Up Late

Long time no post...



There are about a million reasons for that, but I'll just share a few of them...

This little peanut, who is crawling all over the house now and learned how to pull himself up on anything he can.



He's also had a cold which makes him a bit crabby and wanting to be held all night. *yawn* I got a whopping four hours of sleep a few nights ago snuggling Mr Runny Nose, poor kid.

See that right arm curled under the baby?



Well, it's aching like mad. I have DEQUERVAINS TENOSYNOVITIS which means the tendon that helps move my thumb away from my fingers has become swollen. And it hurts...all the time...It pops and cracks some times. It cramps up. I have dull, unnerving pain all the time and occasional sharp shooting pain. I'm doing what my doctor suggested: I'm wearing a brace. I'm taking the brace off and trying without it. I'm icing it. I'm doing my doctor mandated exercises and still, it hurts...all the time...

Next thing to try will be a corticosteroid shot. I'll have to do more research before I tell you how I feel about that!



My Etsy shop is keeping me hopping. I have 5 orders lined up. Looking forward to knocking them all out because...

...Danny has finally agreed that we can go to Disneyland! I was lobbying for Walt Disney World but agree that the timing is not right. He said we can stay at a resort hotel for two days. So that means the planning can begin (really, when did it ever end?!) and I'd like to make some special clothes for the kids. I heard the quote this weekend that "The Cobbler's children have holes in their shoes" and it made me laugh because it's true that my cousin's kids all have custom boutique shirts but I've never made an outfit for Baby D and it's been years since I made anything for The Boy.



Speaking about Danny, he turned the big 3-0 last week and unfortunately it went by pretty much unnoticed because he worked all day and then had night school. But his mom and I are throwing him a pool party this weekend.



I've had a to-do list of supplies I needed which I've picked up this week and I'm in the process of cooking everything right now. It's a luau theme and my mother-in-law will be purchasing some food from a Hawaiian barbeque and we'll be preparing the rest. I'm currently preparing a Hawaiian pulled pork in the Crock-Pot (in two batches because my crock isn't big enough for ten pounds of meat!), a sauce for the cole slaw, a macaroni salad and spice cupcakes with cream cheese frosting. I have a feeling I'll be up late tonight and up early on Saturday morning getting it all done!

Hopefully the baby sleeps all night.

Fourth of July

Happy Independence Day!


This was me last year standing next to Danny while pregnant with Baby D.


This is me this year (same shirt!) holding Baby D at 7 months old!

We started off the day going to the movies...never did that on a holiday before! I had won a ticket to see Brave on an online contest. We scooped up my mom first and headed to the theatre. Turned out nice, the theatre wasn't too busy at 10:30am. Matinee tickets were $6 each and the lovely girl working the booth gave me the entire amount that the winning ticket was worth ($14) and applied it to our total, so we only had to pay $10 for four of us to see the movie! Not too shabby...*wink* And we all LOVED the movie, so exciting and the animation is out of this world beautiful.

Afterwards we wandered over to Gymboree and shopped the sale. $3.95 for sweat pants, yes! A $4 sun hat that is sorely needed? Absolutely! Racked up a good total and walked out with $25 more in Gymbucks, oh yeah!


Hanging out in the walker and cruising the yard at Grandma's house

Headed home to pick up Danny, who'd been out running errands with Baby D, and we all drove over to my parent's house to celebrate the Fourth.


The Girl in her Walmart stars & stripes dress...only $5! Sometimes you can find some cute things. I just had to adjust the straps & sew them down in back, they were a bit long.

The weather wasn't hot and the kids never asked, so we didn't take them swimming that day. They were content to run around the yard together, taking breaks to drink Minute Maid Watermelon juice (yummy!).


Check them out, all looking at the camera at the same time! No easy feat, I tell you!

My mother-in-law is renovating her house so things are still in a disarray. She joined us for a dinner of melt-in-your-mouth tender rib eye, grilled burgers, potato salad and for dessert...homemade apple pie and cheesecake Jell-O pudding pie.

Did you ever know of such a thing? Cheesecake flavored Jell-O pudding??? I was buying a Keebler pie crust and there was a recipe on top. Found the tiny boxes of cheesecake pudding all the way on the bottom shelf. Simple to put together, it truly only took five minutes, just mix the two boxes with 1 1/4 cup milk, lemon zest, and half a tub of Cool Whip. I tweaked the recipe here. The recipe suggests a can of cranberry sauce, but I thought of something we'd like better...I added this entire mix on top of the crust and then smoothed on spoonfuls of Knott's Boysenberry jam (MUST be Knott's, it's the best!). Sprinkled with crushed walnuts, topped with the rest of the tub of Cool Whip and more walnuts. In the fridge for four hours and it's ready to eat. SO delicious!

And why don't I have a picture of it? Because we ate it all so fast, sorry!

Please be content with this image of the pie that I made last year, from Martha Stewart!



You'll also have to be content with last year's image of my decorated buffet. I have the same decor up however this year it's been delegated to one third of the buffet (sharing space with the giant water jug and the fruit stand).




