Happy Memorial Day!!

We drove up to Belmont for Memorial weekend. We went up for two big reasons. 1. Pirates of the Carribean opening weekend and 2. Robbie's favorite cousins birthday party. We had a great weekend. We were able to get a babysitter to watch the kids so we could all go see pirates on Saturday. Ellie had her birthday party on monday and we had blast! It was a pool party at Nana and Poppa's! What a great way to spend Memorial Day! This party was wonderful. Mostly because this party had my three favorite things in life........1. Chocolate. 2. Chips and Salsa. 3. Rootbeer. What more could you ask for? Oh wait...maybe I was supposed to say 1. Rob. 2. Robbie. 3. Lauren.... oh well...all 6 are fabulous!

I had the hardest time get Robbie to pose for a picture. He was having so much fun that he didn't want to stop. I told him that he didn't even have to smile...finally he gave in and gave me this picture. What a kind boy!
Lauren is a lot easier to get pictures of. She let me take millions of pictures of her. She looked really cute in her Future American Beauty Queen t-shirt!


Robbie and Lauren LOVED the pool. Robbie always has to take a little bit of time to get used to the water but Lauren just wants to jump right in and start swimming. You really have to keep your eye on her because she doesn't care if someone is there to catch her or not...she just wants to swim!! Robbie was doing really well and starting swimming by himself (with his vest on). Normally he won't leave the steps or makes us hold on tight to him. I guess we just need to move to a place with a pool! Here are some of my favorite pool pictures!







Here are some more cute pictures for the grandparents and aunties who just love to see how cute the kids are!!!


Alas....the trip was over, and the kids were tired!

Deck of me: CHANGE

The challenge for this week is CHANGE. Change for me is a funny thing. Months ago it was very unwelcomed. I felt comfortable in my life and change just meant taking me away from my comfortable. Today? Change is welcomed and sought for. What does my card mean? It shows my current desire for change. Maybe some of you recognize the place in the picture. This is one of the walls of my house. This is actually what one of the walls of my house currently looks like. This is the second time in the last two months that our house was graffitied. So what does change mean for us now? Well, after spending time with our property being surrounded by three cop cars with four guys in handcuffs, being graffitied twice and having our car broken into... change means a possible move. Who knows what comes next but we've been looking at a few places in Redondo Beach.

Dance Class

Lauren had her first dance class today and LOVED it! It was so cute seeing the little kids dancing around the room. The first half of the class they are in ballet slippers and the second half they are in tap shoes.
Lauren got a really cute skirt and headband at dance class, and we had a little bit of time to spare before picking Robbie up from preschool so we went to the park to take some pictures. She looked so cute all dressed up.

We only made it about ten seconds in the car when she was out cold! All that dancing and picture taking wore her out! She loves her Angelina Ballerina doll and wants to take it with her everywhere she goes!!

Deck of me: SURPRISE!!!!

This week our prompt was SURPRISE!! I love surprises! One of my favorite surprises was a gift from my two kids. Rob had them make two plaques with their handprints and footprints on them! The one with the handprints says "hand-made with love" and the one with the footprints says "foot-made with love". They gave these to me as my mothers day gift last year. They are so special!! I love my husband and kids so much!

Card of the week- The Beauty of Nature

The prompt that we received from Emily was Nature. I love nature...i love beaches, parks, mountains...pretty much everywhere! Although, one of my families favorite places to go is Hermosa beach. It is beautiful here, and never too many people. My husband took this picture one time when we were there. The quote says: "The best remedy for those who are afraid, lonely or unhappy is to go outside, somewhere where they can be quiet, alone with the heavens, nature and God. Because only then does one feel that all is as it should be and that God wishes to see people happy, amidst the simple beauty of nature." -Ann Frank

Preschool Pictures

I received Robbie's preschool pictures today, and boy did they make me laugh!! Its always amuzing when you try to get a group of people that size and have everyone smiling at the camera. The funny thing is...I think 95% of the people weren't paying atttention, caught in a blink, or just completely bored out of their mind! Not just kids...but teachers too!!! Sorry for the un-clear picture...the quality wasn't very good before the scan! :)
Here is his individual picture. I thought it turned out pretty good. He sure looks tired though!

