Question...

Does the word "mom" mean cleaner of all messes?

As if.
I'm leaving this for Jake.
ha ha ha.

Pics From Last Week, & This & That

Since we've been back from our trip to Idaho it has been so stinking hot. Santa Anna winds have been fueling fires nearby, my allergies seem to be kicking in, and here we are in the first few weeks of fall, still hanging out in the backyard in swimsuits playing in the pool. Recent temps here have been 109, 105, 100. Ugh. Today is a little cooler at least.



Look at that grin on Hannah's face after dumping water on her sister's head.


Jake worked this last weekend, and we didn't do too much, but this last week sure has seemed busy. Here's a bit of what went on:

• Thursday night I went to David's Bridal with my sister, Mom, and Grandma so we could watch my sister try on wedding dresses. She picked one that is so beautiful. Her face lit up when she had it on and we all said yup that's the one.
• Friday night after the girls went to sleep Jake and I sat on the couch and watched Gray's Anatomy. It was the first night all week that we were both home together. It was nice.
• Saturday after Jake got home from work I went to the mall with my Mom, Grandma, and my cousin Deanna. We had quite a bit to shop for. Deanna needed a dress for Don's wedding, and a few other things, I needed shoes for Don's wedding, a dress for Hannah, shoes for Hannah, Grandma got a few necessities, and so did Mom. We shopped until we dropped right into Cheesecake Factory for dinner. It was a fun night.
• Sunday I bribed my brother and Diana with Miguel's Jr for dinner, and they came over to my house to watch a movie so Jake and I could go out to see a movie. We saw The Informant. It was alright. Matt Damon was great, and I think it was based on a true story but I am not entirely sure. Saw a lot of previews for upcoming movies that I want to see.
• Today I went to a product knowledge class at my salon this morning for a new line called Unite that we are carrying. Then I met Jake and the girls at Sam's Club just in time for lunch.

A couple pictures of the girls:
We got Hannah some "I Spy" books for the plane ride and she loved them. She was showing Claire where things are.

And here I think Claire was tickle torchering Hannah. Maybe because she wouldn't let her see the I Spy book anymore.

Hannah posing in the onion goggles that my cousin Don gave to Jake for his birthday. (I think it was a gag gift. Or was it not Don? Because Hannah really likes them, and she says they give her special "eyesight")

Hope you're having a happy Monday!

10 Months Old

Please excuse the diaper in her picture, but it was after nap time, her bloomies were off and I was too tired to go get them. I tried to reposition her dress several times so the diaper would not show, but she's just so wiggly. What are you gonna do?

Miss Claire is 10 months old. And she is just as cute as ever. I've really been slacking this month on keeping track of new things she is doing. It was only a couple of days ago that I took her 10 month picture on the bear, and she turns 11 months in just a couple of weeks.

I have not weighed Claire lately, but I'm guessing she is at least 24 pounds. And probably about 32" long. Someone asked me if she was one and a half the other day. Nope. She's just tall and let me tell you she is heavy. I love holding her and getting snuggles from her, but my back and wrists can only handle it for a few minutes. I know I will miss when she was crawling, but I am anxious for her to walk because she spends most of her time either pissy that she can't walk, or holding onto the back of my shorts or pant legs pretending to walk. It makes it a bit hard to get around freely.

She still just has two teeth on the bottom, but we can see the top two trying to work their way through. She has recently become very fussy at meal times and I think that might be why. She is also being very picky with what baby foods she wants to eat now. She loves fruits, and is not too crazy about much else. Playing with, around, under, and beside the highchair is one of her favorite things to do. She pushes it around the house, using it as a walker.

I love to get Claire after she wakes up in the morning and after her naps. She greets me with the biggest smile, and is so happy to see me.

10 months!

Day 3 & 4

Good morning sunshine!

I wish I always woke up this happy. Especially morning of day 3 in Boise. For some reason I had insomnia most of the night and could not sleep. I just wandered around, flipped through a magazine, laid on the couch, and for a while I stood at the front door looking out the peephole at what looked like a scene from the movie Hangover. Three guys that seemed to be a bit innebriated were trying to get back into their room at 4am and they didn't have a key so they were quietly knocking, and trying to get their friends to open up. It was actually pretty funny. But not funny that I was still awake at 4am. I never seem to sleep well away from home. Thanks Mom, I think I inherited this trait from you. Next time I'll pack some Tylenol PM.

