Paint.....Paint.....Paint

High: We got the dining room primed and ready to paint :) AND We got to eat dinner out on the patio :) AND I picked a paint color for the dining room :)
Low: Picking a paint color took FOREVER :(

Here is the dining room, you can't really tell but it looks great!!

Oh the dining room! I cannot believe how smooth the walls are, they really look like brand new dry wall. Wayne is the man - well...as long as you don't mind waiting around for him! So while Claire was at school today Mark and I spent waaaayyyyy too long at Lowe's picking out a paint color. Now, let me explain exactly what the problem is...I am colorblind. Yep that's right. So in my head I see exactly what I want but, when I try to explain it to people, it is all wrong. So you can only imagine how it went down at Lowe's when Mark and I tried to pick a color. Finally, we decided it was best to have my girlfriend Colleen step in and help out. So Colleen and I met at Lowe's and Mark stayed home and primed the walls. Here are the two colors Colleen and I chose:

You can only imagine how happy Mark was when I came home over an hour later with just two samples!!!!! Ok, you can't really tell but I like the one on the right. On the right you have "Cream In My Coffee" and on the left you have "Simply Pink something or other". Now they were very similiar in the store so I am glad that we did the samples. I wanted something very light and the one on the left (which is actually not all that pink but more of a beige) is too dark. Problem solved!!! HALLELUJAH we got a color!!!!!!!!

When I picked up the Chicken from school today she only wanted her Daddy :(. So when we got home she wanted to help him cut the grass.

Then when Daddy's arm got tired she decided that she would just follow him around.

It was finally nice enough at dinner time to eat out on the patio.

Claire decided that her "friends" had to come outside and eat with us.

Here is their food. After we all sat down Claire asked us "Where is the food for my friends mama? Mama my friends need food too!!" in the sweetest little voice that I had to get them a little plate.

And here are Claire's friends eating. I think they enjoyed it!

ZOO BABY!

High: We spent the day at the zoo :) AND Wayne Newton finished the dining room!!! :)
Low: We skipped Claire's nap so she was a little grumpy this evening :(

We woke up this morning and said we are going to the zoo NO MATTER WHAT! So as we made a few stops on the way and it started to rain we said "we are going to the zoo NO MATTER WHAT". We decided to just chance it, and thank God we did because it didn't rain at all and we had a great time! Here are some of our pics from today:

Claire loves the petting zoo!

The elephants were great today. They were playing around with each other and spraying water, it was great. Claire loved when they "drinked the water".

I couldn't resist this one. These two with their matching hair.

Claire liked the Bone Zone. That is until she got some stones in her shoe and that was the end of that!

The gorillas are my absolute favorite at the zoo. I could sit and watch them all day. I think they are hilarious. Here is one of the gorillas with "his silky", how cute is that?! And tonight when I was putting Claire to bed, she asked me "I sleep on the ground?". I giggled just thinking that she was being silly and said "no honey, you have to sleep in your crib." Then she told me "oh, but i wanna sleep on the ground like the gorillas.". I obviously talked her out of it, but I thought it was super cute!

And what's a trip to the zoo without a carousel ride? Daddy has to go on though because that thing makes Mommy a little sick :(

But Mommy loves the train, so we always hit up the train before we leave!

I just had to throw this in. Here is a picture of Claire last year at the zoo. I cannot believe that she is a whole year older! It happens so fast. Look at her hair, SHE BARELY HAS ANY!!!!

After the zoo we stopped for dinner. While we were at dinner, WAYNE NEWTON CALLED!!! YAY! By the time we got home he was just finishing! They sanded everything down and we are ready to paint! I would post a picture but it really just looks the same. BUT WE CAN FINALLY MOVE FORWARD!!!! Now, I just have to pick a color. That should be no problem, I have already picked three!! Wish me luck.

Tuesday July 28, 2009 School Day

High: Claire played in the sprinkler today at school and loved it :) AND Mark and I got both cars cleaned - inside and out :)
Low: Claire had school, so we missed her :(

Today Claire had school and I had a class, so it was an early start today. But after my class Mark and I got both cars cleaned (which REALLY needed to be done). Claire had a blast at school because all the kids went in the sprinkler! She was lovin' it!

