Holes.

Awww, today Peencess woke up from her nap and handed me her blanket and then her binky and then her stuffed bunny. It struck me because she used to do that all the time after every nap and she must have stopped several months ago without me realizing it. It used to be such a big deal too because it was her little ritual that she performed for whomever came to rescue her from her crib. Anyway, it was sad because it was something about her that I had already forgotten she had done. It was a little bit of her babiness that had disappeared.

Brent and I used to talk about that cute little ritual all the time and I can't believe that in all this bloggish rambling that I do, I never once bothered to mention it. It totally broke my heart realizing she had already outgrown this ritual that was once such a big part of our daily lives and on top of that... I had forgotten it! Thankfully, she gave me a glimpse of her younger self today and I get to write it down now to capture it so I can remember it always. I just know there are other things like this that have already been forgotten forever.

I wish we could bottle every moment...

So, while we are on the subject of daily rituals, I figure I might as well go ahead and capture our fascination with bellybuttons while it's still an alive and thriving ritual. Everyday, approximately 5 times an hour or so, one of the two of them will raise up their shirts, point to their bellybutton and then exclaim, "HOLE!". A couple months ago when Callie still only had a handful of words (one of them being "hole"), she pointed to my bellybutton and said, "Hole." Technically, the child was right. Also, because the word "bellybutton" sounded far too difficult at the time, we stuck with "hole". Of course it has now become an obsession and when one of them wants to talk about their "hole" we all gather round helping each other find our bellybuttons and proclaim "HOLE!" like we are Christopher Columbus discovering America!

Pure excitement I tell you. Pure. Excitement.

We are also noticing the "holes" in the kitties... uhhh... nether-regions.

There has already been a couple times when I've had to veer chubby little fingers away from those more true "holes"; holes that I like to refer to as the dingliscious danger zones.

Two fun randoid pics from the weekend...

Hambone digging sushi and eating his first California Roll ever (along with wads of pickled ginger). This lunch proceeded a breakfast of smoked salmon and cream cheese bagels which homeboy devoured after eating an entire banana and plenty-o-cheerios. I have no idea why the little man is such a rail!

A picture of the kids ruining the pH balance in my aunt and uncle's pool.

This has nothing to do with the weekend but, I'm such a happy dork right now because my cutest friend ever, "Other Heather" just let me know that she took her homegrown cucumbers and made my cucumber salad with them. (It's cheap thrills for me for sho!) Anyway, I have been asked for this non-recipe/recipe a handful of times which you can simply jeririg to your liking. Here's the recipe - let me know if you try it!

Cucumber Salad

1/2 pkg. feta cheese (I buy the pre-crumbled sundried tomato and basil flavor)
handful of cherry tomatoes (if you like them)
some very thinly sliced red onion (more or less or none to your taste)
equal parts of caesar dressing (not the creamy kind), red wine vinegar, and italian dressing
dill (to your taste - I use tons!)
salt and pepper (to your taste)

That's it! Just play around with the flavors until you get it the way you like it. Some peeps like it more vinegary and I tend to like it more caesary. Add salt and pepper at the end because the salad dressings are pretty salty already.

**Edited: My lovely bro called me to let me know I forgot the cucumbers! Ha! I only use one sliced thinly.

Jaxson de Ville and The Zoo

We went to the zoo in Jacksonville again on our way to visit our family but this time we did it in 1 million degree weather. By the end of the day, I was afraid they were going to mistake us for zoo animals since we smelled like a pair of hippo armpits.

This time the babies got to see the stingrays ("fishies") and although they were too young to pet them, they really enjoyed watching them swim up close. We also got to ride the train ("choo choo") around the park and Wyatt really loved doing that! Such a boy.

The zoo wasn't too crowded which was nice but the heat was unbearable! We let the squirts play in one of the fountains at the back of the zoo which they absolutely loved since it was a perfect break from the heat. They were soaked to the bone and loving every second of it!

At one point, we went into the aviary to see the birdies ("tut tuts") which are their favorite. Well, this one really precious roadrunner dude was just standing on the path and staring at the kids. Brent and I fell in love with the little guy and because he looked so friendly, we rolled the kids right up to see him so they could get a close look. Callie stretched out her little hand to say hi to the birdie and that mofo bit the crap out of her fingers! I was so pissed and poor little Cal Bear just cried because she was so scared and didn't understand what happened. Brent literally had to pull the bird off of her! I mean, I am an avid animal lover and I have never wanted to pop off something's head so badly before!

