A day at the bay.

One of my favorite places to visit in California is Monterey. We used to go there nearly every year (or at least it seems that way) for my birthday growing up. We would wake up in the morning and head over to the two story McDonald's for our breakfast and then begin our day of shopping. There was this great Barbie doll outlet on Cannery Row and my parents would take me there on my special day and I got to pick out a doll just for me (or two, or three). 

I have always been so excited to take my children to Monterey to begin creating their own memories of this beautiful destination. Our first trip was back in September of 2007, but things didn't go according to our plans. We had just found out the week before that Dad had stage IV kidney cancer and though we thought our vacation would be a good distraction, neither Brad nor I were emotionally ready to be away from home.

This summer was different. It felt like the Monterey vacations that I remembered from my childhood. Maybe because Jacob and Abby are two years older, maybe because Brad and I aren't still numb from the shock of Dad's cancer, and maybe because going there somehow in some way made me feel close to my dad after having spent the past year apart from him. Whatever it was, it was truly wonderful.

I loved watching the kids amazement at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. That place really is like another world. It is crazy to me to think that all of this life exists just under the water's surface. It was so great to see the kids absorb all of this and have fun while doing it. There are so many great interactive exhibits now that Jacob and Abby didn't stop going and going the whole three hours we were there.

Back from the beach

We're back from our wonderful, relaxing, one week vacation in Aptos (near Santa Cruz). What an awesome, fun filled trip we had. We visited the Monterey Bay Aquarium, a great children's museum in Monterey, the Santa Cruz Boardwalk, and the beach many, many times (which is good because it took Abby several visits before she realized that she didn't totally hate the feeling of sand between her toes.)

I have lots of pictures to post, so check back in the next few days to see the images from our trip.

Princess Abby

Apart from filling our family and friends in on what's going on in our lives, I use this blog as a way to document the many milestones that our children reach. I am so bad at updating their baby books, so I hope that by chronicling their acheivements I won't soon forget the little adorable things that they do and say in these early years.


Abby has really grown so much in these past few months. It seems like she hit her second birthday and blossomed into this beautiful little girl. It was so funny because Jacob came downstairs the morning of her birthday and asked if Abby "would be able to talk now." Well, he wasn't too far off. She started adding to her vocabulary daily and it is so awesome to finally hear what she's thinking. So what does Abby think about? Princesses of course! Today I'll break down the many princesses that Abby knows and her thoughts on each of them. (Luckily I'm a certified Abby translator so I'll fill you in just in case you didn't quite get it right away.)

• Belle--Obviously this is Belle from "Beauty and the Beast". She's been saying Belle for as long as I can remember. She used to use Belle to describe anything that she thought was pretty but now it's mostly just reserved for the actual Belle character. She is also quite fond of the "Beasht".



• Ah-white--Second only to Belle, Snow White is a huge favorite of Abby's. She has two different Snow White books that we have to read every day before naptime.



• Seeping Bee--Sleeping Beauty. Abby seems to like her, but she's usually last in line when naming her princesses. She seems to be more taken by the wicked queen in the book. She often points at her and says, "Dat mean".



• Muwan--Mulan. She likes Mulan more and more these days since Jacob's been requesting that we watch it since he loves the fight scenes.



• Yo-wi-yo--Ariel from "The Little Mermaid." Abby loves her and today she pointed to her fin and said, "Yo-wi-yo no feet. Yo-wi-yo fish." It was really quite funny that she never seemed to notice that Ariel is actually a mermaid and not your typical princess.



• Ha-wa-wa--Cinderella. Similar to Sleeping Beauty, Abby doesn't seem to show much interest in Cinderella, but that might be because she hasn't seen the actual movie yet.



• Tinker-belle-belle--Though a fairy and not actually a princess, I thought this should make it onto the list just because it's so cute. I love that she says "belle-belle". I think she knows that her name is just Tinkerbell, but she always adds that extra "belle" at the end.

So now you're caught up on your dose of Abby vocabulary. Stay tuned for some of our favorite Jacob-isms.

Finding our dinner in the dirt.

Brad is the gardner around here. I love that we have a garden every year because my kids will actually eat the vegetables that we grow as opposed to the ones we get from the store. I'm almost tempted to buy a big bag of produce, throw the leafy greens in the garden during naps, and trick them into eating their veggies for dinner. But that would be sneaky and moms never do anything sneaky in an attempt to get their children to eat their fill from the food pyramid.

Last night we were checking out our latest crop when Brad decided to dig down into one of our planters. In went his hand and out came a potato! And then another. and another. and another. Until we filled this entire bowl full.

The best part of this story is that we didn't even plant these this year. These were all volunteers from last year's planting. So we'll be having our fill of potatoes over the next few days. If anyone gets a craving for some fries or hash browns, you know who to call.

Happy Mother's Day

Indeed it has been a happy mother's day. Mine actually began last night after I had given the kids a bath and headed upstairs to tuck them in. Jacob has learned to write both his name and Abby's, and he has this little drawing that he does which I absolutely love! It's supposed to be a person but always looks like Mike Wasowski from Monster's Inc. I adore it and Brad knew this so he had Jacob draw these little guys and Abby color and then he framed their masterpiece and hung it in our upstairs hall. I must say, out of all of my mother's day gifts so far, this is my favorite. Something I will cherish forever.

Happy Mother's Day to all the mommies out there! What a wonderful job we have, to raise up these amazing little people and get their love in return.

wordless wednesday

Dollar store fun

Every once in a while I like to take the kids to the dollar store to pick out a little something special. I think the main reason I do it is because it's so much fun to see just what they will choose. Jacob is almost always a sure bet for candy. Abby usually wants a doll.

On this day they both surprised me. Abby choose a ball and Jacob chose the "silly guy".

My oh my. What little "silly guys" they are.