The Adventures of Brooke & Kyle

Recap on Summer

2010-08-30T17:04:00.000-07:00

I have been bad at posting on here. What can I say?! Anyhow, the summer has come and gone. We weren't going to do anything or go anywhere but we ended up going to Fort Collins, CO to visit Steve's parents and about 2 weeks after getting home from there, we went to my parents house in Bellevue, WA. The kids had swim lessons again this summer and still continue to LOVE the water. Brooke keeps asking me when I will sign her up for gymnastics. The kids have started back to preschool for the last month of the summer session since I will have to go back to work at the end of July. They will start the regular school year in September. Steve had shoulder surgery to repair 3 issues and will be off work for awhile. We as a family went to the kids' first movie...Shrek 4. It was a great movie. We also went to see Toy Story 3. The kids are big moivie watchers more so Brooke than Kyle but they both love popcorn!! Can't watch a movie without it. Here are a few pictures from over the summer. I was also pretty bad about taking pixs as well!

New Birthday Bikes

2010-06-08T16:09:00.000-07:00

For the kids' birthdays, we decided to get them some bikes. They have been riding their trikes for awhile now and their legs were getting too long for them. plus, every time the next door neighbor gal came out to play with her bike, Brooke always wanted to ride it. We took them down to Toys R Us and tried out some bikes. We let them choose their own. They rode them around the store to test them out. I was surprised when they left and didn't ask to bring them with them. I thought they would put up more of a fight when I told them if they were good they could get them for their birthday.

We gave them their bikes on a Friday which was after Brooke's birthday and right before Kyle's birthday. We figured it would be horrible if Brooke got her bike on her birthday and Kyle had to wait 3 days for his. Steve and Pop Pop put them together while the kids were at school for the morning. It was their last day of school for the summer so we sent them to school so they could take cupcakes to school. Of course I had nothing else going on so I decided to make mini cupcakes for the kids to take to school with little birthday flags in them. Seems more personal when you bake it yourself instead of just buying store bought! Gotta love that about a private school. They trust you to bake yourself.

We gave the kids their bikes after nap time before Steve and my dad went to the Mariners game at Angel Stadium. Kyle of course got a green bike with a green helmet. Brooke got her pink, white and black bike along with a....wait for it...yup, you guessed it, a MONKEY helmet. We were walking through Target and I still hadn't found her a helmet and there it was. I think I was as excited as she was. She wanted to hold it the entire time we were in Target and even on the car ride home. Gotta love a great find!

We got their helmets on so they could take their new bikes for a spin in the neighborhood. They are a little bit big for them but we figure they can grown into them a bit so we don't have to buy new ones in 6 months.

Brooke's 1st Mani Pedi

2010-06-08T15:58:00.000-07:00

I have been telling Brooke for awhile now that if she stopped sucking her thumb at night, I would take her to my nail lady, Miss Lily. Well, it finally sunk in and she stopped sucking her thumb. I told her for her 4th birthday, I would take her there and she could have her nails and toes done. Grammy was coming to town so I told Brooke that all 3 of us could go together and make it a girls day.

When we got to the nail place, Brooke asked me if she could have her fingernails done too. She asked me, "will my dad freak out?" I told her as long as she didn't get hooker red. I of course left off the hooker part. We chose 2 different shades of purple.

While Brooke was sitting in the pedicure chair with the bubbles on, she looked at me and told me that she really like it. And that folks is when the DIVA in training was really born! She did so well. I thought for sure she wouldn't sit still long enough for the lady to work on her but she did. She looked so grown up with her hand in the water bowl to soak while they worked on her other hand. My little "baby monkey" is growing up so fast. The 3 of us had a great day at the nail salon. They were super great with Brooke and she got the star treatment and got flowers on her fingers and toes along with little jewel beads in the center. Hopefully my rough and tumble girl won't have it all chipped off in day!

Kyle's 4th Birthday

2010-06-08T15:23:00.000-07:00

Well, 3 days later, Kyle got the same treatment as Brooke did. He got the birthday cake in front of his door and he got the same birthday banners and balloons downstairs. Kyle's choice of dinner was to go to Denny's. Of all of the places he could choose, he chose Denny's. WHY? The kid LOVES the softball pancakes! I made sure to tell Grammy & Pop Pop that we were going there for dinner. Oh well! As long as Kyle was happy since it was his day! Gotta love breakfast for dinner. I remember it always being a treat when I was a kid.

For Kyle's cake I called the same lady. Kyle is still really into the Blue Angels. He has like airplanes for quite some time but once Pop Pop & Grammy took him to see the Blue Angles fly over Lake Washington for Seafair, the kid has been hooked. Now, every plane is a Blue Angel. So with this being the case, I asked for a Blue Angel cake. Kyle loved it and couldn't wait to dive in.
We have had so much cake in the past week! YIIKES!! Between my birthday and the kids' birthdays, we now have leftover ice cream cake, chocolate monkey cake and confetti white cake. No shortage here of sugar!! Not the ideal situation for watching the calories!

After our Denny's adventure...we came home for the cake and presents! Of course Kyle got a similar bag of loot as Brooke did. He bypassed all of the clothes and went straight for the Buzz Lightyear doll. I'll call it a doll for the lack of a better term but it's the exact same toy as in the movie! He absolutely loves it and we had a hard time keeping Brooke away from it. I just love to hear the gasp of air when they open a present with a smile on their face. That's when you know you've done a great job! Way to go Grammy!!

Brooke's 4th Birthday

2010-06-08T14:51:00.000-07:00

When Brooke woke up this morning, she had the blow up birthday cake outside of her door waiting for her. I also decked out the house downstairs with birthday signs and banners and of course a monkey balloon! We really try to separate the kids' birthdays so they each have their own special day that is all about them.

No crazy birthday party this year. Just a quiet family event which was very nice. I started a tradition this year I hope to carry on for many more years. I told the kids I would make them whatever they wanted for dinner OR we could go out to dinner. Well, going out to dinner must be a very fun thing to do when you are 4 since they jumped at the chance. Either that or they don't like my cooking!!

When Brooke was asked this question, she quickly jumped on it and stated that she wanted to go to Red Robin. I told her we could do that. Grammy & Pop Pop were in town so they were able to come with us. What a treat!

Once we were seated at our table, we had a wonderful waitress who really catered to the kids. I made sure to tell her that it was Brooke's birthday. Brooke was really excited when they brought her an ice cream sundae and a balloon and sang to her. She was excited with the ice cream since it was her 2nd time that day! She asked if it was "her cake." I told her it was not and that I had a special one at home. Brooke is still really into monkeys so I got a tip from someone at work about a dessert place. I called and sent the lady a picture of a monkey. She made a monkey cake for Brooke. Brooke like it and that is all that matters. After singing happy birthday to our birthday girl, Grammy & Pop Pop had a "bag o' goodies" for lil miss Brooke. All sorts of stuff for the birthday girl! She loved the little Disney Princess player and passed right by the clothes! Just like a kid. It was hard to have Kyle sit there and watch. We have celebrated their birthdays on the same day for the past 3 years and they hace always opened presents together. They got to play with her new "loot" and then it was time for bed. Brooke was hopped up on so much sugar from ice cream and cake that I figured it would be impossible for her to go to bed. Luckily, it wasn't too hard.

Little Bunny Foo Foo

2010-04-01T21:34:00.001-07:00

I can't believe it's already Easter already. Where is the time going? I am on spring break and this week is just flying by. I made cut out cookies yesterday and the kids were all too excited to watch and get their hands in the way. Brooke told me that we should name the bunny head we were making. I asked her what we should name him and she said "little bunny foo foo." Now there is a kick back to an old song. I start to sing it and then stop and of course, Kyle jumps right in to finish it off. Of course it's another song by Ms. Susan at school. Love it!! While we are putting the kids to bed, I realize that we have not gone to see the Easter Bunny at the mall. EEKS!! We have seen this Easter bunny since April of 2007. Yup, this is our 4th trip to the Easter bunny. I figure I will drop the kids off at school for their Easter party and then hit the mall after nap time. What a wonderful idea. There was no one there. We had our picture taken, went over to play on the play toys which is right next to Starbucks, oh how convenient. I got a Starbucks and the kids got a hot cocoa. We play and then I am freezing and we go inside the food court where there is now a Merry Go Round. Brooke gets on a horse this time and Kyle wants in the bench seat. We are good to go and they like it. We then go back out to play on the toys some more. I then decide to top the night off with a trip to California Pizza Kitchen. Couldn't talk the kids into Panda Express.Tomorrow is already Friday and we are headed up to Lemon Cove to visit with Uncle Bob, Aunt Joanne, Susan, Ray and Bobby and Kellie. We were there last August or September and the kids had a blast. I did too. It was just good ole family fun. We have a new car top carrier so I have their Jeep loaded into the back of the Cadillac. Thank God. More room to pack the kitchen sink and then some.

I am all prepared for the Easter egg hunt on Saturday. I think I must have 100 eggs to stuff and hide. Nothing like overdoing it. Oh well. Brooke and Kyle had such a good time last year on their egg hunt. This year should be even better since there will be total chaos with 13 kids in attendance. Aunt Jo told me there were going to be 29 people at her place. I love it. The more the merrier. I just love Camp Bierbaum. I hope the weather holds for us.

Now all I have to do is finish packing and get my Martha Stewart cookies finished. I cut out the cookies and frosted them and put everyones name on them. I especially like Kellie's. It's a bunny head with her name on it. I'll post more of Easter once it has happened. Until then, Happy Easter to all!

Valentine's Day Care Package

2010-02-09T11:36:00.000-08:00

As usual, another holiday is rolling around and Grammy packed up another box and sent the kids their care package. Brooke told me on Christmas Eve that she wanted a baby monkey and a mommy monkey. Well, at this point I was a little screwed with this request. Mommy monkey was all set to go...baby monkey...didn't exist. Well, grammy found a baby monkey and Brooke got it in her care package. Kyle of course was all about the fruit chews. He actually layed down on the floor and pretended to eat the entire pile of them. What a ham that kid is. For the actual day of Valentines day, we are going to be in Lake Arrowhead. I am going to take the kids with me up to the Scrappin' Shack. It has been snowing up there so I figure I will pack the 2 sleds and the kids can have fun in the snow. I also went through my scrap closet and found some stuff to bring for them so I can teach them the art of scrapbooking! When that lasts for about 5 minutes, I'll have some movies and games for them. Thank God Cindy is bringing her kids. Maybe Sage will have fun with them since he is a few years older than them. Steve might join us later if he doesn't have to work. I have this entire week off from school. I am still getting over this cold business. Luckily the kids have bounced back. Steve and I are still trying to get rid of the last bit. The kids will have their Valentine's Day party at school this week on Thursday. I will have to work on the cards before that so they can pass them out. It will be their first time giving and getting Valentine's Day cards from friends. How cute! Since I'm off, I might just have to stick around and help out at the party and take pictures.

Pre-School Pictures

2010-02-09T11:31:00.000-08:00

The kids had their very first school pictures this year. I had NO clue how they were going to turn out but to my surprise, they turned out pretty good. I was wondering how I was going to send 2 three year olds to school at 7:30 in the morning and have pictures taken around 9:30 and have the kids be clean and looking nice. It happened. Kyle of course is the ham. The year at school is flying by quite quickly. It's a great school and I love it.

Santa Picture

2010-02-09T11:25:00.000-08:00

Here are the kids with Santa! Hats off to my wonderful husband and my father for standing in line with the cold wind and weather while the kids, my mom and I all stood in the stores staying warm. They stood in line for an hour! What a great dad and pop pop!

This year I did not have to bribe Kyle with fruit chews in order to sit on Santa's lap. They both walked in and gave him a hug. They both remembered that he was going to give them a candy cane though. It's always about the candy!

2009 Christmas Card

2009-12-21T23:15:00.000-08:00

I have been bitten by the digital scrapbooking bug. I love it but it's time consuming. Much slower than slapping stuff down on the page with some stickers. Here is what I came up with this year for our Christmas card. I absolutely love "Just So Scrappy" designs so here is what I did:

You gotta love the fact too that Costco allows you to print your own designs on their blank cards. Love it!!! Might just have to do this next year as well! So cheap but yet so cute!

Hopefully in the new year I will find some more time to scrap my favorite subjects!!

Thanksgiving

2009-12-21T22:51:00.000-08:00

For the second year in a row, I had the entire week of Thanksgiving off. what a relief. we took the motorhome out to Palm Springs and enjoyed the week out there with the kids' godparents. The weather couldn't have been nicer and we had a great time. I think I took a nap almost everyday with the kids.

Janet and I decided to do a super easy turkey dinner....we all got reservations to the clubhouse dinner that they were having. Made clean up a real breeze. bummer was, no leftovers.

Janet was great with the kids and did crafts with them and also brought them pooping turkeys. The kids thought that was great fun. I was waiting for them to tell someone that they were eating poop!!

Janet also made a run to the super walmart one day and came back with a golf set for the kids. the back part of our spot was right on the golf course and a putting green. The kids had a blast with their golf set. although, they played more like it was hockey. can anyone say "happy gilmore!"

here are some pictures from the week:

It was a great week and we all packed up and headed home on Friday. The kids and I were all sick on the day we left. We spent the rest of the holiday weekend resting and getting ready for the next big holiday...Christmas! I just can't believe how fast the year is going.

Big Boy...This Ones for YOU!!

2009-11-06T14:11:00.000-08:00

I saw this layout and had to post it. For whatever reason, Kyle has been walking around telling us, "gobble, gobble." Guess it's a little different than, "quack, quack." They are learning about Thanksgiving at school which makes sense. I can't believe we are already into November. My how the time flies.

As we were coming home from school yesterday, I was explaining to the kids about how at Thanksgiving, we look at all the things we are thankful for. I started it off and made some statement and then Brooke told me she was thankful for her cat and dog. Too cute. Kyle hadn't quite caught on but he gave me a silly answer this morning about being thankful for a toy. We'll have to work on that one!

We are going to go to the Harvest Carnival today at their school. Don't quite know what to expect so we'll have to wait and see. Hopefully they will have plenty of stuff for 3 year olds to do.

Trick or Treating

2009-11-06T14:01:00.001-08:00

Halloween was such a blast this year. First of all, my parents came down and went trick or treating with the kids and I. We also had the neighbors over for some traditional stew dinner before we went out. We left the house about 6pm and didn't return until 7:30pm. My original intent was to just go down the block a little bit but the kids really got into it....especially Kyle. He had told me for about a week before that he didn't want to go trick or treating even after I told him that he would get candy. He was still afraid of the Halloween decorations at night. He was fine with them during the day but night time was a whole new ball of wax. He did great! He was even saying thank you to the people who were giving him candy without any coaching from mom! I was so proud of him!! After awhile though, their bags got pretty heavy with the candy and grammy and I ended up carrying them and handed them off to the kids when they went up to a house. It was a great family night. We came back to the house to have some cupcakes that our neighbor Laurie had made, hung out with family and friends and handed out candy until almost 10pm! I will post some pictures of the night later.

Let the Fright Fest Begin!!!!

