own party girl miss Vivienne Grace! Happy birthday America.
...with chocolate chips, mmm the batter was so delicious.
That Caetano glamours me every time I look into those eyes, geesh!
Vivienne and Max enjoyed a few spins around their preschool playground this afternoon. Vivienne loves school and has many friends such as Talia, Azra, Jesse, Tikal, Ella, Sophie and Zizou she counts them all as her favorites. She participates fully and it very comfortable in her classroom. It's wonderful. I never worry about her during the day as I know when I pick her up she'll run to me, hug me with all her might, and then tell me she's had a great day. Max had pajama day at camp today and also had his face painted like a cat yet again. He's loving camp and they are loving him too. I heard from both his team leader and his science teacher about what an amazing mind he has, how he knows all the answers even the hard ones, and what a great citizen he's being. Wow. Yay summer. Now if we could get some warm weather all would be well with our little piece of the world.
While listening to They Might Be Giants kids album called Science in the car today coming back from camp Max said to me, "Mom (Sadly, I am no longer "Mommy" except when he's whiny or crying) when I was three and sometimes four I thought that where ever you went there was a sun there. Like when we were in Virginia they have their own sun and Mexico has it's own sun too. But now that I'm five I know there's only one sun and it's everywhere." Yes, I think my son is a genius. Wouldn't you if you realized that your son remembered what he thought about where the sun shines when he was three years old! What three year old tries to figure out how the sun appears in different places around the earth? I'm amazed. Stunned actually.
Max is loving Ocean Expeditions week at Camp Galileo. He's super into the finding the feather game with a rubber chicken named "cluck clousteau." He comes home each day with a painted face and lots of exciting stories. Good times.
Even Max has enough delayed gratification that he'd rather take a photo using the ever-so-fun and easy-to-use iphone rather than sink his teeth immediately into that frosting. Go figure. Our whole family is addicted, with varying degrees, to the iphone. It's a whole new world of focus and distraction.
That's a happy 'graduation' (from TK to K) cupcake.
Oh the yummy black and white shakes, seen here, are only the icing on the delicious lunch feast we had at Fremont Diner. Mmmm the pulled piggy and burgers are so delicious and the darling picnic tables and country road side environment made eating al fresco that much more fun. Thumbs up.
I've been cell phone challenged since I drowned my iPhone in Mongolia (a story I hope to blog about soon) so I don't have a photo to share from this amazing event, well other than this white board I snapped days later. Max performed in his school's talent show on June 2. He was the only boy from his class to perform and he was the only person from his class to perform solo. Those are important details to consider as he is only 5 years old. I feel I must give a little background so you can truly appreciate what you will later read. Two days before the event I tried to get Max to practice his stand up routine. He didn't want to, and after reading two riddles from go-gurt squeeze packages he gave up and walked away declaring that he didn't want to be in the talent show and was "quitting." The next day he told his teacher that he didn't want to perform. His teachers found me in the hallway during pick up and emphasized how the line up was already in place and the script written and Max was an intregal part and needed to perform. So the night before the show I pressed upon him that following through was important. He confessed that one of the main reasons he didn't want to do it was because the go-gurt squeeze sleeves smelled yucky. I then hand wrote each riddle's response on a piece of paper in my most legible all caps text. It was a feat for me to slow down and write that way, seriously my regular hand writing has gone to sh*t. Max then practiced a few times through each joke and we talked a bit about the importance of a slow delivery and comic timing. I found a seat in the audience a few minutes before the talent show started. Max didn't know yet that I was there. It turned out that Max was performer No. 2. You won't ever believe or understand what happened next. Max took the microphone and was visibly nervous. I thought for sure he'd mumble, stumble, and give up in shy defeat. No! He was fabulous. He read each riddle slowly, loudly and with great diction. He also had a natural sense of comic timing, he waited for the audience to respond and collectively say "why, what or we don't know" before responding. He had it all, clarity, presence, timing, and confidence. Oh my god. I thought he's real talent. Shit. It was awesome. I wish you were there with me!
a few examples...
Which tennis move are waiters best at? Serving!
What trees are best for storing food in? Pantrys!
Do bears wear water skies? No, they go barefoot!
Where do horses live? In Neighborhoods!
What kinds of fish make the best doctors? Sturgeons!
Which bone is the most musical? Trombones!
darling photos taken by daddy, while he does bath time duty. For the record Max as lion, Vivi as butterfly.
Max has a new swim teacher named Chad. He is very calm and supportive and Max is thriving. Here he is doing his first jump into the deep end of the pool! He was nervous but brave.
Ooooh without slighting my own gorgeous and practically perfect offspring : : wink : : can I just gush over my deliciously handsome and glamourizing nephew Caetano? Case in point, just look deep into his big brown eyes and behold his inner (and outer!) beauty. If you only you knew, this boy is a delight to hold, he's super mellow, loves to be held, taken for a walk or bounced, and will fall asleep and stay sleeping peacefully in your arms for hours — ok hours in a crib not being held would make his mommy happy and give her a much deserved break, but still he's nothing less than practically perfect. Oh baby you are stunning. I miss you xoxo — auntie
"Spring" by Max Co.
Snaps of Ms. Vivienne enjoying herself at the Daily City playhouse arcade and me loving the cross process app on my iPhone.
Witches indeed! We are in love with our own images both reflected and captured. Learn about the glorious history of the gazing globe here.
Yay! Thank you 'gamma' Sherry for the fun times musical easter cards! As you can see the kids were thrilled to open their cards. Vivienne played her here comes peter cottontail repeatedly for at least fifteen minutes and they both took the cards into the car with them for their ride to school. A second big shout out and thank you for the darling easter clothes, it's so helpful having new threads. They can use really use them. xoxo
A quick snap and close-up of Max's chalk easel drawing. We'd like to thank Ikea for making such cute and affordable children's things.
These are Max's two pages from a darling Eric Carle inspired art project made by his transitional kindergarten class. Simply wonderful!
Yay! Max got his blue ribbon today at the end of his swim class at La Petite Baleen. He was so happy! And I am so proud! He loves his teacher Fiona and has thrived in her care. I can't say enough wonderful things about La Petite's instruction — they make swimming happen and with loads of fun. I can still hear the bell ringing clap clap clap!
Max had his first t-ball practice last monday and a first game the very next saturday. His team is called the grasshoppers and is organized by the San Francisco Youth Baseball League. A few of the parents are coaching and most of the kids are from Max's class at school. Paga took Max to the game, cheered him on and took all these memorable photos. Yay, thank you Paga!! Apparently Max was a great hitter each time he was up to bat. Most importantly he had a marvelous time and is looking forward to the next game. Afterward we had a lovely family outing to our local favorite and super friendly restaurant Chow.
My sweet not-so-baby Vivienne is ready for a big girl bed. She wants to nap and sleep in her big brother's bed so badly, she's over the prison-like crib. Here she is taking a snooze in Max's bed while he was on a sleepover at Maga Paga's house. Sister misses her big brother.
I love this snap of Max putting his stuffs into Paga's Jeep so he can go on an overnight adventure at their house. He was so excited to go, he wrote a secret note to both Maga & Paga and grinned ear to ear each time I mentioned the upcoming event. When I saw him the next day he told me many details from all the fun like what type of sushi he ate from sushi ran (shrimp tempura & tobiko!), how he stayed up super late (10pm) and woke up before the sun (6am), and played lego star wars wii until breakfast (a 'full' battle apparently), and then he had me guess how many pieces of bacon he had — it was a trick question—none!
The contents of a five year old's pocket: a quarter, paper clip & various rocks — photo idea by Grand-Maga. Funny!
Here's a sweet moment. I found Vivienne in her room in the same position where I sit to read her and Max night time stories. She was reading Golden Books to her Totoros.
Vivi went for her two year old check up (uh ya I was a little late making this appointment!). Of course she's perfectly healthy and was her typical sweetheart self during the exams. She made her doctor smile a number of times. She weighed in at 39.5 lsb and 39.5 inches tall — she's gigantic! She's off the growth chart! Go Vivi!
My little baby girl has started school! She's done very well so far. There's only been a few minutes of tears mostly it's been lots of exploration and excitement. Yay, "wow school" as she repeates after I've read and reread the book during the days leading up to this start date. Vivi has a pretty easy going temperament and likes to do almost everything. So far the transition is going well. Today was her first day of staying by herself for a few hours. I was heartened when I came back to pick her up and she was happily sitting at a table enjoying a book by herself. When she saw me she said "mommy back!" and ran up and gave me a big hug and wet kiss (she's a big kisser!). Tomorrow we'll try a longer day and if that goes then we'll try for a day that includes a nap and second snack. I think once she gets comfortable she's going to love it. She'll get to play all day and make friends plus eat lots of delicious healthy treats made by the beloved chef Celestina. What's not to like about preschool? Sign me up please!
Vivienne and I had a lovely mother daughter luncheon at our dear friends' Bryn and Lauryn house, thank you! Vivi adored Lauryn and all her toys too. Here she is giving her a giant vivi-licious huggy huggy goodbye. See you soon we hope.
Thanks to Maga & Paga for the Valentine sleep over. The kids are crazy about the kiss me "boo-boo stickers" aka bandaids. Of course none will likely cover a wound, instead they are stuck all over our house and or used for hours of playtime funsies. xoxo
Lots of snaps of the ever expressive miss Vivienne while she enjoys herself at her friday art class. Vivienne seems to love it all, her exuberance for life is inspiring!
While wearing her favorite "jeeyish boo-boo" (aka Hello Kitty) dress Vivi added a ballerina tutu skirt and ballet slippers and danced in the shower. She now loves dancing in the shower and keeps asking when her tutu will be back from the laundry (t'was covered in jelly). She also likes to play sleep party in the shower and will drag in her pillows and nigh nigh blankets along with her baby doll collection, most of which are named "baby Tano" after her cousin Caetano. She'll ask you turn off the lights so she can sleep. Oh and shhhhhhh, baby sleeping.
Max and Willow played very nicely, well except when Max got too bossy about putting Willow in the dungeon or jail. Most of the time they just ran, ran, ran around peace plaza chasing and capturing each other. I had fun playing with the toy camera app on the iphone (as you can see).
Max has been playing almost non-stop with his LEGO TIE fighter. (thanks Grandma!) He's also crazy about the little Vader character. He took him to breakfast with us and pretended to have Vader try to eat each item that Max liked. Grandma-in-law Sylvia sent us a link to a LEGO Vader Christmas movie and now Max has been watching that non-stop too! He's crazy for Star Wars and hasn't even seen the movie yet. I was thinking it might be time but when I asked him he said, I will see it when I'm six. Ok then.
What a gorgeous photo of Max taking Vivienne down the hill on the toboggan thanks Paga! What a wonderful big brother he is, he was so focused and in control of the sled making sure they both were safe — meanwhile miss Vivienne squealed with delight and enjoyed every second of the thrill ride.
I wish I had time to post more...
I hope to have time to format and upload more photos from our Christmas in Tahoe trip as there are some cute ones. The trip was fantastic. Snow is so fun and Miss Vivienne really enjoyed rolling in it and mostly she liked to eat it!
a few more images that include fortune cookie Maximillian taken by other parents. I love the bow perspective on the costume and that first one with the big happy smile while Zoe tries to look inside.
Max's school puts on an elaborate "follies" show every holiday season and performs it on stage at Herbst Theater. All the songs and short skits are written by the eight graders. Costumes are handmade by parents, while the staff helps pull together all the needed props.The dramatic arts teacher choreographs the dances and the music teacher performs all the music live. The entire performance is amazing, truly a feat and it's wildly entertaining and touchingly sweet too. I laughed, I cried, I gasped in amazement. We all were so impressed! Max performed in the TK cookie song along with his classmates. Each child was a unique cookie. As you can see, Max was a foam fortune cookie. His fortune said "Merry Christmas" thought up and hand written by him. His cookie was folded, cut and spray painted by mommy and daddy in the wee hours of the nights leading up to the follie festivities.
I wish I could remember the darling lyrics, or get Max to recite them...but alas. All I can remember is "if you lookie lookie lookie you can find a little cookie like me."
