play time @ Wyatt and Dawsons house

Last night we went to Wyatt and Dawsons house for some tasty pizza and some fun playing. The girls were in heaven! They have about as many toys as we have but different. Sam loved the Barbies and doll houses while the twins rocked out! They also had two shopping carts that both Syd and Court just loved to push around! It'amazing how many stuffed animals kids can collect. When I get back to AZ I'll upload a great video of them playing "ring around the rosy" which I ended up recording on the video recorder on tape not the card so I need special cords to upload to the computer!

weather

The weather the past couple days have been cold and wet. We havent really done much. It sure is a change from the AZ weather. We dont go outside because its too hot and here its wet! Go figure! On Tuesday night Samantha and I went and watched nephew Mitch pitch. My brother Lex was all set to watch the twins when at the very last minute my parents thought he couldnt do it and took the twins home and Lex came to the game with us. It was kinda funny! Mitch did really good but his team lost 2-1. bummer! They had one of those bouncey houses there and it was $1 for 5 minutes of jumping. Sam loved it! At one point though our cousin Edie, who is 4, was in there jumping when all of a sudden a ball came over from the field and hit her on the elbow. very sad but she got free ice cream! Sam even ran across the field chasing the chicken (thats the mascot) with a bunch of other kids. Fun to watch her do something like that without me having to hold her hand. She is getting so big! I did break down yesterday and took them to the play place at McD's but Sydney ended up falling asleep on the way there and would not wake up so my mom sat in the car while I took the other two in. The play area was really big so they pretty much stayed in the toddler section which I thought was odd because they are both such climbers but it was like 4 stories (in playland terms) tall and if Courtney got stuck up there I was not looking forward to going in! It did warm up a bit so in the afternoon we had some relatives come over for a visit which made Sam very happy because Haley is 2 1/2 and loved to play!

sippy cups

My parents dont have very many sippy cups here so when we were at the dollar store I found these. They are pretty good at keeping the liquid in when they are on their sides just drips out of the straw part but the lid is nice and tight! (ya never know with the dollar store)

helmet

When Alyssa was up on Monday she took Sam for a quad ride. We made Sam wear this helmet which was WAY to big for her so she didnt enjoy the ride much since her head was like a bobble head while they rode around. I think the helmet would have done more damage to her little head if they did get into an accident. She looked so dang cute wearing her princess jammies though!

a WA beach day

We went out to Birch Bay today to see our cousins from the east coast. They are staying at my parents condo for the week. Perfect timinig on our part...the tide was out so the girls loved it. It sure is a little chilly here but it doesnt seem to bug the kids at all. Alyssa came up last night to spend the day and to play with the kiddos.





I tried to get a cute picture of Namy with the girls but this was the best I got!We went to Dairy Queen for lunch and the girls got ice cream with the kids meal... Happy messy girls!

whirlwind trip

Jon and I spent three wonderful nights at the Sir Francis Drake in SF this past weekend. The girls stayed in WA with Namy and Papa. It was the first time I had slept somewhere without the twins. Needlessly to say we got 3 very restful nights of sleep. It was really weird spending time in the City knowing we dont live near by. I did do a drive by of our old house in CV. They put an ugly metal screen door on the front door but other then that everything looked the same. We planned the whole weekend around our favorite restaurants. It was heavenly being able to sit down and enjoy a meal at a leisurely pace. We even went to a movie. (Hancock-dumb movie but we didnt care) Here is the only picture I took the whole weekend.

When I got back the twins were mad at me for leaving so they didnt want to have anything to do with me and cried and ran away from me for the first 20 minutes of me being back. Sam loved me though! Jon is staying there until Friday.