2009-10-19T09:15:00.000-07:00

OK, so Clark Griswald has apparently given me some pointers on decorating for the holidays. As my neighbor friend Michele told me last night, "it looks like Halloween definitely threw up on your lawn!" Too funny! I have been having a blast with it. It's always fun to make the holidays special for the kids. I just really want to teach them about being together for the holidays and making it special with family. When they grow up, I want them to have the same special memories that I do as a child. Here are some pictures of the outside of the house:

Ok, so my update now shows the pictures. I have 3 large inflatable scary things. Steve put the skull on the roof and it's mouth opens and clothes as well as the eyes spin around. The horse carriage is 15' long and 7' high. Love it AND it makes noise. The archway that the kids walk through is from last year and it also makes noise which is scary. I bought a new fogger this year and it is hooked up to a timer and the fogger has an attachment tube that has 3 hoses coming off of it. It hooks up to the 3 tombstones so the fog comes out of the mouth's of the guys on the tombstones and onto the grass which is my graveyard. I have 2 motion activated ghosts that dance around, a flying reaper which has yet to be hung, a skeleton hanging in the tree, and let's not forget the talking witch on the front porch. she dances back and forth while stirring her pot. She has that scary witch voice. Loved her from the moment I saw her. I will try to take some video and add it on here. It will be hard to capture it at night as we have strobe lights strategically placed. Should be a SPOOKTACULAR good time on Halloween. Kyle was surprised tonight on our way home that trick or treating meant that he would get candy at people's houses. Gotta love kids.

Road Trip to Lemon Cove

2009-09-12T21:14:00.000-07:00

We headed up to Lemon Cove for the weekend to spend it with Steve's Aunt & Uncle and his cousin Susan and her family. Lemon Cove is about 20 minutes east of Visalia. Steve's uncle lives on some land....Twelve Oaks, and the kids were going to have the weekend to explore.

I decided to play hookie on Friday at work so we could head out the door. We waited out the traffic and piled 300 pounds of crap in the car. Thank God for big suburbans! You gotta love traveling with kids. I'm not any better as I packed the same 5 cup coffee pot we took on the cruise. The great thing about Uncle Bob and Aunt Jo's is they have little "casitas" on their property. We got the 2 bedroom on. We arrived about 2:30pm and the fun started. Uncle Bob had the electric cars out and ready to go. The kids jumped in the John Deere tractor and were off. They have a huge lawn that the kids could run around on and not hurt anything. Love it! It's so much better than telling the kids to be careful of the cars parked in the street at our house.

A little while later, Uncle Bob asks if the kids want to get on the "breezie." I have NO clue what this is. Well, it's a quad. Let me tell you, Kyle wanted nothing to do with it and of course after 2 minutes of riding it, Brooke wants to "do it by herself." The thing I love about Uncle Bob is that he is just a big kid himself and truly loves running around with the kids and playing. This is a 79 year old man who doesn't let green grass grown under his feet.
Susan and the kids arrive after she picks Bobby and Kelly up from school. They too also go to a private Christian school. It's a super hot day so we decide to head to the pool. In true fashion, we have every pool town in the pool and the kids are loving the swim boards that squirt water. Of course I am loving the fact that Susan is making margaritas and serving them up at the pool.

To the back of the pool is a pasture that has a horse named Blaze and 2 donkeys named Coco and Gus. Uncle Bob asks if Brooke wants to feed them carrots. Well of course she does. She goes over there in her bathing suit and isn't afraid to walk right up and give them some carrots. She sits on both donkeys and the horse all the while she is wearing a bathing suit.Steve brings over Kelly and Kyle in their bathing suits as well and here is Kyle standing on the fence with his water wings still on. Too funny!We decide to get dressed and go find Auntie Jo who is in the house. It was too hot for her to come out. We enjoy a great meal with family all sitting around the table talking and sharing stories. When it's time for bed, I think it was Bobby who asked his mom something and she said he would have to ask us. Well, he wanted to have a sleepover. Well, the entire theme for the weekend from everyone was, "Oh they're kids...let 'em do it!" So we said what the hell and all 4 kids piled into one room. Kelly is 6 yrs old and I believe Bobby is 7 yrs old. Of course, Kelly sacked out the first and Kyle was the last one to bed at 11:30pm at night. Oh well, it was their first sleepover and they were with their cousins having fun and watching movies.

The next day, almost all of us piled into Uncle Bob's truck to go out and see the cattle he has. I think he told us he has about 50. I am just tickled pink as we are having this good ole country family fun weekend. When we get out to the cattle, Steve and Bob are trying to get the bull....yes the BULL, to stop long enough so they can get a stick out of it's foot. The kids are in the back of the truck standing on the hay. It was a super hot day and there was absolutely NO breeze whatsoever! Plus I had told Brooke not to close the truck door and she looked right at me and did it anyway. Good thing it closed softly as her finger was in the door. It still got her pretty good and at this point she is loosing it since she was up so late last night. We headed back to the house to cool down. Susan was going to show us her and Rays house while the kids hung back. They live in a gorgeous house.Later on after the kids took a much needed nap, we all went in the pool again. I so wish we had a pool at our house but we don't. The kids love the water and are just animals in there. Good thing Ray was going to be cooking up some of his food since we all worked up an appetite. He was cooking ribs! Yummy! Before dinner, we headed out to the lawn since Ray brought out the kids' motorcycles. I think Steve had more fun on it. Brooke of course wanted to ride it by herself. It scares me that she is not afraid of hardly anything. After a superb dinner, we all called an early night as we were all exhausted for a busy day. But what a great day!

The next morning, we got up, had some breakfast and started to get our stuff together. We did fly some kites on the back lawn again and took a few more spins on the breezie and the John Deere. I even went out the horse pasture and up a hill with Brooke and was teaching her to lean forward and to lean with the bike. We packed up the car and headed home. It was a really fun weekend and we have already made plans to head back for Easter. What a great Easter egg hunt that is going to be on that back lawn!! I told Susan we'd have to get together before that since the kids had so much fun playing together!

Fall is Here

2009-09-09T11:24:00.000-07:00

Fall is officially here so I thought I would have the blog match it. Too bad the weather is not cooperating. It is still HOT here in SoCal even though we are a few days past Labor Day. We are still hitting the 100 mark. The kids have started back to the fall session of pre-school and are already excited for the pumpkin patch field trip. The kids just LOVE school and I have a hard time getting Kyle out of there when I come to pick them up. He just doesn't want to leave. Guess it's a good problem to have. Halloween is already out in the stores and we already have our Halloween costumes. Brooke is going to be....wait for it....BIG SHOCKER.....a monkey and Kyle is going to be a spider. Which he pronounces, "sphighter." They came in the mail and I let them try them on and now they want to wear them all the time. Too funny. Hope everyone had a great 3 day weekend and hopefully somewhere they are enjoying the fall season!

Brooke & Kyle's 1st Fieldtrip

2009-09-09T11:16:00.000-07:00

Brooke and Kyle went on their first field trip with school. Toward the end of the summer session, they all went to the Santa Ana Zoo. The kids wore their new green Ontario Christian t-shirts and loaded onto a yellow school bus and went to the zoo. I looked it up online to show them before they went and Brooke was super excited that this zoo was home to 50 monkeys.

In true scrapbook form, I went to the store the day before the field trip to get some fun cameras for the teachers to take with them in order to take pictures. If I couldn't be there, then I wanted to have some pictures of the kids and their classmates having a great time. I haven't gotten them developed yet but I did get a CD the other day from a mom who did take some pictures. Apparently my son was the total ham and got in front of the camera. I have taught him well!! I will post some of those pixs when I get the cameras developed.

The kids had a really great time and fell asleep on the bus ride home. I didn't worry too much about them since they were in good hands with the school. My little babies are growing up, going to school and going on field trips!!

First Day of Pre-School

2009-09-09T09:41:00.000-07:00

On August 10th, Brooke and Kyle started pre-school at Ontario Christian. We have been talking about this day since April when we all went down to Ontario Christian for a visit and decided they would go there. It was an early morning for everyone. I got up at 5:30am to get a head start before I had to get the kids up. I woke them up at 6am to get them moving, dressed and fed. You know Kyle is tired when he doesn't just POP out of bed and still just lays there. I bought little closet organizers where I could place the entire week's worth of clothes. We had packed it up the night before with the clothes and I had shown them where they were to get their clothes so they could help in the morning by getting dressed. Worked out really great and I didn't have any "issues" with what clothes they were going to wear. Typically I have this type of discussion with Brooke since she is pretty head strong on what she wants to wear. Gee, I wonder where she gets that!

We were doing pretty good and got downstairs for some breakfast. While the kids are eating, I make their lunch and pack it in their lunch sacks. Auntie Janet got Brooke a super cute monkey lunch sack that is right up her alley. The kids are pretty simple with what they want. Peanut butter and jelly sandwich. I pack their lunches instead of them buying lunch at school. All they offer is crappy food like pizza, mac n cheese, chicken nuggets, etc. You know, all the stuff that kids like to eat. I still have my kids fooled into eating stuff that's good for them. We cheat but I don't need them eating it ALL the time. Plus, this way they can swap food with their friends like back in the good ole days.

By a little after 7am, we are in the car and on our way. We have the little talk in the car to remind them that they need to listen to their teacher and follow the rules. At this point, I don't' think they have a clue but I am not too worried. We get to school and pile out of the car. We have the backpacks all packed up, the lunches made and the kid looked adorable with them on. I have them stand in front of the pre-school sign and take their picture. My babies are growing up. Today is a learning experience for all of us as I need to figure out where they go. I know they are in room 400 with Miss Kara. We get into the classroom and I get them signed in. Kyle at this point throws his stuff down and heads for the Thomas the Train table. There are some other kids playing and both kids are in NO way bothered by the fact that I am going to leave them there all day. Kyle gives me the, "BYE mom" and a wave and he's off. I give them both a kiss and I'm out the door. That was super easy. Now I just pray that they use the bathroom all day and I don't get a call from school to come and get them.

When I get back to school to pick them up, they are on the playground playing and having a great time. Kyle tells me that he "loves school". This makes me really happy. We pile in the car and head home. A total success! The kids are in a safe learning environment and I don't have to worry about them being parked in front of the TV all day.

Havasu #2

2009-07-21T22:22:00.000-07:00

We had so much out in Havasu that we decided that we would go back out for another week before we headed up to Washington. When I asked Brooke and Kyle if they wanted to go back out to the lake, Brooke answered, "can we go right now?" Now that's when you know as a parent that they really loved it. This time around though we didn't drop the cash to rent another boat for a week. One of Steve's friends was nice enough to let us borrow his boat. Also, before we went, I loaded up the kids and drug them out to the EZ Up factory out in Colton to buy an EZ Up. We were looking at the temps out there and it as going to be 115! EEKS! Can I just tell you that it was the best 100 dollars we ever spent!!

The kids were animals in the water this time. They were so used to it from the other week we were there. Kyle thought he was Michael Phelps without his life jacket on. He and Brooke both were swimming around in the channel with their faces in the water and everything. It was so great to see.

We decided one day to get out of the channel when we looked at the weather and saw that it was going to be 119. We went up river to Park Moabi. It is so nice up there now plus it was much cooler. The funny thing that happened was that once we left from up there it took us about an hour to get back to the channel. We hit the channel and ran out of gas. Couldn't have been a nicer place to run out. The kids and I hung out there and swam and steve headed out for some fuel. We ended up having a boat pull in next to us and they were firemen/firewomen and we hung out with them until 7pm. The kids were having a blast and the parents of the year didn't have dinner until 8:30. Gotta love the river! Brooke is ready for us to buy a boat and Steve continues to prod her telling her that we need to buy a boat. We'll see what happens there. I am vying to go back out but to stay in Park Moabi. Maybe sometime in August we will go.

Havasu

2009-07-21T22:00:00.000-07:00

Schoooooool's out for Summer!! Yeah! I finished school on a Thursday and we left for Lake Havasu City Arizona on Sunday. We stayed out there for a little over a week and rented a pontoon boat. The kids absolutely loved it. They were total river rats by the time we left.

Auntie Janet and Uncle John joined us at the Islander on the following Tuesday and they towed out their son's boat. Brookie just loves her "auntie!" We had a great time on the water and it was really great to see the light finally click in Kyle's head on swimming in his life jacket.

Once he finally got it, he was a swimming fool and was swimming around in this cove going over to everyone floating on a raft.

Once Jason and Jess got there, they brought some jet skis. The kids got on them with both Steve and I and they werent afraid at all and they even understood how to drive them.

It was fun to be back out in Havasu. It's not the same anymore but we did see a few familiar faces. Of course Steve was back to his ole haunting grounds and was happier than a pig in poop!!

Happy 3rd Birthday!!

2009-07-21T21:44:00.000-07:00

OK, I am sooooo behind in posting here. Things were really hectic toward the end of my school year at work. No more excuses.

It was a great 3rd birthday party. It was only supposed to be our family and the godparents and my parents were in town. That's it. Well, in like a flash of a second, it turned out to be 27 people. WHEW! Oh well. Plenty of food and drink and it went well. It was so nice to have my parents in town for the event. We started the day by giving the kids a motorized car. I was more excited to give it to them than anyone.There is still a bit of a learning curve but they will get it. The dang car even has a REAL working radio. Thanks to PopPop and Steve for putting it together. We only made a ton of noise trying to get it upstairs to hide it before their birthday.

I have started the tradition with the kids that on the actual day of their birthday, I get them a little cake of their own and we sing just to them. For the past 3 years, they have had a mutual party but their day was celebrated separately.Thanks to Grammy and PopPop for running around looking for the perfect cake!!! Saved this stressed out mom 1 less task!

The day of the party with everyone there was fun. We all had a great time and I was actually able to relax and enjoy the event!

A day in the life of a working mom

2009-05-14T14:27:00.001-07:00

OK, I was thinking back on my day I had this past Tuesday. Whew! Just another day in the life of a working mom. It wasn't a lot but here it is:
Wake up at 6am and go to work all day.
Leave work and get home to 2 ramped up kids excited to see me! Which of course is the best part of the day.
Once home, the kids are quick to tell me that there is a DEAD rat in the kiddie pool! Lovely!
Get a bucket from the garage and have the dead rat float into the bucket. There is NO way I am touching this thing.
Dump the dead rat into a trash bag and quickly throw him in the trash. The whole time I am listening to Brooke as if she can see it.
Dispose of the dead rat, get the kids back into the house and get their shoes on.
We are now off to the store because the pastor of the church is coming over and I want to have some cookies and goodies to munch on while he is there.
Race through the store in the cart that has the car attached in the front. Stop a few times to tell the kids to stop yelling and fighting with each other or I will remove them from the car.
Get checked out of the store, kids loaded back into the car, get home, unload the kids, get the groceries unloaded and put the kids up to the table for dinner.
Feed the kids dinner, get them cleaned up and out back playing so I can straighten up the house and backyard a bit.
While I am doing all of this, I turn the oven on and throw some chocolate cookies on a sheet to bake in the oven and put the rest of the goodies on a serving platter.
At 7pm on the dot, the pastor and Carlos show up to the house. Welcome them into the house, get them some water, take the cookies out of the oven, get the kids in the house and sit down. Steve gets home from work and is there to help. Whew!
We sit and talk with the pastor and he leaves around 9:45pm.
10pm - Fall into bed and pass out! Gotta get some beauty sleep so I can get up and start the process over tomorrow!

This One's for you La La!!

2009-05-07T11:43:00.000-07:00

Our little LaLa likes monkeys and elephants. For this year's birthday party, we are going to have a monkey party for her and a Thomas party for Kyle. I needed to change the background and get Easter off of here since we are in May now. I found the monkeys and just coulnd't resist.

Well, the flu/cold bug is still at our house. Kyle has now come down with it. Poor little guy has this aweful cough. As a mom it's so hardd for me to see them suffer or be in pain. Hopefully he will bounce back soon.

That's it for now.

Pre-School Bound

2009-04-24T14:23:00.000-07:00

Well, it's official. Brooke and Kyle will be starting pre-school at Ontario Christian starting in August. We took them down on the Friday before Easter to check out the school and to look around. We got the paperwork and I just turned it all in. They will actually be placed in the 4 year old room and they will be placed together. I am so excited for them. They were excited to look around. We showed them that they would have their own cubbie where they would place their things and they would be able to meet new friends and learn. The school even has mini toilets and lowered sinks. It was too cute.