These are a few of Max's art pieces that are hanging in and around his classroom.
Max built a beautiful menorah from crayola model magic (his new favorite sculpting medium). The finished piece just barely balances and a few of the candle holding tips didn't dry together and later fell off. It's a bit of a work in progress. However, I was really impressed with his vision, dedication and intense need to complete this project. It took him a few hours to get through it and there were some tears in the beginning. He was struggling with what he envisioned and how the clay was not working in his hands. Right about now you might be wondering if we are Jewish? Nope closer to WASP but without the powerfully elite background and religious upbringing. Max's school has been teaching the students about the holiday of light and Max has been really interested. He even played dreidel and of course wants to win some chocolate "gelt" money. On the way home from school he said, "mommy did you know that during Hanukkah they get eight presents. Do we get eight presents at Christmas?"
Max has been taking lessons at La Petite Baleen and loving it. His teacher Rachel has got it going on and knows just what to do to keep him trying. Max has been doing really well and progressing quickly. He still complains a bit before we get there and asks when we can play hookie. He also likes me to tell Rachel that he feels nervous. Once we get those rituals out of the way he's in the water paddling and doing his balloon up faces and giving me thumbs up while I watch. This day he got his green ribbon! I'm a proud mama. We all can't wait to go back to the Melia in Mexico and swim to the pool's center island and then get a yabba dabba do from the bar.
Vivienne and Maximillian had a great time at the dentist. Leave it to these two kids to enjoy the journey — well we'll give some serious credit to this wonderful pediatric dentist office too! They really know how to make the kids comfortable. They allow the kids to touch everything which makes it fun for them to experience the water pick, tasty flavored gloves and "mr sucky" hose. Vivienne was happy with all the Hello Kitty gear. She calls Hello Kitty "jee-eyesh-boo boo" even if you get her to say the "hello" part she'll just add it on "hello jee-eyesh boo boo". It's so funny. We have no idea how that translation works but it's consistent each and every time. Both kids got a thumbs up on good oral hygene. Max has a couple of watch spots so we need to keep up the brushing. He also has a wobbly center bottom right tooth! It's been tightening up so we don't think it will fall out too soon. He's growing up too fast!
Welcome to the world (and the bunny blog) Caetano Benicio!! He sped into the world at 5:35 am weighing 7lbs 4oz, measuring 20 inches tall and with a full head of gorgeous black spiky hair. He's as sweet as a pea and already loves his auntie who is just crazy about him—a mutual love fest!
dahling you are too funny! Master Max sure is expressive and just too cute! These fabulous pro photos are from a test shoot for a Lego spot. The best moment was when the photographer asked if there was a machine Max would like to invent, this was a question she'd been asking the kids all day. Max said he's like to invent a machine that could shrink him so he could explore the world being tiny but then the machine could enlarge him back when he was finished. The photographer and her crew were shocked and surprised by his articulate and creative answer. The best they had all day they said! He is a bright and charming boy, Ah, mama love.
Bing bunnies swing time! It was a gorgeous day, much warmer than expected (uh global warming yikes??!) It's so cute how Vivienne wants to do everything her big brother does including swinging on the big kid swings. Monkey see, monkey do!
A few darling snaps of my little two year old party girl. I especially love the last one where she's lovingly gazing at the pink frosting on her cupcake!
There's not much else that can make this mama happier than seeing her baby girl dip, splash and swirl every possible color, mix all with her brushes and hands, plus paint with two hands and with her eyes closed. Perhaps, Vivienne in a pancake tutu performing en point in the Nutcracker would be a close second ;-)
We had a super fun morning watching sea lions poke through the waves at Fort Mason while we waited for the Children's Art Center to open. The side by side two year old class is only an hour long, but it was simple, quiet and really sweet to behold. Vivienne is not at all shy, shocking right? She walked right in, allowed the teacher to put an apron on her and went straight to the paints. She did a great job dipping each brush in it's own color, though she wanted to paint on every child's paper! She wasn't too thrilled with the playdoh station or the colored markers, she kept heading back to the big messy table of tempera paints. In the end her painting was thick, wet and a strange shade of all colors but it was well covered! I hope when we go back next week I'll get to take it home to treasure.
Afterward we got a little snack at Greens to Go and then played in the panhandle scrap metal bandshell in the parking lot. Good times!
Technorati Tags: art, painting, San Francisco, toddler
Class of 2018! (and that's only eighth grade graduation!)
If you want to order a photo, email me and I'll send you the link!
Happy Birthday to Vivienne! She turned two today. Her loving father stayed up late baking and frosting pink cupcakes (pink cupcake recipe from one of Vivi's favorite books Pinkalicious).
Grandma Sherry, Daddy & I took the wee ones to Golden Gate Park so they could ride their bikes without the worry of cars! Turns out the park is such a busy place will strollers pushed by dads wearing inline skates, endless streams of bicycles and even bike teams, skate boards etc, you get the picture. Being untrained obstacles was almost as frustrating as riding on the sidewalk. Even with all the "traffic" it was still a successful trip. Plus it was darling to see Vivienne helping Max learn to ride his bike. She kept spotting him so he wouldn't fall. She loves him something fierce.
Had to post this funny photo of Max doing gymnastics taken later this day. What a grin and flexibility!
These are photos from Max's school halloween parade. Max went as Commander Fox from Star Wars, The Clone Wars (isn't he looking handsome!) and Vivienne was a fairy from Pinkalicious which is one of her very favorite books (she chimes in while we read with the words she knows like pink pink pink). Vivienne loves going to school with Max. She pushed her way right to the front of the parade, held hands with Cameron (the mummy) who was holding teacher Steve's hand. At one point she pulled right out in front, she's a go getter!
More photos to come...
Shopping for pumpkins has never been more fun. These two little busy bodies picked up, dropped, rolled and searched for the perfect squash. Max found "the one" while Vivienne loved them all. We brought home a few, a baby, mama and papa size. After dinner Max drew the "perfect" face. Seriously he drew, redrew and then drew it again until it was just right. Each feature had to have fangs. Fangs in the eyes, fangs in the nose and more fangs in the mouth. And as you can see Max enjoyed making the same fang face as his pumpkin!
Love the first photo of Max and his classmate Marlee, so sweet! The others of Max running, walking and smiling with an orange wedge capture the spirit too. Max and I both had a great day at his new school's walkathon. I was a co-chair and heavily involved as you can imagine, so I was so happy that the sun shone brightly while all the kids ran laps around the field to raise money for scholarships. Max ran 21 laps. A fifth grader took the winning title of most laps with 77. Max and I would like to thank his loving sponsors Maga, Paga, Aunnie, Yaya, Auntie Lulu and Papa — THANK YOU!!!
Can I say anything to summarize this? So darling. Vivi and Papa are like peas in a pod. Vivi adores him as much as I do. She also loves eating like papa does, she takes it seriously too, and he adores that. Photos from a visit on Sept 5.
you scream, I scream, we all scream for ice cream!
Ms. Vivienne would likely have invented burning man sometime in the near future, if it didn't already exist. As you can see she channels the spirit! This series is from our end of summer block party. Vivi had striped to her diaper and pink crocs, had her tummy painted with a pink bunny "totoro" and found herself a hula hoop to dance through the street with. She looks so happy and full of herself, it was a joy to behold. That's one happy baby.
Max and I went to see the darling film "Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs" in 3-D. We had a great time. He was obsessed with his milk duds and I was quite happy eating a bag of movie popcorn. Good times all around.
Vivienne and I enjoyed a wonderful sunny day playing at Children's Playground in Golden Gate Park and luncheoning at Pacific Catch. It's so easy to spend a day with Vivienne. She's care-free, happy, curious, engaging, and self-entertaining — seriously, wow! I'm in awe of her spirit and energy.
This is a photo of Max's self portrait from his first week of "tk" (transitional kindergarten) school.
sorry for the long delay. . . life's been getting in the way of my blogging funsies.
I'm so in love with Vivi's shirt (target!) I wish I had magic make it bigger potion so I could wear it. She's seen here in the SFO airport playing with a found umbrella while we waited for the every fabulous aunnie and yaya to fetch us (a million thank yous). This girl was so easy to travel with. She was a rock star— dancing included.
Here's Max in his new Mexico soccer uniform that daddy bought him while searching for medicine at wallmart — long story. . . which I will go into later when I have more time and photos. All our trip picks are on a different camera and me not know where the cord is and hubby is on a plane to Phoenix. ouch more hot weather and plane rides, poor guy.
That's Max with his preschool buddy Jaewon at the lunch table near the pool. We stayed at the Sol Melia Puerto Vallarta, which I highly recommend if you are traveling with kids and want an easy breezy relaxing vacation. The all inclusive (food and booze!) set up with lots of activities like, shooting, archery, volleyball both beach and pool, tennis, ping pong, foosball, uber large chess boards, bingo, kids pool games like water balloon tosses and frisbee tournaments plus babysitting in the baby rock club, a playground, nightly entertainment shows and PV's largest swimming pool — seriously this place has it all. Totally worth it, and it was actually very affordable. The staff was friendly, helpful and enjoyable to be around. Lots of good things to say about the Melia. Of course they could work on making the food better and changing up the offerings because the same old buffet options get tired quickly but it's tough to serve that many guests in sweltering heat — i get it. Ok more deets to come when I have photos. . . stay tuned.
We enjoyed a fun afternoon celebrating our little friend Logan's 3rd birthday at the Bay Area Discovery Museum. Max loves the pirate playground and wave room while Vivi likes the tot spot water play stream and inside she likes the tunnel and climbing structures. Afterward we had a great family dinner at Korea House — DIY bbq is always a hit (the mung bean sprouts and kimchi too!) Plus Max actually eats this food without complaint or nagging. He's crazy for the short ribs and tofu.
I'm dearly loving the just downloaded iPhone application "ShakeItPhoto" thank you for the tip James. Isn't the view of the bridge from the museum fabulous?!
Vivi's favorite song is No. 6 S.A.X. by Yello but she'll settle for any Backyardigan song too. Here's she's pugged into her brother's borrowed moon lander launch rocket foot pump.
While attending a playdate to meet our mentor family from Max's new school, the host dad whipped up this photoshop job — Max as Prince Charles. Max looks too cool for school eh? Max's expression looks just like his dad to me!
A couple of snaps of Vivi and I from a friend's the day before the holiday "dependence day" bbq. (aaack a photo of me on my blog — a rarity!)
Ms. Vivienne can't get her fingers out of the potions and lotions. She's especially addicted to lip gloss! These glowing snaps of auntie and Vivi are from the birthday celebration luncheon for Yaya & Maga at the Pelican Inn. Afterward we enjoyed the heat wave by hanging out at Muir Beach and splashing in the waves, was fabulous funsies for all.
I have a new saying, "Like kids in an optometry shop." My two darlings went crazy as though glasses are the new candy! They tried on endless pairs, wanted to be held up to the mirror to see how each pair looked, and continued to put their grabby and quick little fingers into the cases for more more more. I had to choose my new pair of glasses so quickly — faster than I've ever purchased anything that I'll be wearing everyday. Yikes I hope I love them?!
Technorati Tags: kids
Miss Vivienne Grace sure can make some crazy faces. As you can see she's wildly expressive and of course a joy to behold. She makes me laugh so hard, it's wonderful. These shots are from our afternoon at Golden Gate Park's Children's Playground — one of my favorites in the city.
