Cute Stuff about Miss Cuters

Catie is seriously cute. Even when she is throwing a gran mal tantrum (as I like to call them) she is adorable. The way she forms words and phrases and almost complete sentences sometimes totally amazes me... and it is hard not to laugh when she gets a huge pout face on.

Since I am now 8 months pregnant I am definitely not the most patient with her sometimes. I get sad lately worrying that she might get the shaft as the middle child, but she makes it so difficult to forget about her or not give her attention because instead of being annoying (other than during the tantrums) she is just absolutely, positively, lovable, and huggable.

Tonight she and I had a little girls night out while the boys went camping. She was so excited! We went to Blackhawk and got a sandwich from Draegers to split for dinner and we bought duck food as well! We fed the ducks, chased them, "rode" the rides (love that she doesn't care if they move yet), played on the playground, and then came home and played toys, dress up, and watched a few minutes of Max and Ruby before bed!

I love the picture above of her on my lap of the two of us because it reminds me of how during the day every day she'll come up and give me a hug and say, "buddy hug!" I dance around and sing the "My buddy" song with her sometimes (you know this one from the 80s)... so she likes to talk about being my buddy. This photo she was calling our buddy picture. I also loved how she discovered the ruffles on her shirt and then thought that 'ruffle' was the coolest word... and then was showing me all the cute things she was wearing- ruffles, a clippy, etc. She is such a tomboy and girly girl at the same time!

I am not the most huggy sort of person so it is really special to have this little energetic, persistent, happy little one always cuddling with me and giving me hug. It is hard to ever have a bad day with her around.

5 Weeks

There are some people that have expressed that they feel like I have been pregnant forever... and then there is me that is pretty much terrified of what is coming in 5 weeks and feels like the past almost 8 months have flown by! (Don't get me wrong, I'm looking forward to every precious minute of cuddling ahead with my baby... but would love to skip the sleep-deprived delivery recovery stage).

I managed to get one prego side view shot last Sunday. Not the most attractive picture ever and I'm not sure what I was doing with my hands, but now I can tell we're getting down to the wire. I'm definitely looking large and in charge... though fortunately don't have very much time these days to feel huge or overly tired.

I'm trying to get in as much running as I possibly can (within reason) before the idea of waking up at 6:15/30am to workout becomes impossible because I am so overtired and sleep deprived. My cute friends snapped a photo of me on our early morning trail run/hike on Friday.

My other main goals in the next five weeks are to...

• convince Andrew that sitting in the back of the Highlander by himself is really cool
• give Catie more opportunities to be my little helper and treat her less like a baby
• buy a double stroller that will fit in my Highlander when my back bench is up and I no longer have a spacious trunk to use 
• do more than just look at the unorganized cupboards, drawers, and closets in my house...

Catie has surprised me once or twice over the past few days and has actually acted more grown up. She was super helpful when baby Jasmine was over on Friday and didn't cry or attack me when I held her (a first for Catie). 

She's definitely realizing it is way cooler to be one of the big kids. When she woke up from her nap she came right downstairs to see the friends that were over and immediately said, "Hi Rose, Hi Simon" and joined in the craft project that the kids were doing.

I took her shopping on Saturday for a few cute baby accessories so that we can practice taking care of babies a bit more over the next little while... and then she's been my little cookie helper and cleaning helper this weekend too.  

Can't wait to see how she acts with her new little brother! 

Can't believe I'm already at 35 weeks. 

Super Saturday with Dad and the Tarantulas

Kevin and Andrew have been planning to go see the tarantulas at Mt. Diablo for weeks. We finally  scheduled it on the calendar to make sure it would happen. Unfortunately, they got up there too late in the morning to see anything, so instead they went hiking at Rock City!

They would not be deterred from their goal... so after a little quiet time and resting back at home, they grabbed their favorite Catie bug and headed over to the other side of Mt. Diablo (North gate) to hunt again for tarantulas. Supposedly the best time to see them is around 6pm.