In hindsight it was probably a good reminder for me that I need to teach the kids to respect animals in addition to loving and helping them. Stupid little bird.

Despite the ridiculous heat, it was still a fun trip to the zoo. The kids crashed HARD once we got to my aunt and uncle's house. Wyatt even slept through the fire alarm that accidentally went off while my uncle was grilling dinner! They slept until 9 in the morning too which was a first! It was so nice!

Beyond Powerful...

I'm THAT mom.

Uhh... I'm fully aware that some of you will feel inclined to call CPS on me after you read this post and the fact of the matter is - I might deserve it!

I bought leashes for the kids.

(Please feel free to gasp.)

It's true. And I hang my head in shame because I swore I would NEVER be THAT mom who would do something like that to her kids. In fact, I outwardly made fun of the leash-believing mom's and thought they were beyond cruel because, "leashes are for dogs, don't ya know!"

But, I started thinking about going to Disney and seeing as how my kids throw tantrums in their stroller because they would rather walk... AND about how we mostly end up pushing an empty stroller to let them walk... AND about how quickly those little twinados can run away from you... NEVER MIND the possible pervy child-snatchers that could be lurking in a big park like that... I thought... Screw it.

I'm buying leashes.

Thankfully, Target doesn't have anything against selling these child leashes and I snatched two of them up over the weekend.

Meet "Ruff Ruff" and "E E" (As in the sound a monkey makes, "Ooooh Ooooh Ooooh E E E".)

Callie named them... not me.

And then of course, in an effort to get them used to the leashes, they immediately became the kids favorite toys. They ask for them first thing in the morning and as soon as I get them strapped on, they start strutting around very proudly. (It is actually pretty cute.) But now, we are having to fight them to take them off because there is no way in hell these puppies are making it out in public yet. Disney? Maybe. The mall? Hell no!

Why?

Because of people like me and the looks of death I know I shot those mom's who had their kids on freaking dog leashes!

Isn't it ironic... doncha think?

Happy Father's Day!

Trying to break free!

Two ferocious growlers and a tv watcher...

Besides Callie having already escaped, this was the only cute picture I got. Of course it turned out blurry.

Welcome to my world.

Guess where we're going...

Oh my gosh... I am so excited! We're not going until the end of the summer but you don't understand!!!! This is something we've both been looking forward to since the kids were just an idea in our heads. While I was knocked up, we talked about how fun it was going to be to take them to Disney! I just hope they aren't terrified of all the characters and stuff. (After all, they are really young and we are probably jumping the gun on taking them but who cares!)

The kiddos are being put though Mickey bootcamp this week and Callie has even learned to say "Mickey!" We have plenty of time but I just want them to be pretty familiar with the rat before we go. We're staying in a condo type thing with a kitchen and two bedrooms so we can nap and eat at "home". Hopefully, that will alleviate some melt downs. I'm stupid excited about it!

Other than that, not too much on the runt front. We are finally converting them down to one nap after the pediatrician yelled me for still having them on a 2 nap schedule at their last visit. It's been hellacious to say the least. They are having a hard time on the new schedule and momma is having a hard time with their attitude problems. I'm giving it one week and if they are still acting like crackheads, then we'll try again later.

Monkey is finally talking up a storm this week. He was pretty reserved with his vocabulary up until now and although he knew words, he rarely used them and preferred grunting caveman-style instead. This week he's tearing it up! His favorite being, "UH OH!" with a obnoxiously long pause between the uh and the oh. I love that quirky turd. He's way too precious!

Today we let the kids play outside in all their glory to dig in the mud, share watermelon slices with the dogs, and pee in their new piece of crap baby pool. I could hear that the neighbors on both sides were also enjoying time out in their backyards, but it wasn't until quite a bit later that I realized they were also having a fairly big cookout. Haha!!!! (Hopefully, they weren't too put off by the peep show.)

My friend Kim calls her son the "glazed donut" whenever he has a runny nose because that's what a little kid's nose looks like when they have a cold. Currently, it's very appropriate for the all noses up in this house because we all look like glazed donuts. Wyatt might even qualify as a Bavarian Cream. (Eww! Was that one step too far?!?!) Anyway, slowly we are all starting to feel better and want to creep out of the house.

It's scorching hot here though! FO SHO!