The only thing now is to turn in the pastor form and the doctor papers. Yes, you read that correctly, the PASTOR form. The Bierbaum Family is now a member of Grace Fellowship of Alta Loma. We went to church this past Sunday. It was actually pretty nice. I found the gentleman who married us and this is the church where he works. The kids were able to go with his wife and play back in the rooms while we sat there. I am thinking I am going to have to get the "cliff note" version of the Bible. Pator Roy kept referencing it and I have to admitt, I have never read it. Perhaps we will have to learn right along with the kids. The church is a very small church and there were only like 15 people in there. They all seem like nice people and the kids and I will be going again on Sunday. Steve is working for the next 4 Sundays in a row. When Janet called and tried to get ahold of me, her son jason jokingly told her we were at church. She about passed out when I told her he was correct.

Anyhow, that's where we are at right now. I am looking forward to summer getting here and having the time off. I am ready for some cocktails and bathing suit time.

Potty Training Boot Camp!

2009-04-24T14:00:00.000-07:00

Friday, April 17th
Kids are informed that as of tomorrow, they will NO longer be wearing diapers during the day. They seem OK with what I am telling them. However, I am guessing they had NO clue as to what I was telling them.

Saturday, April 18th
The kids get up around 7am and I again tell them that they are NO longer wearing diapers during the day. Brooke tells me that she doesn't want to wear underwear. TOO BAD! Potty Training Boot Camp has officially started!

I did some research a bit earlier in the week and found a wonderful little ebook online. It's from the potty training expert. It basically prepares the parent/adult who is going to do the potty training and it has the child going to the bathroom every 20 minutes. You set a timer and when it goes off, the child knows. I am here to tell you, this method TOTALLY worked for us. I came down and set the timer and every 20 minutes, the kids were on the potty. At first I gave them a teddy graham if they sat on the potty and a fruit chew if they actually went pee in the potty in addition to a sticker on their chart. At one point, I gave them a small container of cranraspberry juice. BAD IDEA! From about 10am - 11am, I was chasing pee pee EVERYWHERE! It was nightmare. Once we got rid of that, we had lunch and I put both of them down for a nap. At this point, Brooke was telling me that she had to go to the bathroom. Low and behold, they both made it through naptime without peeing in their underwear. Things definitely were awesome after naptime. I actually even took them to Target to get another toilet seat adapter for Kyle for upstairs. I set my phone for 20 minutes and by this point, they totally know when the timer goes off that it's potty time and they even yell it.

I am so surprised that the kids are so good at this and that it is so much easier than I had anticipated. I think I made this potty training thing out to be a monsterous task and was just not quite up for it until now. My main motivator was the kids going to school this next fall. In order for the kids to go to pre-school, they have to be potty trained.

Sunday, April 19th
Steve comes home from work and is amazed that the kids are doing so well with using the potty. We go the ENTIRE day without an accident and Brooke is telling us quite frequently that she has to go potty. Again, we venture out to Costco with the entire family and again we set the cellphone. We do our major shopping trip and don't have any accidents. We are religious with the 20 minute deal and the kids are doing really well. What a breeze!

We are now on day 7 of potty training and it is still going really well. I still put a diaper on the kids during the nighttime but they are already to the point that they want NOTHING to do with a diaper. They actually cried the other night because we put diapers on them. I am so glad this was not the monsterous task I was making it out to be. Brooke is actually doing so well that the other night I was on the phone with my girlfriend getting a salad recipe when I heard her come back up the stairs telling me that she went pee pee. Here she is in her Thomas shirt with nothing else on coming up the stairs. She knew she had to go so she went downstairs, took off her pants and undies and sat up on the toilet all by herself. These 2 never cease to amaze me. We couldn't be more proud of them. They are growing up so fast right before our eyes!

Happy Easter

2009-04-24T13:43:00.000-07:00

A few days before Easter, Brookie got sick from God only knows what. I came home from the cruise on Thursday afternoon and that night I actually had a mommy 1st, my daughter threw up on me....2 times! Oh the smell! Good times! She made it threw the next day OK but had some MAJOR runny diapers. On Saturday morning while she was sitting at the breakfast table, WHAMO! Projectile. Nice breakfast for the in laws to see. That afternoon, after calling the nurse line, I took her to urgent care on their recommendation. She had been acting a bit better so on a whim, I decided to swing by the mall on the way home and have them both sit on the Easter Bunny's lap. From last year to this year, what a difference. They look so big with the Easter bunny. Of course Kyle is smiling and Brooke sort of has this half smile. I'll give it to her that she was not feeling 100%. It's still a cute picture though.

Easter was Sunday and the kids had a blast and I had a blast watching them. When they woke up, they had Easter baskets from Grammy waiting from them. I told them the Easter bunny had delivered them from Grammy and Pop Pop. After they opened those up, Steve had come home by then and we let them come downstairs and find their baskets from us in addition to finding the real eggs. We had decorated them on Friday and told them that we were going to leave them out so the Easter bunny could hide them in the house. We had a ton of eggs. We decorated 16 of them and then I stuffed 30-40 plastic eggs for them to have an Easter egg hunt outside with. Steve gave them their buckets and told them to run around and pick them all up. Kyle had been a champ that morning finding all of the real eggs. This time it was Brooke to take the lead and she won by collecting a lot. Uncle Dave made the most appropriate comment stating she was preparing herself for shopping since she found all of the ones with money in them. I had stuffed a lot of them with candy so we let them have a few pieces but mean mommy took the rest to work. Watching the kids on sugar is funny. Talk about hyper.

Steve's parents were in town so everyone came over and we had a BBQ. It was a fun day topped off with a little Wii at the end. The day flew by and it was a nice ending to my spring break. I will have to post more pictures of Easter and the Easter egg hunt.

Spring Break

2009-04-04T19:15:00.000-07:00

Whoo Hoo! Spring Break is finally here and I am outta here. No more teachers, no more books, no more.....ANYTHING!!! Steve got my girlfriend and I a carnival cruise for Christmas and it's finally time to go! It's a four night trip down to Ensenada Mexico and back. Let's hope the banditos will leave us along long enough to let us get off the boat and get our drunk on at Whosongs and Papas and Beer. If not, we are bringing plenty of stashed liquor in a luggage and I'm sure we can find a way to terrorize the discotec!

Steve's parents are also coming in tomorrow for a visit. We will celebrate Easter when I get back. I of course was running around like a chicken yesterday getting all the easter basket stuff together so when I get back and am going through withdrawl, I will have everything here. We are going to decorate Easter eggs and stuff the plastic ones with tons of goodies. They are going to love the ones with pennies in them. They just love money!!

Also in the works is to visit a pre-school. I am ready for the kids to move on from a nanny. It's a huge long story but I just LOVE my iPhone. There is a program that allows me to monitor the house and I have 3 cameras set up and I can check in whenever I want to from my phone. I love it and it's been a huge eye opener. Funny! Steve turns them off when he is home!

The kids are coming along so wonderful. Kyle already knows his entire alphabet in the uppercase. I made a poster board that hangs on the pantry door which states the letter of the week, number of the week, shape of the week and color of the week. Both kids already know all of their shapes, even a pentagon. They also already know all of their colors. I went to this teacher store and got them all these cool learning games and flash cards and have even made quite a few games myself for them. They are eating it up and want to play "games" all the time. I made the alphabet on clothespins. I took my hot glue gun to Parent Teacher Conference night at work and I sat there and hot glued. Let me tell you what a kid magnet I was with the little ones. I work at a high school so the big kids could've cared less what I was doing. Anyhow, the kids take the clothespin alphabet letter and pin it to the correct lamenated card. They love it and I am excited that they are so excited to learn.

Well, I am going to put the finished touches on my packing and CRANK the tunes cuz I am OUTTA HERE! VIVA MEXICO!

Happy St. Pats Day

2009-03-18T14:24:00.000-07:00

Happy St. Patricks Day. I just couldn't resist getting t-shirts for the kids. Steve was nice enough to take a picture and send it to me at work. I wore little head bangers that day and my green shirt. I made cupcakes and of course Kyle was in heaven since they were GREEN. Green is his favorite color and everything he asks for has to be green. St. Pats Day was right up his street!
I did however flake on the dinner part though. We had burritos. It's a new Irish meal. With the last name of Bierbaum no one thinks I'm Irish. YUP!! Although I don't like Irish Whiskey. Oh well! The thing that I think both Steve and I thought about on this day was that exactly 2 years ago, we were boarding a plane and flying to Russia to pick up our babies. Now, they are wearing cute little t-shirts! Gives me warm fuzzies. I can't believe it's been 2 years already. My how time flies!

I have one of those kids....

2009-01-11T20:41:00.000-08:00

Like the post title says, I have one of THOSE kids who likes to shove things up their noses!!! Yup! The kids were finishing up their dinner the other night and were eating the rest of their raisens. Brooke told me that it was stuck. I look over and she has her finger up her nose. At this point, I am a bit confused. I just simply told her to take her finger out. I then told her to not put her finger up her nose at the table. I walk over to her and she is still telling me that it's stuck and once I am near here she is nasely. I look at her again and she tells me that the RAISEN is stuck. OMG! I tilt her head back and there it is....a raisen stuck in her nose. I plug the opposite side of her nose and tell her to blow really hard. She actually does it and the raisen goes flying. The funny thing is, she looks at me and says, "thank you mommy." I then lecture here about shoving things up her nose. Good God!!! Motherhood is definitely NOT boring. There is never a dull moment with these two!!

Merry Christmas

2009-01-10T20:30:00.000-08:00

Oh what a wonderful Christmas. It was a picture perfect morning AND snow decided to fall. It couldn't have been better. Well, I could've won the lotto!! Anyhow, it was a very great morning and we were so glad to be spending it at my parents house. My sister and her husband came over on Christmas Eve and stayed all the way through the weekend. We had so much family fun it was great! After the entire morning was done and we had some breakfast, we decided to pack up and head over to the sledding hill. The snow that was coming down was huge and WET! Everyone went but Steve and Grammy. We had a snowball fight, sledding down the hill and lots of laughs! Here are some pictures:

I took so many pictures and video that I put a mini little 20 minute video together of just our stay up in Bellevue. I think the video and the songs I put on there are like my Hallmark card. I had just such a great time with my family. It was definitely a Christmas to remember. The kids were able to make a snowman with Pop Pop in the backyard, sit in front of a roaring fireplace and watch the train "choo choo" around the Christmas tree.

Leavenworth

2009-01-10T19:22:00.000-08:00

We flew into Seattle on December 18th. Thank God since it had snowed the night before and that town doens't know what to do when it snows. Our flight was 3 hours late. Good times in the airport with TWO 2 yr olds. We got to Grammy and Pop Pops house at 11:30pm.

The next morning which was Friday, we loaded up mom's car and headed over Stevens Pass to a small Bavarian town called Leavenworth. I have always wanted to see the lighting ceremony. I was super excited since it had started to snow a week before we got there. It was going to be much colder than we were all used to. By the time we pulled in to town around 2:30pm, it was a whopping 15 degrees. We hit the starbucks and checked into our hotel. It was in a super location as it was right across the street from the lighting ceremony AND the sledding hill. We dumped off our stuff in the room, dressed the kids in their warm clothes and we headed out with our sleds.The lighting ceremony wasn't until Saturday night so we had the rest of Friday to goof around.

We got over to the sledding hill and of course Brooke loved it. Kyle was OK with it and went a few times. He was more interested in playing on a snow hill. It didn't take Brooke long before she was asking to do it all by herself. Our little daredevil.

After awhile of sledding, we decided to take the kids back over to the hotel to warm them up in front of the lobby fireplace. The kids have never had hot chocolate before so we decided to let them try it. They liked it. So they sat in front of the fire and had hot cocoa.After a little warm up, we headed next door to have some pizza. I loved it when I asked the waitress what type of wine they had and she told me they had a "chardonaid." Love it...I'll take a glass. I swear when we walked out of the pizza joint to walk next door the air was so cold it hurt my lungs to breathe. What a SoCal whimp!!

The next morning we got up, had some breakfast and headed back out to the sledding hill and to play in the snow. After awhile, we decided to go into this tent. Well it had some spiced hot red wine called Gluwein. It was pretty good. It was super cute while we were in there, Kyle found his breath. I could see him out of the corner of my eye playing with his breath so I of course grabbed the camera to start filming. It's so fun to experience those firsts with the kids. While we were in there, we heard this calling. We had no idea what it was so we looked at one of the guys that was in there working. He told us it meant Santa was coming. We quickly dressed the kids back into their warm clothes and headed back over to the gazebo where everything was happening. It was perfect. There weren't a lot of people there yet so the kids got to see Santa, Father Christmas, St. Nick, Frosty, Rudolph, etc. We got pictures with all of them.I could go on forever about the weekend and this would be the longest post yet!!
The lighting ceremony was that night. WOW! Mother Nature picked a grand time to be freezing. It was in the low single digits and it was COLD! Everyone gathered around the gazebo and the streets right there and one by one, they turned on the lights while singing silent night. It was really cool to see the entire town lit up.
Needless to say, after the ceremony, we left to go get warmed up.

Our other eventful thing was that we went on a sleighride. Talk about cold! About 10 minutes into it and my feet were freezing. We went on the dinner sleighride so our ride was about 25 minutes or so and then we came back to eat dinner at the lodge. It was fun.

It was so quiet while we were out there in the woods and of course we all had to sing jingle bells! It was very beautiful being out there with all of the snow covered trees...it was just COLD!!! We stopped by a fire when we were almost done and got some hot cider. I basically wanted to stick my feet in the fire they were so cold. The kids won't remember it but it was a fun family outing.

The next day was Monday and we were headed back to Bellevue for the rest of the trip to stay with my parents. I just couldn't believe how much snow was there. I was hoping for a white christmas.

Christmas Tree Farm

2008-12-06T13:31:00.000-08:00

Steve found out this year that there is a Christmas tree farm 10 minutes from our house. Who knew?? I would never have guessed there'd be something like that down here with the hot weather. We decided to go and check it out.

As I mentioned before, I was really on top of things this year and had things planned out. I really should have posted this before the xmas picture post. This was a VERY busy Saturday. Steve got home from work, I fed the kids, got them dressed and we headed out the door. We must have walked around for an hour before we found a tree we could agree upon. Many of the ones we liked were already sold. the cool thing about this place is that you can go earlier, pick out your tree and then come back and pick it up. This is what we will be doing next year.

We took the kids' reindeer ears with us. They lasted through the picture I took of them at the entrance of the tree farm. I didn't want to carry them around in addition to trying to carry a child. I put one set on my head and gave the other set to Steve. He was a sport and put them on. From then on out, everyone who walked past us called us the "Reindeer Family." Guess we could be called worse.

We finally found the perfect tree for us. Steve and Kyle went back to get someone to cut it down. He was a young college kid. He was really good with the kids. He asked them if they wanted to help cut down the tree. Of course it took Brooke about a nano second to fly under the tree with this guy. He had her put her hand on the saw and she got to help. He carried it back to where the car was, they wrapped it up and they put it on the car.

Once we had the tree home and up, it filled the house with that wonderful tree smell. A few bugs too but hey! This was such a great place. What a great way to get in the seaon.

Christmas Pictures

2008-12-06T12:38:00.000-08:00

I was soooo on top of things this year. I planned out our Santa picture and the kids' photo. We took our Santa picture the night before Thanksgiving and that Saturday, I had made an appointment for our Christmas picture. I decided to put Steve and I in it this year. I again armed myself with my favorite bribery tool of fruit chews and we headed out the door. We were so proud of the kids. They did so well and it wasn't like last year when Kyle was afraid of the set. We went to Kiddie Kandids and they do such a great job with the kids.

I again told Kyle that if was a good boy and smiled, I would give him some fruit chews. Worked like a charm. Bad mommy!! We got some really good pictures. The family picture turned into our Christmas card.