After school Claire decided that she was not going to wear pants "just big girl pants mama.". This was fine by me, because it is much easier for her to get her pants up and down by herself if she just has undies on. So here she is making me some coffee in her big girl pants.

Later in the evening I was meeting some friends for dinner so Mark took Claire to lacrosse with him. She LOVES to go with Daddy to lacrosse. He coaches a girls team so Claire loves to watch all the big girls play.

When it was time to go Claire grabbed her purse and they headed out!

Here is Claire texting some of her girls.

Can't keep this girl away from the boys!!!

But this boy is her favorite!!

Peter Bernard update: things are looking pretty good for Peter. He is walking on his paw and things seem back to normal :)

Aquababy

High: POOL PARTY :)
Low: Daddy had to work and couldn't come with us :(

Today was a real summer day! It was beautiful out! My girlfriend from work had a bunch of us over with our kids to swim. Claire had a GREAT time. The party started at 12:30, so I figured we would go and when Claire started to get tired for her nap we would just leave. Well....someone was having so much fun that she forgot about her nap. We stayed until around 5! Needless to say, she was in bed asleep by 7:15!! Claire was in the pool almost the WHOLE TIME! She loves the water. She wanted to do everything the big kids did. She kept swimming, jumping in, and going under water!

Claire was loving all of the yummy treats.

When the big kids took a walk to the pond to find frogs, guess who was right there with them?

Here is the frog the kids found!

Claire tried her hand at croquet.

Claire had a great time playing with her friend Colin. Colin has a "hair thing", he loves to rub other people's hair. Here he is rubbing Claire's hair. And here is Claire almost falling asleep, it was super cute!

And here is Claire on the way home. Do you think she had a blast?!?!

Update: Apparently the wood bees are not the ones doing so much damage to my parents' fence. The bees drilled the holes but now there is a hummingbird that is drilling those long lines to try to get to the bees!!! My parents are trying a few methods to get rid of this ridiculousness, I will keep you posted!

Daddy's Girl.

High: Nothin to do today :)
Low: Yucky weather (big surprise) :(

Today was great, we had NOTHING to do. Claire and I stayed in our jammies for most of the day and she helped me clean. Daddy had to work for a little while, which Claire was NOT happy about. This brings me to my next point. Claire has been quite the daddy's girl lately. There are times that she flat our refuses to hang out with me. It is very sad for me.

Claire and I did get a chance to play in the sandbox for about 5 minutes before it began to downpour!

The only thing that we did today was go to the grocery store. This has always been a family favorite. Ever since Claire was a baby she loved the grocery store. I, of course, forgot my camera so I didn't get any pictures. Well, one because I finally realized that I could just use my phone and email it to myself!

Here is Claire and her baby. It was really cute, she loved the lobsters in the tank. Even though she thought they were bugs and could not understand why they were in water. She kept saying "Bugs mama, why dey in dere? why dey in da wader?".

Everytime we go to the grocery store Mark and I always like to try something new. This time we decided to try Shark Steaks. And man, were they delicious (we just wish that we would have let them marinade longer but we couldn't wait anymore!!!)!!

Here is Claire lovin the Shark. I swear this kid will eat anything!!!

Tonight Claire would not let me give her her bath. Only Daddy!!!

Family Fun!!

High: Super fun family party :)
Low: Today was probably the last time we will see Uncle Kevin before he goes back to Texas :(

After sleeping in a little bit and enjoying a nice breakfast alone, we headed to Nana and Papa's to pick up Claire. Who was not exactly thrilled to see us. She kept saying "we no go home now. we no go home."

Nana and Pap bought Claire a super cool sprinkler and Daddy and Claire couldn't get enough of it!

This is my parent's fence. My mother noticed that it looked all scratched up this morning. She just figured something hit it or scratched it.

Then we got a little closer and noticed..THERE WERE BEES INSIDE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Apparently they are wood bees. Wood bees dig into wood so that they can reproduce in the wood. Isn't that crazy?! And we kept hearing a little knocking noise, it was super crazy!

After Claire took a super long nap, we headed over to Mark's parents for a party. Mark's brother is going back to Texas so the family got together before he left.

Here is Kevin with Baby Owen.


Here is Auntie Erin (aka Baby Owen's Mama), Great Grandma, and Baby Owen just relaxing in the garage.