I can't believe how quick he is growing up!!! He is such a smart kid. I am so proud of him. He now can read a lot of words and even some sentences! We've been recently been working on math problem and am amazed at how well he can already add and subtract. The other night we were practicing counting and we realized that he could count to 50!! He is so driven in his learning. He makes me so happy! I love you Robbie!!!

Lauren's new dancing dress!

I'm so excited! I was able to find Lauren a ballet/tap class that is scheduled while Robbie is in preschool! She is so excited to have her dancing dress and dancing shoes and has been wearing them all day! What a cutie!

My weekend with a vampire

This weekend I had the fun opportunity of taking a roadtrip with some of my friends. 7 of up hopped into our rental van Friday night and drove to Arizona. What were we doing there? We thought of many great reasons....we were actresses filming a movie...we were fashion designers showing off the fabulous clothes we'd designed....but the truth? We were going to PROM!

I'm guessing you are going to want a little back story. I'm sure you are saying "Why are 7 married woman going to Prom, and WHERE are their husbands???" My friend Kristen introduced us to a fabulous Vampire book series by the author Stephanie Meyer. The first book in the series is called Twilight. New moon comes next in the series and Eclipse will be out in days.
(hehe thought this was kind of fun!!)

For those of you who have not read this book, I highly recommend it. I read the book in one day because I COULD NOT PUT IT DOWN!!! Poor Rob...he knows that when I find a good book that I really like that nothing will get done that day, and that he is in charge of dinner and putting the kids to bed!

Stephenie Meyer graduated from Brigham Young University with a bachelor's degree in English. You can read more about Stephenie Meyer and her books on her website http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/index.html . If you live close to me and wanted to borrow, I have both books.

Anyway....back to the prom...The Prom was held at Arizona State University. This was to be a Prom and a book signing. Stephenie said that there is no such thing as "too formal" at the Eclipse Prom. She wanted everyone to have fun with their outfit and bring a bit of creativity into it. Two of my friends are very talented and wore dresses that they had made. Karalenn made an amazing Vampire dress. She was a celebrity at the prom, as it is a vampire book. She won runner-up for most creative costume. Kristen made THREE dresses! She made herself a beautiful Jane Austen dress, Nanette a flapper dress and Hannah a hippie dress! I am amazed at their talent...as I can't even figure out how to put thread in a sewing machine!! As for the rest of us, Robin was also a modern vampire, I wore my mothers dress from when she got married and Betsey wore a beautiful lace dress that she had found. Personally, we were the best dressed, most stunning group at the prom!! Even though the food was gone before we got there, the lights were on, the music was quiet and no one was dancing... I still had a lot of fun! Plus, I was able to get both books signed by Stephenie!!What a crazy fun group of girls we are!
Don't worry, don't worry...those aren't some random guys I met at the prom and decided to get my picture taken with!! :) They are two characters that were portrayed from the book. The one on the left is Edward and the one on the right is Jacob! If you read the book you'll know all about them! :)

All in all, it was a wonderful weekend. We had tons of laughs and all enjoyed putting on fancy dresses and getting our hair done (thanks Kristen!). I'm sure Arizona will never forget the group of girls who came into Cheesecake factory in full costume. Every eye was turned to us!!

One part of the prom that we missed was Stephenie Meyer reading the first chapter of the book Eclipse, which will be out in August. We were bummed that we missed the reading so, we pulled over when we were halfway home and Kristen read us the first chapter. (The first chapter is in the back of the special edition of New Moon that was released on May 5th). What fun we had!!

Deck of me Week 17: My bedroom

The prompt that we were given for this week was bedroom. I chose Mickey Mouse for my card because my bedspread has a large Mickey Mouse on it! :)

What a silly girl!

Lauren loves many things....she loves princesses...she loves ballerinas....she loves dresses....and she LOVES herself! Everyday when I get her ready, the first thing that she always does, is run to the mirror to see how she looks. She loves watching herself in the mirror, and on occasion we even catch her giving kisses! What a silly little girl!