I can't get over the beautiful little girl she's becoming, we love her to pieces!!
Showing posts with label seasons. Show all posts
Showing posts with label seasons. Show all posts
4/30/12
our little lady
Going to the park with our kids has been awesome this year with so much good weather. It's been especially fun to see how much more Lila can do this spring than she could last spring (since she was only 9 months old and crawling then...). She is now a maniac at the park just like her brother, fearlessly climbing jungle gyms, catapulting down slides, jumping off everything imaginable, and gaining me the looks of nearby parents concerned I may not be watching her close enough. Sigh...so reminiscent of Van.
I can't get over the beautiful little girl she's becoming, we love her to pieces!!
I can't get over the beautiful little girl she's becoming, we love her to pieces!!
3/27/12
not my best idea ever
We've had crazy awesome weather here this year. A cold day here and there, rare bouts of rain, and a very early spring (that groundhog had no idea what he was talking about!). That's my kind of winter!
An early spring meant early cherry blossoms, probably 2 weeks earlier than we've ever seen them in the last 5 years. Almost without thinking I planned on going again this year like we always have, and I waited for a solid forecast for good weather to join the crowds. That ended up coming on an afternoon, so I figured I'd wait until Lila woke up from her nap and then head out to the District. Our evening went as follows...
3:30pm. Lila woke up.
4:00pm. Out the door. Driving into DC during peak blossoming at 4pm could be deemed less than brilliant. Especially with 2 toddlers, an almost-7-months-pregnant belly, and no husband since he was out of town for work. And let's not forget rush-hour traffic. :)
5:15pm. In the heart of the cherry blossom festival. I was confident of where I could find parking, but after driving around for nearly an hour, I started to get frustrated, tried to get creative with finding a new parking area, and conveniently ended up getting spit right onto the freeway going north (directly away from the blossoms, and further into the city). Noooooo! I took the first exit, sending myself right onto Constitution Ave with bumper to bumper traffic leaving DC. Awesome. The two little people in the back were hating life strapped in their carseats and letting me know it at max volume. I weighed my options of trying to get back to the blossom hub, or coming up with another way to get there, and opted to leave the city, park across the Potomac in VA at a place called Gravelly Point, and run in from there.
6:00pm. Park at Gravelly Point, 2 hours after leaving the house. I had worn running clothes just in case something like that happened, but when I got out of the car and eyed the distance, I realized I had seriously underestimated how far it was. Not being one to bail on a plan once I've made one, though, I put the kids in the jogging stroller, and started running on the trail. Oh wow...I must have been a sight. I googled the trail when I got home, and found out it was actually about 2 miles to the Jefferson and 2 miles back. I was DYING pushing 2 kids and carrying a baby in utero. Pretty much the worst idea ever. I think I stopped every 2 minutes to walk.
6:45pm. At the Jefferson, finally, after crossing the-bridge-that-would-not-end. Saddest 2-mile run of my life. I had about 30 mins to let the kids run rampant on the grass by the monument, blow bubbles to make them happy, try to take photos and fail miserably, refuel with snacks, let a stranger watch my children while I used a porta-potty, and head back before the sun started setting. I felt lucky just to have not lost them both—these two see open spaces and everything turns into a version of the game run-away-from-mommy-as-fast-as-you-can. I'm sure I looked completely crazy running after two insanely fast toddlers, pushing an empty double stroller with a camera around my neck that was bumping my baby belly with every step, and climbing under chains to catch my kids before they were loose in the parking lot. Motherhood at its best!
7:15pm. Leave the Jefferson. That's right, we didn't even walk around the Tidal Basin. At all. Cherry blossom cardinal sin. I tried my best to "run" (read: a slow, slow, slow jog) the full 2 miles back to our car even though it felt like my hips were going to dislocate themselves at any given moment, and the kids were good at adding drama by either trying to climb out or screaming like not getting out was the end of the world.
7:45pm. Made it back, loaded up the car, headed straight to a girl friend's birthday party, stayed for the shortest time I've ever stayed at a party but probably much longer than I should have with the babes in tow, then started to head home only to remember we were out of key grocery items that said babes would be less than pleased to not have the next day.