Technorati Tags: San Francisco, toddler
Miss Vivienne Grace still loves to say "Totoro" and usually repeats it emphatically. She also loves to watch the movie and can keep her attention focused for the whole length — seriously. She doesn't do that for any other tv show or disney/pixar movie. Now added to her vocabulary of things like book, bubbles, and ball is pillow which she loves to say while throwing herself onto one. It's adorable. Vivi loves to be tickled, kissed and have raspberries blown on her tummy and especially the bottom of her feet. She really really gets into it and says "more, more and more" — we always tire before she does. Vivi loves to draw and chooses colored pens over crayons when given an option. She enjoys putting the tops back on the pens and often stands around the penciling table pulling and pushing them off and on. She likes to put stickers specifically on the backs of both of her hands. She carries her toddler size chair around so she can sit on it in other places including next to Max when he watches tv. When Vivi wants something she finds me, grabs my pointer finger and pulls me to the object and says ma ma ma (spanish for "mas" meaning "more") while pointing at it until I figure out what it is —typically it's the hungry hippos game box, a yogurt squeeze or to open the back door so she can push her baby doll in the stroller out on the deck. At the park Vivi likes the slides and the swings best, she's a thrill seeker for suresies. She likes to ride in the car, on her tricycle, and in the stroller too. Vivi's pretty much up for anything, even just hanging out and reading books over and over. Her favorites are the Bing bunny series (even Bing has a blog!). She has a darling and infectious laugh, a wicked little smile and and a serious sparkle in her eye. One last thing, she's started doing a funny pouty move when she doesn't like something or get what she wants. She crosses her arms across her chest like a rapper, the arms just lay on top of each other rather than one folding under, and then she shrugs up one shoulder while turning and showing you her back but of course keeping her face turned toward you so she can register your reaction. It's hilarious! (for now)
Technorati Tags: motherhood, toddler
Our tree swinging neighbor Chad came over to catch and fix our "it never stops running" toilet (uber urgh!) and he ended up staying for tea, dominoes and the best game of checkers we've ever played — skittles vs trix. Eat your way to victory! Was totally impromptu sugary fun. Thanks Chad!
I'm finally allowed to release this information to the whole wide web world...I'm thrilled to announce I'm going to be an auntie! These are the first photos of my nephew-to-be cooking away in his happy place. I love him already and I'm so excited for aunnie & yaya, yay!
Our kids love bath night. Frankly we enjoy it too. The hour between dinner and bedtime sails by because the kids are happy. Just like the saying goes "kids, just add water." In our case adding Alex's shaving cream soap increases the fun factor even more. Max and Vivi turned the bath water a wondrously unnatural shade of aqua with the abundant amount of shaving soap they added to the bath. The pictures say it all don't you think?!
Technorati Tags: parenting, preschooler, siblings, toddler
While playing late on a chilly afternoon at Parque Ninos Unidos, Maximillian and Vivienne discovered this hammock and laid in it for at least ten minutes, maybe more, asking me to swing them over and over again. They cooperated fully with each other, laying still and experimenting with closing and opening their eyes.
Vivi and Max love to "play bedtime." They pretend to get ready for bed, get their "nigh nighs" (lovie blankets), fluff the pillows and get under the covers in Max's teeny tiny toddler bed. They barely fit and usually one or both of them bonk their heads on the head board or side rails, so I can't figure why they love to repeat this game — but they do — and to no end! What cuddle bunnies they are.
Technorati Tags: preschooler, siblings, toddler
The gloriously healthy ms. vivi weighs in at 30lbs and measures 36 inches (uh she's huge for suresies!). Doc says she's practically perfect, wishes us well and says see you when she turns two. On we go...
Writing, drawing or any kind of mark making on the sidewalks around our house has been a fun to do project as of late. In fact the kids are keeping the box of chalk right by our front door so they can start scribbling as soon as they step outside. It's so sweet to see them working together and enjoying each other while they play. I really think these two siblings love each other already and will grow up to be friends.
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It was so super funsies to enjoy a really hot day that rolled into a comfortable night. We dined on the back porch at Chow and luckily got our favorite waitress Jess. See Aunnie and Vivi eating mashed potatoes with a chop stick above! Afterward I was loving that we all hung out on the front stoop of our house and chitty chatted with each other and many of our neighbors who strolled by, while sipping some cold white vino followed by scoops of ice cream, as we watched Max and Cindy chalking the sidewalk with adorable robot drawings! There was one really big one with arms stretching out twice the length of its body that Max named "Moe" (from the movie Wall•e). Thanks to Yaya for the pixs.
Max was a rock star at the dentist this afternoon. He's actually really good at most appointments like these — the doctor, barber etc. He cooperates nicely. His teeth looked great and he's a good brusher. He had a couple of stains on his back molars and really needs to start brushing in the morning not just at night, but other than that all was well. He had his first x-rays taken which was a fun experience since he loved seeing what's inside his gums. What's in there you ask? All of his adult teeth are lined up directly above just waiting until they are ready to drop down. Wild! He has big adult teeth the dentist said. He also has the same wicked overbite his mommy and daddy are sporting plus serious overcrowding. Looks like the charlatan art of orthodontistry is in our future, I hear cash register bells ringing in my head.
It was tough managing two kids during the hour long appointment. Vivienne was a serious handful. She wanted to be in the dentist chair doing everything her big brother was doing. This girl hates to be left out (ok who doesn't?), but gee Viv, it's the dentist after all, just relax and consider yourself lucky that you just get to watch. She gets her first appointment when she turns two.
Oh my, what fun it was to see Max dress in his sailor shirt, kerchief and hat. He wore it with pride and kept his hat on all day — even under his coat hoodie. His teachers went crazy when they saw him. Andy wanted to switch clothes and Nina was kicking herself for forgetting her camera that day. Can you blame them?! For the record pogey bait means sweet stuff.
Later Max really turned into a sailor as he tattooed himself with six different images. What was so cute was how he told me he put the heart tattoo right where his heart is on the inside. Sweetie!
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I love watching Vivienne do just about everything. Watching her eat miso soup at Moki's was a special treat. She tested it, liked it and slurped up most of it. I took about forty photos of her feeding herself so be glad I only posted four. This girl is impressive with a spoon or a fork and she even tries to use chop sticks!
It's so fun to watch Vivi discover the world. She's running now and starting to master the stairs, well, really only in the up direction. She's super smart and understands many things we say and is excellent with taking direction. Ask her for something and she'll get it for you. For example, she fetches shoes for herself and for me (also in the hopes we'll leave the house asap!). She's big on "B" words, her favorites are belly button, bubble, ball, balloon, baby, banana, boo and book. Every once in awhile she whips out a random new word and it sounds pretty accurate, which can be freaky to hear—it's tough to get her to repeat it though. She certainly has a mind of her own. Give her an open top drinking cup and she'll politely take it, hold it perfectly still and take a sip, perhaps even set it down and smile at you. You look away thinking all is well with her, then she picks it up and purposely pours it all over the counter so she can put her hands in it, spread it across the counter, mush it into her food, and attempt to wipe it up with a paper towel which really just spreads it further across the counter and of course onto the floor — fun in her book anyway. Case in point with the DIY yogurt feeding photo below.
A typical day with Vivi consists of a minimum of 2-4 outfit changes based on her love of liquids. No day is complete without time spent washing hands, which I realize is a good thing since some kids won't go near soap or water. Her "washing" technique is like a bird taking a bath. She likes to splish splash and pour and I think she'd do it for an hour or maybe more if I'd let her. I'd let it run it's course if I wasn't so paranoid about the lack of clean water being the worlds biggest issue. Vivienne loves three things most right now in this order: nigh nigh (her polka dot blanket), pushing her baby doll in the toddler sized stroller and the movie Totoro ("totoro" is one of the words which she can say and she says it over and over and over in the cutest voice while climbing into our tv watching arm chair and waiting for one of us to surrender and put the film on). While playing at the park she's crazy about the swings and slides — a thrill seeker already! I could go on and on about her loves, her sweetness and how much I love her, but I gotta run and fetch my other gorgeous, genius child from preschool.
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Max and Griffin, seen here devouring their cold creamy cones mmmm sweetness.
Easter seems forever ago! However we had a great saturday getting prepared for the holiday sunday festivities. Papa really enjoyed helping the kids dye their eggs. Of course we cracked most of them, but the spilling of dye and the cracking of shells is where the fun is, right? Just add salt to the tasty treat and it's all good.
The next morning the kids had a wonderful time running circles around the house searching for jellybean and m&m filled eggs. Lots of photos of Vivi because as you can see Max dove into the candy immediately and the endless basket of sweet treats never lost his attention.
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Snaps from a late afternoon jaunt to Golden Gate Park. Most importantly we all wish a very happy birthday to Paga!
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My little girl loves to pretend drive. So she really enjoyed playing in Calder's ride on toy car. Vivi's clearly a take charge little lady (like the rest of her family!) and she was also a little heavy on the horn like her mommy. Hey, I once had my car's horn fall into my lap from over use — makes me laugh to remember that! Beep beep baby.
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Max with his great auntie Lulu in their matching beatles shirts, smooches you are both too cute!
Today Vivi turned seventeen months old. We celebrated with a mommy daughter day visit to the Bay Area Discovery Museum. Vivi ran all over the toddler area soaking herself in the water stream, jumping on the squishy water beds, pushing huge plastic shapes through their matching tubes, and banging giant musical instruments in the wildly loud "play it by ear" exhibit. We were both super happy and then later ridiculously exhausted.
A few darling photos of Maximillian at school while he draws a robot — one that he's asked me to knit for him! As you can see, I'm still loving the toy camera application for the iPhone. Below you see Nicholas and Max acting out their favorite Ultraman poses.
Technorati Tags: drawing, preschool, preschooler
Gotta catch up on a little Vivienne loving — she's such a doll. This girl loves to wear jewels and will instantly put any necklace or bracelet on and proudly keep it on. She's also fond of hats and hoodies (just like her brother who we sometimes refer to as "Kenny" because he keeps his hoodie on while inside) However, Vivi does like to rip barrettes out of her hair and has already lost of couple of my favorites (those embroidered barrettes are so darn cute eh?!) Vivi is also crazy about keys and loves to try to stick them into keyholes (or any philips head screw at her eye level will do!) and then open and close the doors to no end. She also loves shoes, preferably Max's or mine and tries to put them on herself and then "asks" to go outside for a walk (really it's not "asking" it's a lot of finger pointing, hand waving and sing song whining — but she gets the point across perfectly). She asks us to turn the music on by waving her arm in the air pretending to conduct the band and then dances by stomping one foot on the floor while turning in a circle — she's so adorable!
While reading Design Mom's blog I found a couple of kids shopping sites I want to remember and check back in on — ISO Modern & Peek. Cute stuff and relatively affordable?!
If you didn't already notice (I dare you to search "bunny" on this site!) I'm a big bunny lover and yes easter is just around the corner so I've got bunny on the brain. I found these darling hand crocheted then felted bunny slippers and mini bunnies by way of a downloadable childrens magazine called LMNO. It's filled with wonderful kids clothing, toys, interiors and playful ideas for fun times. The above felted bunnies are available at pretty little's etsy shop, but since they don't have no-slip rubber bottoms I'm passing on them in favor of these boiled wool bunny slippers — not quite as cute but with these I won't worry about Vivi slipping on our hardwood floors.
Max and Vivi really do love each other! It's so sweet to see them watch out for each other, share food and feed it to each other, tickle toes, sing songs and so so much more. Of course they tug-o-war over the same toys and pull each other's hair too — they are normal!
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Maga & Paga bought Max a microscope (and a crystal making kit too) while visiting the Exploratorium (thanks you twos!!). Max came home so excited to start being a scientist. He even asked me, can I be a scientist when I grow up? I told him he already was one. For the last few days we've looked at all matter of things under the scope: sugar, salt, onion skin, hair, carpet, baking soda, leaves etc. it's been very exciting. A highlight was when Max asked if he could wear daddy's lab coat — from daddy's days of yore when he studied blue green algae at the Pasteur Institute. Like father like son, as they say!!
“Faith” is a fine invention / For gentlemen who see -- / But microscopes are prudent / In an emergency. -Emily Dickinson, poet (1830-1886)
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A couple of cute snaps of miss Vivi from "aunnie's" perspective.
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In keeping with Max's image of himself as Ultraman he created this "self portrait". Notice the yellow eyes and wild scribble lines representing his energy source!
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In room 4 (preschool) the kids just completed their first clay sculpture project which was a pinch pot. They also glazed them and learned about kiln firing. Max went the extra mile on this one and used some left over clay to make an "Ultraman" too! He was a little disappointed that silver wasn't a glaze option so he told me he just stuck to all over red. He painted his pinch pot orange for me since it's my favorite color. What a sweetheart! The pinch pot now resides on my bathroom counter filled with "jewels" aka plastic beads from some necklaces he's made me. I love them all!
