Back to school recap

I've been really good about documenting and posting our camping trips lately...but it feels like that's about it.  September flew by with all of the back to school goings-on and business, not to mention moving my office (again!).  

Week 3 of school was book fair week.  Last year, like a crazy person, I volunteered to run the book fair.  Well, it didn't happen exactly like that.  An email went out stating Tricia, who had previously run the book fair, would be graduating (well her son) and would be able to train someone new to run it and who would like to help?  Crickets.  After three days of seeing zero response from classmates, I wrote to the teacher in charge and said under no circumstances did I want to run it but whoever took over to send them to me, I would be happy to be their number two and accomplish check lists and finish tasks for them.  Her response: no is number one...so you win.  So now I do book fair, and since Owen will be there for two years after this year, it looks like I have my work cut out for me.  In all fairness, its very easy, about a week of organizing, planning and volunteer getting, followed by a super long week of running it and being at school all day everyday, then its done til spring!

So all of a sudden it was book fair week, and with the help of my school mama friends (women who I literally could not live without), it went off without a hitch.

Tuesday morning was breakfast with Clifford and Owen was obsessed.  He gave a million hugs and kisses and followed him all over.  Scott could not have cared less.

Wednesday night we opened the book fair during "Take-a-Peek" night (our school's back to school night) and participated in the electric light parade (kids march around school with glow sticks and they LOVE it).

This one was out like a light as soon as we got in the car at nearly 8pm.

Did I mention the office move happened the same week as book fair.  Great timing right?  For all the stress and headache of it we are in now and it was more than worth it.  I'll have to do a whole office post at some point.  I'm pretty excited about it.  

During one of the many trips back and forth moving we stopped for adjustments.

Owen was a little helper, and has clearly spent a lot of time watching me work.

Breakfast with the rescue bots one morning, ignoring our "no toys at the table" rule.

Our first school field trip was to see a local community theater play.  Naturally we stopped at Starbucks for some morning treats, well and also my good friend choreographed the play and had to be there bright and early that same morning so I promised her a double shot and some sugar when we got there.  And did you know Starbucks now does coconut milk?!?!  Game changer.  We don't do cow and we don't do soy so our choices have been limited, but now with more places doing almond and or coconut we are a happy bunch.

I also recently discovered gluten free, non gmo, no artificial dye candy corn at Whole Foods, its just as disgusting as the real stuff, but the boys are happy, and my little hippy heart doesn't have to freak out about all the chemicals.

All ready for picture day.  

Halloween prep.  This was the day Scott got his costume (which has made for hours and days of entertainment), they didn't have any Owen's size (at Costco) so he settled for his super hero jams and a mask.

We are loving fall and looking forward to Halloween and the impending holiday season!

Fall at the beach

I love fall.  Unfortunately, it hasn't felt much like fall around these parts.  We attempted to go to the beach for our anniversary, but didn't get a spot, probably due to our unseasonably warm weather (stupidly, annoyingly, hot and humid weather).    So we headed up mid week to try again and hit it perfectly.  We spent the first night at Hobson and moved up the next day to a spot at Rincon.  It was the perfect way to spend what was hopefully one of the last warm weekends of the year (please, God!).  

The mornings were overcast and foggy, however that didn't stop the boys from getting in the ocean immediately after breakfast.

Ocean life:

Nature's legos:

And beach art:

Obligatory family selfie

During high tide we had some inside time but we did get to watch a huge pod of dolphins from the rocks, it was pretty amazing.

My happy place.  I never want to leave when I'm there.

Evening number three at dinner Owen was looking pretty wiped.  He was just finishing up when he put his head down and fell asleep still chewing his food.  Don't worry we made sure he didn't choke.  He was asleep around 5:45...for the night!

Daddy offered to stay with the sleeping babe while Scott and I took and evening walk.  We did a little rock collecting and Scott really got into it.  I'm a big rock collector, I think I get it from Mimi ; ), I love perfectly round and perfectly flat ones, I can't help but pick them up, and it looks like Scott shares our excitement in the quest to find the perfect rock.