Steve and I still can't believe how old the kids look. With Kyle standing the way he is next to Brooke with his arm resting on the chair, he is just so much older looking. He just cracks me up. The poor guy did a GREAT job for a kid who hadn't pooped in a few days and was backed up like NO tomorrow. We worried for not. Our little flirty ham did a great job and Brooke is actually smiling more for pictures.

Santa

2008-12-06T12:26:00.000-08:00

Well, Christmas is finally upon us. Where has this year gone??? I didn't help the issue by taking the kids to see Santa the night before Thanksgiving. It was much easier since there is NO line. We just walk right up and they can take lots of time with us since no one is behind us. Perhaps I shouldn't be posting this idea online.

So, we got home from the beach, unloaded the motorhome, and put the kids down for a nap. I ran around to get the last minute outfit accessories for the picture. Once they were up, we fed them and raced up to Santa. Of course, I brought the bribery again. Yes, I have stooped to that level to get a good picture. I shoved some fruit chews in my purse and off we went.

The kids were all dressed in their Christmas outfits and just looked adorable. We walked up and the first thing Kyle says is, "no want to." I then told him that if he went to sit on Santa's lap and didn't cry, I would give him some fruit chews. Worked like a charm. He also gave Santa a hug at the end. Well, perhaps Santa helped by giving him a sucker. Kyle should have a shirt that says, "WILL WORK FOR FOOD."

The kids are looking so much older. I just can't believe it. We took them over to have some pictures taken in front of the tree but getting them to both look at the camera is like hearding cats. I felt lucky to get this cute Santa pix. Although, the Easter picture with Kyle screaming is actually pretty funny. My girlfriend put it in a frame at her cabin in Arrowhead.

Hope everyone is catching the spirit of the Season!!

Sesame Street Live

2008-11-20T11:05:00.000-08:00

Steve finally made it home yesterday around 2pm and we were able to make it to the Sesame Street Live show. It was right down the street at the Citizens Bank Arena which is across from Ontario Mills mall. We got their early not knowing what to expect. I was so excited for the kids to see it. I was also very excited to be out as a family again.

We pulled in, got a pretty good parking spot and walked up to will call to get our tickets. I had just purchased them online hours beforehand. Kyle was very fascinated with the lights that were going on. We got the tickets and were on our way in. In my mind, I was thinking we are here early enough, I want to find some T-shirts or mementos for the kids. Steve is talking to me and all of a sudden I see the booth. I have a one track mind at this point and Steve just looks at me and says, "FOCUS!" Oops. He wanted to know where we were supposed to go for seats. yeah, yeah, yeah! Section 109. We ended up getting the kids these Elmo light things and some T-shirts. Once those were purchased, we got to our seats.

Once we got to our seats, we changed the kids into their shirts. Here are some pictures:
You can see from the picture the little light up Elmo stick we bought for them. These are the only pictures that we got. I figured it would be like any concert where you can't take your camera in. NOPE! Everyone had cameras. Guess the next time I will bring it. I just thought they would make me take it out once they checked the diaper bag. Silly mommy.

Once the show started, the kids were in total awe of the entire thing. Kyle was really good about clapping and singing along. Brooke just sort of stared at the show. She and Kyle both always want to touch everything. I asked her who was on stage and she said Bert. Then she asked, "can I touch him." I told her we couldn't and she was OK with it. The show lasted for about an hour and a half. They did really good lasting almost an hour past their bedtime. I had so much fun watching them watch the show. It was such a great family night out. Something that just really gives you warm fuzzies and makes you appreciate how much you love your family.

So, the night ended wonderfully. We only had a 10 minute drive home and the kids had a great time. Can't wait for the next one which by the way is in February with a Thomas show. Can you guess who'll be bringing their camera???!!!

Daddy & Kyle flying a kite

2008-11-19T10:16:00.000-08:00

When were up in Oregon this past summer on the coast, I went to a kite shop and bought this HUGE airplane kite since Kyle loves airplanes so much. Of course, we went to the beach and there was NO breeze. It was gorgeous for us but not so good for the kite flying. We ended up not flying that darn thing at all while in Oregon. We went to Huntington Beach a few weeks ago and we took the kite. I had previously asked the guy at the kite store if I was going to need an engineer degree to fly the thing. He said, "nope! just chuck it up in the air." Well, he was right. It was pretty easy. Here are some pictures:

However, I must admit that the wind decided to change a bit and the airplane kite decided to nose dive into the sand. We tried to get it back up but it kept nose diving into the sand. Poor Brooke was standing there and it almost hit her so of course she wanted nothing to do with the kite after that. She just kept telling me, "no like it mommy." She wanted to $2 Thomas kite. We knew that one would not stand up to the heavy wind though. It was fun. I always enjoy family time at the beach. Can't wait until we go again next week.

California Wildfires

2008-11-19T10:08:00.000-08:00

Well, California is once again on fire. I think they are now finally out but last Saturday morning, things were a bit crazy here in the southland. Steve was recalled Thursday night and we have not seen him since. We were able to go down and visit with him one night for a few hours. All the guys were so exhausted. The kids and I miss him like crazy. When we went down there, Brooke who is usually a mommy's girl, was definitely a daddy's girl that night. She only wanted him to hold her hand. We ended up taking the kids to the Rainforest Cafe and they loved it. We were a little worried about Kyle being afraid but he did great. We took off about 8pm and Steve was able to go back to a hotel and sleep in a real bed. We are hoping he can come home sometime later on tonight. We were supposed to take the kids to see Sesame Street Live tonight but I was able to cancel the tickets and get a refund. We wanted to do it as a family. I got us some great tickets to see Thomas the Engine in February.

I am on the countdown to Thanksgiving. For the first time since starting with my district 14 years ago, we have the entire week of Thanksgiving off. We made plans back in August to go out to the beach for 4 of those days. We are now going for 3 since Steve took a shift on Thanksgiving so a guy would work his Christmas Eve. The kids and I are going to go to Auntie Janets house. It'll be better than the mac n cheese we had last year. I am in charge of sweet potatoes for 32 people. YIKES!!

Hope everyone is doing great. I can't believe the holidays are upon us. I am curious to see how much the kids understand this year.

1st Pony Ride

2008-10-31T09:22:00.000-07:00

We went to the Pomona Fairgrounds the other day to the RV show and they had a free pony ride station. Steve had gone off to look at something so I decided to see if the kids would ride the horses. Of course Brooke walks right up to the place and wants on...Kyle, he stands back and tells me, "no like it mommy." So, Brooke got on and rode the horse and Kyle stood back with me.

It was sort of funny afterwards. I was trying to put the monkey "leash" back on Brooke and all of a sudden, the horse starts to go pee pee. Well, it was splattering since the horses were on cement. I grabbed Brooke and told her to move back since the horsey was going pee pee. Well, I regret telling her that. The rest of the afternoon was spent by her telling me what the horse had done. We were walking through a motorhome with a sales guy and she looks at me and tells me, "horsey go pee pee mommy." After about the 100th time, I decided to ignore her to see if she would stop staying it. She finally did. However, it did come up the next day in conversation...somehow....who knows! Gotta love what kids remember!!!

HAPPY HALLOWEEN

2008-10-31T09:11:00.000-07:00

Well, life has just been sort of humming along. I can't believe today is already Halloween. The house is all decorated and we are ready to scare the neighborhood kids. I really don't know how our kids are going to do. Kyle is not really sure about all of this Halloween stuff and is always telling me it's scarey. I have been telling Brooke that it's fake and not real so she will turn around and tell me, "it's fake mommy." Anyhow, we got their costumes awhile ago and Brooke is going to be an elephant and Kyle is going to be a dragon. We were having a hard time getting Kyle to actually try on a costume. He refused to do it. I bought him a costume with green on it since it's his favorite color. He liked it and they both actually put them on the other night and had their pictures taken at Sears.
It turned out really cute. I didn't know if Kyle was going to put the costume on or not so I brought an arsenal of "treats" with me to bribe him. I have never done this before but I really wanted the picture. Bad mommy! Anyhow, I only gave them fruit chews since they were soooo good. I was so happy and couldn't stop telling Kyle how proud of him I was. Hopefully tonight will go well and they will have fun and not have the crap scared out of the.

Diva in Training!

2008-08-20T20:34:00.000-07:00

Well, we all think it's really funny now but like the title stated, I swear Brooke is going to be a Diva. Especially if Auntie Janet has anything to say about it. Here is a picture of her at Auntie J's house in her bathing suit that she got for her birthday and her sunglasses. I'm surprised she didn't want her purse and cellphone! She's a pretty smart cookie though. I was putting watermelon in her bowl tonight after dinner and she counted the pieces as I placed them in her bowl. She went all the way to 10 all by herself with no help from mommy or Kyle. Pretty good for a kid who just turned 2 a few months ago. Kyle is a smarty pants too. Before he was even 2, he knew about half of the alphabet. I would have to venture to guess now that he has about 3/4 of it down now. Whenever we are out somewhere, he always points out all of the letters that he sees. I love it when he can give me the letter AND the color! What can I say....I'm a proud momma!

Kites

2008-08-20T20:26:00.000-07:00

I have to post this funny story about Kyle. At the beginning of the month, we had the carpets cleaned so we moved all of the furniture out of the family room so the carpet guy could clean that entire room. Well, Kyle got up early that morning as usual. He is sitting on the carpet in the middle of the room with himself and this airplane kite that I bought him when we were on the Oregon coast. From the picture, you can tell that it's not small. When I bought the darn thing, I asked the guy if we had to be an engineer to fly the darn thing. Anyhow, I am trying to get out the door to go to work and Steve is just arriving home from work. What I didn't realize

was that the cat was in there trying to play with the tail on this kite. This was upsetting Kyle and making him cry. I told Kyle to tell the kitty cat NO. So I would hear him tell the cat no. Well, all of a sudden, the cat comes running out from wherever, grabs ahold of the tail of this kite in his mouth and takes of with the kite. Kyle is hysterical. The cat runs to the kitchen with the kite, the kite gets stuck between the highchairs and the sofa that has been moved in there because of the carpets being cleaned. I am trying my best not to laugh all the while Kyle is yelling NO to the cat and telling me that the kite is broken. Thank God. The kite is no broken. Good thing as we haven't even be able to get that thing in the air yet. Whole nother story there! Thought I would pass that along. Kids! Gotta love 'em!

Thomas the Train

2008-08-20T20:16:00.001-07:00

OK, so we are now ALL about Thomas the Train in our household. Kyle is officially obsessed with the trains. He wakes up in the morning and says, "Kyle play choo choo." He would play with it all day if we let him. It's cute too, this morning, Brooke went by the train table and said, "Choo night night." It was a great investement and I'm glad we got it. Mommy already wants to build another track for the kids. Perhaps I like it as much as they do! I already have plans for what I want to get them for Christmas! Trains of course!!!
Kyle has also figured out that if he brings the ball over to the table, he can sit on it and he will be chest high to the table. Smart kid! The kids are too funny on what they come up with.

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

All Aboard!!

2008-08-17T10:30:00.000-07:00

This weekend has been ALL about trains! The kids and I went up to Victoria Gardens on Saturday to ride on the train up there. When we got there at 10:45am, it wasn't there yet. So, mommy had to tell a white lie and tell the kids that the train was still sleeping and he would be here in a little bit. We used out time wisely and Auntie Janet would be proud. We went to the Brighton store. The kids did great as the woman there gave them a cookie. Everyone was happy!! So, back to the train weekend. We went back to the train and it was there. I was really nervous that we would get up there and Kyle wouldn't want to go on the darn thing. He was a bit nervous at first but once I picked him up and we got in the car toghther, he was fine. It goes around this little area twice. We had a good time.
After the train right we decided to go up to the Thomas the Train store. We played in there until it was naptime AND of course, Kyle stunk up the place with his diaper. We headed home for our nap and while the kids were sleeping, I decided to get online and start looking at Thomas the train stuff. My mind was made up! We were going to head down to the store after naptime and get a Thomas table. So after about an hour in the Thomas isle and speaking to a very nice lady and her family, we were out the store with $$$ worth of Thomas the Train stuff! YUP! I will officially say it! The kids are spoiled! I had a lot of fun doing this with them.

As of this morning, Kyle has been playing with this Thomas the Train since about 8:30am and it is now almost 11am!!! He loves it! I am so glad that I got it. Brooke likes it too it's just her attention span is much shorter than his! We have officially entered the world of Thomas!

1st Ferry Boat Ride

2008-08-11T20:55:00.000-07:00

While in Seattle, we decided to take a ferry boat ride up to the San Juan Islands. We drove to Anacortes which is about 1.5 hrs from Bellevue. From there, we walked on to the boat and took an hour ride up to Friday Harbor. We packed a picnic lunch and ate on the boat. The kids did really well. I love the fact that we can throw anything at them and they just go with the flow. Our entire plan, entirely thought up by Pop Pop, was to go up and get an ice cream cone in Friday Harbor and then come back. The weather was awesome and we could have stayed longer but the next ferry wasn't for 4 hours. Friday Harbor is a very cute quaint town but to walk around for 4 hours, too much especially with 2 2yr olds. We decided after our ice cream to walk over to the docks. We were over by where they sell fish and there was a harbor seal. Poor thing was missing an eye. The kids were waving to him. He was definitely not hurting for food. he must have weighed a ton.I wanna say his name was Seymour. We didn't stay long and it was time to head back to the boat. It was a short stay but we decided we would come back and have more time and stay for the weekend.

A Day at the Lake

2008-08-10T23:13:00.000-07:00

The weather was so nice in Seattle. At times it was even too hot! It was the humidity. My parent live about 10 minutes from Idylwild park which is right on Lake Sammamish. Steve and I went down there after the kids got up from their nap. Grammy and Pop Pop took aunt Kaye to the airport and met us there. What a great time!

Make a Smilebox scrapbook

All that great weather makes me want to move up there tomorrow. I would however have to have air conditioning. Global warming is making that place HOT!

Happy 4th of July

2008-08-10T22:02:00.000-07:00

I am behind and Lord! don't I know it. What else is new?!! Anyhow, the 4th of July was spent up in Seattle at my parents house. we were not having a huge party but by the way we decorated, you would've thought we were having a ton of people over. At one point during the day, Steve asked if this was all of the people coming. YUP! It was fun. Mom and I went hog wild at Party City buying decorations and we started hanging them days before. The guys just shook their heads! I brought up my red, white and blue lights from home and we had the backyard lit up like a runway. The poor hummingbirds didn't know what to think. Here we are decorating:
We didn't stop there....oh no! Mom and I had gone to Kohl's and we bought MORE stuff. We got Pop Pop a shirt for the 4th. Much to the boys' surprise...they had the SAME shirt. The were cool about it. i almost went totally overboard, drove out there again and bought uncle jared the same shirt. I think they would have killed me. So the house was decorated, everyone had on their 4th outfits..we were set to go! I even pulled out my Betty Crocker apron and made a 4th cake.It wasn't perfect but it tasted OK. I was the total Nazi that day. Pop Pop wanted to make bratwurst. HELLO! On the 4th of July. Nope! We had hot dogs, hamburgers, potato salad, potato chips, baked beans and you guessed it...apple pie and my cake for desert! ALL American! I am a dork! I loved doing all of this especially now that I am a mom. These are the things I want to pass down to the kids! Traditions and family fun!

I want to also add how smart my son is. When I came downstairs that morning after my wonderful husband let me sleep in, everyone was in the kitchen. Apparently, Kyle went through the ENTIRE 4th of July sign and was able to tell daddy every letter and number. He just turned TWO! Although he has had almost half the alphabet down since before that.