8:45pm. Braved the grocery store. The kids were WIRED.
9:20pm. By the time we got home, I decided we should count all the goldfish crackers, veggie fries, sliced apples, teddy grahams, and water we'd survived on as dinner, and I still didn't get out of the kids' room with the lights out until 10pm.
Jon called from out of town a few minutes later, and after I recounted my genius day trip idea, he told me just hearing about my day exhausted him. I clearly make better decisions when he's here—good thing he doesn't have to travel much!! I had to document this in order to remember not to repeat all my bad ideas next year. The blossoms were so pretty and pink this year, but I dare say they may have been better experienced from afar in our case. Or I could have just waited 18 hours and gone in the morning like someone with better judgment would have done.
But who needs good judgment when you can get a good story out of poor judgment???
5/4/10
sunshiney
we heart you, beautiful evening backlighting on sunny days. BIG heart. We're also pretty crazy about this little blonde boy with messy hair, a messy face, and energy that could sail him to the moon and back.
that cute little messy face has never looked happier
he's got this thing about his stomach and exposing it and/or checking it out...it's both hilarious and adorable.
that cute little messy face has never looked happier
he's got this thing about his stomach and exposing it and/or checking it out...it's both hilarious and adorable.
spring + van = blossoms + happiness
Totally stoked about all the pink flowers with his dude buddies. Okay, so they've totally got crusty bored-out-of-their-mugs expressions in this photo and they were much more interested in the big truck driving past than anything pink and fluffy. These guys were all born within 20 days of each other, Van right in the middle. They've been tight ever since, and it's so fun to have an excuse to get together with their moms while we let our boys play. For the cherry blossoms we took them to a little used-to-be-secret-but-everyone's-finding-out-about-it neighborhood in MD just outside of the District that is LOADED with cherry trees. Every street is seriously lined with them. It's beautiful.
Later that evening Jon and I headed back to a nearby park to enjoy the weather while we let the maniac go wild and be happy. This kid loves digging and playing in the sandbox, and I love how transparent his joy is.
Here's our kid showing off his social bug skills. Van is so friendly and quick to play with strangers (I know, totally safe, right?). He has no reservations whatsoever with other people's personal space, property, or attitudes, but he's so sweet about it that people can't help but love him. I love how he brought this lady to life. It's so Van.
life in a basement apartment while awaiting warm weather
While we were hibernating in the winter, Van was off growing up on us. We became creative with ways to stay entertained, but after seeing the photos below, our methods don't sound so creative anymore. I'm gonna tell myself I forgot to take pictures of the creative things and then I'll feel a lot better. Here are some of the cabin fever highlights we managed to capture over the past few months.
**********
Mastering the remote. He's the real deal now, or he likes to act like he is. He can, however, turn on the TV manually. And beg endlessly to watch Cars. He wakes up asking for "cahs...voom voom?" and will seriously have a breakdown anytime we tell him no. If you could see him say "chow!" (for Lightning McQueen's 'ka-chow!') or sing to the music, you would probably want to laugh out loud and eat him up as much as we do.
Coloring. He loves to scribble, especially if he can switch crayon colors approximately once every 4 seconds. His attempts to say "color" are darling and hardly decipherable, and his skills are pretty amazing when he's not pausing to eat the crayons (note: washable crayons are a nightmare in disguise for a crayon eater! When they're wet they might as well be paint on a paintbrush!) This photo of him just makes me want to smother him with kisses!
Rocking. We got Van this sweet Radio Flyer rocking horse (who knew Radio Flyer made those?) at a consignment sale last month for $10 and it was a total steal! Van calls it his "hoyce" and makes horse sounds when he sees it. He loves rocking as soon as he gets up, right before he goes to bed, and anytime he remembers it exists in between. It's totally prepped him for the park this spring, now he knows how to ride all the toys! Cute little rider.
