Gotta Love Date Night!

Date night...glorious date night:) We went out for date night this past week. Cam just finished a brutally intense and LONG quarter. He was gone at school 3 days a week, worked 12 hour shifts on 2 days a week and studied on the extra day. That meant no time with dad/hubby for us. We have missed him. He is now off of work and school for the next 16 days....YAHOOOOOO!
Back to date night. It was a beautifully sunny evening. We headed downtown to a local wine bar. We've read about it in the paper and wanted to try it. We had some wine...Cam tried a good beer and we ate some appetizers. The yummiest one was bacon wrapped dates drizzled in balsamic vinegar...YUM! Next we went down to the waterfront for dinner. The restaurant in right on the marina and we knew there would be an amazing sunset. We had a coupon for one dinner free sent in the mail for Cam's b-day month. We had delicious wine, salmon with coarse salt, mashed potatoes, green beans, and for the last course....mmmmmm....chocolate mouse. Delightful. It was such a relaxing dinner. We were snuggled up chatting and having a great time watching the sunset. After dinner we walked along the marina. It was amazingly warm out with no wind. A perfect evening walking hand in hand with my hubby and enjoying the quiet. We've got to do that more often!

Swim Lessons

Tuba, Mr. P and Busy Guy took swim lessons this summer and just finished up this week. They all improved so much.
Tuba took private lessons and loved to jump off the diving board. He wore a life jacket and would jump like Tigger off the end of the board, pull his knees up and bound into the pool...cannon ball style. He would completely submerge even with the jacket on. He'd wipe his eyes and then paddle and kick over to the ladder and do it all again.


Busy Guy is usually super outgoing but he was a little nervous when lessons began. I had to do my "oh, yes you are going to do it" speech and plop him into the water the first couple of lessons. Now he loves it! He is very brave about putting his face in the water and follows all his teachers commands. He's willing to try everything she suggests...Yeah:)

Mr. P has made huge progress. He can now swim! Really swim. He goes about 4 ft. under water on his own. He is no longer afraid and doesn't fight the teacher's instructions to try new things. He loves his goggles! Go Mr. P:)

I'm a bad mom and don't have any photos of Tuba jumping off the diving board! BAD! Well...that's a good excuse to take him to family swim:)

Dirty Girl

My fun sweet girly girl loves dirt! After dinner she shouts "OUTSIDE" and then after the slider is opened she jets out to play some more in the yard. Of all our kids she bar far loves to play outside the most. She swims in the pool, climbs the slide up to the playhouse, drags toys around, swings, plays in the sandbox...and yes, grabs handfuls of dirt and throws them around.

I came out to check on her and was cracked up by how dirty she was! There was about a cup of dirt in her hair...and how about that dirt mustache! In order to get her clean I had to wash/rinse her hair 4 times and then let all the water out of the tub and get rid of the pieces of rock, bark and dirt floating in the tub.

"Hi Mommy...am I in trouble???

Okay if I'm not in trouble...then I'm having SO MUCH FUN!!!"

Sticker Pox

They've got a disease called Sticker Pox. They look really sick don't they??? I like how they put stickers right on their "booby bites". These two have had such a fun summer together.

Shopping boy style

I took Mr. P shopping yesterday for back to school supplies and clothes. We were excited to spend some time together...just the two of us. We headed to Target with our list in hand...and some yummy drinks from Starbucks. Mr. P decided we would gather the list of supplies for Kindergarten first and then shop for clothes. It took about 20 minutes to get our supplies and it was fun to have him help search for things and pick them out.

Next, we were off to get clothes. The only two kids that need clothes for Fall are Tuba and Mr. P. Busy Guy and Baby George have TONS of clothes due to the hand-down factor. Sis has a stocked closet thanks to a friend's generosity in passing bags and bags of girly things onto us. I knew that getting pants to fit my boys is always a challenge so we loaded some jeans and pants into the cart and headed to the dressing room. Yes, I had to inform Mr. P...we are going to try them on. We got into the room and realized that Mr. P was wearing swim shorts...with the built in undies...ooops! Well, at least I had to buy new undies too:)

He was a trooper and tried on about 6 pair of pants in the first round. They are always too short if they fit in the waist and way to big in the waist if they fit in the length....in other words...my boys are tall and skinny! In the second round of try-ons he donned another 6 pair of pants for me. He tolerated my adjusting and tugging and even my outright giggling at how big some of the pants were on him...clown pants. After settling on 2 jeans and 2 other pants we headed to pick out shirts....and get pants/shirts for Tuba to try on at home.

I could see that I was losing Mr. P's enthusiasm for shopping and he was getting whiny and ready to GO. He started fussing and told me...."Mom, you know how when I've been playing video game for a long time and you say that's enough, turn it off, WELL, that is how I feel about shopping, it's enough now". HA...LOL....cracked me up. I thought he might faint when I suggested we stop at Old Navy after Target...."no, I just want to go home" he protested. Sheesh! I can't wait til Sis is big enough to go shopping with me and we can go ALL day...not just 2 hours.

I treated him to lunch and then took him home...exhausted but happy with his new school things:)

Reunion

From Left: Moi, Susan, Julie and Katie...

And...20 years later....the same lineup!