Baby Patriot! I bought this outfit for him way before he was born with the intention that he would wear it on the Fourth of July. Thank goodness I found it in that box I'd put away in the closet!

We ended the day by watching fireworks from my mother-in-law's driveway. The city moved the location a bit, which worked out okay because they were perfectly lined up with our street so there were no trees in the way and they were less than a mile from the house. Baby D loved it and was repeating our ooohhs and ahhhhs, he wasn't even scared by the loud bangs.

Happy Fourth everyone!

Small Saturdays, Big Sunday - Part 2

Fast forward another week to the following weekend. This time it was just The Boy and Danny took him out to the lake for the afternoon so Baby D and I had the house to ourselves. Finished a custom order and got that mailed out. Much laundry completed too and finished pulling out all the summer clothes I'd put away last year when I was too roundly-pregnant to wear them! It was like shopping in my own closet.

Been going through Baby D's outgrown clothes and listing things slowly on Ebay. Seems like he outgrow everything overnight! Our living room is a clutter of outgrown clothes and equipment that is either ready to be returned to their original owners or put on Craigslist. It will be nice to get our living spaces back after having such large pieces in them like the swing, bassinette, bouncy seat and Bumbo seat!



Here is a link to the Ebay listings, if you have any need for baby boy clothes! I've got more listings to come...

After a quiet Saturday, we were geared up for our Big Sunday. We had tickets to the San Diego County Fair and were ready to play! Danny's grandma works there seasonally so she gifted us with free entry tickets and enough tickets for the kids to go on three rides.


With Roswell the Alien, Fair mascot in the Fair's "Out of this World" theme


Ready for fun!


Some crazy spinny thing...


Himalaya ride, their favorite!

We walked through the garden area, woodcarving, gem show, kiddieland, watched a lamb competition, Monster truck rally (louder than loud...I'm still deaf and I was about 50 feet outside the complex!) amd a yearly favorite, the Swifty Swine Pig Races.

My husband prides himself on being a self-professed cheap-skate and we were able to get out of the Fair without spending a dime. Fortunately we have kids who know that if they want a snack, it comes toted in the backpack and not purchased for $10 at the stand and they were satisfied with the rides and shows we were able to see. They carefully chose their three rides and were happy and content with just going on three. I actually blogged about this from our day at the Fair last year when I was impressed with the kids and how content they are and don't fuss about what they don't have. We had great attitudes from everyone the entire day, including Baby D, who happily sat in his stroller.



I love this picture of Baby D. He was watching the kids on the Himalaya and it looked like he was really crabby with his poochy lips pouted out, like he was upset that he wasn't able to go on it too!



Maybe next year little brother, we'll let you go on something fun too! Other than a spin in the stroller, of course!

Small Saturdays, Big Sunday-Part 1

*sigh* Seems like I can't get ahead lately! I've had the blog on the backburner, trying to get my post done, so now you get a double-dose.

The kids are out of school and the driving around is better in the morning so we are sleeping in an extra 30 minutes... that's always nice.
The kids had summer camp two weeks ago together with lots of fun activities, crafts, a field trip to the County Fair and this day, can you guess what this day was?



Two weekends ago, Danny went out fishing with a friend and I had the kids to myself for the day. We started off with cleaning top to bottom! Nothing like a good scrub-fest on a Saturday morning (that's sarcasm). At least the kids are getting older and I can trust them on small tasks like vacuuming, dusting, emptying trash cans and wiping toilets and sinks, though it often requires me to tell them to "do it again". I tackled the kitchen (cleaning stovetops & counters, washing dishes, mopping floors) and washed/dried/folded/hung four loads of laundry in between moving Baby D away from things he shouldn't be touching, feeding him breakfast and laying him down for a nap.

After lunch, we opened up the Little Bunny Gardens that they'd received in their Easter baskets and they planted all their seeds. Nothing like starting a garden really really late in the season, right? Hopefully they will sprout because visions of watermelons and green beans are already dancing in the kids' heads. Now I just have to remember to water them...











We headed out to Old Navy and I ran across a big time sale and was able to walk out with a giant bag of goodies for $30...love a good bargain! And now I have a few new pairs of 60 cent flip-flops to break in.


The Girl

We all got small slushies from Sonic and got there just in time for 1/2 Price Happy Hour so all of our beverages were a grand total of $1.80. YES!


The Boy

Got home and Danny was back, sun-tired and starving. I'd picked up what I needed to make macaroni salad from the Pioneer Woman's site and we paired it with turkey burgers for dinner, one of our stand-by staples.

I finished up a dress I'd made to list on Etsy and The Girl did a quick modeling session for me. Wish that our complex had a nicer area to take photos. This dry patch overlooking the freeway is for the birds. When we have a house, I'm definitely putting in a pretty arbor of flowers somewhere in our yard specifically for the purpose of having a nice portrait backdrop!



End of part 1, will be back later with this past weekend's activities!