Surfing. Skating. Climbing on anything he can and trying out gravity's limitations. His balance is surprisingly good, so unless it's in the dining room where tile lines the floors, we pretty much let him have at it and show off his mad skills.
Gettin' techy. As if we would expect anything less from a child in the current generation. He loves the glowing screen and would kill for us to let him take full reign of the keyboard and mouse. This was more like a "you can touch it for the picture then forget about it!" moment. Poor kid, someday all his computer user dreams will come true!
Eating. Or being terrible...same thing in our house! If we could ever win the mealtime battle with this kid, it would be pretty awesome. He looks cute as ever and innocent here, but don't let him fool you! I'm sure seconds later he was launching his plate, mashing his food in his hair, throwing his fork at us and screaming for us to give him something to eat all at the same time. Always a party in the Smith home!
Praying. Is this not the sweetest thing EVER??? Whenever we tell him it's time to pray, this is what he gives us. Cute little chubby hands together, bowed head, and closed eyes. He only lasts about 5-10 seconds before he starts talking while we pray, but then he attempts an "amen" and smiles. SO CUTE. We were cracking up one night when he kept thinking it was time to pray for no apparent reason, giving us the chance to steal some pictures of him in action. What a sweetheart!
Brushing. He LOVES brushing his teeth, even if he's pretty terrible at getting the job done. We try to take over so that his future dentists don't curse at us some day for being bad teeth brushing parents, but that little Van is a muscle man, and he's so hard to wrestle a toothbrush away from!! When we let him try to do it by himself, he's sooo happy. As you can see below. Sometimes on good days we can get him to say "ah" and brush a tooth or two in the brief window of time that buys us. He'll thank us someday!
Getting desperate. Before things finally warmed up around here, some days we would just slap on winter layers and brave the cold for the sake of our sanity. Clearly a little oxygen and sunshine makes someone besides myself happy! And that little smile makes me even happier...
**********
Mastering the remote. He's the real deal now, or he likes to act like he is. He can, however, turn on the TV manually. And beg endlessly to watch Cars. He wakes up asking for "cahs...voom voom?" and will seriously have a breakdown anytime we tell him no. If you could see him say "chow!" (for Lightning McQueen's 'ka-chow!') or sing to the music, you would probably want to laugh out loud and eat him up as much as we do.
Coloring. He loves to scribble, especially if he can switch crayon colors approximately once every 4 seconds. His attempts to say "color" are darling and hardly decipherable, and his skills are pretty amazing when he's not pausing to eat the crayons (note: washable crayons are a nightmare in disguise for a crayon eater! When they're wet they might as well be paint on a paintbrush!) This photo of him just makes me want to smother him with kisses!
Rocking. We got Van this sweet Radio Flyer rocking horse (who knew Radio Flyer made those?) at a consignment sale last month for $10 and it was a total steal! Van calls it his "hoyce" and makes horse sounds when he sees it. He loves rocking as soon as he gets up, right before he goes to bed, and anytime he remembers it exists in between. It's totally prepped him for the park this spring, now he knows how to ride all the toys! Cute little rider.
Surfing. Skating. Climbing on anything he can and trying out gravity's limitations. His balance is surprisingly good, so unless it's in the dining room where tile lines the floors, we pretty much let him have at it and show off his mad skills.
Gettin' techy. As if we would expect anything less from a child in the current generation. He loves the glowing screen and would kill for us to let him take full reign of the keyboard and mouse. This was more like a "you can touch it for the picture then forget about it!" moment. Poor kid, someday all his computer user dreams will come true!
Eating. Or being terrible...same thing in our house! If we could ever win the mealtime battle with this kid, it would be pretty awesome. He looks cute as ever and innocent here, but don't let him fool you! I'm sure seconds later he was launching his plate, mashing his food in his hair, throwing his fork at us and screaming for us to give him something to eat all at the same time. Always a party in the Smith home!
Praying. Is this not the sweetest thing EVER??? Whenever we tell him it's time to pray, this is what he gives us. Cute little chubby hands together, bowed head, and closed eyes. He only lasts about 5-10 seconds before he starts talking while we pray, but then he attempts an "amen" and smiles. SO CUTE. We were cracking up one night when he kept thinking it was time to pray for no apparent reason, giving us the chance to steal some pictures of him in action. What a sweetheart!