Its been very rainy in San Francisco recently so we've had to find alternate play areas. This day we stayed at school a little late and played in the multi-purpose room. I couldn't help taking a photo of froggy boy and he snapped one of me that I really like because it looks so natural. Max has a good eye for composition and has really been enjoying taking photographs — you know that excites me!
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Vivi had her walking pneumonia and 15 month check up (with vaccinations) today. She measured 33 inches in length and 26 pounds. She's in the 97% percentile — yes, a big baby girl. Dr. Brock said her ears were beautiful and her lungs were perfectly clear! Yay. So that's the good news.
Then on the way to pickup Max I ran a red light and got us into a horrible car crash. I really have no idea how it happened. In fact when I was in the intersection and saw the car coming toward me I thought, what is that crazy driver doing? After we collided, I looked up at the street light and damn if the sutter street light wasn't green and my laguna street light was red. I was so confused because I really thought my light was green. Guess I'm just losing my mind and this makes it official! The other drivers car was crunched badly, first from hitting my driver's side wheel and then ricocheting off and hitting a lightpole, plus it was an older honda maybe an '82 and it just crumpled under the strain. All this and it was pouring rain so the scene was even more intense. Vivienne and I were fine, even though I hit my head, it wasn't a severe bump. The woman who struck my car started out ok and was able to talk to me, talk on the phone and to the witness. She was conscious and wasn't bleeding or anything scary like that — and I'm so thankful for that. However, she was so pissed at me I thought she would kill me if she had a weapon. She kept giving me the most horrible looks as though I did this on purpose and she was going to make me pay. She wouldn't talk to me except to say she was calling the police and I'd better be insured. She did speak to the witness but I couldn't hear what they said. When the fire truck arrived about 10 minutes later she said she was dizzy and couldn't stand and was taken away in an ambulance. Yikes. I have no idea what happened to her after that, they don't tell you these things because of liability. I'll have to request a written police report via mail after 10 days if I want to know what the official word is. It took us two hours to clear it all up, get the report #, make the insurance claim, get a tow, rent a car etc. It was a crazy, stressful and really scary accident. You can only imagine how nutty the kids were with all the waiting and we didn't make it to dinner until 7pm. Since all this happened I keep reliving the accident and many uncomfortable snippets of details from those horrible minutes — it really sucks.
I'm so happy to be looking at these dreamy and romantic childhood images. Even though parenting is such hard work, moments like these make it so wonderful and worth it. We all had such a good time breathing the 'it just stopped raining' fresh air, we were so happy to be outside! Picking oranges and then playing bocce with them was a font porch highlight.
Happy 94th birthday Papa! and of course a giant thanks to Auntie Lulu who took all these adorable photos xxoo.
See little Vivi riding a wild boar while saying "ohhh" and one of the coolest creatures on the Golden Gate Children's Park carousel. She was loving the swanky classic tunes playing by Frank Sinatra, Ella Fitzgerald and others.
As cute as my kids are (and boy has nature done a job on me, I wear Max & Vivi goggles daily!) its been a tough weekend. Vivienne was just diagnosed with an ear infection and walking pneumonia in her right lung and Mr. C has been in bed for 2 whole days with a non-stop fever. I've had to reach down and pull up my handle boots just about every ten minutes to make it through these last few days. Craziness! But then I take snaps of them like these and all the struggle melts away. Like I said, what cuties they are!
A charming baby mobile available at eGiggle and found on The Birds & Bees blog, and she has a fun design blog too.
Kiddie birthday parties take up many of our weekends, this last weekend was no exception. Here's a common scene, this one from Calvin's baseball themed event, with of both of our cutie pies stuffing their tiny mouths with giant bites of thick frosting.
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I so love my iPhone and some of the best things about it are the fun photography applications like camera bag and toy camera. I love the crossed processed look in the photo of Max and Vivi's hot pink lips and bright blue eyes are so sassy. Below are a few more snaps I took today that I really like — awesome color twists.
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Max and Jaewon had a fun time cruising through the California Academy of Sciences on their MLK holiday from school. We listened and watched diver "Charles" educate us about the worlds largest aquarium and the processes they used to create the Philippine coral reef we were gazing into. I was most impressed by my little genius boy Max who exhibited no inhibitions and raised his hand proudly to ask a question to the moderator. "How does coral grow?" he inquired. They explained how it divides endlessly and has a structure similar to our bodies with bones on the inside.
Technorati Tags: preschooler, San Francisco
After Max walked (ok really he was lovingly strollered by Maga & Paga) across the Golden Gate Bridge we met up at Chrissy Field for a quick Let's be Frank dog and some fun time playing in the sand.
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Vivi is walking so much these days. She's not a professional yet — actually more like the cutest frankenbaby ever! it's a joy to behold her progress and she grins with pride each time she braves the journey. (adorable sweater from Gramma Sherry — thank you!!)
Meanwhile, Ms. Vivi doesn't miss a beat. She was so into it all and was desperate to be included in the big kid fun. She would have done anything they would have let her. She's been taking some serious steps toward walking on her own — every now and then she steps out and takes about five steps without holding on. It'll just be days now until she' s walking on her own. Watch out world!
Technorati Tags: baby, preschooler, San Francisco
It was a crazy cold and rainy day but we still managed to make it out and cross the bridge to the Bay Area Discovery Museum's Gingerbread Extravaganza event. Mr. C and Max spent the hour with Max's friends Griffin, Lila and their parents making delicious candy covered and frosting seamed homes. Max was in sugar heaven and Mr. C was loving the challenge (and wishing he could start from scratch and do it all himself!) Vivienne was jonesing to be a part of the action (see photo lower right). Now that the gingerbread house is home and living on the kitchen counter, Vivi walks to it daily and begs for a jellybean or candy corn — it's a torture treat!
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Max, Vivi and I enjoyed a really lovely (but super cold!) afternoon at Yerba Buena Playground and Zeum with Maga & Paga. Max was enthralled with the big tube slides, garden maze, and all his favorite exhibits at Zeum. Vivenne is still waking up to the world, so each time we go somewhere anything and everything amazes her — and she gets so tired from all the experiencing. I mention this because of her little red eyeballs in the photo above with Paga. Oh, this reminds me, let me just take a moment here to document this for the record . . .Vivienne is absolutely crazy in love with her Grandpa. No joke, as soon as he's in eye or ear shot she's all about him, more than mommy, daddy and even Max. Boom boom Paga!
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Max loves to draw in Photoshop using the pen from my wacom tablet. Not only can he hold the pen fairly well, he can even change the colors and brush sizes on his own.
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It was an instant attraction. Within minutes they knew each other's names, were calling for each other to hurry to the top so they could go down the slide at the same time, and even holding hands while sliding down together. Max and Taylor were digging each other in a big way. Even right now, Max just said "Mom, did you know Taylor is my friend?" While I was taking photos, I heard Max at the top of the slide asking Taylor "Would you like to have a playdate?" and She said, "Yes". It was so sweet, I melted. (too bad Taylor's mom wasn't into it!)
Vivi is a seriously happy baby. She cracks herself up and squeals over nothing and anything. She laughs, smiles and coos constantly. Here she is after I simply said "hey Vivi" and then voila she gives an adorable grin. I also love this photo 'cause it shows off the new buttons I bought (and Mr. C so kindly sewed on) which make this GAP sweater way more fabulous, loving it.
Yaya has Dr'd up this iPhone image so it's now gloriously gritty and hyper cool. Oh, those blue eyes slay me. I feel the need to note here that whenever Max has a hoodie on he wears it over his head — indoor, or outdoor — any weather. Mr. C has started calling him "Kenny"!
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When I picked Max up from school today I got a big "milestone" surprise. Max has started writing words! He sort of jumped right over writing single letters and is busting out with full words. He bragged to me during the ride home that he can indeed write all the letters — all the ones in the alphabet. He gave me this adorably smug grin and happy head nod. Amazing! Above you'll see his playground chalk words "MAX, LUNCH, CAT & CAKE."
This morning I came across this great parenting site titled, Half Full, Science for Raising Happy Kids. The first article I read on welcoming conflict and how to deal with it was fantastic and left me wanting more. The site is deep with information and help and I will defiantly be referring back to it and visiting often. Two other sites I want to keep tabs on are Practically Speaking (by the woman who started the Works for Me — working mothers yahoo group) and this new blog by two moms called Parent Grapevine.
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Look who is ready for her close up! A million thank yous to aunnie and yaya for taking care of the sweetest, but so hard to get to sleep, baby. xxoo
While playing freeze tag through Union Square, Max and I happened upon this heart sculpture with the Golden Gate Bridge painted on it. Turns out this one was designed by Tony Bennet! We've seen hearts designed by various artists throughout the city for many years now. It's part of a genius, on-going fundraiser for SF General Hospital. Luv 'em!
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Vivienne went out as a little pumpkin (a hand-me-down, but fitting!), Max was a ninja, Ian a Power Ranger and Isabel was Belle. Not shown here were fireman Finn and another Power Ranger, James. We trick-or-treated down Fair Oaks Street which is a closed to traffic and totally immersed in the spooky spirit. There was lots of candy fun for all.
Max drew this face himself, no kidding, I just crafted it into cut outs. Awesome. Daddy and Max did all the carving, nice job boys!
Vampire Max!
Max was very decisive about his pumpkin selection. He was also a super thoughtful big brother and picked out a small one for his little sister. She loved it, as she always does, because her big brother gave it to her.
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I didn't think I could love my iPhone more. Oh but I do, thanks to the new application Camera Bag which turns my camera into a Holga (the Lolo and 1974 settings are favorites also). Oh sweet Vivienne!!
Look at mini-marky our breakfast comedian! Seriously he looks more and more like his father everyday.
This picture of Papa & Vivienne nuzzling is so sweet it hurts.
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I've been so remiss in keeping up with my blog. In fact the whole time I was in Austin I hardly took any photos, so I'm having to rely on the kindness of others to piece together events.
Vivienne and Gabriella were two peas in a pod. Both babies are super huggy and kissy love bugs and they giggle spontaneously. They adored each other. We can't wait for them to hang out again!
Max really enjoyed himself at Salt Lick (and so did we — so yummy!). I love these images (thanks Andrea!), as they are so natural and happy. Usually when I ask him to smile I get something like this. I also love the top one of him because it shows off his perfect and first professional manicure. He is quite proud of his painted nails. The "last tango" and "life of the party" colors he chose look great against the green window frame : : : big smile : : :
We spent the day before the wedding getting properly primped at Milk + Honey. It's a lovely spot to be pampered and we were treated very well. They did an amazing job on Alexis' wedding hair and makeup — she looked amazing. Chad is a rock star. We also adored Jasmine, who on the down low (they said "no" to giving kids under the age of 12 a manicure) gave Maximillian a perfect and totally professional manicure. She was an absolute sweetheart and said some of the cutest things like "the more dirt under the nails the more fun you've had". She praised Max for holding so still and talked about how they were working together, as partners, in the manicure process. She gave him "minus one point" when he swiped his wet thumbnail across a towel, but she gave the point right back to him after he held still while she repaired it. She's a gem.
Vivi had her 9 month check up today. She's actually 10 months already and her flaky mommy forgot to go last month — whoopsie. No matter, she's in perfect health. In fact the doctor said she was huge (like I didn't know eh?). She weighs in at 23 lbs 8 oz and measures 31 inches long. Now that she's pulling herself up to standing she's officially a toddler! Doc says she can drink cows milk now too. Seems like she's practically grown up already,
Vivi gave us a post-bath crawling show by zooming around naked on on all fours, getting close and closer and....
So Gabriel didn't actually sleep over, but they boys did get all the way to sleep before his daddy came to get him — and Mr. C was home alone with the three kids and got them all to bed before 9. Well done!
Max was thrilled to recognize his name on a package that arrived in the mail! He carefully opened his to reveal two t-shirts. He then repeated the process and opened Vivi's tees and then realized she got matching shorts too! Kids love 'em, thanks so much for thinking of them while you were enjoying your island vacation! xxoo
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She officially crawls and now she pulls up to standing too! This girl is on the move.
