Tidbits not big enough to Qualify as Ramblings

Lots of little topics today:

Libby is constipated. Hey, don't look shocked! If you are going to read my blog, you are going to hear about Poop once in a while. This child is a poop champ and never fails to fill her diaper to capacity or beyond a couple of times a day. Well, today begins day #4 of nothing accomplished on that end. She's fussy and her belly is pretty dang big. I think she's gonna explode any time. Gosh, I sure hope so! Watch Out, World! And hold your noses!

Teeth are coming in. Libby got a new top tooth this past week. She knows it too, she grins like she's showing off a full set. So cute! And sharp.

The happy little couple had a busy week of newlywed bliss. Katie had jury duty and she had to run around getting her name changed and getting her car in her name instead of her dad's. That was a wedding gift, she no longer has to make payments on her car and she got the title. Of course, the courthouse, the county offices and the DMV are nowhere near each other. But, she got it all done, jury duty, wedding paperwork, and car registration! Plus went to the insurance company and the bank and whatever else she had on her list. Andrew had to work at the Navy recruiting office all week. Plus, his ring didn't fit so they were back at forth at the jeweler's getting that done. They managed to spend time with us, and time with Andrew's family and time with their friends too. Married life is busy! On Saturday morning Andrew flew back to South Carolina and Katie is here waiting for him to line up housing and all that jazz. It could be a couple of weeks or a couple of months while they live on opposite coasts.

I filled my mini-van with newborn baby things and cleared out some storage space. Sad to let the newborn things go, but glad to reclaim some space again! There are two newborn babies who we are passing thing on to. One is a baby boy in Las Vegas who probably doesn't need anything but he's getting it anyway since we're friends. His name is Eden and he's getting a bouncy chair, exersaucer and a small bag of baby boy clothes. Not sure why I have boy clothes, but I do. The other baby is here in town, a little girl named Ella. She's a week old now and already has enough of a life story that she could write a book! Here is a blog with her story; in summary for anyone who doesn't click to it: she was born to a prison inmate and her 19 yr old half-brother (college student) from her father's side got custody of her until inmate-mom's release in 4 yrs. Poor little kid doesn't have anything so I was more than happy to donate. There will be a baby shower for her soon, so she'll be loaded up and ready for anything shortly. But, I was able to pass on my bassinet, pink bouncy chair, baby monitor that I never use, baby gym, soft carrier, tons of baby clothes, blankets and whatever else I tossed in the back of the van. It was full! It really feels good to pass on the baby things. I tried to sell them on Craigslist, but everyone is selling everything and nobody is buying (darn economy!). And I tried to donate them, but I missed the truck when it came by picking up donations. Finally, I have cleared my little space of things I'll never use again. I'm sure it'll fill up fast since Gracie and Libby are growing quickly!

I'm working on getting a space set up for my sewing machine and my new serger. I still haven't even taken it out of the box! I found a group of women online who post tips and tricks and projects and all sorts of discussions about using the same serger machine that I have. It's called Viking 936 Users. That'll be me! As soon as I get it out of the box! I need to look into the classes that are offered at JoAnn Fabrics so I can learn how to use my new machine. It's a lot like rocket science and brain surgery; ok, it's not. But I still think taking the class would help a lot!

We went to a birthday party yesterday for an adorable 4 yr old. The party was in a backyard pool in Vista. The sun was shining and it was such a beautiful day! I put sunscreen on the girls, but I see now that I missed spots on Gracie. I didn't get it rubbed in right up to her straps, so she has a little bit of sunburn right on the edges where her swimsuit straps were. And I didn't account for her perpetual swimsuit wedgie. Her little cheeks are red! Oooops! Why can't they make swimsuits that don't ride up anyway?

Sounds like everyone got home just fine and enjoyed their vacations to Southern California. It was so nice to have all of our families out here to celebrate our daughters' big events with us. Gracie wants her cousins to come back; she's been wondering where they are. She wants to go to the beach and look for them, maybe they are there. Cousins! Come Back!

More Wedding Photos

Everyone at the wedding watched it through a camera. When I looked back, all I saw were people with cameras stuck to their faces. Yay! This makes for lots of wedding photos!

The professional photograher did an amazing job! His photos aren't bloggable since he has them all password protected, but, here are a few from my sister!

Other guests are slowly sharing their shots. Can't wait to see more! Here are a few for your blogging pleasure courtesy of Mrs. Caveman

Fun Little Outing

Today we hopped in the van and went to Queen Califa's Magic Circle. What a great little park! It's entirely an artpiece of mosaic tiles, stones, porcelain, and mirrors. Very fun place!




I've known about this place for a few years; my cousin took photos of it for the San Diego Magazine and ever since then, I thought it would be a fun little stop. But, I never had time, couldn't find it, was in a hurry, etc. Recently, I saw it in another blog (Tonya) and thought I'd try to find this place and stop by. I'm so glad I did!

