I miss you, Grandma

Grandma, you will be missed. I am so glad I saw you just a few weeks ago.

Precious Morgan

Here's one of the cutest little girls in the world...Baby Morgan at her Naming Ceremony! (Yay, Robin, I got it on!!!!)

Ohhh...my pics worked....here's Tegan!!!!! :-) From a week ago...Spencer's first best friend!

My baby is grown up

Feeling a little mopey...my baby Spence started pre-school today. How in the world did that happen???? My babies aren't babies anymore....he loved school, by the way. He looked so cute! His favorite part was playing with the trains in the yellow room. :-)
I am also a little mopey about school..liking my new partner, but other stuff are kinda bumming me out...oh well...anyway have a LOT of money to give us so I can stay home????

stuff I hate continued

Ah, Sally, you reminded me...
10. I hate doing report cards! I love teaching, but I do not like all the grading and paperwork! I get behind and then have to make a mad rush to catch up. I like to do daily assessments to know where my kids are.

I also hate crowded places, especially when I am with my 2 small boys. Waiting in line with them is hard. Especially my very mobile-on the move- can't stand still Cooper. His grammy says he is just like his daddy! We postponed our Disneyland trip for later this fall...hopefully less crowded than summer! :-)

Oh, and being stuck in traffic with 2 boys who may or may not be happy or hot or thirsty or hot...

OK, gotta go mop the floors...and help Joe paint...my favorites! Yippeeeee.....

10 Things You Hate Doing

Ok, 10 on Tuesday's newest tag is 10 Things you hate doing...here's mine...

1. Cleaning the toilets
2. Scrubbing the shower (anything bathroom related)
3. Painting the top part of the wall
4. Mopping (Can you tell cleaning is not my thing...)
5. Taking my car in to get fixed
6. Writing big checks
7. Putting away baby clothes because they won't fit my babies anymore...
8. hate being late and I am late a lot now....ugh...
9. losing my keys (starting to stretch...I guess maybe cleaning is my hated thing...)
10. hmmmm....

Ok, that was harder than I thought. Ok, I am tagging Sally, Vicki, and Brian....

Weekend Fun

So we ventured down south again to visit friends and go to Morgan's naming ceremony (Robin and Peter's beautiful baby girl). We had a blast! First we stayed with Tegan and family. Tegan was Spencer's first best friend. We love his family. Spencer had a great time playing with Tegan (and seeing Evan, his cute baby brother). He is the most well behaved 3 year old ever! Joe and I were amazed at him...he certainly seems much older than 3 and 2 months...Charity and Shane are some amazing parents!! Our boys weren't in the best form, though I know 2 long trips and a week without mommy all day didn't help. No more car trips for awhile...
We also visited with the Hayes family and their new addition, Summer. So cute! Diane, one of my dearest friends and Spencer's godmother, came over and chatted with us for a while at Charity's house. Diane is also mother to Aaron, lead singer of Under the Influence of Giants, a hot new band. They have been in People the last 2 weeks, on Jimmy Kimmel, and have a video on rotation on MTV. If you love dance music, you'll love them. Check it out on itunes!!! Awesome!!!
On Sunday we attended the naming ceremony. It was so good to see Robin. I miss her a lot. She is such a fun friend and we always have a good time together. Isn't her daughter just precious???? She slept through the whole party!
On the way home, we ran into a brush fire on the 5 and sat on the Grapevine for 2 hours!!! Augh! It was closed and we wern't sure what to do. Go back to LA? Just wait? Luckily (I guess...) they opened it before we had to be diverted onto an alternate route that would have taken us off and around the Grapevine, a delay of ??? hours! So we made it home, and I went straight to bed as today was my FIRST day of school! Already! But I survived and Maya, my new teaching partner, and I enjoyed our day. Tomorrow I'm off at 11:50, so I am looking forward to my shorter days!
UGH>>>>My pics won't link....Robin, I'll keep trying...I'm not sure what is going on....ugh...

Amanda's here!

Kim and Mike welcomed baby Amanda Joy yesterday! Congrats! Can't wait to see pictures! So excited for these guys!

pics that didn't post

my pics won't post...waaah...not my day!

Broken...