We had a great day playing in the backyard. Uncle Jared and Daddy had too much fun with the t-ball set for the kids. I think they were having more fun than the kids. You'll see the expression of Steve's face from the photos. A few of the balls met their death with the "big kids" playing with them. Side note here, I called the company and they are sending me 5 more balls for FREE. I didn't tell her how they broke. You're all set to go Jared. However, I think I will buy you your own set for Christmas!!

We wound down the day with some cocktails on the back patio. I love my parents backyard. I appreciate it now that I live in CA on a postage stamp lot. It was all lit up and it was a great way to end a great day. Now those of you looking at the picture might think that we turned in at 8pm. Nope! The great thing about Seattle is that it stay light outside pretty late. I would say this picture was taken around 9:30pm. If we could move tomorrow, we would.
More pictures from the day!
BubbleShare: Share photos - Find great Clip Art Images.

Make a Smilebox greeting

Emerald City

2008-07-14T13:50:00.000-07:00

We are now up in Seattle/Bellevue at my parents' house. Steve and I have actually returned from a 6 day trip to Hawaii. It was really great to get away, sleep in, have some cocktails, and eat a meal without having to be a circus clown. We missed them like crazy and called everyday and actually took the laptop so we could video conference with them. The kids had a great week with Grammy and Pop Pop. They had 2 different playdates set up with 2 different kids, have been to the park and the lake. WOW! The kids are popular. Anyhow, they went to the lake on one playdate and they loved it. Brooke apparently did a face plant in the water as she was trying to run out into it. They have had a great time spending some quality time with their grandparents and also their aunt and uncle. Kim and Jared took the kids on Saturday to the Zoo and let them go all day. It makes me very happy that the kids will know them and have fun with them.

The weather here has been really great. My girlfriend Erin and her family came over yesterday to play with the kids. We took the sprinkler out and let the kids run through it naked. It was really cute. Kim and Jared came over and we had a little BBQ. It was a really great day and I went to bed to with warm fuzzies. I would love to live here with family and friends. Hopefully one day in the near future we will.

I will have to upload some more photos of our trip here. The naked sprinkler pixs are too cute.

Lake Shasta

2008-07-14T13:00:00.000-07:00

Here we are at Lake Shasta. The first picture is of Brooke after I told her that it was time to get into her bathing suit and go on the boat. She had her sunglasses that Auntie Janet got for her and her Elmo hat on. She couldn't get out of her PJ's fast enough. The other is Kyle with daddy on the boat learning how to drive. The one with Brooke and I was when we were on our raft out in the water. She resisted at first and then really liked it. The other picture is of the kids on the boat with their lifejackets on. They really liked it but the water was colder than they would have liked. We had to dip them in the water to cool them off. Brooke actually did jump from the boat once but she did not like how cold it was. She did better on the raft when only her legs got wet.

We had a great couple of days there. The kids actually took naps on the boat. Kyle was so tired at one point that he feel asleep next to Steve while he was driving. We had a fun filled 2 days on the boat with the kids. At one point, I was in the back of the boat and just watching the kids play and tickle each other. It almost made me cry. These were the days that I have always waited for...the family times spent with the kids.

Schools Out for SUMMER!

2008-07-14T10:24:00.000-07:00

Summer vacation is finally here. As of June 9th, I was done with the regular school year. I decided to do the first 3 weeks of summer school in order to finish up with the master schedule. I had about a week off before summer school started. Steve's parents came in for his niece's graduation and stayed with us for a few days. Steve also brought the motorhome to sit in front of the house so I had 3 days to pack before we left for a month. We have plans to go to Lake Shasta for a few days and rent a boat. After that, our plans are to head to my parents house and then take off to Hawaii just the 2 of us. After that, we are planning on heading down to Oregon to stay at the beach in Newport. WOW! Sounds like the summer is already over and I will have to go back to work.

Father's Day came and the kids and I went to the fire station to be with daddy and have a BBQ with the other families. I got some shirts for Steve and the kids got him a book that I had made online. It was pictures of just Steve and the kids and I put some quotes in there. I was really happy with the way that it turned out.I figure I can continue my love for scrapbooking but do it online after the kids go to bed. It would be something as opposed to what I am doing now which is nothing!

So it's off for summer and some real good times with the kids.

Airplanes!!!!

2008-05-29T21:34:00.001-07:00

Kyle LOVES airplanes and helicopters. Wherever we are, if he hears one, he will stop what he is doing and yell...AIRPLANE! Since the park is next to a medical place that has helicopters, they fly over the park so he now knows that as well. He can be in the middle of eating, will hear it and yell.

We decided on my day off since we were all home to head down near the Ontario airport and watch the planes come in. We parked in an area where they were pretty low so he could get a good look at them. Here are some pictures from the day:

Happy 2nd Birthday Kyle

2008-05-29T21:21:00.000-07:00

OMG! Kyle is 2 today. I can not believe our "little peanut" is now 2 and he is not our little peanut anymore. He is our chubber whubber sumo wrestler. I can definitely wait until he's 16 since I know he will be eating us out of house and home. He is a tank when it comes to eating!!!

We did the same thing with him tonight that we did with Brooke. I cooked dinner and we had dessert after dinner and sang him happy birthday. He really loved the fact that there was CAKE in the house. He was so fascinated with the candles. He wasn't so sure about blowing them out. I like the fact that we are setting traditions here that I hope will continue on and when they get a bit older, will really come to treasure them.

Here is some video of us singing to our little "boo bear:"

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books
As you can tell from the video, once I leaned the cake in, it wasn't like it took more than a nano second for Kyle to figure out he could open his mouth and sink right in to the cake. We have found his weakness. Cake, cookies and sweets.

Finger Painting

2008-05-29T21:08:00.000-07:00

We spent a week here in California where the weather wasn't so great. It was raining and cold. It was sort of funny. The nanny came and sort of looked at me and said, "all day in the house with the kids." She had this look of doom. All I could think was, "have fun....better you than me...gotta get out the door to work." Oh how mean of me. I decided I would try to get some crafts for the kids so on days like this, they don't have this strong desire to rip the house apart.

We took a fieldtrip down to Michael's and we bought some finger paints. How messy can you get?? We painted some pictures that night and it wasn't too bad. It's totally washable so the clean up wasn't bad. Kyle only tried to eat it once and I was very glad Brooke didn't put her hands in her hair. Here are some pictures from the evening of crafts:
BubbleShare: Share photos - Find great Clip Art Images.

I also took some video:

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books
The kids are really getting to a super cute stage. They come up with the funniest things. Right now, Brooke's saying is, "Ernie poo poo, Elmo poo poo" and then we go through everyone in the family to see if they have poo poo'd.

Our New Trampoline

2008-05-29T20:33:00.001-07:00

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Happy 2nd Birthday Brooke

2008-05-29T20:20:00.001-07:00

I can't believe it! Brooke is 2 years old! We had a family day today and spent it together. We went down near the airport today so Kyle could watch the airplanes come in. He just loves airplanes and helicopters. After that, we went over to Toys R Us since we still needed something for Brooke's birthday. Well, next thing you knew, we had an 8' trampoline in the car and on it's way home. YES! The backyard is full of kids stuff, a little bit of patio furniture but mostly kid stuff. I had originally stated that I wanted to go to dinner somewhere. I decided to cook something and we stayed home. After dinner, we put 2 candles in a cupcake and sang happy birthday to Brooke. She almost was able to blow out the candles. I think it was a very special moment for both Steve and I. Just to have that family time together. It meant more to me than the party we will have on Saturday with some friends over. Here is a video of us singing to her:
Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

My girlfriend Erin sent Brooke some boots that belonged to her daughter. Don't panic Erin, we haven't opened the other gifts yet. We're waiting until Saturday. Anyhow, I told Brooke to put her hand on her hip and give me some attitude. This is what I got: What a little ham. I came home from work the other day and she saw the glasses on my head. She wanted them. I knew if I gave them to her, she would break them. I went to the back, got an old pair, and also gave her an old cellphone. Steve told me I am creating a monster. Here she is: So on this lovely Memorial Day weekend, we celebrated Brooke's 2nd Birthday. I can't believe she is 2.

Happy Mother's Day

2008-05-12T14:10:00.000-07:00

This was a pretty relaxed mother's day this year. Steve was home on Saturday and we spent the day with the kids and us. We went to the park and took the kids down to Toys R Us. In a weak moment, we bought the kids more magnetic letters and numbers. They LOVE those things. Since Steve was home, I used this time to run some errands by myself. I went to Target and did my whole shopping spree there. They mostly see me there with the kids. After I had checked out, a gal who sees me a lot told me happy mother's day. It really hit me this year. I am a mother! I told Steve when I got home how it had hit me. I was officially a mother last mother's day but it wasn't really a reality to me yet. I was thinking last year of the women who gave me their children. They made it possible for me to be a mom. This year, I felt like a mom. Brooke and Kyle have ME as their mom. So the kids and I spent a day together as daddy had to work. We played in the backyard, Brooke and Kyle decided to eat the sand in the sandbox and we took a trip to Bed, Bath and Beyond. I decided to take a nap with the kids so it really was an easy day. After calling my own mom, I was wishing I was up there in Washington seeing as my sister and new brother in law were over at my parents house making brunch. I hate living this far from my family. Hopefully soon, it won't be an issue as we hope to move there in the next 5 years. I would move this summer if we could but not likely! Oh well.

So Happy Mother's day to all of the mothers out there and the mom's to be(I'm shouting that out to you Heather!).

Pool Time

2008-05-01T20:48:00.000-07:00

The weather has been a bit yo-yo lately. I came home from work and it was still around 80 degrees. The kids love the water. I got out the swim diapers, hooked up the hose to the washer's hot water and filled the pool! The kids really got into it and started to rough house in the pool. Take a look at some of the air Brooke can get. My little dare devil.
BubbleShare: Share photos - Play some Online Games.

Summer is Coming!

2008-04-29T19:26:00.000-07:00

Well, this past Friday after work, I took the kids down to Sears. I had really gone to look at vacuums. Well, I had heard on the radio that it was going to be really hot over the weekend. I knew the last time it had climbed to 100 it was miserable. I saw one of those plastic pools out front and decided it was going to come home with us. Gotta love having a Yukon XL. Boy can I pile a bunch of crappola in that thing. Anyhow, I also knew that Steve could not kill it by stabbing it to death. Plus it was also small enough that it could fit on the back patio. The kids are having a blast in it and it kept them cool over the weekend.

Let's Get Ready to RUMBLE!

2008-04-29T19:16:00.000-07:00

OK, so my rough and tumble little girl got a HUGE bruise on her forehead. I felt so bad. It happened while I was at work. I didn't even see it when I got home since her bangs were covering it up. Both kids were in the bathtub that night and I was doing what I always do and wash their hair under the faucet while the tub is filling up. Well, when I put my had across Brooke's forehead, she started to scream bloody murder. I had no idea what was going on.Obviously, once her hair was wet and I took a good look at her I almost fell over. I felt so bad that I hadn't seen it and was a little panicky since the nanny hadn't told me anything either. I picked up my cellphone and called her and my little gymnast was climbing up the slide and fell and hit her head. The reason I sort of panicked was because the bruise was squishy. I was trying to call everyone and NO ONE was home. I ended up talking to my girlfriend Heather and her husband Wes who pulled me off the ceiling. Let's chalk it up to first time mom syndrome. The picture I posted here was a few days old. I had a hard time getting the full effect of the bruise on her head with the flash of the camera. Brooke is going to be the one that takes us to the ER not once but probably numerous times. Guess I should just prepare myself now. It's hard. I just felt bad and a bit guilty.

Potty Time

2008-04-21T20:14:00.000-07:00

Well, back in February I bought a potty at Target.It sings, it has stickers and it has lights and music. You never knew a potty could do so much. Too bad it can't wipe your hiney! Anyhow, Brooke had started to tell me, "Pee Pee". Well, we have had it in their bathroom and I haven't been real serious about potty training. The kids aren't even 2 yet. Trust me, I am not one of those moms ready to go out and tell the world that I have a super baby who can pee early. No way.

Anyhow, there have been some times where the kids have been naked and they have peed. One time I had Brooke on the potty and told her to go before we got into the motorhome shower. She must have sat there for 5 minutes. I put her in the shower and in the process of me getting undressed, I hear her say, "pee pee." Sure enough, urine on the shower floor. Better there than the carpet. A good story on Kyle is that he was standing in the bathroom while I was drying Brooke off afte a bath. I swear to God it scared him cuz the pee shot right out and hit the side of the tub. I just laughed. Not very nice but it was hysterical to see the look of bewilderment on his face.

So here sits the potty in the bathroom. Well, the other night, Kyle hits it out of the park. When i am here by myself with the kids and it's bath night, I leave Kyle on the potty with a book(I swear I am training him to be an old man on the pot with a newspaper!). Thank you very much Erin for the great idea. They can only read those books when they are on the potty. So, Kyle has his..of course...Elmo book about going potty. I take Brooke into the bedroom to get her a diaper and some PJ's. I come back to the bathroom to get Kyle and the floor around the potty is wet. I am a bit confused. I lift him up and there is the pee in the potty. I made such a big deal about it the kid probably thought I was nuts! Needless to say, I picked up the rugs and put them in the wash and got him dressed. Stupid mommy forgot to turn on the potty so the lights, bells and whistles would go off when he went. You'd think I would've learned from that time but I didn't. A few days later, I am again single mommy and I do the exact same thing. Come back and Kyle has done it again. Way to go BOO! Here I bought a $30 potty to not use the best part of it. Here are some pictures of the kids on their potties. I ended up buying another one since they started fighting over the one I had. They both wanted to sit on it at the same time. Go figure.

ELMO

2008-04-21T19:59:00.000-07:00

I have decided that since the kids are a bit nutsy about Elmo, I am going to do their 2nd birthday party in an Elmo theme. I now understand why moms can have selective hearing. The kids and I are in the car the other day headed to wherever and all I can hear from the back seat is, "Elmo, airplane, Elmo, airplane, Elmo, airplane." No wonder I walk around singing kid songs.

Anyhow, I got to stay home with the kids due to childcare issues so I decided to do a trial run of these cupcakes. I got the idea online about making Elmo cupcakes. I thought that would be really cute for the kids to have their own separate cupcake sort of like their own 1st birthday cake. I just really also want to have a small get together and not something really over the top. We can save that until their 16! Anyhow, here is a picture of my cupcakes....the red could be a little redder and the stupid Necco candies only have ONE pair of white in the package. I have to find something else that will work for his eyes. Other than that, i think they turned out really cute. Kyle got up first from his nap so when I brought him downstairs, I showed him the cupcakes. I asked him who it was. He told me, "bucket." HUH? I asked him again and i got the same answer. I was a bit disappointed. I thought, well, they sort of look like Elmo. Brooke gets up awhile later and i do the same thing. I bring her to the cupcakes and ask, who is it baby girl? She says, "Elmo!" Thank God. I am no June Cleaver nor am I Betty Crocker but I thought it would be fun to make the kids these for their birthday. It was a fun day to be with the kids and not be at work.

I took some pictures with the kids and a cupcake. I told them to not touch it until after I took a picture. Brooke listened...Kyle just couldn't wait to dive into it. We did eventually eat it however Brooke didn't want to eat Elmo. She just kept saying, Elmo. I tried to explain that it was a cupcake and that we could eat him. No dice.

Kyle...the wild sleeper

2008-04-21T19:46:00.001-07:00

Who would have ever thought that KYLE would be the one to escape from the crib first. Brooke has been our climber from the get go. Although, she climbed out once in a sleep sack nonetheless and fell pretty hard. We're thinking that she learned pretty good on that one enough to keep her in bed until someone comes for her. Kyle on the other hand has VERY skillfully learned how to climb out of his crib. Fortunate for us, he has yet to get the door handle down. Soooo, this weekend I made a trip to Babies R Us and bought a crib tent. It's basically a tent that goes over his crib but this also has mesh sides to it. Our other problem is that he is like a tornado in his bed. He must do 200 flip flops in there, turn around 15 times and flail around like there's no tomorrow. He has been waking up in the middle of the night and I am pretty sure it was because he had an arm or a leg stuck through the rungs of the crib. Good God!