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Even when she's fighting sleep (which feels like an everyday occurrence) she still manages to smile. These beautiful portraits were shot by our neighbor Ari.
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Into the fog we went to enjoy the morning strolling through the zoo. Nadia, Tommy and Max all had a great time and I enjoyed hanging out with Aunnie and Julieann. But that miss Vivienne gave me a run as she refused to sleep and wailed through most of the route — joy. I thought these two peacock portraits were amusing. They show a glimpse into Max's mercurial mind and his amazing morphing facial talents.
Technorati Tags: boys, preschooler, San Francisco
After months of playing too much wii bowling, Max finally talked us into playing a real set. He'd been asking to play for weeks it seemed. We headed to Yerba Buena's bowling alley. Though the lightest ball - a six pounder- was too heavy for him, he managed to bowl fairly well. We were all thankful for the gutter guards. Most importantly he really enjoyed himself. He cried when we said no to another game, but we promised to return again soon.
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The never napping (!) Ms. Vivi seen here enjoying herself on the grass near the San Luis Obispo mission.
Max's wonderful room three teacher Nina, snapped these images of Max during the school year and sent them to us. I love seeing him through her eyes.
See the little beans swinging the afternoon away at "frog and bunny park" aka Holly Park in Bernal Heights.
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Vivi is still on the verge of real coordinated crawling so no new progress there, but what's most exciting is her first word...drum roll please... it's "mamma" !!! She's saying it over and over — and most often while diving intently for my boobs, so we are sure that she truly knows its meaning.
This morning as we were driving into the bright morning light Max said to me "Mommy, it's really sparkly outside." I melted. It was a really spectacular day and the sun was clear and shiny and little did he know how much better his day was going to get. I dropped Max off at Pier 30 so he could take a very special ride with his Grandpa aka Paga aboard the tall ship Eagle (it has it's own blog) which was at the front of the Festival of Sail parade on the bay today. Max was pretty aprehensive about going, but we made it there and he said goodbye without issue. According to Paga he had a few moments aboard where he wanted to go home, but for the most part he was thouroughly entertained by all the activity. He watched the coast guard hoist and unfurl the sails while chanting "heave ho", he took a turn at the steering wheel (uh I guess they call it the helm), got a full ship tour, and hung out with a child-friendly sergeant Jonathan Lolly (not sure if that's his real title but that's what Max is saying). In the early afternoon I drove around the Embarcadero and Chrissy Field water front chasing their gorgeous pirate-like boat as Vivi napped for two hours in the back seat. Max returned with hats, commemorative coins and a most-beloved embroidered patch. He was beaming. He was so sad to leave Paga that he cried for him as we drove away. He clearly had a special but exhausting day!
Technorati Tags: Bay Area
Vivienne has started waving! It's so cute. I swear she even says a "hi"-like sound while she waves. Have I mentioned that she's a really happy baby? She's truly amazing. She only fusses over basic issues — a dirty diaper, hunger, and tiredness — the rest of the time she's a grinning, giggling sweetie pie.
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Vivienne Grace is on the verge of crawling. She's doing all sorts of pushing up, army crawling, down dog and worming maneuvers. It's only a matter of days I think.
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Max accompanied me to simply unique nails so I could get a pedicure (by the amazingly sweet Jessica!). For many months now he's been dictating which shade of red or pink I should put on my toenails. He often complains that I've chosen the wrong shade. He's expressed many times that he wants to go with me but I wasn't sure he'd really handle the experience until he repeated the request a few more times — then I knew he was serious. He was very excited to go with me and thrilled to get his nails painted red and pink on alternating fingers. After his were done the wait for my pedicure was painful and too time consuming for his three year old mind. I resorted to saying yes to the candy bowl on the front counter. He then sucked on a sees lollypop while watching his favorite Backyardigan videos on my iPod — oh mother.
Technorati Tags: mom, preschooler, San Francisco
This image makes me happy. I really like this simply spartan yet gleeful little still life. And I must admit too that I'm absolutely crazy about "Sophie le giraffe" and one of the newest creations from Vulli "gnon". The rubber quality is tactily perfect for babies and the softly painted creature features are sweetly seductive.
Mr. C gave up dressing in our bedroom and moved his armoire to our not connected downstairs rumpus/junk/craft/office/laundry/cat room (i.e., he has to go outside to get to his stuff) so that our darling Vivienne could sleep safely in a crib (and so we could have a few hours to ourselves in our bed). But this left the wall over the crib was looking terribly bare. Rather than take down the quilt that matches the bumper which is still hanging in Max's room, I bought some wall decals by wee gallery from Natural Resources. These stickers match a set of high contrast flash card art images that someone had given me and that I have taped up on the wall over the changing table. I'm really please with how easy they were to adhere and how quickly they gave the room character. Vivie likes them too!
It's so hot I broke down and thought that buying a vinyl kiddy pool was a good idea. It was. While inhaling the horrid vinyl vapors and blowing my lungs out trying to inflate the pool I kept thinking," this is a half hour of my life." Existential moment gone...we each had satisfying turns splashing in the refreshingly chilly little pink puddle.
The effort was more than worth it. The reflection of the ginkgo tree in this little pink pool is quite beautiful.
I feel a bit evil taking a photo of this moment, but...it's been happening so much that I'm losing empathy for it. Many of these break downs are filled with crocodile tears, while others are sincere moments where Max is feeling any number of things that cause tears. But all of them are trying my patience!. This particular moment was one where I said "no you may not have a chocolate chip cookie before dinner" — I am such an evil mother?! About an hour earlier he cried hysterically for about 15 minutes because I said, "No, you may not drink the pink pool water." Ah this is why the book on this age group is titled Your Three Year Old, Friend or Enemy?
Technorati Tags: parenting, preschool, preschooler
Max and Gabriel are best of friends but also tattling rivals. They ebb and flow, trying to be the same and then in an instant demanding the other to go away and never return. Such wondrously mercurial minds these little men.
Technorati Tags: preschool, preschooler
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Gertrude and Mabel put some sneak peek pictures of Vive and I on their blog. Wow! They are stunningly beautiful and I can't wait to see the rest....mmmm baby is so yummy. xxoo
Technorati Tags: baby, Bay Area, photography, San Francisco
Max has decided he doesn't want to go to karate anymore. The last few classes have been a bust. He wouldn't wear the adorable ninja uniform and he refused to participate in the class. We sat there watching and I struggled to keep him quiet and focused. The last class he whined and cried most of the way through. When I ask him why he says its just too scary. I find that I just can't argue with that. Since Max no longer hits kids at school I'm thinking the karate outlet has served it purpose for now and maybe he'll be interested in picking it up again later? Who knows eh. So after school on this thursday we opted for an hour of play time at the fabulous Children's Playground in Golden Gate Park. Max's physical abilities are rapidly improving. He went up and down most of the climbing structures and down some longer and fully enclosed twisting slides — things he was too scared to try before.
Today Vivie had her sixth month check-up — a month late, but whatever. She weighed in at 20lbs 10oz after a giant pooping mishap while on the scale, uh thank you so much darling. She measured 28 and a quarter inches long. All these numbers put her in the 95% for both height and weight. I asked about the red cheek rash she gets off and on and the doc said it's baby eczema which she'll likely outgrow before she's two years old - if not sooner. Best I can do is keep it moisturized at all times and use cortisone if she scratches it. Other than that doctor says she looks fabulous, proportions are all perfect, her lungs sound clear and ears are healthy. She's cutting her top right front tooth too. She had 4 immunization shots without a single whimper or tear! That speaks well for having chunky thighs so you can't feel the pain. The doctor has approved her as ready to try the high allergy foods like, eggs, yogurt, wheat, citrus, berries, and soy.
Her brother Max accompanied us to the pediatrician. since I mistakenly promised him last week that we'd play hooky next wednesday and then of course it turned out I'd booked a doctor appointment for THAT wednesday. I feared it would be a recipe for a melt down, dragging him to the doctor with Vivie, but he handled like a champ and soon we were off for the day's adventure.
Max has recently been complaining about having to go to school and crying at drop off. So I decided we'd plan a hooky day so he could have some outside of school play-time and we could enjoy the beautiful weather. We decided on the Bay Area Discovery Museum. One of Max's favorite play areas at the Discovery is the wonderfully landscaped lookout cove. He's come along way in willingness and ability climb in, on, and through. I really enjoyed watching him at play and he had a great day. I think we'll cut school a little more often now that I'm freelancing!
Vivie enjoyed the Gullah exhibit the most. She really savored the fresh caught plastic crabs. (for all you germaphobs, yes, I wiped them down before she slobbered all over them!)
Technorati Tags: baby, Bay Area, preschooler
Last year we grew some amazing tomatoes. We are hoping this year will be the same or even better. I look forward to more tomato, cucumber and feta salads, but this time the juicy parts will be home grown!
There's no equality between the sexes when it comes to this issue — boys really do have it easier!
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We finally put together the crib for Vivienne. Recently Vivie's been inch-worming her way around our bed so we knew it was time for her to have a safe sleep space. I still bring her to bed with us sometime between 3 and 5 am, but I'm now getting a few hours of sleep by myself — it's great — well, except for all those nights when Max shows up somewhere between 8pm and 2 am. Oh well, these are the days.
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Today Vivie had her first photo shoot — she did an amazing job! Vivie is pictured above with my dear friend Heidi of Gertrude and Mabel who did the portrait session. Heidi's work is simply amazing so please go check out her site. Vivienne was a total trooper through costume and set changes and switching formats, film types and lighting set-ups. I was surprised at how well she handled, she really has a wonderful temperament. Afterward Vivie slept peacefully in her stroller while Heidi and I ate a delicious lunch at Serpentine. What an enjoyable day!
Technorati Tags: baby, photography, San Francisco
This morning Max had all eyes on him. He was given the power and title of "person of the day" and he relished it. Max spent a few minutes at the beginning of his presentation talking about the photos on his family board. At one point when his fellow classmates interrupted him, he not so gently reminded them that "this is not about you, it's about me." During his presentation he asked me to help talk about the photos, but when I started to talk too much or gaining control of the focus he gave me a giant "Shhhh mommy!" and put me in my place. Whoa, Max is clearly a kid who is comfortable being the leader.
After the photo presentation we made fresh pasta for our family project. Each child got two opportunities to crank the pasta machine. One was to flatten the dough and the other was to cut the dough into spaghetti or linguini. We asked the school chef Celestina to cook the pasta for lunch. We weren't able to stay for lunch, but we heard it was a hit. But sadly for Max Celestina had put tomato sauce on all the pasta and apparently Max cried because he only wanted butter on his. Oh goodness.
More photos to come...thanks to Paga & Daddy for taking the time to be there and help, Max felt very loved.
Ah the gun issue. How I wish I could suppress it and live in peace, but alas it only seems to rear it's ugly head the more I try to kibosh it. I started with a hard line response explaining that we are pacifists and there will be no guns in our house. I even made Mr. C remove the giant poster of his grinning five year old self holding an AK47 in front of an Israeli tank (not really such a weird request eh?) I pleaded with Max not to talk about guns and reiterated that we don't want to hurt anyone. But recently I've softened my gun stance. I'm still on about not hurting anyone, though I've added no pointing at people or shooting anything that's alive — "yes trees are alive." I'm feeling that fighting his inner and clearly biological urges isn't going to get me anywhere, in fact it may produce the opposite result. So I'm letting most of the finger guns, stick guns, straw guns slide — obviously there's no limit to what can become a weapon— I'm just trying to get him to aim at the skeet instead. Above is Max pictured with the gun that came from his tiny star wars drone action figure —thanks Paga ::wink wink::. He doesn't care much about the drone but he's been carrying the teeny gun around in his pocket.
Technorati Tags: preschooler
Captain Max enjoyed ordering his first mates Aunnie and Yaya 'round Stowe Lake yesterday afternoon. As Aunnie put it "boating is such a lovely weekend activity even in this man-made lake." It was a perfect holiday afternoon, thanks you two! I walked the lake perimeter pushing Ms. Vivie in her comfy carriage while constantly waving to the peddling crew. Along the way I gazed at some lovely wild flowers and watched a family of geese herding their young to shore.