Shoes by the door. I copied this pic idea from my friend Tawny. She always takes a picture of her family's shoes when they are on vacation.

After enough caffeine was flowing through our systems, we got ourselves and the kids dressed, and went back to Diane's for breakfast. Then our plan was to head to the Boise Zoo for a little while.

It's a pretty walk through Julia Davis Park (right next to BSU) to get to the zoo.

Those of you who have seen the movie Role Models, you might think this is hilarious. I took these pictures of people in the park that were "LARPING". My brother in law told me that is what you call what they are doing. It stands for Live Action Role Playing. Just like in Role Models. I couldn't believe people really spend the day doing this. They had full on professional looking costumes, swords, and everything. You can click on picture to enlarge.

I only took about 3 pictures at the zoo. It was hot. I was tired. And I think I was a little burnt out of snapping shots. Here is one of Hannah looking at the giraffe.

Day 4

Heading Home

We checked out of the hotel on Sunday before the sun was up. We woke up the girls to go, and when we got outside Hannah was so concerned that it was still dark. She was rubbing her eyes as she asked in such a worried voice, "Where's the sun at Dayeeee??" (Notice how she always asks Dayee these questions? Do you think she thinks that I don't know the answers? Must be a thing with little girls and their Daddies cause I remember being little and thinking that my Daddy had all the answers too. In fact, I still do.)

At the beginning of our trip, I would never have let the girls get down on the dirty floor of the airport and play with these public toys. At the end of our trip... I guess I let them do it. But I bathed their hands in hand sanitizer the second they were finished.

And we're done...

Our flight home was delayed 20 minutes (figures) due to high volumes of traffic at LAX. When we got on the plane we were able to bring Claire's car seat, but by this point of the trip she had spent so much time in it that she would scream bloody murder the second I even made her look at it. So she spent very little of the return flight sitting in it. We landed just after two hours of flight, but we sat on the plane for almost 50 minutes while waiting for a gate to be available for us to unload. Talk about the end of your rope. Not to mention that I also felt a little bit motion sick after landing and I was starting to feel claustrophobic just sitting on the plane that long. I thought I might scream and start banging on the door to let me out like a crazy person. I didn't. Luckily.

Thanks for getting us home safely Horizon Air. I don't know how soon I'll be hopping on again for another flight though. That one was good for a while. Unless I'm headed for an island with just my husband. Then maybe I will consider flying sooner rather than later.

That concludes my photo journaling for this trip. Thanks for hanging in there with me.

Day Two

You might want to go grab a drink. And a snack.

And maybe put your feet up.

And get comfy, because this is a long

post, with a lot of pictures.

With each passing day the recency of these events gets older and the details get a bit more jumbled in my memory. Hopefully the pictures will provide me with enough commentary. This photo journaling is hard work.

After a not so restful night's sleep, we threw on some comfy clothes and headed over to Jake's Mom's for breakfast. This is her new house. It is a split house (that's called a duplex right?) and the left side is hers and the right side is Jake's Grandma's.

Before breakfast we went out back behind Diane's house to run around on the grass and play at the park. This is the only family picture of our whole trip, and it's not that great. Oh well.

Hannah was so well behaved the entire trip. We were so proud of her. She is such a happy girl. She had tons of fun at the park.

Sweet Claire with just one diamond in her ear. She was so good too. Especially since she was the one who was really thrown all off of her normal schedule. Such a trooper.

Jake and his brother Dustin.

Hannie eating pancakes with her Uncle Dusty.

Totally random picture, but I was so excited to get my ring back on day 2. Jake suprised me with this right hand ring for my birthday 5 years ago and it needed to be re-dipped in white gold (and also maybe stretched a half size bigger. Seems nothing is the same size since giving birth twice, hmmph). Anyway, when Jake's mom visited us last, she brought it back to Boise for me to drop off with Carl and Sara. Carl and Sara own a jewelry shop in Idaho. They made our wedding rings, and both my sister in laws rings, and several of Jake and Dustin's friends rings too. They are awesome, and always so accommodating when I've needed my rings dipped or anything else.

Part Two of Day Two.

After the girls naps (or lack of), we set out for the wedding. Jake's friend Nick was getting married. Jake and his brother Dustin used to play together with Nick and his older brother Lars when they were younger. They were all good friends. I met Nick about 8 years ago. He is a very likeable guy. He made the trek out to California when we got married, and we were happy to do the same for his wedding. This was our first time meeting his beautiful bride Kelly. They seem like a very happy couple.