Really into it.  I finally had to make a pouch from my shirt to carry our loot.

Sunset before we went up for the night.

When I checked on the boys that night I found this:

Precious.

Already looking forward to our next beach weekend!!!

Happy fall!

6

Saturday we celebrated our 6th wedding anniversary.  We are not big on the celebrations of life events around here, and I don't mean that in a bad way, its just not usually our style to go big.  This year we did have some biggish plans though, a night away, camping at the beach, just the two of us.

Well that was until we didn't get a spot - major bummer.  Enter plan B: the boys still had their scheduled sleep over at Mimi and Papa's and Brian and I went out for dinner and drinks and then home for the evening sans kids.  Brian even surprised me with a stop to buy a mirror I have had my eye on for our living room.  And we are hoping to squeeze our camping trip in soon too!

Time flies, ya'll.

Sister Cousin

September 12, 2014.  Talked to Auntie in the morning and found out she was IN LABOR!  Hurray!  So the boys I and headed up to Mimi and Papa's to hang with Parker John and be nearby for when baby girl made her arrival.  

We played outside and ate lots of ice cream while we waited!

And enjoyed our new pillow quilts that Mimi made us.  Nothing like a middle of the day campout.

This one, always eating.  Always.

<3 p="">

Around 2:30 we finally talked to the proud parents.  She was born at 12:17, 7lbs 6oz, 20 in. if I remember correctly.

We all headed over and I got to walk Parker J in to meet his sister.  So I busted out my phone and took 800 pictures (not an exaggeration, actual 800).  It was precious beyond words and I wish I could have captured it better for them (i.e. used my good camera).

Proud big brother

His reaction to baby crying.  Good luck dude, this was mild.

Parker really wanted the boys to come in so they got to come after a few minutes and meet their littlest cousin.

Nothing like hanging out on a birthing stool with your cousin!

Peaking at baby cousin

And before we knew it the little nugget was heading home.

She has a name now, but I'll post it later.

Walking with Dinosaurs

Last weekend we scored some sweet tickets at the Staples center....to walking with dinosaurs.  Thanks Farmers.

We had a heard about this show a while back and found out they were finally touring again.  We got there with plenty of time to walk around before the show started.

We found our seat, and of course at all of our snacks before the show started.

It was pretty cool, I must admit.  Huge animatronic dinosaurs with lots of history lessons to go with it.  I'm pretty glad we were up high in the farmer's suite because I think it could have gotten a little scary if we were down on the floor.  T-Rex literally leaned over the audience and roared in their faces.

T-Rex of course came last, its a blurry picture below but there he is chasing down ankylosaurus.  

T-Rex was Scott's favorite part.  At the end they told the story of a meteor hitting earth near the Gulf of Mexico and creating a dust storm that blocked the sun etc. etc. extinction.  The lights flashed and there was booming and roaring, I assumed this would be a scary part for the boys....this was Owen's favorite as he took this time to give the whole show a huge round of applause.  

If you have the chance, I recommend it for your little dinosaur lovers.

Hart Hawks

Friday night was girl's night out for me!!!  My best friend from growing up, Erin, came down so we could drive together to see our elementary school friend, Keeley, play in Hollywood.  We also found out ahead of time that a few other elementary school friends would be there as well.  Most of these girls stayed together through high school, but since I moved after 8th grade I hadn't seen most of them in almost 18 years.  Aaaaaand....I'm old. 

First of all Keeley was AMAZING.  The last time I saw her play was at the sixth grade talent show at Hart elementary (hence Hart Hawks).  I have her albums on iTunes, but this was my first time seeing her live (well in adulthood!).  Truly amazing.  Goosebumps! 

Above picture: Tami, Misty, Keeley, Erin and me

  

Keeley on stage.

After the show we went out for some drinks and some catching up.  It was so much fun.  Facebook and social media really is great because we all sort of kept up on each other's lives and families and we could have never coordinated this outing with out the help and simplicity of being in touch through social media.  We already discussed having a hart hawks reunion with even more childhood friends in the near future.