By the way, to find this park, go to the Kit Carson Park in Escondido. When you see the sign that says Queen Califa's Magic Circle -----> , don't believe it. The right arrow actually means straight ahead. And, the Queen Califa's Magic Circle Parking sign that is on a bridge where there is no parking... also a bit misleading. Park in front of the big sign that has the right arrow and hike straight ahead on the dirt path, when you come to a fork in the road where there is no sign but it looks like the park is probobly to the right since there is nothing but weeds straight ahead, go straight. You'll go over a little rise and find the Magic Circle park hiding behind a big fence that has a big sign on it that says "Closed Mondays". That's when you hear me say, "Awww, Man! It's Monday!", no fear, the gate was open and a few other people were enjoying the park.

It was worth the stop; the kids really enjoyed the colorful surroundings once they got inside! And the hike was pretty too.

Wedding Photos

Our photographer, Micheal Fletcher, was amazing! He already has the wedding photos online in a password protected album, but he has these two photos on his flickr site for public view (which means I can share them on my blog!). For those of you who do not have access to the wedding album, I thought I would share these two pictures of my girl.






Oh, and I have this one that I sort of stole from his site, I hit print screen!

She's married!

I'm home from the wedding, it's 1am, I'm in my jammies and out of all things that lift and bind, I have a glass of wine and my feet up. Ahhhhhh... feels so good!

It was the most beautiful wedding I've ever been to in my life. And Katie was the prettiest bride I have ever seen in real life and movies, she was absolutely stunning!

I charged my batteries, cleared my memory cards and took both of my cameras. Got there and thought, what am I thinking, I'm not taking pics, I'm just going to enjoy! And I did! First photo I took was when we got home and Gracie looked so adorable sleeping in her poofy flowergirl dress. What a cutie!

Everyone had such a wonderful time. The wedding went as smooth as if it had been planned for years by experts. And now I have a son. Life is good.

Because she's getting married...

I just have to share this little tidbit of a memory from a few years back.

We used to send her to 4-H Camp every summer for a week or so. When she got older she went for three weeks. Ahhh, good times!

Anyway, when she was 12 or 13... far too young in my opinion for learning what you are about to learn that she learned... she came home from camp and stepped in the front door dropping all her stinky smelly stuff and she says with a big proud grin...

"Guess what I did at camp?!?" We could feel her excitement radiating. This had to be good! We guessed all sorts of cool things: Swim all the way across the lake? Hit the target in archery? Get to work in the concession stand? Make some cool craft? An award for having a clean cabin? What? What? What amazing accomplishment did our little girl do this summer?

"I kissed a boy behind the bathhouse!" Big grin.

We settled back into the couch cushions and went pale and numb. Speechless.

This little girl is getting married in two days. I wish her well, especially when her sweet children come home from camp and announce how much they've broadened their horizons. Marriage is when you are speechless together, feel each other's feelings in exactly the same way, and ride that roller coaster from proud to stunned in no time flat - together. She's lucky and has a good guy to spend the rest of her life with; I'm so glad it's not the kid who kissed her behind the bathhouse at camp.

Invasion!

The invasion of family and friends begins today! We're expecting about 30 - 50 people (ok, I know that's a pretty big window, but I haven't had much coffee yet. Who can count before the caffeine kicks in?). With a graduation and a wedding in the next couple of weeks, this place will busier than LAX.

I've been busy whipping this house into shape. This poor house has been sadly neglected while I was in college and tending to the baby and trying to stay awake. I had a lady come over and rip down the wallpaper and scrape my walls clean quite a while ago; my intentions were to have the walls and nice and pretty back in March or April. Well.... this happened, that happened, this came up, that came up, next thing you know, it's JUNE!

So... I'll show you what I've been doing in between diaper changes these past few days. Before you see that, you have to see what I was getting rid of. I don't really have a good picture of the ugly wallpaper since I avoided taking pictures of it. It looked like something you'd find in an old run down trailer house.

Last November, Thanksgiving actually:

Three days ago:


About a minute before the first of our company arrived:





I'm ready!!!

My Blog Stalker - Gotcha!

Ever since I added that Feedjit thing in the margin of my blog, I've been very intrigued by who is reading my blog. Who is stopping by? Where do they come from? Where do they go? Very cool little gadget.

I discovered that one post in particular was drawing some hits based on searches for porn. Ewww. I also found that my blog pops up a lot for people looking to find out why their husbands don't understand them. Sorry, can't help you on that. Other popular searches that bring people to my blog are Pregzilla, momathon, birth story, Sandra Dallas, and Libby-cakes. Hmmm. I find these to be some interesting searches.