Claire playing with the big kids. All of Mark's cousins are so great with her. When we got home Claire kept talking about "Silly Boy" and we finally figured out she was talking about Mark's cousin Andrew!! I thought it was hilarious that she named him Silly Boy!!!

Here is the man!! Baby Owen! Look at how stinkin' cute he is!!!

NO SERIOUSLY LOOK A LITTLE CLOSER!!!!! He is soooooo awesome!!

Here are Mark's cousins hanging out with Baby Owen. He is a bit of a chick magnet. Notice that someone is always holding Baby Owen, WHO CAN HELP IT?!?! DID YOU SEE HOW ADORABLE HE IS?!?!?!

Claire loves her Uncle Brian, who allows her to climb all over him. Here he kept telling her to climb on his head. Of course she agreed and thought it was the greatest thing EVER. PS Thanks Brain because now she just wants to climb on our heads all the time!

See, I told you she loves Uncle Brian!

It was a really nice party but, we will really miss Uncle Kevin! Have a safe trip and be safe! WE LOVE YOU!!!

Baby Ashlyn

High: We got to meet our new cousin Ashlyn Grace :) AND we had a great dinner with friends :)
Low: We didn't get to spend as much time as I would have like to with our new cousin :(

Today my cousin Christy, her husband Corey, and their 2 month old daughter Ashlyn came to visit. My whole family met up at my uncle's house to see the new baby. Too bad I goofed up the dates and "double booked" the night (after I made my friends switch their dinner party for us...oops) and I didn't get to spend nearly enough time with our family's new addition.

Ashlyn Grace. How awesome is her hair?! She was such a good baby. She smiled the whole time!!

Claire and Ashlyn. Claire actually looked big next to Ashlyn.

Me, Claire, Christy, and Ashlyn. Four hot mamas ;)

After hanging out with my cousin and Ashlyn for a while we headed to my girlfriend's house for dinner. Claire slept at Nana and Papa's, I was a little worried that she wouldn't want us to leave her at my Uncle's but she could have cared less!!

After a delicious dinner we decided to have a fire. Yep, that's Frank working hard on his fire (which ended up taking us about 3 hours to get going).

Shannon and Alex - have you ever seen a cooler couple?!

Me, Jenn, and Shannon..again hot mamas (I only surround myself with hot mamas :)).

My Girl Likes To Potty All The Time!

High: Claire did EXCELLENT on the potty today :)
Low: I had a class this morning :( AND I was at Quest Labs for waaaayyyyy too long :(

Claire is doing sooo well on the potty! She had one accident (at school) but other than that she did great! She is even doing great with #2. I realized today that when Claire says "I have to fart, mama." that means haul %$# to the potty because this kid's gotta make poop! She is even telling me when she has to go (instead of me asking a thousand times a day "Claire, do you have to potty?")!

I had a class this morning and I spent the other half of the day at stupid Quest Lab! But I did sneak a nice lunch at the buffet in with my girlfriend Colleen (which we decided later wasn't the best idea because we ate super fast and then felt sick...but it was totally worth it!). Then some girlfriends came over for some yummy summer drinks on the patio (even though we were all in sweatshirts and freezing). Therefore, I don't have too many pics for today. I got some great ones of Claire in the tubbie but Mark doesn't like the nuddie ones to be on the blog.

I did get this adorable video of Claire taking care of her baby. My parents bought her this baby for Christmas. It is motion activated. So when it senses motion it will start cooing and making all kinds of sounds. It used to creep Claire out before but now she LOVES it and takes it everywhere!!! Today she left it in Mark's car when he took her to school and she was freaking out when couldn't find it. Finally, she said "we call dada and ask dada where baby go?". It was reallly cute!

Don't mind the hiccups! Also, she has been trying to get that hat off that baby's head for days now but it is sewn on! And she repeatedly tells the baby "ohh you ok."


Claire was big on sharing her silky today. She wanted to "give Peter Nard a silky" and "Baby need a silky". We think this is all a ploy for us to give HER the silky!

Then Daddy read Claire her new favorite book "Little Cloud" by Eric Carle.



And I tried my hand at close up photography. I think I will leave those pictures up to Mark, he is much better at them than I am. But notice Baby is not too far away.