My main reason for making the trip this weekend was due to the fact that when I went into his room Friday night, as always to tuck him in, I was walking over to the crib and there was NO KYLE! My heart skipped a few beats and with the light on in the hall, there was Kyle in the corner of his room, asleep on the floor. WTF! I run into our room to get Steve who is brushing his teeth and I tell him he has to come NOW. I sort of freak him out a bit but I wanted him to see where HIS son was. He walked in and went straight to the crib as well. I then pointed to him on the floor. We both almost start cracking up. I pick Kyle up and place him in the crib and he stirs a bit but goes right back to sleep. No wonder parenthood gives you grey hair.

So on another night, I go into Kyle's room to tuck him in. Steve and I always do this before we go to bed and put their blankets back on them. Well, I go in there and Kyle has one arm out of his PJ's and the PJ's are up around his neck. He also has one leg sticking through the rungs of the crib. I almost started laughing so hard. Of course I ran to get the camera. I am so surprised the flash going off in the pitch dark didn't wake him up. I took the picture, put his PJ's back on and tucked him in. Here is what I am talking about:

Spring Break

2008-04-20T21:52:00.000-07:00

For Spring Break this year, we decided to fly up to Washington state and visit my family. It has been since September since everyone else has seen the kids. We left on a Friday at the crack of dawn. Oh what fun it is to travel with 2 kids on your lap especially ones that have been up since 4:30 in the morning.

We had such a variety of weather. When we landed, it was a snow/rain mix. Steve and I went out later on that day with a realtor (yes, we are looking for a house up there to buy. Our plan is to move in 5 yrs when Steve retires.) and were out on the Sammamish Plateau and it was full on snowing. Hello! It doesn't snow that much in Seattle let alone in April. A few days later, it was sunny and then when we left it was raining. Go figure! Steve was able to catch a Mariner's game with my dad, sister and brother in law. Grammy and I stayed behind and took the kids to the park and froze our you know what's off. Thank God for the Starbucks before hand. The funny thing is I had just come from a swim meet at school the day before where I was pulling my capri pants up to get some sun since it was in the low 80's. What a drastic change.

On Saturday night, we celebrated my sister in laws 40th birthday. It started to snow again that night but this time it was actually sticking to the ground. We took the kids outside and my little cautious one Kyle did NOT like the snow. He didn't want a lot to do with it. Of course Brooke would have been out there forever. Here are some pictures of the kids in the snow:

We always new that Kyle loved music so we put him up at the piano and he had a blast. He would just be pounding away at the ole ivories.

We had a great week and as usual, it went by too fast. I miss being around my family and I hate the fact that the kids are growing up NOT being around them that much. Family was always so huge when I was growing up. I would move back this summer if it was possible but Steve has 5 more years. We'll be back up there this summer hopefully with some nicer weather.

Easter

2008-04-20T21:29:00.000-07:00

I can't believe I am writing this but it is now our 2nd Easter together. WOW how the time flies. This year the Easter bunny photo wasn't as good. I believe I posted it before. Kyle is crying but oh well. I'm sure Santa is going to be the same way. I'd be surprised if they are both not crying. Anyhow, it was a really great Easter. Unfortunately, Daddy was working but Brooke, Kyle and I headed down to some friend's house in Yorba Linda for the day. It was a really warm day so we brought our bathing suits to go swimming. Of course Auntie Janet spoiled the kids with Easter baskets. I'd brought mine as well. The kids did really well with the eggs. Leslie had put out a bunch of eggs all over the place. Some were really easy for the kids. We hadn't quite started the egg hunt and Kyle was finding the eggs. Les was nice enough to give them these really small baskets and they were off and running with the eggs and putting them in their baskets. Every time Kyle got one, he would turn to me and say, "EGG!" They both looked so cute that day in their Easter outfits. Thanks Auntie J for the dress. Here are some pictures from the day:

The kids are growing up way too fast. I just can't believe how much they have grown. I don't have my little babies anymore. It was a great day with friends and my two little ones. They were spoiled with numerous baskets from mommy and daddy, Grammy Joyce, and Auntie J. They kids are well loved.

Here are my favorite pictures from the day. My small camera decided to break so I grabbed the big one. I always forget what great pictures it take!

MARCH 20TH - Happy 1 year "Gotcha Date"

2008-04-20T20:27:00.000-07:00

Well, it has been one year since a Russian judge granted us the legal parents of Brooke and Kyle. I can not believe it has been a year. So much has happened and they have changed so much. Kyle has gone from a preemie boy who couldn't sit up on his own to walking, running, talking and loving his alphabet letters and airplanes. Brooke has gone from the Orenburg scowl to laughing and smiling all the time and climbing anything she can.

Here are some pictures of them:

Brooke-
referral photo

6 months home

1 Year Home

Kyle -
referral photo(poor guy looks like he has a black eye)

6 months home

1 year home

It has been an awesome ride so far. There are times that I catch myself just looking at them and thinking to myself and wondering how we got sooooo lucky. We have such great kids. I need to add another song to my blog by Rascall Flats. It's called, The Broken Road. It may be about a relationship by I really liken it to infertility and my path towards these beautiful children. Everytime I look at them, "God bless the broken road, that lead my straight to you!"

Brookie and Kyle...Mommy and Daddy love you more than you'll ever know. All the way to the moon and back.

Father & Son

2008-03-19T19:17:00.000-07:00

Kyle is a huge book lover. When daddy is home, he likes to read bedtime stories to the kids. He and Kyle were on the floor the other night when I got this picture. My 2 little boys! I am very blessed to have a "hands on" daddy who likes to get involved. Steve will also roll around the floor with the kids and of course get them wound up before bedtime. Best of all, he helps me out when he is home. Thanks Honey! Remember, it's not babysitting when you're the daddy! :-)

This picture reminds me of my dad. I can still remember him giving my brother and I "horsey rides" in our Kirkland home just like Steve is doing here. These are the best family moments/memories!

Over the hills and through the Woods to Grandmother's House we Go!

2008-03-19T19:07:00.000-07:00

I was in the closet the other night and I was getting out this big suitcase to see if the kids' pac n plays would fit in there. We are traveling to my parents house a week from this Friday. We are going to need something for the kids to sleep in. So Brooke goes over, grabs the carry on suitcase and starts wheeling it around the house. I ask her if she's ready to go to Grammy and Pop Pops and she says "yes." I couldn't resist taking a picture of it. Little does she know how early we are going to have to get up that morning. EEKS! Like 3:30am! Oh well, we'll just have to nap when we get there. Not like we'll be sleeping on the plane with 2 kids in our laps. This will be our last trip where they can do that. They are quickly approaching 2 years old. I can not belive it!!

Easter Bunny

2008-03-12T18:48:00.000-07:00

We were up at Victoria Gardens the other night and at the last minute, I decided to have the kids sit on the Easter Bunny's lap. There was NO one in sight and he was just sitting there bored. He was leaning over the wall, waving at the kids and the kids were waving back. They even blew him kisses. I convinced Steve to have us take the kids up there before we went over to the Adoption Options meeting. The were still happy once we got up there, but once I placed Kyle on the bunny's lap, he had a total melt down and wanted out of there and FAST!!! I told the gal to snap the picture. I still think it's cute and in years to come, Kyle will hate the fact that he cried but that was the moment. I'll post more pictures of Easter but it's not here yet. Once the Easter Bunny comes, I'll post pixs of them finding their baskets.

More Fun Pictures

2008-03-06T21:09:00.001-08:00

Tub Time

2008-02-23T10:41:00.000-08:00

The kids absolutely LOVE to take a bath or a shower. Well, Kyle has just now come around to the whole idea of the shower. We had to get them used to the shower since they have outgrown the baby tub. That's how we bathed them in the motorhome. We were out running errands last night and I made the fatal mistake of telling the kids it was bath night. Well, Kyle then would not keep saying, "tub." We came through the door 15 minutes later and he headed straight for the stairs telling me "tub." I told him we had to eat first. Geez, one track mind. I guess I'm glad they like to bathe. Sure is different from the first few times we tried to do it. Screams and tons of crying!

A funny story that happened while we were in the motorhome home....I had gotten a little training potty for Brooke since she is now saying, "pee pee." I had her sit on it before getting in the shower. She sat on it for about 5 minutes or so. I told her to go pee pee before we got in the shower. Well, nothing! I put her in the shower and then got undressed myself. Next thing I know, she's telling me, PEE PEE and there she is, standing in the shower with pee on the shower floor and down her leg! Lovely! What can you do? I smiled and told her she needed to do it in the potty. Yeah, I'm sure she got that one.

So of course I can't have enough tub time pictures:
BubbleShare: Share photos - Nosara Surfing

Had to edit out the ones that Steve didn't like. I liked the one from the waste up of he and Kyle. He thought they were naked photos on the internet. Can never be too sure who is out there and being GROSS! There you go honey!

My 'lil Mini Me

2008-02-23T10:20:00.000-08:00

Poor Steve thought they broke the mold when they made me. Well, who knew that we would fly half way around the world for our daughter who would be just like ME. Guess it's good and bad news. She is strong willed, pig headed and wants to do stuff herself. Sound like anyone else we know??? Of course my parents LOVE it. When I ask Brooke to say mini-me she says, "mi mi." Steve and I go in every night to open the kids' doors and cover them up with their blankets. When we went in the other night, Brooke had 1 foot sticking out of the blanket. This is of course how I sleep. Steve just shook his head.

The other night after dinner, I sat down on the sofa to read the grocery ads. Brooke came running over to the sofa, climbed up and sat there with the ads that I had already read. It was too funny. It really looked like she was trying to read them. It was a great learning tool too. She and Kyle both were able to look at the pictures and pick out the milk. It was cute.
BubbleShare: Share photos - Find great Clip Art Images.

The Many Faces of Kyle Bierbaum

2008-02-23T09:42:00.000-08:00

BubbleShare: Share photos - Play some Online Games.

Can you tell that I just love this new photo site. Steve took these pictures the other night. The kids are starting to get some pretty expressive facial expression. it's pretty cute. Kyle is so good about smiling for the camera.

Huntington Beach

2008-02-23T09:37:00.000-08:00

We love taking the motorhome to Huntington Beach. It's only an hour away. We feel like we are out for the weekend on vacation but it didn't take us forever to get there. I love the boardwalk that they have. We can take the kids for stroller rides and they can play on the beach. We park in a parking lot so that is the only downside because they don't have sewer hookups. We always have a great time when we are there.

This past time, we took the kids' little cars that they got for Christmas. Kyle was a maniac on his. He was going so fast on it that he actually tipped the car forward and took a header! He then found out that he could make a race track with the pillars in front of the handicap parking. He would race in and out of the pillars, jump up the curb and do the same thing all over again. I think he could have stayed there for 3 hours doing it.

BubbleShare: Share photos - green toy news

Here is video of Kyle on his car:

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

February 21, 2008

2008-02-23T09:20:00.000-08:00

As of this date, the kids have now been with us longer than they were in an orphanage. It's hard to believe that we have been home 11 months. The time has just flown by and the kids seem so old to me. I swear Brooke is almost 21 months going on 5 and Kyle is learning new words everyday! So much for that little guy in the orphanage who was functioning as a 3-4 month old. What happened to my little babies I came home with???!!! Guess they can't stay little forever. Before long I'll be posting pictures of their 2nd birthday!

Our 1 year post adoption report is going to be due soon. We are going to go to an adoption seminar for people who are interested in adoption and speak. We'll bring the kids with us so people can see we appear to be a normal family! LOL! I think Steve and I are on the same page when it comes to the "pay it forward" philosophy. We had some great people we met along the way who helped us so we'd like to do the same for others. So much for not wanting to be the poster child for adoption. i am also going to spearhead getting our district to put adoption language in our contract. No one else should be told that they "didn't have a baby so your leave will be unpaid!" Give me a break. Oh, don't get me started.

ABC'S

2008-02-23T09:11:00.001-08:00

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books
Kyle has learned to sing along to the ABC's. You can make out some of the letters but the rest is just him singing. It was too funny. I was making him breakfast one morning and he started singing it. I was like....WAY TO GO KYLE!!! Brooke is still a bit behind him in the speech department but she is ahead of him in the "scale a counter" department. I am sure I have told many of you that she can climb up the front of the highchair and get herself in. She has been doing that for quite some time now. Our little gymnast! The kids are just growing up so fast. I can't believe it.

Ventura Beach

2008-02-22T21:29:00.000-08:00

We spent one of my 3 day weekends in Ventura Beach, CA in the motorhome. I drove up after work on Friday. Whew! Am I glad I don't have to drive that traffic everyday. It was a great weekend with the sun shining and no clouds. It was a really relaxing weekend. Diva Cindy came by on Saturday with her friend and her kids to meet our kids. Noah was really great with them. She came back later on that night for happy hour and brought her husband. I have seen so many pictures of him in her scrapbooks but have never met the guy. It was a fun evening with chips, salsa, beer and enchiladas! Way to go Diva Cindy!! And by the way, with 2 scrappers there, who had a camera going? Oh that would be NO ONE! Bad scrappers. Don't tell Janet or Robi, we could lose our crowns over it. Well, as long as we don't lose the tangerinis.

We took the kids down to the beach and let them play in the sand. On Sunday, we went down to the Pier where there was better sand and a playground. They had a great time playing on it. We watched the waves roll in and threw rocks out into the water. For lunch, we went up to the pier and had a nice meal. Steve ordered sashimi and Brooke actually ate a piece of tuna. I was surprised. They weren't too much into the fish and more into the chips. I had a salmon sandwich and it was pretty good. After lunch, we headed back to the motorhome so everyone could take a nap. Gotta love a good nap!

The motorhome has become VERY interesting during sleep time. Brooke decided she was going to have a little adventure on Sunday evening. At 4am, she decided she was going to wake up, crawl out of her pack n play and jump into her brothers. I of course hear the shrieks coming through the monitor in the bedroom. I think I said something like, "you've got to be &*%$#@ me! It's 4 o'clock in the morning!" I go out there, put Brooke back in her bed, cover Kyle and Brooke back up and stand there for awhile to make sure they have gone back to bed. Needless to say, I have to walk back out there 2 more times. On my last trip out there, I swung open the door and announced, "someone is going to get their ass fanned!" Took that line from my father! Thank you very much Pop Pop! Of course, there was Brooke, back in Kyle's pack n play lying on top of him. Poor guy probably just wanted to get some sleep. At this point, I decide to sleep on the sofa. It took my til 5am to calm back down and go back to sleep. Oh the fun times of having toddlers! I think my sister said it best when she asked if it was child abuse to use duct tape at 4am.

Here are some pictures of us during our trip:
BubbleShare: Share photos - Find great Clip Art Images.

Must admit, I was cruising around tonight on the internet and found this bubble share site. LOVE IT!!!

Happy Valentine's Day

2008-02-22T21:15:00.001-08:00

This was a really great day. Steve surprised me at work with a boquet of flowers, cards and the kids. It was too funny, one of the students looked at me and said, "your babies are here." I had lots of fun taking them around showing them off. They really loved it when I took them out to PE and they got to see all of the kids playing in the gym. They loved the basketball and climbing on the bleachers. It just really made my day and gave me the warm fuzzies all over.