I recently noticed that someone from my town was visiting my blog. Visiting often. Very often. Very Very Very Often. Ok, it's gone from "oh cool, someone I know found my blog" to "hmm, someone in town is sure interested in my blog, wonder who it is" to "who is this freak who is stalking my blog? You? Her? Her? Him? Everyone?". I began to kind of freak out a little. Someone was visiting too often!

After nearly a week of being stalked, I finally figured it out. It's ME!

Ten Dollah Torture? I do good job!

Don't Fear the Unibrow!

*Not really me

Really, what is wrong with a nice full temple to temple eyebrow? I've been blessed in the way of eyebrowness. I am lucky enough to have a big black bristley beautiful eyebrow. Just one. It goes all the way across and I rather like it!

I take a lot of flack for my lovely brow. It usually doesn't bother me, I know you are all jealous. But recently I've been in this crazed quest to look like a girl and I caved under the pressure from the nice smiling lady at the Nail Salon.

Lexie and I went to get pedicures together for her birthday. Pedicures.... Ahhhhh! Heaven! My toes are so pretty now! And the massage, wowza, sweet! Anyway... this lady there said to me in broken English, "Wax your eyebrow? Oh yes, you need, oh yes". I noticed her use of the singular.

I protested, "oh, no, no thank you". Lexie said "Come'on Mom, you'll love the way it looks, just do it". Little miniature imaginary Katie appeared on my left shoulder saying "Do it, Mom! For my wedding! Do it!" and little imaginary Bonnie (my sister) appeared on my right shoulder saying, "Do it! I did and I'm the biggest wuss ever born! Do it!" The nice lady said "I do good job, you like very much".

Next thing you know, I've got hot wax on my fur lined forehead and a quick YANK later, gone. Goodbye unibrow. You were kind and fuzzy and now you are stuck to a wax strip with a very nice lady saying "ohhhh, lotta hair".

I can't believe I did that. Now I look like this:

*Also, not really me

Pretty, eh?

Happy Birthday, Sis!

Happy Birthday To You!
Happy Birthday To You!
Happy Birrrrrrrrrrrrth Day Dear Patty,
Happy Birthday to You!

Sorry, that's the best singing I can muster. Even reading my singing, you know it's pretty bad. Don'cha?

I do hope you have a nice day today! And if I were there, I'd buy you a drink!

For the rest of you blog readers, this is what my birthday sister sent me a few days ago, she knows things are kinda crazy for my family lately and the mom is who holds it all together! This totally cracked me up!


Thanks for being so in tune with my yearning for a great cup of caffeinated coffee, yet, it needs to soothe and calm my nerves. There sure is a lot of growing up going on around here, and in a hurry, ahhhh.... my sister knows how to give me a great laugh in the middle of the chaos! Thanks. Lets get together for coffee soon!

Happy Birthday, Pat!

18 years ago...

Way back in the olden days, before every home had 3 PCs and a laptop, before cell phones, before the ipod, before dvd, before dvr, before flat screen tv, before Hannah Montana, before we moved to California.... yes, on this day way back in 1991... Lexie was born!

We didn't know if she would be a boy or a girl, but we assumed that a boy was coming along since the pregnancy was very different. This kid gave me morning sickness for months, and didn't even limit it to mornings. She had the hiccups all the time! And the doc promised me that she was going to break my tailbone during delivery. A rebel before she was even born!

She was due to arrive May 23rd. Her big sister asked ten times a day for weeks and weeks "Is it May 23rd yet?" Even after that day came and went, I still told her, no, not yet.

On June 3rd, I woke up still hopelessly pregnant with no signs that this would ever end. Luckily, this was induction day! Yippeee! We all piled in the truck, Katie sat in the jump seat in the king cab part, and we headed out of town a couple of miles to the radio station. I forgot the call letters, hmmm... KPHR? They called it Pow-Pow-Power 104FM. Keith ran in and they put him on the air. He said "I just stopped in to say that we are on our way to the hospital to have our baby. My wife is out in the truck. Well, I suppose I should get going". He neglected to mention that I wasn't out there screaming in agonizing labor pains! Hahahaha!

After dropping Katie off at daycare, we crossed the border got to the hospital on the other side. We had our first daughter in South Dakota, this one was going to be a Minnesotan. First thing they did was a stress test; baby was fine. I could either go home or start the pitocin. Go home? Are you nuts? I'm sick of being pregnant! The doc said it would be anytime ever since I was 8 mths along back in April and now I'm 10 mths along with no end in sight - I wasn't leaving!


Lexie was born at 4pm. Well, she wasn't actually "Lexie" yet. She was "Girl". We were so excited that our daughter got a baby sister! Two girls! Now, we had the task of trying to name this cutie little girl. Honestly, that was the hard part! She got her name on June 5th.

And that is how it happened a long long time ago, back in the olden days before satellite radio and GPS in your car, 18 long years ago.

Happy Birthday, Sweet Lexie!