spidey

Spidey strikes again.

Step off

And I quote, "there's some trouble following me".

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Spidey

Just a few bedtime stories with a superhero.  No biggie.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Day 2

Another day recovering.  We played it real mellow today with a trip to the Library.  FYI, this is the first time in 4 days that she is not either in her Spiderman costume, or the Tarzan "loin cloth".

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Darn you!!!!

Strep strikes again.  Here we are watching 101 Dalmations.  More on this later.  Stay tuned.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

I needed a laugh today.

Hi, it's my birthday, and I invited lots of animals to my party.

Alex's birthday party was today, and it was epic.  An entire barn, complete with cute little animals, came to the house.
Alex's birthdays are bittersweet for me.  While I am so proud of the person she has become, I am also sad that she will never be 2 again...
Happy Birthday to my sweet, sweet baby!

Meet the animals

The Petting Zoo included:  2 pot belly pigs, a horse, a donkey, a sheep and a goat named "Boots".  And a surprise to us all was the fact that the people who brought the animals didn't even look like Carnies one bit!

Just having fun

Look at how beautiful my girls look...makes me happy.

just being me

Another spectacular toddler move at the wedding.  (Alex was removing the tree sap from between her toes, classy.)

"GET IT OFF!!!!!"

We have just arrived at a wedding, and Alex REFUSES to wear her dress.  If there was no proof before that she was from my gene pool, let this be the evidence.

As she is ABSOLUTELY MELTING DOWN, BFF says, "What are we going to do?"    

My response, "Get the video camera, quick!"

Clearly, you can see that reading the parenting books that last month have been extremely helpful.

Come on in!

Hello Virtual Readers, this is my school, and I still like it!
I play with Play Dough, there is a pretend kitchen, there is a water table, but my favorite is the pretend ice cream station.  Then we wash our hands and have snacks, then we go outside to the best playground in the entire world!!!  There is even a "zip line" for kids just my size!

Day 2, it's competitive to get in the door...

This is the second day of school.  Just a little taste of Alex's world in the mornings, twice a week.

Zoo day

It's starting to drip, and that's where I come in.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

open open open open open open open open open

FIRST DAY OF SCHOOL!!!!!!!
Here is our baby, waiting, patiently waiting, for the doors to open for her first day of Preschool Juniors.
Shortly after this picture was taken, the doors opened, and Alex took off running, like her pants were on fire, to her classroom.

Cold Hotdog

I heart veggies too Alex.  Another "Mother of the Year Award" coming my way.

Darn you croup!

Croup has struck again!  Alex had to miss her first day of school.  We made the best of it by going to the Botanical Gardens. 

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Guide her, protect her

This excerpt is from Tina Fey's book, "Bossypants".  

Tina Fey's prayer for her daughter:

First, Lord: No tattoos. May neither Chinese symbol for truth nor Winnie-the-Pooh holding the FSU logo stain her tender haunches.

May she be Beautiful but not Damaged, for it’s the Damage that draws the creepy soccer coach’s eye, not the Beauty.

When the Crystal Meth is offered, May she remember the parents who cut her grapes in half And stick with Beer.

Guide her, protect her
When crossing the street, stepping onto boats, swimming in the ocean, swimming in pools, walking near pools, standing on the subway platform, crossing 86th Street, stepping off of boats, using mall restrooms, getting on and off escalators, driving on country roads while arguing, leaning on large windows, walking in parking lots, riding Ferris wheels, roller-coasters, log flumes, or anything called “Hell Drop,” “Tower of Torture,” or “The Death Spiral Rock ‘N Zero G Roll featuring Aerosmith,” and standing on any kind of balcony ever, anywhere, at any age.

Lead her away from Acting but not all the way to Finance. Something where she can make her own hours but still feel intellectually fulfilled and get outside sometimes And not have to wear high heels.

What would that be, Lord? Architecture? Midwifery? Golf course design? I’m asking You, because if I knew, I’d be doing it, Youdammit.

May she play the Drums to the fiery rhythm of her Own Heart with the sinewy strength of her Own Arms, so she need Not Lie With Drummers.

Grant her a Rough Patch from twelve to seventeen. Let her draw horses and be interested in Barbies for much too long, For childhood is short – a Tiger Flower blooming Magenta for one day – And adulthood is long and dry-humping in cars will wait.

O Lord, break the Internet forever, That she may be spared the misspelled invective of her peers And the online marketing campaign for Rape Hostel V: Girls Just Wanna Get Stabbed.

And when she one day turns on me and calls me a Bitch in front of Hollister, Give me the strength, Lord, to yank her directly into a cab in front of her friends, For I will not have that Shit. I will not have it.

And should she choose to be a Mother one day, be my eyes, Lord, that I may see her, lying on a blanket on the floor at 4:50 A.M., all-at-once exhausted, bored, and in love with the little creature whose poop is leaking up its back.

“My mother did this for me once,” she will realize as she cleans feces off her baby’s neck. “My mother did this for me.” And the delayed gratitude will wash over her as it does each generation and she will make a Mental Note to call me. And she will forget. But I’ll know, because I peeped it with Your God eyes.

Amen.