A Washington vacation

We landed at midnight on Tuesday. My dad came to Seattle and picked us up in the motor home. What a luxurious ride! Jon and the babies slept the whole night in there. I came into the house and snuggled Sam. I couldnt get to sleep because I forgot ear plugs and Jon snores! When she woke up she wanted to know where her Daddy was, she is such a daddys girl! When I told her that he was in the motor home with the babies she was like "Mama" and I finally got a big hug and kiss with lots and lots of snuggles. She did so good being away from us. She had one big meltdown on Monday because she missed us but other then that she was a spoiled rotten grandchild! We spent a couple hours at Bloedel Donovan Park yesterday afternoon. The girls were loving it. We havent been able to play at any parks in AZ because its so dang hot. They are all climbers. We also had a nice little picnic -take out from Lee's they have the best fried chicken!- but a crow ended up eating the rest of Sams sandwich!
Jon and I are heading SF for the weekend. It's sure going to be a nice little getaway. I think this is going to be my first time away from the twins. I am looking forward to sleeping in!!

Sam at the beach

My mom didnt take that many pictures of Sam while she had her for the week, here are a couple with her cousins, Josh and Kate, at the beach at Birch Bay.

Alexa Kay and Samantha Kay

Cracker Barrel

This morning the parent/child swim class started up again. We didnt do the last session because we didnt like the teacher so we asked to skip that session. They usually dont do that but they bent the rules a bit. The girls really love it (well Syd didnt like it that much today) and it's nice to spend that time with them and focus completely on them. When we swim here at the house there is so much going on that they end up wearing there life jackets and they arent going to get the feel of really swimming if we keep doing that! Now that I've been swimming in our pool that is so warm the Y's pool is cold and its 84*. We went to the Cracker Barrel for breakfast afterwards. The girls really loved the General Store and the bug rockers!


When Jon was in San Fran for work on Weds I took the girls to Buffalo Wild Wings all day on Weds they have $.50 chicken legs and $1.99 kids meal so I thought what a deal! I got myself 4 legs with buffalo sauce and a Coors Light. The girls got one kids mac and cheese and two bbq legs. I ended up getting the deep fried mushrooms so my bill was $15 thats with tip! I could only eat two of my legs so that was my lunch Thursday... What a deal!

Syd's bed update

Last night I tucked her in her bed turned on her wave sounds like usual and she just laid there snuggling her dolly, didnt try and get up or even cry. I checked on her 2 hours later and she was sound asleep with her head on her pillow and arms around her dolly on her bed. She didnt make a peep until 7 this morning! yay!! lets pray that she keeps this up!

an email

From: Alexa Ludtke
Subject: your crazy daughter
To: "Liz Howe"
Date: Wednesday, July 16, 2008, 1:08 PM


Hey aunt liz,


I had an interesting time with Sammy last night at Wall-e! I went and picked her up at grandma and grandpas, she was dressed as a princess with a crown and everything! The crown was wayy to big for her and kept falling down to cover her eyes. When we got to the movie theatre and she was hopping up and down because she was SOOOO excited!!! I brought a ton of candy in my purse. She loved the sour gummy worms and wouldnt eat anything else.
Everyone told me i wouldnt be able to get her to sit through it. My mom said that when they went sam had to go to the bathroom and couldnt get her back in. So we didnt bring drinks in, we just had sour candy. After a while she said 'lexa kay im thirsty!' so i told her to stop eating the candy.

In the movie they play this movie clip from a musical. Wall-e dances for about 10 seconds and then they move on. Sam looks at me and says she wants to dance too. At this point the music has stopped but she already got off my lap. She stood up and started dance in front of the seat. Kinda shakin her bum and twisting back and forth. I start to giggle because its so cute. I guess she was really in the dancing mood because she started to dance her way out to the aisle. She starts doing twirls and point her foot and doing fast spins. I am loosing it laughing beause she is sooo serious and so into dancing even though there is no music whatsover. The theatre was pretty bright and she started dancing farther down the aisle. I was trying so hard to tell her to come sit back down but she was too far away and i couldnt breathe or see because i was laughing so hard and my eyes were watering. Finally i got up and got her to dance back to her seat. It was great. I know everyone in the theatre stopped watching the movie and was staring at this 3 year old bustin a move down the aisle with her crooked crown covering one eye.