Hidden Springs (or is it Swings?) The wedding was in a small town completely isolated from the rest of Boise called Hidden Springs. It is set back among these foothills, and is really an interesting place. The people of the town have all their own schools, banks, stores, and such so that they do not need to rely on other cities for jobs or grocery shopping or anything. The houses in this quaint town are really beautiful. I wish I had my camera out on our drive in. They all had big wrap around porches, and were just so neat. This picture is of one of the houses near the barn where the wedding was held.

So the rumor is that a lot of the people in Hidden Springs are swingers. If they leave their garage door open a crack at night, that means they want to swing. Who knows, kinda sounds like a crazy story to me, but that is the rumor.

Moving on...

We got there a little early and had time to visit with Dusty (the best man) and a few of the other groomsmen that are friends of Jake's.

Hannah had fun scoping out the scene.

This was a sweet moment. Hannah does not dole out hugs very often.

This shot was an accident, but I really like it. I meant to focus on them and the camera focused on the plant. Or is that a weed?

The wedding took place outside in front of the barn. The weather was warm but very nice.

The happy couple.

BSU had a football game on the wedding night. I caught Joel and Jason (friends of Dustin and Jake's) listening to the game. :)

The scenery around the barn where the tables were for the reception was so pretty. Mature trees, flowers, dandelions, tractors, and the sunset. I was in "momtog" heaven taking pictures of Hannah running around with the other kids. I took so many pictures of her playing there is no way I could post them all, but here's a few.

You gotta click on these pics to see them larger. I thought they are so cute of Hannah making her wish.

I love this picture. That little girl in the background on the fence is Nora. Nora's Mom Becki was a good friend of Jake and Dusty's when they were growing up. Her little girl was such a doll.

Jake's sister Tania and her husband Nick.

I gave Tania a quick lesson with my camera so she could take a picture of us.

The only picture I got of my sweet Claire Berry the whole night.

And this is me at the end of the night. Tired eyes. Look at those bloodshot things. Ugh. Gross. I was so tired.

We got back to our hotel about 9pm.

Just as the party at the wedding was getting started.

We missed it.

Instead we went home with 2 tired baby girls.

Both girls cried until 11pm.

I might have cried too.

Oh my.

Day Two.

Psst- Is anyone else as excited as I am to go see this movie? I can't wait.

Traveling To Boise. Day One.

And so our adventure begins. We set the alarm for 5:30am last Thursday Sep 17, and we left the house by 7. Headed for LAX.

This is a picture looking out over the fence in our backyard at about 6am. The street lights were still on. Coffee. I need coffee.

Luggage loaded and ready to go. Check.

Not too bad eh? Only 1 suitcase, 2 duffle bags, and 1 stroller to check.

Two cute girlies, safely buckled. Check.

Our driver/boarding pass purchaser/schedule coordinator/hotel finder/Daddy.

Photo journalism and commentary from this trip provided by, yours truly.

The morning commuters on the 91 freeway. Thank goodness for fast track (plus now we can drive in the 3 plus lane, nice).

We got there in one and a half hours, which isn't too bad. Jake dropped Claire, me, and the luggage off outside our terminal and took Hannah to go find long term parking. Jake said Hannah thought riding the shuttle back to the airport was so cool.

While chatting with Claire I noticed that one of her earring backs was missing. Great. She was wearing her diamonds! Luckily the diamond was still in her ear, but no back. I called Jake and had him search the car. It was nowhere to be found. (It was later found upon arriving back at home, laying right smack dab in the middle of her crib.) Anyway, she sported just one earring all weekend. I think all the babies in Idaho are going to be doing it soon. She's such a trend setter already. ;)

Here we are, happy as can be when we thought we would be airborne in about one hour from this point and halfway through the hard part. We were so wrong.

Gettting some wiggles out.

On a side note, let me just tell you, going through security at LAX was a breeze. That place is so crazy busy that they don't have time to search through your stuff like they are supposed to. Since 9/11 they have the "no liquids" policy. Last time we flew I had to put hand sanitizer, diaper cream, formula, even lip gloss in a seperate baggie to be inspected. This time, they didn't even look twice at it. I had an entire bottle of spray sunscreen in my diaper bag, baby foods, formula, you name it, and they didn't even look at it. Coming home however, since Boise airport is so much smaller and less busy, the security girl (who loved her authority way too much) gladly dumped the contents of my neatly organized bag onto her counter and thoroughly checked each and every liquid item, as she lectured me about how to travel with these items next time.