Source: Bossypants

Git her outa there!!!

I'm so glad that Alex isn't in my belly anymore.  This picture was taken exactly 3 years ago.

She's leaving the cocoon and going to school...

Look at the little caterpillar, she's growing up!

Butterfly Pavilion

"Mama, look at those butterflies on the ceiling!"

This is Alex's new school! She starts next week, and she's VERY excited! Wish her luck.

Just your standard trip to the grocery store with Spiderman, no biggie.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

An early morning conversation

5:00 am. (she ALWAYS sleeps till 7:30)

Alex: "Mama, I want to go to the store and buy a Spiderman costume, then we can go to the Candy store. Is the Candy store tall? Mama, open your eyes. I'm not tired anymore."

Me (barely opening my eyes): "OK, we can get you a Spiderman costume, then the candy store. Now close your eyes and go back to sleep."

Alex: "Is it tall?"

Me: "Yes. Candy stores are tall.". (As I'm falling back asleep.)

Alex: "Then we can buy an Indian costume. Deal?"

Me: "Deal.".

Cat Pirate

Playing dress up is the new favorite game. In this picture, Alex is a "Cat Pirate". (Everything is preceded with the word "cat" in her world.)

That is her dog, Dotty, and you can clearly see her "hook" for a hand.

nose picker

Alex gets distracted when she takes her nose on a scooter ride.

Doesn't she look tall?

A lazy sunday...hanging out in the millet with the deer family.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Uncle Travis and the rocket

Uncle Travis is loading up the "stomp rocket" for Sarafina.

Apparently, HE is the only one in the entire world who can do the stomp rocket correctly (according to Alex).

buh bye

Angela is off to college with her new computer...buh bye. We'll miss you sistra!

buh bye

We will miss you Joyce!

pure awesomeness

Hi, have you met my glasses?

I am now a proud owner of spectacles, and BFF has just ordered hers as well.

Awesome. Pure awesomeness.

2 boys and 2 girls

Rachel and Mer.

Pretty soon they're going to be a family of 4. Yup, Rachel is growing 2 boys in her belly! We are sooo happy for you guys!

Another mother of the year award...

Alex was invited to play "ring around the rosie" at the park the other day. She really enjoyed playing with these little girls, UNTIL they all wanted to do "princess dancing". Alex was really underimpressed with this suggestion. I'm sure their moms were underimpressed with my parenting, when alex pulled down her little boy underwear and went "nature pee pee" right in the park.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Driving and talking on the cell takes practice.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

hardcore cowpoke

I bet you're saying to yourself, "No saddle, that's a hardcore Cowpoke."

And she is.

kid movies

Cousin Vicky's visit was fun. She's getting married in a few weeks, and we can't go, so we are sooooo glad that she came to hang out with us and get caught up on all the kid movies.

Sorely disappointed

Painting didn't last long because Alex really wanted us to paint her a Snow Leopard. Alex said mine looked like a Donkey, and the one that Grandma Sussa drew looked like a kitty. That was the end of painting.

git some

School starts in less than a month for Alex, and we're going to try and squeak out as many "fun in the sun" days as possible.

fountain park

This is Alex's cool and hip aunt, Joyce. We had the pleasure of spending the afternoon with Joyce at the fountain park. Joyce is leaving for Africa in 2 weeks to show off her freshi freshi haircut and her new language of Swahili.

Curly haired goodness.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

I am a knight because my moms haven't bought me any princess dresses.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

pony ride

Alex went on a pony ride, ALL BY HERSELF!!!!

She chose to ride a pony named, Peanut.

cowgirl Jodi

Cowgirl Jodi really liked Alex. She even let Alex wear her hat.

Cousin Vicky and Grandma Sussa

Cousin Vicky is visiting from Iowa, and she just took the BAR exam in Iowa.

(That's right readers, I have a cousin that is a Lawyer, full on Soprano style, so don't mess.)

Alex baked her cupcakes for a reward.

I heart Veggies

This is my favorite t-shirt.

SHE SOOOOOOOO DOES NOT LIKE VEGGIES. She would rather eat shards of glass than veggies. But if you ask her, "What is your favorite food?", she will say "Broccoli and SeaWeed."

Really, her favorite food is frosting. Just frosting.

from dooce.com

This is a blog entry from one of my favorite authors, dooce.com
This perfectly describes Alex, and her crazy ex-girlfriend behavior, and then the garbage collecting, until finally, a time out.

The timer starts now
Last night at dinner Marlo became very angry when we would not let her eat a pile of shredded cheese off of the table without utensils or her hands. She just wanted to stick her face in it like a dog. Sadly, this behavior didn't surprise us because we have turned our back for two seconds only to realize that she is on the floor next to Chuck eating his food out of his bowl. With her face.

Nutritious!

As most two-year-olds are wont to do, she began screaming hysterically. And as parents who have already lived through this with one kid are wont to do, we told her to get over it and then ignored her. Except, ignoring Marlo is like ignoring an ex-girlfriend who isn't ready to get over you yet. And next thing you know she's spelling SCREW YOU with gasoline on your lawn and is standing there with a match in her hand.

