Butterfly in the sky...

Last Friday, while Scott and I were staying at Mimi and Papa's house, we all took the boys to the monarch butterfly reserve north of Santa Barbara. It was so amazing and beautiful. We started the morning with pancakes with "sirpup", which Scott is now requesting daily and usually its "cake cakes with sirpup at mimi and papa's house".

We got up to the butterflies just after 10 which is supposed to be a great time (and turns out it was because it was getting pretty crowded with tour and school groups. The hike in was super easy and there were simply millions of monarchs everywhere.

We kept the boys close because we didn't want them running into the clumps of butterflies and disturbing them (or worse....crushing)

So beautiful...

The hike was so easy that the boys walked the whole way back (actually ran...)

Then we stopped at a beach in Santa Barbara for our picnic lunch on the way home...these boys LOVE the beach. And thanks to southern ca weather we can hit the sand and surf in just our diapers...

Kisses for baby brother Owen

Kisses from cousin J too...

Good bump pic....Owen: 33 weeks

We buried the boys' pigs in the sand...over and over and over and over...they couldn't get enough

If you get a chance to visit the butterfly reserve I highly recommend it...we had a wonderful day!

A view from the phone...

It seems I have been capturing lots of fun moments on my phone these last few weeks. Not that I'm not using my awesome camera, its just that in the day to day of it I don't always have it with me. Thank goodness for technology so I least I have some pictures of what we've been up to lately....even thought the quality lacks. As seen above, the boys spend many days together and most of those days include some park time! Scott has become rather bossy these days so much of our park time has included Scott deciding what they will play on next (and Parker happily complying) and Scott saying "Parker Jay mere (come here)" and clapping his hands at him like a dog. Its pretty hilarious.

Now that we have had some chillier weather we have had long mornings in our jams...its been very cozy. This picture of Scott with his rice krispies (cereal and milk self feeding = hours of toddler fun in the morning, and pretty easy clean up) we texted to Brian on his last trip to say "good morning daddy!"

More park time....Scott is such a climber!

And Scott had his first haircut. What?!?!!! I know that he hardly has hair to cut yet. But he was looking like such a scraggly muffin we couldn't stand it any longer. Jackie (who cuts my hair) offered to trim him up in the back and around the ears so he wouldn't look like a balding old man anymore (no offense to balding old men).

Climbing slides...the bigger the better (this one is quite small...he usually prefers the tallest one at the park, where I can't reach to the top to help him if need be, with bumps etc.)

Lunch time with J. Always better to share a chair than have your own, and who needs a booster? Not these two....so glad I bought it : /

Oink, Oink

And for my all of my gluten free friends: have you discovered these little gems? Truly every time I think I could not love trader joe's more - BAM they come out with a new gluten free treat and I fall in love all over again

We enjoyed one on the way home from the store that day.

I like to call this picture "For the Love of Pitas". Scott's pitas were filthy so I threw them in with a load of laundry. Well Scott caught me putting them in and FREAKED. He wanted them right that second - "NOoooooo PIIIIIIITAAAAAS!!!!". Well the washer door locked and the water started....basically nothing I can do now buddy. "Nooooooooo water, pitas wet, NOOOOO". He stood at the window and watched in agony as his pitas swirled and soaped. He beat on the window (that's the picture I tried to capture but I was too late, mean mom). I sat down and explained the situation of needing his pitas to be clean and that he could have them back soon etc. To no avail. I offered mickey mouse, elmo, snacks...nothing! Pitas only. And by the way he will only accept these two pitas so there would be no substituting. Now pita washing has to happen covertly.

More mornings spent in our jams. Scott is loving building castles with his new blocks these days.