Brushing. He LOVES brushing his teeth, even if he's pretty terrible at getting the job done. We try to take over so that his future dentists don't curse at us some day for being bad teeth brushing parents, but that little Van is a muscle man, and he's so hard to wrestle a toothbrush away from!! When we let him try to do it by himself, he's sooo happy. As you can see below. Sometimes on good days we can get him to say "ah" and brush a tooth or two in the brief window of time that buys us. He'll thank us someday!
Getting desperate. Before things finally warmed up around here, some days we would just slap on winter layers and brave the cold for the sake of our sanity. Clearly a little oxygen and sunshine makes someone besides myself happy! And that little smile makes me even happier...
2/11/10
whiteout in washington
We're sure you've heard. Or you're here going through it like we are. But to make a large understatement, we have been seriously dumped on with the white stuff lately.
Dec. 19 was a rockin' 2-footer snow storm. Unheard of for DC. We're used to 2-4 inches once a year that melts off in limited subsequent days. All the same, December's storm came, it went, and life moved on just in time for a perfect White Christmas.
But starting last Friday night (Feb. 5), we got a blown-up version of a Dec. 19th repeat. Not only did we get somewhere around 2 feet again (apparently breaking a 100+ year record for the area in total season snowfall), canceling school, church, work and life in general for days, but by the time Tuesday rolled around the skies were at it again, landing us with another 10 inches or so. It's up to our hips. No kidding. Jon's on a freebie holiday tomorrow for the 4th day in a row. (Rock on, snow days!) Our car hasn't moved since last Thursday (despite Jon's diligent shoveling and cleaning off his car—just in case we should decide to brave it). The mail has come once. Church has been canceled for 2 weeks in a row and we just got word that Stake Conference originally scheduled for this weekend has been postponed by Elder Packer until March. Besides the neighbor kids outside going nuts with their sweet sled hill they built and the overly-confident SUV drivers, no one's left their own street (at least in our neighborhood, because residential areas are never plowed. Ever. Chalk it up to lack of snowplows, but seriously. Oh how Utah would laugh). It's hilarious, awesome, crazy, and giving us all a healthy dose of cabin fever. Jon is in heaven. I'm in heaven because he's home, but I wouldn't mind soaking in some July heat rays about now. :) But I can't lie...it's pretty fun.
Good news is we're finally checking some things off of our never-ending to do list. Bad news is we're running dangerously low on TP (anyone nearby got a spare?). Should things get desperate around here, we'll spare you the details. But in the meantime, we thought we'd finally get some pics up here to show our families a hint of our snowy state (and how cute our kid is surrounded by snow taller than he is).
We're curious to see if the speculation of more snow on Monday proves to be true. If the forecast is strong for snow, you better bet we'll be making a store run the second roads are clear enough this weekend, and you can guess what will be the first thing on our list!
Taken on Saturday night, the first night after the snow stopped and we dared take our camera out.
this is the path leading out from our apartment, and photo number 2 is our dining room window. Basement, remember? Submerged in snow. The bottom of our window is at least 6 inches above the ground, and it still looks like this. And I thought we lived in a cave before...
day 2 venturing out.
the man's reaction. what a babe.
he LOVES dogs. and it looks like they love him back.
oooo, pretty snow!
oh how I love this photo...doesn't it look like they're sharing some inside joke or something? not the clearest photo,
but i had to include it.
yeah, that's a car.
a little spontaneous light painting, but we made the cars and traffic lights do the work for us this time. :)
Van-angels. jon may or may not have dropped the kid in a time or three to see what he would do. I may or may not have begged him to stop for fear the poor little guy was getting cold snow all over his face and neck. i'm a mom. it's my job to beg for no nonsense even when said nonsense is really funny and cute. :)
looks like he survived!
day 3 venturing out.
hot.
it's official. he's a snow-eater. he digs his mittens straight in, pulls them straight out and starts licking. with very little coordination due to awkward snow layers. it's darling.
sliding off of one of the many mounds surrounding our path out to civilization. van LOVES slides, and therefore he loves sliding on snow as well. even in jeans since he has no snow pants. welcome to dc in the snow.
i'll eat him up i love him so.
the official shoveler in the family. needless to say we're grateful for his love of snow and his large muscles.