...toe....I broke my toe this morning...owwww! I was on my way to school, had the boys in the car, ran back to the house to get something and owww...ran into the handle of the hose house...my pinky toe was literally pointing the other way! It hurt soooo bad!!! I dropped the boys off at their auntie's house (Aunt Chelle) and went straight to Urgent Care. After an xray, a shot to numb the toe (MORE pain) and a post op shoe, I was at school. Monday is the first day of school. Nothing like starting the year with a broken toe. Hmmmm.....oh well....
I guess the house will stay half painted, the rooms messy...how did I get so far behind????

That's all...I'll leave with some pics from our San Diego trip. The boys had a blast! Spencer wants to move to San Diego (me, too!). Anyone else????

Kim, anxious to hear baby news...the countdown's on!

For the grandmas

Grandmas....here are some shots of Coop and his haircut! :-) He looks so cute and so grown-up! San Diego pictures coming soon!!!!
P.S. Little Locks in Ja Jolla rocks!!!!!

new shoes...

Cooper got his first pair of new shoes! We went to the cutest boutique, the owner is sooo sweet (vicki, I'll take you when you guys come up next!). They were out of size 4 in the shoes I really wanted, so she got on the phone to order more from the company, but I didn't want to wait so I picked another pair. They are so cute! Very fall-like...you can see the pics. In one of the pics, doesn't my baby look soooo old! Waaaah! (Edited to add, my links aren't working today...hmmm, but if you want to check out the shoes, they are See Kai Run style "Diego" at www.seekairun.com)

Summer's here!

Summer Hayes, baby of my friends Colleen & Chris, was born last night! Yay! I just got the news via a friend, but I had to post. Her big brother is Turner, 2. He must be so happy!
Congrats, Hayes Family!

Tagged

So Sally tagged me...what are 10 random songs that would come up on your ipod?
Well, I do not own an ipod (and that's OK with me, even though I know almost everyone owns one now...), but if I did, here are 10 songs that would come up on mine (from my itunes downloads and CD collection):
1. Dani California...Red Hot Chili Peppers
2. Mama's Room...Under the Influence of Giants (know this band! :-))
3. Feel Good Inc...Gorillaz
4. Stars are Blind...Paris Hilton (I know, I know, but I am a sucker for reggae/ska songs...)
5. Dancing Queen...Abba
6. Riley Jo...Hometown Hero (now they are band #2 above..)
7. Jane Fonda...Mickey Avalon
8. Lilian...Depeche Mode
9. Home...Coldplay
10. Copacabana...Barry Manilow (have I ever told you I got to stay up late in kindergarten to watch his concerts on TV, is that weird? Was I just a precocious child?)

OK, so I am tagging....Brian, Vicki, (fellow bloggers) and my other readers...send me your 10 random Ipod songs...tell me in the comments. :-) Get a blog! It's free, Kim, you KNOW your family and friends would love to see pics of the new baby girl as she grows...and Robin, you too, your LA family and friends would LOVE to keep posted on Morgan and Justin's lives....

where oh where does time go

OOPS, forgot to turn pic sideways...my boys fingerpainting outside!!!

Ok, where did the summer go? What was on my list again? Did I accomplish it? Noooo....BUT I did get Spencer potty trained, part way...he is trained enough for school, even naps in undies. So that's good. Still have to paint the front rooms, but we did pick a paint color...greystone from Kelly-Moore. We'll go pick up the paint tomorrow. You can see the actual color in the photos of Kim at her shower. I loved the paint color and asked Jen, the owner of the house, for the color. Did a lot of cleaning around the house, LOTS of papers cleared out, ready for the shredder. Even had a garage sale yesterday. Just sold junk, junk that Joe was ready to haul off to the dump. But I made about $76 in junk! Yesss!
Garage sales are weird, though. Should I be offended when someone pulls up, looks from inside the car, and drives away? Do they not want my junk??? One lady yelled out in joy when she saw the VHS version of The Birdcage. She said she had been looking for it! Ha! So, now there are only a few boxes ready to be carted off to la dump.
I have also started ebaying stuff and making some moola! I made almost $30 in shabby chic books (living with 3 boys has made me give up on my dream of a shabby chic home). Now selling a figurine and an oil lamp that has been in the box since a student gave it to me about 5 years ago (shhh, don't tell, it was nice thought)...so have a nice little chunk in my paypal account and have bought a few things for the boys, a wall grille for me, a book, some scrapbook supplies, and am bidding on some fall clothes for Spence. Joe loves it!
Ok, better go, my little man just woke up and is rooting around the doughnuts from this morning's doughnut run with Daddy. So long, healthy snack!