I headed out of work early so I could stop by the store to pick up some shrimp and some other goodies to really top off the night. I scamble home and Steve has reminded me that some people are going to come by and check out the Lexus that is for sale. At about 5:50pm, I start to cook dinner. The kids are not going to make it much longer. I throw the shrimp on the stove to simmer in butter and garlic and have the steaks on the BBQ. Before this I had put a baked potato in the oven. Well, the kitchen starts to smell burned. I go to open the oven door and it's locked. I look at the digital display and for whatever reason, it now states CLEAN. I have NO idea how I did it but the oven is now on clean and the potato is locked inside. By this time, the kids are going crazy, screaming and climbing up my legs, the dog is whining and barking because he knows that Steve is outside and my potato is in the oven. I swing open the garage door, look at Steve in my best calm voice and tell him I need to see him inside. I tell him the story and tell him I need his help inside. I put the kids the highchairs and start them with the milk. FINALLY, the people leave, they are going to buy the Lexus. Yeah yeah...get out so I can get this dinner going. I put the food on the table, minus the hockey puck potato and we dig in. My steak is still raw, Steve is in the process of spitting something out so I look at him and ask what? Apparently, I never noticed that the shrimp still had the shell on it all the while I was simmering them in butter and garlic. I was so upset by this point, I went to the fridge and poured a glass of wine. At least the potato was out of the oven. Steve manhandled the thing open. Thank god. He asked what was wrong and I told him there wasn't enough pills or boozed to make this evening better.

Now that some time has passed, I can laugh at this story. WOW! I was a wreck that night with that 3 ring circus going on. I just wonder how other women do it. Am I the only one who can't handle all of this stuff going on at once? The gals at work had perfect advice....chicken nuggets and hamburgers next year minus the stress and of course the potato that was locked in the oven!

Here are some pictures of the kids opening up their care package from Grammy Joyce. She is so good to them. I can't wait for them to really understand and appreciate all the great things she does for them. I have now lovingly referred to them as Grammy and Pop Pop. Kyle can actually pick my parents out of a picture. Can't wait for them to see them again. Hopefully they will remember them.
BubbleShare: Share photos - Find great Clip Art Images.

I am trying to get better about posting stuff. This way I don't have to listen to Erin complain! Just kidding scoop! Hey! Where is YOUR blog?! Can't wait to see you too in March. The kids will have a blast playing together.

Christmas Morning

2008-01-26T11:14:00.000-08:00

I was so excited for Christmas this year. I couldn't wait to enjoy it with the kids. They didn't really understand what was going on and all of the present overwhelmed them. It was still fun though. Both sets of grandparents were here so it was a very festive time. Here are some pictures from Christmas Morning.

After we opened up all of the gifts, it was a pretty relaxing day. I was cooking again but it was only for the parents and us. We had so many leftovers from the night before we decided to use up a lot of those. I cooked a prime rib and we had leftovers with it and it was great. It allowed me to sit around in my PJ's for quite some time. Gone are the days that I could lounge all day and wait for MY mom to cook dinner and put out snacks. It's my turn now. That's OK, I enjoy cooking when I have the time.

The rest of the time with my parents went by too quickly. We were up at 4am to take them to the airport on the 28th and then Steve and I and the kids were on our way down to San Diego for the week. It was very relaxing down there. I think the first few nights Steve and I were asleep shortly after the kids went down at 8pm. We were exhausted but it was great to get away. While we were there, I booked plans for NEXT Christmas time already. There is this very cute Bavarian town about 2.5 hours out of Seattle. We are going to stay in a hotel and go on a sleigh ride with the kids in the snow! I'm already super excited. I am such a nut! Maybe we'll even show these Californian kids how to sled.

As for New Year's Eve, we were total loooosers! We were asleep by 10:30pm. Loooosers! It was nice though not to go anywhere but to just hang out, watch a movie and relax. I always feel like I"m running around these days. Some days I even feel like it's in circles!

I hope everyone enjoyed the holiday season.

Our Future Gymnist

2007-12-05T14:34:00.001-08:00

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Brooke & Kyle going down the slide!

2007-12-05T12:23:00.001-08:00

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Photo Printing - Photo Books

Christmas came a little early for Brooke & Kyle

2007-12-03T12:18:00.000-08:00

We finally did it! We broke down and bought the kids a play yard. I always just told Steve we would go to the park that is right around the corner from us. Well, I ate those words. It is going to be soooooo nice to be able to have the kids play in the backyard and mommy can sit on a chair with her coffee in the morning and watch them play. Plus it's going to be much easier on the furniture and should help wear off some of their energy. If I could just bottle some of it up.

We decided where the grass was in the backyard, you know...as big as it is, to rip it up, cap the sprinklers and put down sand. Kyle is going to be in hog heaven. He just loves the sand and dirt. Hopefully he'll want to climb and play on this thing. Brooke is going to have that rock wall down in a week flat! Mark my words. Anyhow, this past Friday, it rained the entire day. No biggie but we decided to cap the 2 drains off as well. Of course I remembered it at work but forgot once I got home with the kids. Wholy crappola. I went out there in the dark, walked straight into "Lake Bierbaum" and tried to pull the caps off so the water would drain. Can I just tell you how cold that water was. Yikes! I'm out there in the mud, sweats pulled up to my knees trying to pull those damn caps off. Well, I can't do it with my bare hands. I go back into the kitchen, grab my jar lid helper, take it back outside and turn the caps off. Glug, Glug, Glug and the water starts to drain next to the patio. Well, not so lucky on the one next to the gate. It plugs up so I just put the cap back on. Nice! Luckily it doesn't rain here much. Guess we'll have to figure something else out for the next time.

So once the play yard is all set up and we're good to go, I'll post pictures but the kids should be able to play on it by tomorrow late afternoon or early Wednesday morning. We are then going to have the sand brought in on the 15th.
Here is a picture of the play yard that went in yesterday. I was so excited yesterday to get home from work and have the kids play on it. There is no sand down...just wet dirt. Oh well. Nothing like being a kid and getting dirty. These are some pictures of the kids on the swings in our enormous backyard(yeah right!)!!!

It's Beginning to Look A Lot Like Christmas....

2007-12-03T12:02:00.000-08:00

I can't believe it is already December. Where or where does the time go? It seems like just yesterday when everyone was telling me how different this next Christmas was going to be with kids. Well....it's here and I just know it's going to be great. We went shopping at Toys R Us the other day and it was fun shopping for them. It is going to be extremely difficult to not go overboard with them and overwhelm them with "stuff." Brooke is actually in the beginning stages of saying Santa. It's really cute. Everything she looks at whether it's an angel, a snowman or a nutcracker...she calls it Santa. Kyle is just so fascinated with all of the lights and decorations. Whenever he goes by something, he makes an "oohhhh" or an "aawww" sound. It's super cute. He's going to go nuts when we take them to Christmas tree lane later on this month.

Since I missed taking the kids up for their pictures for Halloween, I knew I just had to get their Christmas pictures taken. We already did Santa so...CHECK! The pictures though entailed mommy finding Christmas outfits to wear. Yikes! Well, thank you very much Macy's. CHECK! Got the outfits so we were ready to roll. I decided to book an appointment at Kiddie Kandids since my girlfriend and a guy I work with have had such good luck with them. Good thing I got on top of this early. I booked the appointment online and they had NO appointments after Dec. 4th! Wholy cow! Here is the final result:

The gal there worked hard for her paycheck that night. For whatever reason, Kyle started to cry the second we put him up on the staging area. I mean, it wasn't a little whimper...it was a full on get me the hell outta here cry. You would have thought the boogie man was behind there. She finally did get a smile out of him but we were unable to get a picture of the 2 of them together. What really shocked us was the fact that she got Brooke to have a HUGE smile on her face while Kyle was the one crying. Usually it's Brooke with the stone face and Kyle is our little ham. He still is our little ham but he wasn't having any of that picture place. Who knows!

I hope everyone is enjoying the holiday season. I would just love to slow down, enjoy this time with the kids, bake cookies, make a gingerbread house, and sing carols. As cheesy as it sounds, that would be the best Christmas present EVER! It would take me back to when I was young and it was Christmas time at our house. The more and more I get into mommyhood, the more and more I appreciate my mom and how much SHE did. I don't know how she did it but she sure made it look easy. I have some pretty big shoes to follow in and it's tuckering me out! Looking forward to seeing you mom in a few weeks. You are SO helping me with this June Cleaver crap!

Happy Thanksgiving

2007-12-03T11:44:00.000-08:00

Well, hopefully everyone had a great turkey day. Ours was pretty uneventful. Steve went to the fire station and the kids and I stayed home(I think we might have stayed in our pajamas all day)and decorated for Christmas. Well, I decorated and they would play with everything that I took out of the box. I was a really quiet day. I ended up eating mac n cheese for dinner. New Thanksgiving staple.

The night before turkey day, I had a brainstorm of an idea and wanted to take the kids up to the mall to get their picture taken with Santa before the mad dash. I thought no one would be there this early. Well, I was right. No one was there and we walked right up. The kids did great with Santa. They both sat their on his lap. At the end, Kyle started to cry for whatever reason. Steve got him down and I told Brooke to give Santa "a love" and she leaned back into his beard and it was too cute. The picture is dark but it's still cute. Here is the picture of the kids with Santa. We had the picture taken at Victoria Gardens and it is so cool up there right now. They have the Christmas tree and Santa in this main quad area. They have machines up on the roof that make it snow. I thought it was real snow but it turns out it was just bubbles. The effect was still cool though. Made me want to take the kids on a "one horse open sleigh."

So basically, I flew right past Thanksgiving and went straight to Christmas. Bad mommy since we have so much to be thankful this year. We have 2 beautiful children that I can not imagine my life without right now.

Parenting 101....PLEASE!

2007-11-09T13:37:00.001-08:00

I thought I would share this story that happened last weekend with Brooke. What a proud parenting moment....NOT! So we are in the motorhome last weekend at the beach in Huntington. Steve and I come in around 7:30pm to bathe the kids since it was bath night. I get the little tub out and put it in the shower and fill it up with warm sudsy water. Our little water baby Brooke just jumps right in. I get her all cleaned up, hair shampooed and then pluck her out, wrap her in a towel and hand her off to daddy. He then gets a fresh diaper and some PJ's on her. We're at the beach so it's her warm, footed fleece PJ's. Steve is now in the process of setting up the pack n plays which is what they sleep in at night. In the meantime, I undress Kyle, put him in the tub and get him cleaned up. I get him out and am drying him off on the bed when I hear, "TERESA!" I look up and there is Brooke, back in the bathtub...PJ's and all, sitting there splashing around in the water. I immediately start to laugh. At this point, Steve is not seeing the humor. I tell him it's funny and he needs to go get the camera. We took some pictures and then Steve got Brooke back out of the tub and wrung out the PJ's. Thank god we had an extra set of warm ones. Goes to show you how fast they can get into trouble. Like I said, I will have to post the pictures of her sitting in the bath tub with her PJ's on. What a little stinker!! Gonna have to watch this one like a hawk!

Happy Halloween

2007-11-04T15:42:00.000-08:00

Well, this is the year of our "firsts!" We decided way back at the end of August to have the kids be monkeys. Brooke because she scales and climbs on everything...Kyle because, Monkey see...Monkey do. They were so cute in their costumes. Janet came over to help us trick or treat and it was her suggestion for the bananas. Brooke wouldn't let go of hers all night. First chance Kyle got, it was on the ground. We walked around to about 5 houses in our block of the people that we knew. Brooke has understood knocking on the door for awhile so when we walked up to the first house, she knocked on the door. When the door answered, she walked right in. Bypass the candy, forget the concept....I'm coming in! It was too funny. We came back to the house and the kids had just as much fun passing out the candy and putting it in the other kids' bags. It was a fun night.

Pumpkin Patch

2007-10-07T20:35:00.000-07:00

Well, fall is here and Halloween is just around the corner. I am so excited to be with the kids this holiday season and watch them experience it all. Tonight we started things off by going to the pumpkin patch right by the house. They had tons of stuff to do there besides buy pumpkins. Which by the way, we didn't even buy a pumpkin. I'll wait a bit and buy one closer to the actual date. They had a petting zoo, jumpers, little teacup rides, etc. I really just wanted to go and have the kids experience it all and so I could take some cute pictures. We had a blast. Brooke is our fearless child and will pretty much do anything. Kyle is a bit more cautious. We bought tickets for the fun stuff and let the kids go into the jumper. Kyle wanted absolutely nothing to do with it and the lady was nice enough to give us our tickets back. Brooke got in there with some other kids around her size and jumped around.There is one picture and she had this goofy look on her face and it's just so her! The ride next to it was a slide. I knew she would love it so I sent Steve up it with her. She had the biggest grin on her face after coming down. At one point, Steve DIVES head first with her and slides down that way. I thought for sure it was going to freak her out. NOPE, she just kept on grinning. This picture is the both of them once they got to the bottom. Take a look at those grins! Steve took Kyle down it and he was OK with it. Not too thrilled but he wasn't crying. He was OK to sit at the bottome on a haystack with me and watch and play with the hay. On the last slide down, Steve let Brooke go by herself and she loved it. Our little dare devil. She cracks me up. Hopefully I will be able to keep up with this blog during the holidays. I will try super hard. I am sure I am going to take a million photos. I am just so excited to see the holidays though their eyes. It's going to be fun to have kids around this season. I'm also going to try and put on my June Cleaver skirt and heels and bake cookies and decorate them with the kids. I wonder how the pumpkin carving is going to go??! Kyle more than likely will want to eat the pumpkin! He has turned into an eating machine again. That boy can eat! Hope everyone is doing well. Things always seem to be crazy around here for me but it's a fun crazy. I am missing sleeping in lately. What I wouldn't do to sleep in until 8am!

It's October Already

2007-10-06T09:18:00.000-07:00

Yikes, I can't believe it is already October! We have already been home now for over 6 months. By the end of this month, we will have been home for 7. That is just so hard for me to believe. The kids have almost been with us as long as they were in an orphanage. I can't wait to surpass that number!

The kids are doing just wonderful. Steve took them to the doctor the other day and Brooke has grown 3" and is now in the 90th percentile for height. No wonder the 12month overalls I bought for her were too short. She is in the 25th pecentile for weight but that is still in a average range. Kyle has grown as well and is showing a steady climb. He is still in the 10th percentile but like I said, has shown a steady upward climb and that' all we look at. They both have about 5-6 words that they say. Their new favorite thing though is to throw something on the floor and say, "uh oh". They can also say, Bubba (the dog), mama, dada, up (this is Kyle's thing), hi and baby. They are eating machines and are eating all big people food.

We had a busy September. Work was in full swing for me and my sister got married so Steve drove the motorhome up to Seattle and the kids and I flew up. It wasn't so bad flying with the kids by myself. Everyone around me was very helpful. Restores your faith in mankind. There are still nice people who will help a complete stranger. On the way home from Seattle, Steve stopped at the ACA Rally in Calistoga, CA. It's north of San Fransisco. He was there all week. I flew home with the kids and went back to work. I decided to throw the kids in the car on Friday night around 5pm and drive up to meet him. Everyone thought I was nuts. It wasn't too bad. The kids did great and let me tell you this, we did not have a DVD player in the car and the kids were still fine. They played with some toys and at one point, I did stop and they had their first taste of chicken mcnuggets from McDonald's. Big shocker...they loved them! We stopped around 8ish, changed into PJ's and a new diaper, had some milk and they were asleep the rest of the way up. I took Monday off of work and we had a great time. The kids missed Daddy and wanted in his arms when we got there.

Here are some pictures of the kids with their warm clothes on in Seattle.
They did really well with all of the happenings going on up there. It was a whirlwind of a weekend and it was fun for the entire family to be together. The time sure did fly by and I didn't really want to come home. I hate that my family lives so far away from the kids. They are changing so quickly and they are missing out on that. Oh well. We bought a web cam so hopefully they will get to see the changes that way!

The other day the nanny called in sick so I had to take a sick day too. The kids and I went to the park. I haven't gone to the park with them in a long time. They love it there and of course Brooke is a total monkey and loves to climb on everything. Here are some pictures I took there.