We hope you all have a safe weekend with no toilet paper rationing in your homes! :) We'll be here all week.
Dec. 19 was a rockin' 2-footer snow storm. Unheard of for DC. We're used to 2-4 inches once a year that melts off in limited subsequent days. All the same, December's storm came, it went, and life moved on just in time for a perfect White Christmas.
But starting last Friday night (Feb. 5), we got a blown-up version of a Dec. 19th repeat. Not only did we get somewhere around 2 feet again (apparently breaking a 100+ year record for the area in total season snowfall), canceling school, church, work and life in general for days, but by the time Tuesday rolled around the skies were at it again, landing us with another 10 inches or so. It's up to our hips. No kidding. Jon's on a freebie holiday tomorrow for the 4th day in a row. (Rock on, snow days!) Our car hasn't moved since last Thursday (despite Jon's diligent shoveling and cleaning off his car—just in case we should decide to brave it). The mail has come once. Church has been canceled for 2 weeks in a row and we just got word that Stake Conference originally scheduled for this weekend has been postponed by Elder Packer until March. Besides the neighbor kids outside going nuts with their sweet sled hill they built and the overly-confident SUV drivers, no one's left their own street (at least in our neighborhood, because residential areas are never plowed. Ever. Chalk it up to lack of snowplows, but seriously. Oh how Utah would laugh). It's hilarious, awesome, crazy, and giving us all a healthy dose of cabin fever. Jon is in heaven. I'm in heaven because he's home, but I wouldn't mind soaking in some July heat rays about now. :) But I can't lie...it's pretty fun.
Good news is we're finally checking some things off of our never-ending to do list. Bad news is we're running dangerously low on TP (anyone nearby got a spare?). Should things get desperate around here, we'll spare you the details. But in the meantime, we thought we'd finally get some pics up here to show our families a hint of our snowy state (and how cute our kid is surrounded by snow taller than he is).
We're curious to see if the speculation of more snow on Monday proves to be true. If the forecast is strong for snow, you better bet we'll be making a store run the second roads are clear enough this weekend, and you can guess what will be the first thing on our list!
Taken on Saturday night, the first night after the snow stopped and we dared take our camera out.
this is the path leading out from our apartment, and photo number 2 is our dining room window. Basement, remember? Submerged in snow. The bottom of our window is at least 6 inches above the ground, and it still looks like this. And I thought we lived in a cave before...
day 2 venturing out.
the man's reaction. what a babe.
he LOVES dogs. and it looks like they love him back.
oooo, pretty snow!
oh how I love this photo...doesn't it look like they're sharing some inside joke or something? not the clearest photo,
but i had to include it.
yeah, that's a car.
a little spontaneous light painting, but we made the cars and traffic lights do the work for us this time. :)
Van-angels. jon may or may not have dropped the kid in a time or three to see what he would do. I may or may not have begged him to stop for fear the poor little guy was getting cold snow all over his face and neck. i'm a mom. it's my job to beg for no nonsense even when said nonsense is really funny and cute. :)
looks like he survived!
day 3 venturing out.
hot.
it's official. he's a snow-eater. he digs his mittens straight in, pulls them straight out and starts licking. with very little coordination due to awkward snow layers. it's darling.
sliding off of one of the many mounds surrounding our path out to civilization. van LOVES slides, and therefore he loves sliding on snow as well. even in jeans since he has no snow pants. welcome to dc in the snow.
i'll eat him up i love him so.
the official shoveler in the family. needless to say we're grateful for his love of snow and his large muscles.
We hope you all have a safe weekend with no toilet paper rationing in your homes! :) We'll be here all week.
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