Zippy stayed through the weekend which was a good little wind-down from the trip. We went to see the Sex in the City Movie on Friday and it was great! I would definitely recommend seeing it and I honestly think that even Brent would have been able to sit through it without being bored. It was so cute that I would even consider seeing it again while it's still in the theaters.

On Saturday, as if we hadn't gotten enough sun already, we took the squirts to the pool. They are still a little young to be able to spend hours there, but they enjoyed watching all the little kids and Callie really loved kicking around in her float. Mostly we just chased after them around the pool deck. We ended up at a luau on Saturday night which was pretty fun even though we didn't stay very long. Zippy rolled out Sunday morning.

So, after how ever many days of partying that was for me, I finally crossed the line of pushing myself too much and got pretty sick. I don't know if it was from being on a corroded, germ-infested airplane or the community beer pong cups at the luau, but I do know that I feel like crap and that Brent and Callie are starting to feel the same way.

Good thing I ate a bag of Reese's Pieces for breakfast this morning. That should help me to get over it faster.

Puta Flacita y La-oooora

(Warning: This post is long winded and probably pretty boring but I'm writing this for myself too so I don't forget stuff that happened.)

Punta Cana was beautiful! I mean, it was literally the most breath-taking beach that I had ever seen and the snorkeling was pretty good too. Up until now, the best place I had ever snorkeled was Grand Cayman and this was definitely comparable. The resort was awesome and had immaculate grounds and an incredible pool. It was so hard being able to see all that beauty and not to be able to share it with Brent and the kids. Honestly, it was almost unbearable.

We lost two days to travel. I had hoped we could get there and still have a half day of sun (on both ends) to enjoy but that didn't happen. The first night we got there, we ate at two restaurants, had grilled lobster and very foul sushi, and watched a Michael Jackson show that was cheesy but entertaining. We walked around the resort for quite awhile just trying to take it all in and to scope out the best places to soak up some sun.



We got up at the butt-crack the next morning to eat breakfast and to lay out as early as possible. There was an entertainment crew that got people involved in a lot of dorky little activities like a dart contest and water aerobics and balloon toss... crap like that. We did all of that the first day and in between, we festered at the swim up bar. The drinks were frozen and fruity and despite pounding drink after drink, we never got tipsy. We spent some time at the beach that day too and quickly realized that it was a topless beach. I guess we felt inspired by it because since there were no planned activities that night, Laura and I decided to enjoy the evening on our balcony with some cocktails in our birthday suits. That is, until a flock of staring workers decided to congregate below us which sent us diving headfirst back into our room!

The following day, we went on an excursion where we snorkeled at an incredible reef and then got to swim with nurse sharks and stingrays. The reef was amazing and swimming with the nurse sharks was pretty crazy. I mean, I knew they wouldn't hurt us or anything, but I still had to fight back the urge to freak out a little bit. It was really fun. After the sharks, we found out about "Mamajuana" which is a Dominican shot that is basically rum and sake that they soak in some weird plant bark for awhile. It supposedly has a Viagra-like side-effect. It smelled like gasoline. We (mostly Laura), drank that while they had dancers performing some Dominican dancing in ornate costumes while we sailed home. The party boat was awesome!


Our last full day there was overcast for most of the day. In the morning, we went to a local flea market for coffee and cigars and t-shirts and stuff. It was sketchy and the vendors were like leaches trying to sell you their stuff and "Give you good price!". After that, we went back to the pool and just parked our butts at the swim-up bar. We hung out a lot with another couple there and they were nice enough to order tons and tons of room service for lunch so we never had to leave the pool. It was really nice. At night, in the midst of getting ready for the evening, Laura and I both passed out and didn't wake up until 12:30 am and completely missed dinner and everything after that. By the next morning, we were ready to go home. I was ready to see my babies and while I thought I was going to miss them more than anything else, I just couldn't handle being away from Brent. I hated being without him.

When we finally got home after another really long day of travel, we met Brent at the airport with the kiddos. They looked shocked and scared to see me and both of them poked out their bottom lip and started to cry. I wasn't prepared for that reaction and it still kinda bothers me (like if I had died, they would have been perfectly fine). After about a thousand kisses and a couple minutes later, you could tell that they were starting to warm up and get hyper. I just felt so much better just being able to be next to them. Brent had a bouquet of really beautiful welcome home flowers for me. Punta Cana was great and all, but it was nothing compared to coming home to Brent, Callie, and Wyatt (and Tony, of course)! I just don't know how I got so lucky or what I did to deserve them.