"Nemo Elmo Campbell"

Ever since we found out this baby would be a little brother we have been asking Scott what his little brother's name should be. Firstly because we thought it was cute to hear his thoughts, secondly because we literally had no idea what we would name him and needed all the suggestions and help we could get, and thirdly because when asked as a 3.5 year old what I wanted to name my little sister I was dead set on "little Arabella Miller" (you know, the one who had a fuzzy caterpillar). So from the start Scott said "baby", because come on what other choice do you have but to call the baby "baby". Other favorite choices were "neigh neigh" and "baby neigh neigh" (for a while there I was pretty nervous that Scott was going to be hugely disappointed that he wasn't receiving a baby horse near his second birthday). Once he told me that we should name him "Peace G-ha" (G-ha is how he says train) which I think takes the cake for creativity. The most hilarious choice he came up with was: "Nemo Elmo". Just like that, first and middle. Talk about the ultimate my-toddler-older-sibling-was-allowed-to-name-me. As cute as that is, so many 'E's and 'M's and 'O's - we have decided on a name that is not Nemo Elmo or Peace G-ha.

Dah dah dah dum:

OWEN CHANDLER CAMPBELL

We liked the name Owen even when we were pregnant with Scott, but we so loved Scott and always knew that is what we would name our son that we didn't consider deviating from our plan. This time around we went through so many (I mean SO MANY) names, only to have the other parent veto and we kept coming back to (and, more importantly, agreeing on) Owen. Chandler is after Brian's paternal grandfather. We are aware of the friends reference, "Ms. Chanandler Bong" will never be far from my mind when I think of the name, but we love the name and its significance. So there it is. We absolutely love his name, almost as much as we already love him!

Owen, we cannot wait to meet you in less than 10 weeks (is that really it? wow!!!). The 3 of us (and Charlie too) love you so much already!

P.S. Scott's first night in the big boy bed went awesome!

Big Boy Bed

After much procrastination on my part we have now finally changed Scott's bed to a toddler bed. We probably could have done this much earlier, but I just didn't see the point since he was not climbing out of his crib yet. Scott moves around A LOT at night so I also hesitated because I knew he would roll out sooner than later. There was also the question of Scott getting out of his room unannounced which I know for some people isn't a problem, but Scott's room is on the complete other side of the house from ours, not to mention he would have to pass through the kitchen on his way to our room and that would be a huge distraction. He would probably forget about coming to get us and go right for a midnight snack!

But in the last few weeks many of Scott's friends have graduated from their cribs (lots of his friends are getting younger siblings soon too) and it made me think I would rather start this transition now than in say 2 months when his brother will be here/be here soon.

So we changed out the front of his crib to the toddler rail today, moved the monitor and the humidifier so he couldn't get down and mess around with those cords, and added a baby gate to his door so he can't come traipsing through the house at night!

Tonight's the night! Wish us luck!

Four letter words...

What four letter words have we accidentally used around Scott? Very very few thankfully...our little repeater says absolutely everything we do and we have been overly careful, even in moments of our deepest frustration! So what four letter word does Scott know and use...the worst word in the English language (ok there are worse, but none that I can think of that a toddler would hear):

M-I-N-E

I absolutely can't deal. Everything is "mine"! Even if he is not using it at the time. Don't get me wrong Scott is good about sharing, which I attribute to so much playtime with Jay and his other friends but having just learned and understood mine it has become the grand theme of the moment. We try to tell him that his toys etc are his to share and if he doesn't share then we will take them away but he is not deterred from his insistence.

I know it's a stage but oh how I loathe the "mine"!

In honor of the "mine" I give you the Toddlers Rules of Possesion (via pinterest):