One of the many suprises we had purchased for Hannah, a Woody action figure from Toy Story. She was so happy.

Since we've been home Woody has been missing. If anyone knows of his whereabouts, please contact us immediately.

The first time we boarded the plane, sat for an hour, and then deboarded due to air conditiong issues, Hannah thought we had flown already. She clapped as we got off and yelled, "That was fun Daddy." He had to tell her we're still here Hannah, we have to get back on in a little bit. So we headed to Burger King for lunch.

No pictures from the flight. By the time we finally took off I was in no mood to be taking photos. Plus I had my hands quite full. The plane was small. Two seats on each side. I sat next to Claire's car seat (while she screamed bloody murder unless she was in my lap-until we took off and she instantly went to sleep. Thank you God.) And Jake and Hannah sat across from us. Both girls were amazing during the flight. The end was tough, but by that time, we had basically been traveling all day. The flight to Boise is a tiny bit over 2 hours. We were originally scheduled to arrive at 1pm. We got off the plane in Idaho at 5:30!! We seriously could have driven and been almost there by that time (It's a 12-13 hr drive). What a day. Only, it doesn't stop there...

After getting our bags, we checked in to get our rental car. Here she is. It was actually very clean, and suprisingly did not reek of cigarette smoke like most rental cars do.

We went straight to the hotel...

...but we couldn't stay long. First we were all starving and needed to refuel in a bad way. Second, we had to get to a grocery store to buy baby food and milk, and most importantly, coffee and cream for me. ;)

We ate dinner at a really really great place that was right next door to the hotel. I meant to take a picture of it, and the morning we left I was going to, but it was so dark still (and freezing), and I was too tired to bother. It was called Grains of Montana. It was a lot like Panera Bread, but I think better. Everything was SO fresh. Jake and I had the best cobb salad we've both ever had, and we shared a gloriously delicous spinach, artichoke and turkey sandwhich. Oh my. It was good. Plus a couple of frosty beers to ease our travel troubles. Yum. Then we found Albertson's, and headed back to the hotel just as both girls were whining and crying and so ready for bed.

The hotel was fabulous. We could not have picked a better place. Location was great. It was 5 minutes from Jake's Mom's house. Brand new, and it was so nice. A 2 bedroom suite, with a full kitchen for $98 a night! What, that is unheard of. Normal rates are $300 and I'm not sure why, but we got a deal.

Come on in, and check it out...

Very nice full kitchen.

First things first, Daddy turning on a carcoon (cartoon) for Hannah.

This was Hannah's bedroom, and ours was just like it. Both bedrooms had so much storage space, and a big closet. (Hannah took one of her naps underneath that desk that you see in the picture. No we did not place her there, but we found her there.)

The hotel had so many other great ammenities too. It was in Eagle, which is a suburb right outside of Boise. If you're in the area, I would highly recommend it. The pool area was so nice. There was a great workout room (which I wanted to use but never had the chance) with complimentary waters and beverages everywhere you looked. In the mornings Jake ran down and brought back up great muffins, fruits, doughnuts, and juice. We really lucked out with our hotel choice. It was great.

Diane (Jake's Mom) made it to see Hannah just before bedtime.

She had planned on seeing us much earlier in the day, but obviously things did not go according to plan. She moved into a new house last year which we hadn't even seen yet, but it was going to have to wait until the next day. Bedtime had arrived. Diane also had to go to the airport that evening to pick up my sister in law Karen, who flew in seperately from Dustin (Jake's brother) because she had to work.

The night doesn't end here though. Oh no. Of course not.

Bedtime was rather difficult. Claire screamed and screamed and screamed. Hannah cried and howled and yelped. They both quieted down about 11pm. Utter exhaustion. I am tired just thinking about that day now. I'm still tired. We finally got to sleep, and then Claire woke up crying. Then Hannah woke up crying (and on the floor). Then I had some major IBS issues the entire night. I slept about 3 maaaayyybe 4 hours that night. I woke up with IBS issues. They continued on all morning. Not fun. Sorry if that is TMI folks, but I'm just telling it like it was.

Day 2 did get much better though. More to come. Stay tuned.