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Vivienne is now able to sit up unassisted. Every once in a while she teeters over but she rarely complains about it. She loves being on her tummy too and has been doing push-ups and tucking her knees like an inch worm — she's getting ready to crawl. She's quite fond of putting everything in her mouth as pictured above. Max's toys are everywhere so it's quite a chore for us to keep the house picked up and all the chokable items put away.
While browsing through H&M on friday Vivie tried on these sparkly shades and then tasted some pink tights packaging.
I picked up those mesh food bags I'd been hearing so much about — and yes they are a hit and a brilliant product idea. So far we've put in banana, apple, bread and avocado. On the list of foods she's tried via blender or jar are sweet potato (japanese yellow yam is her favorite), peas, pears, apple, butternut squash and lots and lots of rice cereal.
I succumbed and brought the hideous, but oh so helpful, "kingdom" exersaucer out of storage. Our teeny house it done for now there's not a single baby or kid free space!
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When I picked Max up from preschool today he was toting more giant chalk and had been busy writing all over the playground's rubber mats. He wrote his name for me again and then drew me this flower.
When we left school, we headed off to Kid Robot to get more cool zipper pulls (we discovered them when we got one for daddy's birthday) and then we got one little special extra surprise toy (seen here). Max loves him because he has a cupcake on his back. What's not to love about a cupcake eating monster named Maurice?!*#@!^!
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It was high noon at Jackson Playground when Ms. Vivienne took her first glide in ye old bucket swing and boy did she enjoy herself.
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There's no denying that boys have an unique and intense energy. I experience it when Max eats a piece of bread and then tells me the shape of his bites look like a gun or when he tells me he's taking his gun (thumb up and forefinger pointed) with him to make sure no bad guys are out there — these are moments that I feel I had nothing to do with. I certainly didn't teach him about guns or expose him to them. Somehow he's figured out the gun thing and feels ready to aim, point, and shoot it. I think there's nothing a pacifist such as myself can do other than just wait for him to out grow it. I worry that if I try to suppress his interests in guns, swords etc I'll just encourage his intrigue. I know from my own experience that each time my parents tried to tell me something was bad or that I shouldn't do "x" I wanted to do it more — so I'm thinking that he should just shoot his finger gun until his heart is content and then hope he'll grow up to be a conscientious objector.
Here is Ms. Vivienne Grace reading an old favorite by Eric Carle while lounging on our deck during a San Francisco heat wave.
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Max was so excited about mother's day, it was sweet to hear him say that he'd hidden a card and couldn't wait to tell me where it was. Then this morning he came into our bed, after sleeping through the whole night on his own — gift enough, and said "Mommy it's Mother's Day, can I give you your present now?" He and daddy came back in a few minutes with a little blue box. Max says, "We went downtown to Stiffany's mommy." No kidding, he has said it a few more time since then so I can confirm the pronunciation of "Stiffanys" — don't you love that?! Inside the box was a beautiful big solid silver heart locket on a chain with a photo of Max on one side and Vivie on the other (good job daddy!). I melted inside while tears of motherhood joy rolled down my cheeks. Then to add to my water works, Max tells me about the card he made for me at preschool. "Mommy, see it's a heart. Here's where I did the gluing and I put letters on it I -L-O-V-E-U" he said. Then I said, "it spells I love you" and he said "no not yuh yuh 'you'" as he sounded out the letter Y, "I didn't use the Y." He also planted me a sunflower in a pot and wrapped it in yellow tissue paper. He put his hands on his hips and said in the cutest voice, "Now what's that mushroom doing in there?"
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Max, seen here wearing all his favorite things. He asks me every morning if it's a school day, seriously he does. On Saturday when I finally say, "no today is not a school day," he dresses himself in crocks, his superman t-shirt and an almost too small union jack sweatshirt. Super-hero wear and crocks are outlawed at his preschool, oh and so is celebrating holidays — political correctness sucks.
We headed out at about 8:45am via Muni and made it to Blue Bottle Cafe about 9 am. It was already crowded. Normally that would get me down, as I am so over waiting in long lines at the cool kid spots, but today I didn't mind. It's ironic how when you truly don't care and are relaxed, that life flows smoothly. Within minutes three counter spaces in a row by the big window opened up — such luck.
We each enjoyed a delicious fluffy and lightly sweetened belgian wafel and two lattes each (yes two!). I could drink their creamy lattes all day if they didn't cause such jitters. Vivienne took notice of our blue bottle love and dove into the cup for a sip (no she wasn't successful).
Happy six month birthday to baby Vivie.
Technorati Tags: Bay Area, eating, family, San Francisco
Last night we were waiting outside for a table at Delfina Pizzeria, when Max whipped out a giant piece of chalk (that he'd swiped from the school playground) and started drawing on the sidewalk. This is how I found out that he can write his name. Love it.
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This is Vivienne with her great grandpa. There's 93 years between them! I love their matching bright blue eyes. Awe, so beautiful.
When Max melts down during family dinner at Santi (yes, this has happened before) we walk across the street to the tractor sales show room and take a pretend ride. A few minutes of serious fun makes the rest of dinner manageable.
See Miss Vivie kicking it.
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mmmm miette is so yummy and it's on the way home from school — which is so dangerously delicious! We stopped by on this lucky tuesday and each found a treat to enjoy.
Happy Birthday to Paga & Auntie Gail! xoxo
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Here's daddy holding the picture Max drew for him on his birthday. It was so endearing to listen to Max explain the drawing — he said something like "the orange is a reflection of the sun on the pond." We looked at each other with awe, how poetic!
Max and I decided it would be best to put four and three candles on daddy's cupcakes, otherwise we might have a fire hazard! The over abundance of sprinkles were a necessity! Why walk when you can run eh?
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The lower right one is poking through too!
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Max took his first karate lesson today. I thought karate would be a good place for him to learn where hitting and kicking is appropriate and to practice discipline, courage, and respect, while also getting his boyish aggression and energy out. He's on the young side, so the teacher wanted to assess if he had the attention span for the 30 minute class — his physical abilities don't matter at this point. For the first 15 minutes he followed the class perfectly doing all the exercises and he looked like he was really enjoying himself. Then he was paired with an older kid who was his height (I think he was about 6 years old — the boy on the right in the top photo) to take turns hitting and kicking while holding a pad and he got really scared. I watched his face turn from interest to fear. Max had a lot of trouble holding the pad for this kid to kick. Each time the other boy whacked the pad Max got more fearful until he gave up and ran to my arms. We then sat on the sidelines and watched the rest of the class. I asked repeatedly, but he had no interest in trying it again after that. When class was over we talked to the sensei (Mirako) and determined that he is quite capable of taking the class if he decides he wants to. Fortunately, they aren't charging me any money until Max decides that he's willing to commit to the class and we are welcome to to come again for a few more times. We stayed about 10 minutes afterward exploring the space and taking turns hitting the pads. I was hoping if mommy and he did it together he'd feel more comfortable trying the class again. While driving home Max asked me why the teacher was saying so many weird words. So now I'm trying to reiterate the concept of multiple languages and to teach him a little Japanese so he understands what the teacher is saying. I hope he'll want to try the class again next thursday.
school = dojo
teacher = sensei
one= ichi
two= ni
three= san
four = shi
five = go
that's enough for both of us!
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Surprise! There's a hard and sharp little bit poking through her gums. It's the lower left front tooth. Time to start serving some first foods eh?!
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It was extraordinarily hot today, in the low 80s at the beach! We had scheduled a playdate for the park but the day just screamed "go to the beach!" We headed down to Chrissy Field with a classmate of Max's named Griffin. Max thoroughly enjoyed getting covered head to toe in wet sand. I, of course with my typical craziness, forgot to bring his sand toys — but hey I remembered the sunblock. Max wasn't so into playing with the girls (Griffin met her friend Lily there) who were mixing sand to make hot chocolate for the plants, so he adopted a nearby family with two boys and borrowed all their boy sand tools to build roads for their cars. By the end he was buck naked and our walk back to the car elicited grins and giggles from many gawkers.
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Who wants to grow up to be a police officer just like Lulu? Little Marcus, uh I mean Max. History repeating itself can be a beautiful thing! Max's fabulous great Auntie Lulu set up a full-on tour of the Healdsburg police station, jail & a squad car. Our tour was given by the kind and patient officer Uretega (hope I spelled that right?). Max's eyes were like saucers and he was so uncharacteristically quiet and on his best behavior as he soaked in all the information about how 911 works, what jail is like and how the police car works. He really enjoyed turning off and on all the car lights and savors his special silver officer police pin. Thank you so much Auntie Lulu, you are truly the best!
Papa and Vivie are 92 years apart — wow, life is amazing!
Every little body is a-ok (for one little second no one is sick— big sigh!). Max weighed in at 39 lbs and 42" tall which puts him in the 95%. Vivie weighed in at 17 lbs 10 oz and 28" long, which put her off the chart!
Max and I are enjoying the days when I can pick him up sans Vivie and spend an hour alone together. We often head to Duboce Park so he can run around in "the woods" (really it's behind a tree and some bushes), swing, slide and blow off steam. It's so fun to watch him explore his world. Recently he's decided he has to climb up on the park gate and swing with it as it opens. He's still mustering up the courage to go down the "big kids" twisty slide all alone. Usually he thinks he'll do it, but changes his mind once we are at the park. This day he asked if we could go down together — was so sweet.
Sometimes we stop at a cafe before hand and pick up a steamed milk and madeline for him and a latte for me. Today we stopped by Duboce Park Cafe for said treats and I saw this fabulous piece of art. This so summarizes my recent mental struggles with not feeling sane and thinking meds may be my only hope. Ok a bit dramatic, I am prone to theatrics on occasion, but I do wish now an again that I could pop a pill to feel "normal". It makes me a bit sick to see the repetition of bottles representing the toll pill popping would cause just to achieve "normal" eh?
Technorati Tags: art, preschool, preschooler, San Francisco
Max did a great job at the dentist. However turns out we aren't doing such a great job brushing his teeth. We need to start brushing in the mornings in addition to evenings and we need to floss — especially the back teeth which are tightly touching. He has a watch on the lower back molars 'cause there's a cavity a brewing. Gotta brush away those rotten "sugar bugs."
It was an historic merry-go-round ride. Max started on the stationery tiger — a step up from his usual pick of the big bench seats. And while riding the tiger I kept coaxing him to try the up and down animals. So on the second ride he chose a shiny gold horse with glitter jewels. As long as I kept a hold of him he was happy.
When does your sweet little toddler turn into a fierce young boy? Right about age 3. Max has these wild moments where he's really intense and demanding and really reminds me of a teenager — YIKES!
Technorati Tags: preschooler
The Easter Bunny managed to find us in Purcellville, Virginia—imagine that!
The glorious looks of shear delight and surprise on Max's face were priceless. I adore seeing the light beam from his eyes. What's not to love about Easter eh? A basket filled with chocolates and jellybeans, plus we added some books and little toys, and a day filled with hunting for eggs filled with MORE jellybeans! Aunnie was forced to reenacted the egg hunt numerous times.
I love this photo. Aunnie looks (and feels) just like I did — tired but so happy. But she gets all the credit for the easter hunt success! Well done and many thank yous!
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Max thoroughly enjoyed the science of measuring, pouring, and fuzzy colored pill dropping as well as the art of egg dipping. The activity kept his attention for quite awhile which was impressive. The results were stunning. Sadly the weird spring weather forced us to choose an indoor plastic egg hunt, so these little masterpieces weren't hunted. However they did end up as delicious egg salad sandwiches, mmmm thank you Gail.
Technorati Tags: holiday, preschooler
This is the scene I saw when I opened the door at his preschool pick up today. There he was playing nicely with his best friend Gabriel — an endearing moment.