1. If I like it, it's mine.

2. If its in my hand, it's mine.

3. If I can take it from you, it's mine.

4. If I had it a little while ago, it's mine.

5. If its mine it must NEVER appear to be yours in any way.

6. If I'm doing or building something, all the pieces are mine.

7. If it looks like mine, it's mine.

8. If I saw it first, it's mine.

9. If you are playing with something and put it down, it automatically becomes mine.

10. If its broken, it's yours.

Ringing in the New Year

Well by New Year's Eve we were all healthy and ready to party (haha, like we party). New Year's Eve was quite special and fun for Brian and me as I got to join him in Pasadena that night for the President's Ball for the Tournament of Roses. Brian works really hard all year on the tournament and especially the month of December and ESPECIALLY the week between Christmas and New Years. This year the dinner fell on new year's eve so not only did we get to have a fun date night out together but it just so happened to be NYE! I barely took any picture of the night and most of them turned out a little blurry, but it was fun and oh so beautiful. The highlight of the evening (besides getting dressed up and spending a night out with my handsome, tuxedo clad husband) was hearing this year's Grand Marshall, J.R. Martinez, speak at the dinner. I am not a dancing with the stars watcher and barely watch news so I didn't really know too much about him until Brian told me he would bet this year's grand marshall. Once I knew that I looked up his story and paid attention when he did interviews on TV, and what an amazing guy! He was such a wonderful speaker and he did a remarkable job of conveying his story - so positive and uplifting all while remaining incredibly humble. I did vomit in my mouth a little when he said he was only 28 years old - I'm not enjoying this stage of being older than people! I'm definitely a J.R. fan now!!! Dinner was fun and beautiful and we even got a little dancing in - which was a sight with my big ol belly, very junior high-esq. But did we make it to the new year? Nah. We had hit the hay by 11:30 (that's right we couldn't even stay up 30 more minutes in our room to watch the ball drop). Part of a great night out is actually getting some uninterrupted sleep!

The next morning Brian had to be out a the float judging at some ungodly hour like 5:30ish. I slept in a while (we were in a sweet hotel so I had to live it up, but unfortunately my body clock says sleeping in is about 7am) then headed home to hang out with my munch for the first time in 2012. My parents (who had oh so kindly stayed the night with Scott so I could be in Pasadena, thanks again mimi and papa!) and I decided to spend the first day of the new year at the beach...and Scott was THRILLED!

It was a little overcast but not too cold...and it burned off by midday so it was a win!

"Smell the foowers mimi!"

Story time before an early night to bed so we could wake up at 5am for the parade...

Scott's awesome daddy hooked us up with great parade tickets and Scott loved every second (despite being really tired from such an early wake up call)

Walking in we got to see the horses and some floats up close. In the distance we could hear some of the bands warming up and Scott kept saying "more trumpets", he couldn't even see the trumpets...hilarious! Look at those tired eyes of his below...

Our seats were right at the parade start...it was so cool!

Absolutely mesmerized by everything!!!

The Trader Joe's float...I thought it was really cute!

Clapping along to the music!

Happy New Year written in the sky by 5 planes!

HGTV float was also cool (love me some HGTV!)

Scott's second favorite float was the one with the dog's surfing - it was cute and hilarious!

Of course the highlight of the day was the Farmer's float because DADDY WAS RIDING ON IT! Coolest thing ever! I couldn't believe it when he told me (that morning). My pictures are terrible, at some point I will have to zoom in and edit and see if I can get a better shot of his face.

We were able to see him quite well from where we were sitting and he saw us as well. If you look really closely at the picture he is on the right of the float sitting down. See the guy standing and waving on the front right corner? Ok, the guy sitting behind him, right under the key. We got to see him on TV when we got home later too!

The Farmer's float from the front!

Scott was pretty much done-zo the last half hour or so, but he still did a great job!

One of the last floats were these amazing dinosaurs - big time score for our little buddy who is turning into quite the dinosaur fan lately!

We were home by lunch time and good long naps were had by all. Here's to 2012, we can't believe Scott will be 2 in less than two months and that baby brother will be here just two weeks after that!!! Happy New Year loved ones!

"More fun horses"

Last week my sister, mom and I got to take the boys to meet up with some old friends we grew up with. We had an amazing lunch at a little mexican place in Somis then they took us to meet their horse. Needless to say, the boys were in heaven. And as soon as we drove away Scott said, "Mommy, more fun horses please!"

Parker got to help give Princeton (the horse) his water bucket.

Scott gave him snacks. Scott quickly figured out where the horse snacks were kept and wanted to give him more and more. Princeton got spoiled that day!

Haven't seen these girls in years. It was really fun catching up for a little while with Megan and Jessie.

Our little ranchers...so cute!