She came and sat down on my lap and seemed satisfied with her dance break. She said 'lexa kay im not thirst anymore can i have some candy?' She got her candy. With 10 minutes left in the movie i noticed she hadnt talked in a loooong time. She was completely passed out. When the movie was over i carried her out to the car. She woke up when we were pulling out and asked where we are going. I told her we were going to meet alyssa and then they were going to go out to Namy and papas. I didnt want to drive another hour when alyssa was going out there anyway. I guess this was NOT the answer she wanted to hear because she flipped out. She was not going to let Alyssa drive her out there. She wanted to go to Namy and Papas RIGHT THIS SECOND and she wanted to go in my car. I tried to reason with her but she is 3. So I just said OK. On the way back to my house she fell alseep. I met alyssa at my house. We both carried passed out sam in her car seat to alyssa car. We were laughing because she was basically dead. Her foot go caught on the door and alyssa and i lost it. Sam started to smile with her eyes shut. Alyssa said hi and tickled her and she was laughing and i thought everything was going to be fine. I did the ultimate no no by kissing her and saying goodbye. She flipped out again started screaming and kicking. She looked at Alyssa and said 'no i dont want you i want lexa KAAAAyyyyy!' Alyssa was kind of offended but Sam pulled that trick on me the other day. She told me she never wanted to see me again and that Alyssa was going to come and play with her and she only wanted alyssa.

Anyways i shut the door and they drove off to the ranch. Im sure having a lot of fun with sammy though! Shes so cute i love all her outfits!

Love you and see you very sooooooooon!

A family of four

Samantha went to WA yesterday morning with Papa. We are heading up next week so we thought what a great opportunity for her to spend some time with Namy, Papa and all her cousins while we get the house all unpacked. It is really quiet around here without her. I called this morning and my mom said that when the phone rang she asked if it was Alexa Kay (her cousin who visited her last night) and my mom said no it's your mom. She jsut said oh and and went back to watching tv. I guess it's good she doesnt miss me but wow!
This evening we decided to go to Red Lobster for dinner. The twins are usually really good about sitting and eating when we go out, it's Sam who gives us grief. Well this time the little ones were not very cooperative at all and did not want to sit in their high chairs. Not the best way to enjoy a nice (somewhat expensive) meal. We wolfed our food down and left.
Sydney is having such a hard time transitioning to her twin size bed. I know it's all a big adjustment with the move and all but I would have thought she would have liked it by now. We are on night 6. She just wont fall asleep on it. She usually cries herself to sleep by the door which cant be to comfortable since she has a wood floor. After she's been asleep for awhile we move her to her bed. But we are sort of starting a habit of bringing her into out bed around 4 am when she wakes up. This morning after she had been sleeping with us she got out of bed and fell asleep on a blanket next to our bed, Funny little monkey!
Lot's more unpacking tonight too. we are getting there. I am hoping to have the majority of it all done before we go on our trip north. I still havent been able to find our cordless phone, it's driving me nuts!

chili's

I have been craving the build your own fajita's at chili's for awhile now so we ended up going there for dinner tonight. After a day of unpacking box after box after I really didnt feel like cooking. The girls were being super cute...Courtney had to do what Sam wasnt suppose to do...

I worked on getting the dining room boxes unpacked. I probably got about 25 unpacked today. It is so funny though. We had Bekins pack for us and they packed EVERYTHING and wrapped it all in paper. They even wrapped a water bottle. It's fun to open a box and see what's inside. Yesterday I opened a box and it had a bag of potatoes and onions in it. GROSS. little cockroaches all over. yuck. Thankfully there wasnt any thing of value in the box because it went straight to the trash can!

still need to work on the dens boxes...I did get to one in there today!

cute butts