But then my utopian vision was shattered when two of his teachers pulled me aside to tell me that he had a really bad day and is having trouble listening and getting along with others. Apparently he wound up (literally turned his body and took a huge swing) and slapped one of the sweetest kids from room 4. He hit this boy Emmet so hard he had a red hand mark on his face for half a day. When asked "why?" Max really can't think of an answer, he just says that room 4 kids aren't supposed to be where room 3 kids are. The teachers say Megan, the oldest girl in Max's room 3 class, has been picking on him but they can't understand why he would take it out on Emmet. It makes no sense. I've seen a fierceness, rage and temper in Max, one that he doesn't understand or know how to control. He could just out grow it and learn to behave over time, but we also need to keep an eye on it and learn how to direct him. We also worry that he may not be in school or with teachers that understand him well enough and that perhaps the school may not challenge him enough — or have enough structure to keep him focused. It's a lot to think about...
This is Max's favorite sweatshirt. He chooses to wear it everyday. Sadly it's getting too small so we are being challenged to figure out what to do to save the Union Jack. Scissors and sewing are in our future! In addition, I'm excited to post this photo because I'm so happy to see Max taking physical risks like climbing up this high. I sometimes worry that he's too heady and mental (like his parent!) since he often won't go down the slides at the playground or swing on the monkey bars or other activities like that. I gotta fret less eh?!
Technorati Tags: parenting, preschooler
His Irish eyes are smiling!
Vivie enjoyed watching us each a yummy breakfast at Mission Beach Cafe.
Max will still nap without too much grief, but the two hour late afternoon snoozes cause havoc at bedtime. He'll often not want to sleep until 9 or even 10 pm, so I'm on the cusp of canceling nap-time in favor of early bedtime. I tried it last weekend, and bedtime was still a battle, but he did pass out sooner. He's also totally regressed and now wants to sleep in our bed every night. He claims to be afraid and lonely and doesn't want to sleep in his bedroom. We try every night to get him in his own bed, but he almost always ends up in our bed. Not sure what we can do at this point. More experiments to come...
such a cutie! She's a rolie polie olie.
Technorati Tags: baby, motherhood
I've really been enjoying my morning stroller walks at Crissy Field. After I drop Max off at preschool, I drive to the Warming Hut, park and feed Vivie. Then we stroll to the St Francis yacht club or if she's sleeping deeply I walk to Divisadero and then back. The weather has been beautiful recently, making the walk that much more enjoyable. Moments like these remind me just how lucky I am to live here — and to enjoy these days because one day not too far from now she won't quietly sit in a stroller for an hour and half!
Technorati Tags: Bay Area, motherhood, San Francisco
Miles had a kid sized drum kit at his house and Max went crazy over it. Flash forward to Max as a teenager!
Ms. Vivienne Grace really wants to be able to suck her thumb. She tries and tries but can only hold it in her mouth for a few seconds before her wildly flailing arms disrupt her sucking happiness. I ply her with the pacifier every chance I get but she loves to spit it right out with a push of her cute little tongue.
There was a lot of suffering still underway so I can't say it was a wonderful weekend. However there were some nice highlights in between. First was the location. Monterey is seaside lovely even if the cannery is tacky tourist row.
Max squeezed the "how hot are you?" machine and got the hottest possible answer "uncontrollable!"
The aquarium was beautiful. Most of the tanks are amazing and the facility is really well organized and has all the needed amenities.
ok, well mostly. There was that time he threw the tinkertoy container at her head and had her crying her first real tears.
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Max has been sick since sunday evening. Yep now picture me with a 3 year old and a 3 month old stuck in the house for five days. So how much tv and how many dvds can we watch? Quite a lot actually, but truly only two days were filled with non-stop viewing. You know your kid is super sick when he'd rather lay down in mommy daddy's bed in silence than lay on the couch spacing out to his favorite shows. His fever has been pretty constant and got as high a 103.6. He's been really congested and vomiting. I must say, watching your child suffering and not being able to do anything about it has to rank at the top of life's most painful moments. And I'll add that cleaning up mac & cheese with hot dog vomit was far worse than the yogurt squeezes or raspberries incidents. But what's worse is that now I'm sick with a fever, harsh congestion and a really sore throat. Plus my hands are now really dried out from all the doctor recommended Purell rubbing. I'm so paranoid that we'll get Vivie sick too and she's just too small to take this on.
Technorati Tags: motherhood
Max's first snow experience was this weekend at North Star Tahoe. He loved the snow and the cabin experience. He didn't totally love skiing, but we made it down the mountain twice and that was after waiting in all the lines for gear and for the gondola. The good news is he says he wants to go again.
Ultraman flew in for a special sunday breakfast. I adore watching Max engaged in imaginary play. I love all the funny things he says and how he incorporates little details from our lives in a non-sensical ways. We had to set a plate for Ultraman and serve him eggs, scones and lemon curd. Ultraman was a wee bit gooey after Max actually crossed over from his imaginary world into reality and shoved eggs into Ultraman's face.
As per our usual sunday breakfast, daddy, chef extraordinaire, knocked it out of the park so to speak with a homemade lemon curd and scones. Saturday night while I was out enjoying a fully fabulous adult evening with a girlfriend at the sundance kabuki in the 21 and up balcony viewing area (ahhhhhh was so wonderfu)l, Max and daddy went into our garden and picked lots of lemons from our bush that was an anniversary gift I gave years ago. While juggling Vivie and pushing Max's bedtime to the limit they managed to whip it up. And mmmmm the lemon curd was so delicious on the fresh orange and currant scones. We eat so well on the weekends!
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How adorable is this kimono dress and pants? I swear i would wear it. Tea Collection makes the most stylish kids goods — loving it — to bad she's already out grown it.
Old news but I'll have you know that Vivie rolled over three times on Christmas eve. She was only six weeks old back then, what a feat! Now she's twelve weeks old and a real expert - plus she enjoys it. Unlike Max, Vivie likes to be on her tummy. I have high hopes that she will crawl, again unlike her scooting and early walking brother (Max walked at 10 months).
We had a wonderful morning. We met daddy at the new Blue Bottle cafe @ the Mint and then hit the SF Center's fabulous family room for nursing and a freshening up. Then little angel baby let mommy do a touch of much needed shopping at H&M where I found a pair of non-draw string pants to wear and of course a few sweet items for baby and big brother. Thank you sweet pea!
Most nights I read Max 1-3 books, rub back about 10 times and then explain why I can't lay down and sleep with him (uh, I've got just about a million things I'd like to do before I pass out about an hour later). Both Max and I love this ritual, but there are some rare nights when Max decides that he wants to read TinTin. I declared long ago that TinTin is a "daddy only" read. I simply can't deal with the intensity of the densely drawn comic squares in combination with the inappropriate 3 year old content! Daddy on the other hand is so familiar with the stories he can sort of sum up the plots and keep the pages turning. And then I get a well deserved night off from reading duty.
Technorati Tags: parenting, preschooler
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He did it! 20 days later he's now running around our house as officer Max. "You're under arrest!"
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The kid went cold turkey! After a few weeks of talking about saying goodbye to "nano" Max is finally off the nipple. Here's how we did it.
The kid went cold turkey! After a few weeks of talking about saying goodbye to "nano" Max is finally off the nipple. Here's how I did it.
I started planting the seeds of him being a big boy and how nano's ("nano" aka pacifier) were for babies. I also tried saying that he should give up all his nanos so other babies who need them could use them. I also talked about how the dentist said nano was ruining his teeth by giving him a big overbite and said the dentist would be so proud if he went into his next visit and said he wasn't using one. I also repeatedly said I'd be proud of him and I know he can do it. That was all possibly just blah blah blah to him I think? I then said he should just tell me when he's ready to say goodbye, that he should just let me know the best time. Then I would ask every so often, "are you ready?" to which he always replied "no". But I think that random questioning laid the foundation for it to be ok. About three weeks later I told him I'd give him a dum dum lollipop if he tried to take a nap without his nano. Oh yah, that worked! Sugar, the king of all motivators. So yes, he took that first pacifier free nap and enjoyed his sugary nano-like treat afterwards. He wanted to do it again the next day and yet again the next. The following day was a school day, so I wondered if he'd be ok not bringing it to school? He was fine with it, so long as he got a lollipop or madeline afterward. My next trick was to do ye old bribery switchero (apparently I'll end up with a son who has a case of entitlement for doing so! Bad parenting 101). I made a devil's deal by saying in exchange for 20 nano-free nights he could pick one toy — any toy he wanted— in the toy store. He was quick to say he wanted a police costume with a badge and a magnet (due to a cops and robots episode of the Backyardigans that he likes to watch over and over. Together we decided to use his Spiderman calendar to "x" off the days and we printed out a photo of the police costume for him to look at as motivation. We talked that costume up at every opportune moment. The first night we started story time nano-free but he changed his mind, so we blacked out the x and decided to try again tomorrow. Then every night there after was nano-free with no complaints. Amazing! It worked. He loved getting that costume, we took lots of photos and looked forward to putting it on each evening after school. 
Here's the rub though, ever since he's been off the binky bedtime has gotten more difficult. He doesn't want to stay in bed and claims to not be tired or is still hungry, urgh trade one issue for another — such is life.
Technorati Tags: pacifier, preschooler
If only it were fashionable for me to wear a onsie sweater jumper, I'd put this lovely one on for sure. Made by Lucky Jade, thank you Ms. Royall!
I'll have you know she's not grinning as I try to type this out, crying actually. I'm hoping she'll let me finish this entry. She hasn't slept in two hours so she's a bit of a wreck right now. My left foot is bouncing the bjorn like crazy. But back to the photo, Vivie has started to smile and coo and even have short periods of quietly doing nothing and enjoying it. We're all enjoying it too.
She had her two month appointment yesterday. She weighs in at 14.05 lbs (90th%), measures 24.25 inches (95th%) and checks out perfectly according to her doctor. But I saw a few areas that need some work : : : uh second baby syndrome alert! : : : There was serious cheese in her arm pits, behind her ears and, well, down there in all those folds too, uh geez mom, I hope the doctor wasn't too grossed out like I was! Sadly she had to have four shots plus an oral vaccine so the rest of the day was yucky, poor dear. She didnt cry until the 3rd shot — what a champ. We've traded the nasty case of seborrheic baby acne for a head full of cradle cap. So during that long over due bath I gave her last night, I scrubbed her scalp with a toothbrush and olive oil which did make a difference as a lot came off, but there's lots more to go. Just like the rest of the family, Vivie loves taking a warm bath. She'll stay in there without complaint and then take a long snooze there after, ah reprieve.
Technorati Tags: baby, motherhood
As Vivie slept I played with an iPhone and really truly enjoyed web surfing on a mobile device for the first time. I'd read an article in February's Wondertime about why mommies blog (review here, my main reason for blogging is memory retention, I blog what I l know I'll forget in a minute, a day or forever — I hope my backups work!) and it listed a few blogs I checked out— one I'd surfed before but didn't get hooked on until yesterday. Finslippy is my new Dooce, and yes I'm really late to the party. The entry on bad parenting awards (like the Darwins for moms) had me cracking up, especially the "Oh No You Didn't" award, yikes! And yes, these made me feel like a stellar mother! Love that, thank you Finslippy. Others to check out next time I'm pinned under a sleeping baby and can still reach the phone: Breed 'em & Weep, Ben & Birdie (the Wondertime article writer & blogger) and then I'll just check out their blogrolls, oh my more reading than I'll ever be able to do.
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My favorite baby blankets are all wonderful gifts that I cherish (and wish were in an adult size). Each time I wrap Vivienne in one of these I purr like a kitty. Vivie is so lucky to nap in these. The gorgeous blanket and lovely above were gifted to Vivie by YaYa's mom and sister — thank you! — and are made by Heaven's New Souls. Both are made of super soft, fur-like fabric with textured dots and a thick satin trim and came with Vivienne's name embroidered in a lovely script. On the smaller "lovey" blankie there's a sewn on wish that says, "Guardian Angel, On-the-go, As you travel far and near, Take me with you — never fear, Let the softness of my touch, Remind you that you're loved so much." How sweet! I love the pink and brown color combination, it's always been one of my favorites.
Another amazingly soft über luxe— feels like rabbit fur — blanket that I adore is made by Little Giraffe. It was gifted to Vivie for Christmas by a generous friend of Vivie's grandparents. The big watercolor-like brown, pink and green polka dots on the light pink background make me so happy. It has a wide pale pink soft satin trim and the blanket has a really heavy weight feel and is very slippery. Super yum.