Baby Girl

Here's a pic of our newest member of the Brown clan, isn't she a cutie? She was grimacing because my camera has the worst strobe flash...a good reason for a new camera, right??? (Hint, Joe!) I have a cuter pic, but it shows her mommy in it, and I'm not sure Amber wants a pic of herself a few hours after giving birth on my blog! Ha!

Sally, I know you tagged me...

Sally, I know I was tagged...how fun! I will add my response later and tag others...watch out!

New baby, hot, and smarty alert!

OK, first congrats to my brother-in-law and sister-in-law on the birth of their baby girl, Panacea, this morning in Sacramento. She is welcomed by her big brother Tyler, 2. We're going up later today to see them. :-) The picture posted today is Spencer and Tyler last summer. Sorry it is kinda blurry, I think I need to get more pics of Tyler!

TOO HOT here still...we're breaking all kinds of records, it's been 110+ for over a week now. You open the front door and feel like you are walking into an oven. We can't do much of anything and the boys are getting cabin fever. Good thing our vacation to San Diego is coming up soon. We can't even swim because the water is so warm, it's not refreshing at all. Yuck...

Last, a shameless mommy brag, I don't want to be THAT kind of mom, but hey, I know my relatives are reading this (Hi!), so I'll post it. Others, you can leave now. :-) Spence was eating breakfast this mornig and playing with some alphabet magnets. He picked up the P and said, "P-p-p popcorn!" So, I picked up a few others, "R-M-O-B-E" and he correctly identified them! Go, Spence! I will ADD that his Leapfrog ABC Phonics DVD is his favorite movie right, so he is learning through that. I did attempt to pull out the flashcards (hey, I am a teacher after all), but he wasn't interested. He was more interested in napping with them, so maybe osmosis??? Hee-hee....
Stay cool and hope your summer is going well.

SO HOT>>>>>>>>>and scrapbooking

Whooo-hooo, it is H.O.T here...omigosh...it was 103 on our way to church at 10:30 and 111 on our way home from the grocery store at 1:00....it's like an oven out there. We are staying in, with the air blasting, the boys in diapers and undies....what about you? Are you roasting, too???

OK, so more of my friends are starting scrapbooking (i.e. Kim!), and I wanted to post about a fabulous book you need to get if you are a scrapper. It's not really a "layout" book, though it does have many examples, it's more of a theory. When I started scrapping, I had to go in order and had ro scrapp all the big moments in Spencer's life. That's probably why his first year takes up 2 overstuffed albums! And heck no, he is NOT taking it with him when he's older...unless I REALLY like his wife! BUT, now that I have Coop, and our family, and our house, and life, and etc.etc to scrap, I am soooo far behind. So I read Stacy Julian's The Big Picture Scrapbooking, she also has a website here. It totally freed me up from the "so behind" mentality. She suggests scrapbooking what you want to, telling your stories, and just putting them in albums that are not chronological, but topical: Birthdays, Our Town, Where We Go, What We Do, Our friends, etc...even for the kids once they start school, have a School of Life album that does 4 pages a year and includes going-ons from that year, not just school related. That is the album her kids will take when they move out. I love it! She also stresses how the story is the important thing...we want to remember stories, not how pretty that paper was. I am working on my journaling. I want Coop to know what his favorite food are and how he loves to climb everything and started crawling backwards first. I want Spence to know what his favorite books were at age 2 and how he is fascinated by aliens right now and how he remembers how to get everywhere (very good at directions!). Sooo, anyway, that's my little commercial for her book. Read it, you'll be happy and feel better about feeling behind. OK, so I am only about 7 pages into Cooper's first year album, but that's OK. I'll get there. I am working on a Halloween 6X6 album of their costumes and the stories behind them and just finished "Our House" album of the building and moving in. So, check it out....