Because the pitch of the scream suddenly jumped to 170 decibels, the approximate sound of a rifle going off right beside your head. Not because of the cheese anymore, no. She went from screaming to sociopath because we stopped returning her phone calls. Because we disregarded her texts. We unfriended her on Facebook.

Jon promptly picked her up, set her on the floor ten feet away from the dinner table and said, "You've got two minutes to calm down." Operation Time-Out. This is sometimes a controversial parenting topic, whether or not to put your child in a time-out. You may think it's the most barbaric thing you could do to a child, and that's fine. I'll still invite you over for coffee, although I might spit in it.

Time-outs worked wonders with Leta because it stopped what my brother-in-law refers to as Garbage Collecting. She'd get so worked up that she'd lose sight of the reason she got upset in the first place and would then be screaming about fifteen other things she picked up as she spiraled out of control: we never let her have ice cream for dinner, we wouldn't get her a swimming pool, we always made her wear pants.

Time-outs gave her the space and time to calm down, and it removed us from the equation. And since we weren't screaming at her to, you know, CALM DOWN, she'd realize, hmmm. Now that it's quiet and I can think clearly, my parents are totally right.

Or something like that.

We've just started putting Marlo into time-outs, so she's still catching on to the whole idea. Meaning it makes her even angrier. And last night after Jon put her on the floor she dramatically flopped her whole body over and writhed. As if we has just injected her with electricity.

Leta thought that was the funniest thing she had ever seen, and because she doesn't like it when people laugh at her, she tried to hide her laughing. Which only made me and Jon laugh because OH MY GOD, kid. You used to do the exact same thing when you were her age.

"No, I didn't!" she said defensively, still laughing.

"Yes, actually, you did," Jon said. "Sometimes you'd even throw your body."

"I don't remember doing that," she said.

So I asked, "Do you ever remember being out into a time-out?"

"Nooooooo," she said, as if Jon and I were making the whole thing up.

THERE YOU GO. See? She doesn't have a single memory of how barbaric we were!

So happy to be in the mountains!

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™

Nope, not tired

Clearly, she's not tired.

Goin Fishin

Uncle Gary took Alex fishing today. They used worms. The first thing Alex did was grab a worm out of the bucket, then she threw it in the water for the fish to eat it. PETA would be so proud. Uncle Gary showed her how to put it on the hook, she didn't like that nearly as much.

snipe huntin

Hiking in the mountains. We had fun exploring, throwing sticks in the lake, snipe huntin'...you know, the usual. (Photo compliments of Jacqui and Maria- it was GREAT to see you guys!)

"I am a cat, and we love Bobby"

Singing in the gutter after a rain.
This is an original song by Alex titled, "I am a Cat". This cracks me up that she has taken on the persona of "Bobby", because we never really LIKED our cat Bobby, we LOVED him, but we never really liked him. His nickname was Bobby Bin Laden, and he was a Terrorist. And now, Alex has been in her "Bobby" costume for 16 days in a row (and counting), and introduces herself as Bobby to everyone she meets.

Here is another funny story to share.
When I am at work, Mommy and Alex always call me to say "...goodnight Mama" and "...be careful Mama". The other morning I came home from work with a Bandaid on my finger. When Alex noticed it she said, "I TOLD YOU TO BE CAREFUL MAMA AND YOU GOT AN OWIE!"

Swim lessons

8 days of intensive swim lessons have begun. Alex likes it when we sing songs, but she does not like when the teacher tries to hold her. She is showing improvement every day, and as always, we are very proud.

See story below.

Cassowary on the loose

Hold onto your seats Virtual Friends, we had quite an adventure today...
Alex and I went to the Denver Zoo today. There were certain animals that we really wanted to see, Hyenas, Snow Leopard, Hippos, and George the Rhino. After a successful viewing of the Hyenas, we headed toward the Pachyderms. A Security Guard stopped us (along with hundreds of other people) to tell us that there is a "situation that is being handled, but the rest of the park is closed". We continued on our way, when we saw another Security Guard, and I asked her if there was an animal on the loose. She told us it was a Cassowary, which she described as an "Ostrich that's been sippin' on the Hatoraide."

Obviously, I couldn't wait to explain this to Alex. And once she finally understood what was happening, she almost came out of her skin with excitement!!!!!

She told an entire crowd of people that "...a Cassowary is on the loose, he got out of his cage, and he's on the loose." Then she would walk up to the Zoo Security Guard and point to her and say, "AND SHE IS KEEPING US SAFE. SHE IS KEEPING US SAFE."

She would repeat this story, for all who would listen, OVER AND OVER AND OVER. It was hilarious.

The Great Big Adventure

Oh my gosh summer is fun!

Hoola Hoop star

Meet Bobby. Alex is no longer "Baby Bear", she goes by Bobby (our dead cat).

Firecracker popsicle

Summer is the greatest!

We went to the mountains this weekend, and I don't even know why I packed clothes for Alex.

She was either in her kitty costume (as shown above), or naked.

A "quick trip to the store" with a 2 year old is virtually impossible.  Alex had to wear her Jessie Halloween costume.

Sent via DroidX2 on Verizon Wireless™