My other favorite blanket is a cotton candy sweet light pink, super thick chamois on one side and velvet-like chamois finish on the other side. The trim is matt satin so it's not so cold to the touch. The blanket has a heavy warm feel. It's made by Potterybarn. It was gift from Maga Paga, many thank yous!
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Oh, my heart. Tears welled up in my eyes when Max said "mommy I made something for you, I painted it myself". He was so excited he opened it for me. I had a flashback to my childhood creations and then I felt another moment that solidified that I am truly a mommy, my son just gave me a christmas ornament that he made — for me. This is love.
Technorati Tags: motherhood, parenting, preschooler
Technorati Tags: baby, motherhood
I feel like I've had amnesia, I didn't remember how small and fragile newborns are — amazingly resilient but still so delicate. There's so much crying due to constant gas, spitting up, hunger, exhaustion, confusion and then it's repeated every hour or so. It's so hard to be a baby! I'm super tired and it tries my patience, but I'm hanging in there. All the trouble is washed away when she smiles, looks in my eyes, and sleeps so peacefully, then it's like holding an angel in my arms.
I am so impressed with how Max is adjusting to life with a little sister. He's been an absolute sweetheart. When she cries he says "Mommy, she needs you," he holds her hand, gently strokes her face and often tells me about the little things she's doing like her eyes are open, or she's sucking on her finger. He wants to hold her all the time, though it only lasts a few seconds before he says "She's heavy."
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She sleeps just like Max did at this age — with her arms up (and snores too). Living on the 24 hour cycle of eat, sleep, poop plus taking care of a preschooler — it's a challenge. I still cant manage to get out the door with two unless I'm headed to someone's house via car. If it's a walk out the door to the store, park etc I just cant make it happen yet. Seams like one or the other is always melting down or needing one on one attention. Ah, this too will pass.
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Just like his daddy, Max is an "expert" swaddler. He wraps his Paul doll just like we do Vivienne, it's adorable. I have to give Max the title of "Worlds Greatest Big Brother" since he's ben so supportive, helpful and interested in all things related to baby Vivie. He still demands we call her "Sofia Duck" and he does tend to rock her too hard and poke her in the head now and then, but all is made well every time he plants a big kiss on her — and he does it a dozen times a day. It's so sweet he melts my heart each time. He's also very attentive to the breast pump (boys love boobs and machines eh?!), he loves to get it out, plug in all the parts, and set up the bottles and cones for me, of course turning on the machine is the best part — for him!
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I've been searching for a new diaper bag and I finally found two I like. I still can't seem to locate the perfect does it all bag. So I'm going with a friends advice and having a few for different purposes. Her suggestion was to keep a few packed so you're always ready to walk out the door. It'll still take a little time to pack snacks and drinks, but if I keep them filled with the basics it should help cut a few minutes off the getting out the door time.
I really like the fabric design on the Hoohobbers China Doll Diaper Tote. I just hope the long vertical design doesn't make it difficult to find what's at the bottom. The other bag I like but am waffling on how to justify the price, is the Skip Hop City Chic. It looks like right size and has a great shape for carrying goods for two kids and it straps on a stroller. It's too bad they don't offer better patterns as I find the four patterns really conservative and they scream "I am a diaper bag."
I've also been looking for a better changing pad surface. I'm over the teeny tiny nylon one that came with the Skip Hop Duo bag I've carried for the last three years. I saw the Patemm Pad somewhere along the way and liked the big round design. I was sad to learn that most of their products are coated in noxiously evil pvc, but they have a few they make in a washable cotton so I'm getting one of those too.
Technorati Tags: baby, mom, motherhood, parenting, pattern, shopping
I recently bought a "yoko" nursing cover from natural resources on Valencia St. The company that makes them is called bebe au lait. While at Thanksgiving dinner my soon-to-be brother-in-law's sister, who is from Texas, asked me if I owned a "hooter hider?" I chuckled, in fact I do have one I said and I thought how very "Texas" it was to call it that. Well, turns out it's not simply so "Texas" after all. The company that makes 'em calls the same product lines by both names— hmmm a strange marketing ploy. So, they market the frenchy high brow "bebe au lait" name to city dwellers and the daisy duke-like "hooter hiders" brand to others? They explain it as: "Hooter Hiders for tongue-in-cheek and Bebe au Lait for mama chic. "
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Robert & Sharon sent us this fabulous arrangement, thank you! It's so simple and fresh, I love it. It really makes me wish I could afford a flower budget on top of all the other indulgent habits I have!
Vivie takes all the oxygen she can get! Baby yawns are so adorable. Who am I kidding? Everything she does is adorable.
Baby Vivienne is prone to hiccups and spit ups so she spends quite a bit of time with an over the shoulder view of the world. Other than that she's a fabulous baby, eats, sleeps, poops and does it all over again and again and again without too much complaint. Of course she prefers to be held as much as possible, but who doesn't? She grins, puckers her lips, and makes lots of dolphin giggly noises when she isn't grunting.
Monica ( a room 5 teacher and after school playground guard) painted the kids faces this afternoon. Max chose to be a "kitty" and was so happy to run around and show off his painted face. We ate at Chow for dinner and Max beamed with pride at all the people who commented on his whiskers.
Technorati Tags: motherhood, parenting
We welcomed our newest family member, Vivienne Grace today at 4:19 p.m. She weighed in at 8 lbs 3.3 oz and 20 inches long. She's simply beautiful. I'm deeply feeling the meaning of "bundle of joy" and totally in love.
Labor was half the time of my first, the delivery was far better and kinder to my body, and my recovery has been remarkably faster. It's true what they say, that delivery is easier with each subsequent pregnancy. I can't say the pregnancy was easier though. I was sicker, more tired and irritable and physically taxed this time around. I also had horrid varicose and spidery cluster veins down one leg and covering both ankles and my vanity caused me to wear pants for seven months.
I have to write a few things here so I don't forget them — I blog mostly due to my lack of memory retention. I saved Ms. Vivienne from her father's name choices of Pandora, Nemesis or Helix. Her runner up name was Paloma — should she one day decide that Vivienne just doesn't suit her perhaps she'll choose it. I was truly tortured over the naming decision. There are so many wonderful names. I settled on our choice because of the lovely sound and meanings and of course that WE agreed on it. Vivienne means alive or lively and in the Arthurian romance she's an enchantress, the mistress of Merlin, known as the Lady of the Lake. Grace has so many meanings; effortless beauty, elegance, good will, mercy, and excellence of divine origin. Her brother is calling her "duck" when he isn't calling her "Sophia" or "Lucia."
When Maximillian arrived at the hospital the first thing he said was "where is my baby sister?" I'm so proud of him. He's handling this transition quite well. Of course calling her "duck" and constantly wanting to wake her up are just a few of the challenges we'll face along sibling rivalry road. But I'm touched each time he wants to choose her pajamas and brings extras like socks, wants to help her stop crying, and makes sure I'm feeding her enough "boobie milk." He's really being so sweet about her presence. Our pediatrician warned us that it may get rougher about month two, when he realizes she's not just a visiting guest.
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We trick-or-treated with the neighborhood gang which included James as Peter Pan, Isabel as Tinkerbell, Max as a pirate and not shown was Finn as Superman and Ian as a Power Ranger (couldn't get those two to pose with us!). We treated down Fair Oaks Street in Noe and really enjoyed ourselves. Max was game to gather candy until the spooky older kids started showing up and the crowds began swarming and pushing. When we got home he thoroughly enjoyed inventorying his candy — surprisingly he wasn't too interested in eating it.
Technorati Tags: family, motherhood, preschooler
I'm so saddened to learn that the "Reel Moms" program at the Metreon/Loews is no longer happening. Turns out they stopped the program a year ago with no explanation. I loved going to the mommy movies every tuesday morning at 10 am. Back when Max was a newborn in October of 2004, they were playing first rate hollywood flicks at a lower volume and in a semi-lit theater so we could breast-feed and change diapers. They even had valet stroller parking. It was awesome and I looked forward to it every week of my maternity leave. Sigh. I'm researching alternatives but so far nothing seems to match up for San Francisco and I'm not going all the way to Oakland for the Baby Brigade (tempting as that is). I've sent an email to the "Rattle & Reel" program at the Landmark Embarcadero and am hoping they'll respond (!?) and say it's still happening. I'll Iet ya know if anything comes of it.
Technorati Tags: baby, Bay Area, motherhood
Ahoy Matey! We're aboard the birthday ship today. We made daddy walk the plank already this am, urgh har har har. We started breakfast with delicious cupcakes, mostly just Max eating the frosting, what a happy pirate. Max fielded birthday calls from great auntie Lulu and grandma Sherry, plus some "leelows" (letters) from Maga Paga and grandpa Billy. Last night daddy stayed up into the wee hours to make 30 cupcakes for Max's classmates, two kinds of cakes at that and all from scratch. Those lucky little kids.
Technorati Tags: parenting, preschooler
A three year old with carving tools is scary enough, but then this little guy takes it up a level! He's so into the saw, the knife and doing it himself it's a little more frightening than usual.
Just so you know we didn't give in to letting him mange the carving weapons on his own.
When I asked Max to give me a smile, here's what I got...
I can only imagine what he'll do when I ask him to smile at say age 13. What I hope never to change (or forget) is when I whisper "I love you" into his ear, he whispers it right back. xo
Technorati Tags: family, motherhood, preschooler
We hit the Seventh and Irving streets pumpkin patch this afternoon, looking for that perfect roundy shape to take home and carve. Max wasn't too into picking the pumpkin (daddy stepped up), but he got really fixated on the googly eyes carving kit up at the check out (uh thanks mr. pumpkin patch merchandiser) so after much pleading, like typical parents, we gave in.
And who is just like his daddy??
Technorati Tags: family, motherhood, preschooler
Oh the shriveled fingers of fun. Mr. Millian could spend hours bathing so long as there's "shaving cream" (soap) to squirt, shmush, scrape and spray.
We've got a serious addict here. He loves his "nano" like nothing else. No matter that we limit it to sleep time only, he must have two with him in every bed and often they must match. At this particular moment he'd found another one inside the bed from the night before and was trying to see if he could somehow get all three in his mouth — more, more more! We've been told by the dentist that we've got to get him to give it up before age 4 so it doesn't permanently alter his bite. We are aiming for 3.5. Wish us luck - or better yet send advice.
To make dressing more fun I started suggesting that socks go on your hands, or shirts on your legs, or hmmm undies on your head?! Uh oh, he loved the game so much that he often puts his underpants on his head to make me laugh. Note to self: gotta watch out with preschoolers, they so easily turn the tables right back at you!
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Max and Easton getting ready for a rally!
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Calling all moms, go watch this you tube video. It's pretty much everything a mom says in 24 hours condensed into 2 minutes. After you finish laughing (at her and with her), you'll feel fabulously sane. Love it. (Anita Renfroe)
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Awe, more bunny love for baby! Thank you gramma for sending baby "sherry" an adorably fancy bunny bank. She'll save all the coins you send her right in there! xo
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I couldn't help myself! I was shopping for a friend at Urban Nest on 24th St and I saw this adorable ballet pink with brown hand drawn bunnies baby dish set and had to buy it. It's so sweet! I look forward to using it and can only hope that my little girl will like pink and bunnies as much as I do.
Technorati Tags: baby, San Francisco, shopping
Our first siberian red heirloom tomatoes grown on our back deck. We are so proud of Max...last year he picked so many tomatoes before they were ripe we were pulling our hair with frustration. But this year he watered them faithfully and watched them grow until they were ready to pick!
Max wearing papa's hat.
And here he is playing his new trumpet, courtesy of the master blower himself, grandpa paga! :-) xoxo
Me too! I'm loving these anonymous confessions from mothers, check out True Mom Confessions.
And Mommy Track'd had been updated and now offers more content. I think Noe Strollers site has amazing collection of useful San Francisco mommy content (though often outdated, it's a great starting point), but I can't stand the way the site is laid out. It has horrible scrolling lists with yucky unspaced type, yikes. I desperately want to redesign it.