I went to my reunion last night. I'm severely tired this morning...I think I'm getting old...er! It was fun to see people and catch up. It's amazing how you can see old friends that you haven't talked to for 10 or 20 years but you feel totally comfortable with them. I saw many of the people that I went to Elementary School with...Go Garfield!!! About half of the people at the reunion I seriously didn't know who the heck they were...thank goodness for name tags...and even then it didn't always help;) I missed my babies (even though they were in bed for most of the time I was gone) so today I'm hanging out in pj's and were baking cookies.

From Left: Julie, Katie, Susan, Brooke, Jean, Susan, Me. You can see the previous post to see us in our 80's Glory of BIG hair and perms:)

20 Years

This weekend is my 20 year high school reunion. I'm very excited to go and see people that I don't see very often. Some of the people I'm excited to see are the ones I've known since Kindergarten. I live in the same town where I went to high school but I don't really ever run into anyone. I'm excited to catch up with my girlfriends too. We all have busy lives are rarely get the chance to get together. I'll post an update photo of us girls too:)

From top left: Steffanie, Julie, Me

Betsy, Brooke, Madeleine, Jean

Susan, Katie, Danica and Kathy

Cheap Night Out

We are always looking for fun things to do...that aren't too expensive. I thought I'd share one of our favorites with you.

We start with dinner at The Ram...on Monday nights kids eat for $1.00 for each paying adult. Since the babes just eat off of our plate that means we buy one kid meal at full price and the other two for $2.00. It's yummy too.

Then we head into the mall and take a leisurely stroll down to the Sharper Image store. We take turns sitting in the massage chairs....ohhhhh. It's hilarious to watch the kids operate the remote and then respond to the massage...either giggling or sighing. You have to peel me out of there but our next stop motivates me.

We head down the mall to Sees Candy. Mmmmm. They give you a piece of candy to try...there is 7 of us and they give us 7 big yummy full size pieces of candy. We do buy some too but I usually only buy about $3.00 worth. Then we window shop and stroll back to the car just in time to go home and put kids to bed....full, relaxed and happy.

Tuba's New Wheels

Tuba got this awesome new trike for his birthday. He is loving it and getting the hang of riding it. It will fit him forever. Cam and I have ridden it too...very fun:)


Sis loves his new bike!

New Bathrooms

My bathrooms are finally done. They are glorious!!! I think there might be nothing better than fresh clean new floors and toilets. I love the new toilet seats/lids...they have a "hiss" self closure. You simply push it about an inch down and it closes itself...slowly and quietly. No more bang of the seat and lid...which had usually been me when I found one in the up position:) They also have a twist hinge that allows you to easily take off the seat/lid and wash it and put it back on. The guy at Home Depot said "you can put it right into the dishwasher"....Ummmm...Ewwwww... I won't be eating at his house! But, you can scrub it in the wash tub and put it back on.

Here's some before and after photos. Can you believe we lived with this nasty brown tile with black grout???? Who would put that into their home??? Well...it was the late 70's!

Picture of old vinyl...just my opinion but vinyl is EVIL. I can't stand it. It's toxic chemicals, terrible for the environment and off gasses in your homes, plus it's not very durable...just my two cents:) The toilet paper mess is courtesy of the cat!

Lovely brown tile....NOT! Cute kids though.

Fabulous new toilet...so clean I'll let a baby touch it.

New tile in shower...looks so bright and gorgeous.

New faucet too.

New tile floor. Love it!!!

Overall look in bathroom. We also had the floor, toilet, faucet done in our master bath but really the look is the same so I didn't post those photos too.

Ethiopian Weekend

We spent the weekend at our adoption agency gathering. We had a great time connecting with other families that have kids from Ethiopia and Ghana. There was a little boy who had been at Layla House with Busy Guy and another little boy who had been there with Sis. So special to see these kids again. These babies shared the first months of their lives together....shared a nursery, shared cribs and shared caretakers. I think of them as my children's first siblings. I also saw some teenage girls that I had met on my trip 3 years ago to Ethiopia. Wonderful to see these girls in families and doing so well.

The teenage girls were braiding all the little girl's hair. So fun to watch...and try to learn. Sissy's hair is getting really long but it's still too fine (baby hair) so not ready for braids yet.

Ethiopian dance lessons. Cute girl on Busy Guy's left is our friends' daughter...and cute girl on Busy Guy's right is our same friends' older daughter (home from Ethiopia just before Sis came home).

Sis dancing to the Ghanaian drummers. So much fun and so moving to listen to. Sis really got going...clapping and jumping around and dancing up a storm.

Mr. P and Busy Guy got a lesson on the Ghanaian drums.

Sis playing outside with her partner in crime! This little sweetie is another friend of ours daughter. She and her sisters have been home from Ethiopia for about 6 months.

Wow!

Whoa...we have been busy this last week! The bathroom re-model is done and we've been adding a few more touches to beautify it. We went to the annual gathering of adoptive families from our adoption agency. We had dinner with some friends and....it was also Cam's birthday.

I'll start with the most recent and work my way backwards to catch up.

Happy Birthday to the BEST hubby and father!!!! Flaming 41!!!

C - Crazy and Caring
A - Affectionate and Adorable
M - Manly and Magnificent
E - Energetic and EXTREMELY ENERGETIC
R - Radical
O - Outspoken
N - Naughty and Nice:)