Life seems to always be so busy with 2 kids. It is fun though watching them learn and grow. Halloween is right around the corner and I already have their costumes all picked out. They are both going to be monkeys; Brooke because she climbs/scales everything and Kyle because whatever Brooke does, he does.

So we are just chugging away here at the Bierbaum house. Hope everyone is doing great. I think fall is finally here in SoCal as the weather is cooling down. The holidays are rapidly approaching. This year is going to be extra fun with the kid. I can't wait!

Where or Where did Summer Go?

2007-09-17T10:01:00.000-07:00

I can't believe it is already the middle of September! Geez. Although summer is still around here in Southern California. We have spent the majority of this month with temperatures well over 100 degrees! It has really been miserable. Make me want to move NOW!

The kids are doing so good and it's just so wonderful to see. They both have about 4 words that they can say. They both say mama, dada, hi and baby. If you listen they are really trying to mimic everything we say. Unfortunately, I said a bad word the other night and if the words had come out, Brooke would have said it. Luckily it was just the EXACT sound of the word. Nice! Guess I'll have to get her a tattoo to go along with the potty mouth! They understand a lot of what you say to them they just can't say much back. What makes me really happy is that Kyle now gets "kisses." I'll tell him to give me a kiss and he leans over and does it with a little sound to it as well. Brooke understand when we tell her to say sorry to her brother. We tell her to go over and say sorry and give him "a love." she'll go over, put her head on his shoulder and give him a love. It's sort of cute. She'll still whack him with something 20 minutes later though.

They are both now walking really well. Brooke is almost running. It gets a little harder for them though now that we have them in shoes. Kyle wears a size 3 and Brooke just jumped into a size 4. I can't believe how fast they are growing. It just seems like yesterday that they were babies. They are toddlers now. Won't be long now before they start telling me NO.

Our newest addition is a web cam. I never knew anything about these things and they are the coolest!! It is a great way for the kids to see daddy when he is away at work. Our computer screen has goobers all over it from the kids kissing daddy goodnight. It is actually really cute to see. Even the dog got into one night. He could hear Steve's voice but didn't quite get to look at the screen. The kids are quite a handful when they are in my lap. They just want to crawl all over the computer desk and mugger all over the screen. Now whenever Kyle hears the computer phone ring with the web cam, he starts to say, "hi dada." He'll so it when the house phone rings too.

We are in the process right now of gathering all of our stuff together and heading up north to Seattle for my sister's wedding. Steve is driving the motorhome up and leaving today. I am going to fly with the kids and leave on Wednesday night. Apparently I must be a complete idiot to fly with 2 16 month old children by myself. I guess I keep thinking it can't be that hard. Guess we'll see if the plane has any booze left when we land. i just called the airline today and the flight is wide open. This means that i can get an extra seat for free. Right now Brooke and I have booked seats. I was going to carry Kyle is the front carrier. Looks like he is going to have a seat. Hopefully they will sleep all the way up since it will be past their bedtime. One can only hope. Guess if you see a madwoman on the news who was flying with 2 children, you'll know it's me. Please feel free to write to me in jail. Care packages would be nice too!

Well, I hope everyone is doing well. I have been super absent lately with some of my friends. Being a mom and working a full time job is tough. I am still trying to balance the 2. There are times when I would really kill to sleep in late and relax and do nothing all day but I wouldn't change a thing. Steve and I have the most adorable kids in the world and they make me laugh with the things that they do. Perhaps the sleeping in thing will come later. For now, I'll just drink A LOT of coffee in the morning and diet cokes during the day. Caffeine is my friend!

Of course I am at work right now as I post this. I will have to post some recent pictures of the kids. I am working on a video of them as well. It's going really slow as the program likes to freeze up on me. Bye for now. Hope everyone had a great summer!

San Diego

2007-08-12T21:07:00.000-07:00

We took the RV down to San Diego at the end of July for a little trip. We were only gone about 5 days. It was nice to get away though and the weather was so much cooler down there than up where we live. We took a drive one day over to Coronado. I have lived here now for 12+ years and I have never been over to Coronado. We drove all the way around and ended up at Silver Strand Beach. I believe it's a state park. We paid to get in and then walked on the beach with the kids. There was a ton of seaweed. EWWW! Steve had his bathing suit on so he took the kids in the water. Kyle wasn't so much on it but Brooke of course loved it. Daddy decided to take her out in the big waves and we finally found something she doesn't like about the water. It was an enjoyable day.

The Ball Pit

2007-08-12T20:53:00.000-07:00

We got this ball pit as a hand me down from some friends. This thing is going to be the death of me. The kids absolutely love it. There are about 50+ balls in this thing. We had it downstairs but decided to move it upstairs since there was more room. These balls are everywhere! I find them in our bedroom, on the staircase, in the BATH TUB, stinking everywhere. I find myself picking up these darn balls all the time. I am trying to teach the kids to help me put them back in but Kyle just jumps in the pit and throws more out. The never ending battle of the balls. We do however have some really cute pictures with them in it. Steve decided to get funny one night and put 2 balls down Brooke's shirt. The picture will speak for itself! Brooke has figured out that she can push the entire thing over and ALL of the balls come out. She thinks that is super fun. It is a blow up type of deal so they climb all over it. They are definitely our monkeys! That's why it was easy to decide on their Halloween costumes. MONKEYS! Brooke actually has so much upper body strength that she can scale the bathroom counter and hold her own body weight as she tries to get up on the counter. I'm guessing by the time she's 5, she'll be able to kick MY butt!

Kyle is Walking!

2007-08-12T20:47:00.000-07:00

Well, at 14 months, Kyle is now really starting to walk. It amazes me how fast they pick it up. Just last week he was only taking about 2-3 steps. Today he has just taken off like something just clicked in his head. He is so different about his walking than Brooke. I don't know why I compare the 2 because they are soooo different. Kyle sort of marches when he walks. Now is when the double trouble starts since they are both walking. Other than that, the kids are great and growing like weeds. Here is a video of Kyle walking.

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

Mommy Time Out

2007-07-29T10:48:00.000-07:00

Like I mentioned before, my parents came down for a visit so on a day that Steve wasn't working, we headed down to the wine country in Temecula for some fun! We hit 3 wineries and had some lunch. We figured we'd take lunch to dump the good buzz we had going on. By the end of the afternoon, we were all wined out. You get 5 tastes as each winery. It was a fun afternoon and one that I don't get to enjoy much since my parents live in Washington State. It was also a nice break away but I missed the kids the entire time. We showed their pictures to anyone who would look. This one lady asked how old they were and I told her they were both 1. She said, "no wonder you're here drinking." That gave me a good laugh.

It's Summertime

2007-07-29T10:30:00.000-07:00

My parents came to town this month and we decided to get out of the house and head up to Victoria Gardens which is an outdoor mall/shopping center. We had called to ask about a playground. We got their and it was pretty skimpy to say the least. It was also in the direct sun so the equipment was pretty hot which made it impossible for the kids to play on. Grandpa decided to take Brooke over to this water fountain. It is this circular thing and on top it has water that comes out and flows over. He took her over and put her right on top of it. For those of your who don't know, Brooke is an absolute NUT for the water. Any chance she gets, she's in it. She was getting all wet so thank god it was warm out. We let Kyle play in it too. We then decided since they were already wet to take them over to the interactive water fountain. It's one of those things that kids can run through and the water shoots up. Brooke of course was in heaven. She was out there with the big kids and didn't care much that one of them knocked her over. She just got back up and kept on going. It also didn't phase her when she tipped forward and the water shot her right in the face. Again, just kept on going. Grandpa took some pictures with his cellphone as I forgot my camera and my cellphone was in the car. Nice!!!! We decided a few days later to take the kids back again so I could get some pictures. It sort of reminds me of the kids who play in the fire hydrants back east. Here are some pictures from our second trip.

Kyle did a lot better the first time with the water. He is a bit more cautious when it comes to stuff. Brooke has NO fear whatsoever and just does it. So Kyle got a little wet with daddy but mostly hung out with him. After Brooke had purple lips we decided it was time to go. How fun it is to be a kid!
OK, so here is a video of Brooke in the fountain. She was not afraid to get in there with the big kids. I have NO clue why dropshots has blurred the video. They have made some updates...urrgh! Don't fix stuff that isn't broken!

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

It's Official......AGAIN!

2007-07-29T10:11:00.000-07:00

On July 20th, exactly 4 months from our original court date in Russia, we had a court date in San Bernardino County Superior court to re-adopt Brooke and Kyle. It was pretty cool! My parents and Janet (their godmother) were in attendance and it was a pretty informal affair. The entire process took less than a half an hour. The judge came down from the bench to give the kids 2 teddy bears. It was really cute and everyone in the courtroom was very happy for us. The reason we chose to do the re-adopt is so the kids can have birth certificates from the state of California. Here are some pictures from the day:

After it was all said and done, we filled out some paperwork to have their birthcertificates mailed to us and then went back to the house. We had a little dinner celebration and John, their godfather, was able to make it over after work. It was a very nice night with family and friends.

Family Picture

2007-07-15T09:32:00.000-07:00

While Steve's parents were in town, they wanted to have a professional picture taken with the kids. We went to Sears. I had some great pictures taken of the kids for Father's Day so we went back there again. I am so glad that we did. They did such a great job! Here are some of those pictures. The single shots of the kids are the ones I had taken for Steve. We had other pictures taken of the grandparents and the kids, all of us and then one of the 3 boys. That was a great idea and Phyllis thought of that one and I'm glad she did.

Our First Haircut

2007-07-15T09:10:00.000-07:00

It's so fun to post all of their firsts. It seems I type that a lot!! I am glad to be here for all of those!

So, Steve has been pestering me for the longest time about getting the kids' haircut. I was really nervous about doing it. I don't know, perhaps it's my own issues with getting MY haircut. Yes, I have had the same haircut since high school. I just didn't want to have this screamfest somewhere and have the kids' hair all jacked up. So, the other day, the kids and I were out running errands and I walked past this haircut place for kids. It's called Cool Cuts 4 Kids. They obviously cater to kids so I grabbed a card. Well, I made the appointment since we were having a family photo taken the next day. It went really well. I scooped them up after a nap, threw them in the car and headed down. Brooke went first. I figured if someone was going to go south is was going to be her. She did really great. The lady who was doing the hair cutting had a Baby Einstein video and put it in. Brooke was actually trying to look past her to watch it. She didn't even really care that she was cutting her hair or even wetting it down with a squirt bottle. Here are some pixs of Brooke:

Kyle was up next. Since they hadn't had lunch yet, I brought their bottles. Well, once I gave Brooke hers after she was done, of course Kyle wanted his. I stuck it in his mouth and I'm glad I did. He was a bit more freaked out since he got the shearer tool on the hair and not just scissors. The one picture where he is crying is because I took the bottle out of his mouth. I wanted to have one picture where he didn't have it in his mouth. Silly me. Anyhow, his hair turned out soooo cute. I called Steve and told him that if I'd known that it was going to be this cute, I wouldn't have put up such a fight. Here are some pixs of Kyle:

The kids did great and mommy got a keepsake to take home. The place took a polaroid of the finished product and then kept some hair. It's now sitting on the mantle of the both of them. I will definitely be going back there. It's a super great place and the gals were super nice. Free advertising for them!

New Walking Video

2007-07-15T09:07:00.000-07:00

OK, so I added to the walking video and put some new stuff on there. I still haven't quite figured out why dropshots makes the video stretch out. I also have no clue as to how to post it from the program I made it in. Oh well!

In only a short month she has gotten a lot better. She walks all over the place. If she wants to get there faster though, she does this crab crawl thing. Kyle is beginning to let go of things but falls shortly after. Once he starts in, I will of course be making another walking video. Although, I must admit, I am getting a little tired of Fats Domino. Anyone have another walking song?

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

Jungle Gym in the Kitchen....Who knew?

2007-07-15T09:02:00.000-07:00

OK, so my daughter enjoys climbing through the kitchen chairs. Well, that is until she gets stuck and ends up pulling a chair through the kitchen. I took some video of it. This was her 6th or 7th time doing this in a row. I was sitting there eating my lunch and she just kept climbing through the chairs. So I of course decided to grab the camera!

So, Kris this is for you and all the gals who keep talking about your HUGE play yards in your backyard. Here is MY jungle gym that cost me $75 at a garage sale. A bit more ghetto but what can I say?!

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

Jumpin' in the Pool!

2007-07-14T17:26:00.000-07:00

Photo Sharing - Video Sharing - Share Photos - Free Video Hosting

I created this video of the kids jumping in the pool. All we have to do is put them up on the side and they throw themselves in. They just can't get enough of the pool/water. Our "ghetto pool" as Steve calls it out back is the same way except there is an inflatible step. The kids climb up on it and then fall off of that. It's hysterical to watch.

Happy 4th of July

2007-07-14T14:35:00.000-07:00

Happy 4th of July!!!!
Well, it's that time of year again which can only mean...yup....PARTY AT THE BOUCHERS! This year Steve's parents were in town so we loaded up the Yukon with all of us and the kids' crap and headed out. We spent the day over there in the pool. The weather man said is was going to be 107! Yikes! I can't really remember it being that hot around here. The river yes...rancho cucamonga...NO! It was a fun day. Hot dogs, hamburgers, the works. I forgot the kids' bottles of formula and gerber food. They found out what hot dogs tasted like. They really liked the taste of them. They ate fruit and they always love fruit. I'm trying to give my kids better eating habits than mine!

The kids' outfits for the day were very cute. I bought them months ago at Toys R Us. I called Janet after the fact and told her that I'd purchased the kids' outfits for the party. Her response was, "what party?" Every year, everyone always wants to get together at the Bouchers for the 4th of July! When we were in Seattle, Fred and Sandy gave us these cute little American/USA bathing suits. Of course they had to wear those. It was Brooke's 1st bikini! Look out! Here are some pixs:
Brooke is our "little brown berry" which means, she tans. That girl can be in the sun for 5 minutes and be brown. Kyle on the other hand has senitive skin so he burns with 50 on. Hence, he's wearing one of those swim shirts and a hat. He didn't really particularly like the hat at first which always amazes me since he was wearing TWO when we got him. Perhaps he has flashbacks and that's why he doesn't want to wear them anymore. When I would tell him to "leave it," he usually would and it stayed on his head. We had a great day eating, drinking and swimming at the Bouchers(who are also the godparents to these 2). We brought the pack n plays so the kids could take a nap. Brooke is usually my great sleeper well, this time, Nikki came out and said, "brooke's crying." WEll, Lauren had tried to sneak in the room and Brooke saw her. It was over from there. Steve got her up and what did she want to do....get back in the pool. So we threw on a swim diaper and back she went. Our little naked girl. She just loves the water!

Grammy and Grandpa Bierbaum hanging out in the pool with the kids!

It was a great day but like all of those, they must come to and end. We loaded everything back up into the Yukon and took the kids home so they could sleep in their own beds. They were tired pups from all that swimming! Thanks Aunti J and Uncle J! We love you!!!

Our Colorado Visit

2007-07-14T12:49:00.000-07:00

We also made a stop during our travels so the kids could meet Grandma & Grandpa Bierbaum. We also had a birthday party here and this is where the kids tasted cake and ice cream for the first time. They were in heaven and of course Kyle could have eaten it until the cows came home. He went in with the cake with one finger, then one hand and then once he figured I wasn't going to get mad....he went in with BOTH hands. Guess he figured he could get it in faster that way. Take a look! As you can see, the look on my face says it all!

We also had a BBQ and Steve's parents had some of their good friends over and their daughter too(Myron, Linda, and Samara). It was a fun day and the kids were exhausted by the end of the day! Brooke actually got her first bling bling. Grammy B got her a bracelet and necklace for her birthday!

(Myron & Linda Recob from Wyoming)