They wanted to make sure they had plenty of energy for hunting, so they stopped at Mel's Diner in Walnut Creek for some dinner...  

Kevin said they were amazingly well-behaved (I am still floored Kevin took them out to eat at a sit down restaurant... albeit a diner, by himself... sounds like my worst nightmare).... Their dinner came out in a car and they both got milkshakes. I think Kevin is winning the best parent award this weekend. My idea of dinner out with the two of them involves them strapped into their carseats watching a movie while I pass them Chipotle quesadillas and I inhale my salad in peace and quiet in the front seat and read emails.

Love this little milkshake face

After they got energized, they explored the area by the north gate and saw three tarantulas right in the road!!! They got out to get a better look. Sounds like there are less tarantulas out this year... normally you'd see way more (all over the road everywhere), but man was Andrew IN HEAVEN. Catie actually didn't get too freaked out either... she's hot and cold with spiders... usually they scare her and she hates them... but sometimes she loves them.

What a fun night! My kiddos are lucky to have such a great dad... and I was so lucky to have had somewhere else to go so I didn't have to see all the spiders! :) Ugh!

Father/Daughter Campout

On Friday night after helping me do a few things for our neighborhood BBQ, Kevin and Catie headed off for the Father/Daughter Campout put together by two of the wards in our area. As the EQP, he was in charge of the breakfast for everyone on Saturday morning, so he and Catie ran around trying to find grills and coolers and then loaded up food in different people's cars and headed off for some fun!

They didn't make it to the campsite till close to 9pm, so Catie went right to bed like a champ and Kevin managed to snag one of the last s'mores and hang out with some of the dads/girls. He said it was quite different than the Father/Son campout because there were little girls practicing cheers and performing them for the dads and stuff like that... which I don't picture Andrew and his friends doing :) So cute!

Catie wasn't her typical super sleeper self and managed to wake up three times during the night... but calmed herself down quickly without any intervention from Kevin or bothering anybody (besides Kevin), so that was good.

The next morning Kevin got loads of the dads to help him with breakfast while he kept tabs on our crazy girl.

I loved hearing how everything went... especially with regards to the food. There were a few key items that Kevin didn't think to bring (mixing bowl, spatula, wooden spoon, large pot) which made feeding over 100 people pancakes, eggs, hot chocolate, etc. a little tricky. Fortunately they improvised and used a cooler (pictured below) as their mixing bowl... and a wooden paint stirrer that I had in the trunk, to mix the hot cocoa. :) (Reminded me of the time we used a lacrosse stick to mix hot cocoa at Palo Alto Palooza). 

Overall, it sounded like the campout was a lot of fun and Catie came home and showed me her dirty shoes and toes and clothes right away. We dropped her right in the bath and then later that afternoon she almost took a 3 hour nap and then went to bed early. I think Kevin actually went to bed at 9pm last night, which is super early for him too. They were both wiped out!

So proud of super dad Kevin for taking Catie! She was by far the youngest camper and I was impressed they went! (I did not twist his arm to take her either) I'm sure as she gets older this will become a really fun father/daughter tradition!

Fall BBQ

Last night was our first attempt at a large neighborhood HOA event as Social Directors. We thought it would be fun to do a Fall BBQ. As September started approaching and life (and schedules) got to be crazy though, we were a little bit hesitant that we'd be able to pull it off.

My amazing co-director Kara had the brillant idea of having Fuddruckers cater the BBQ instead of having our husbands slave over the grills all evening. It was the perfect idea... especially since Kevin was one of the leaders in charge of the Father/Daughter camping trip last night and he and Catie only made it to the BBQ for 30 minutes (if even).  

If you get more than 100 guests, the cost from Fuddruckers is only $8.50 per person and you get unlimited french fries along with your meal. Yum! 

We decided to get a giant bounce house for the kids to play on and it was a hit! People came out in droves and the best part as organizer was that all 150+ people that RSVPed paid me ahead of time... so I didn't have to spend the evening hounding people for money. :) A local real estate agency gave us bags to hand out with our neighborhood name on them, so that was a fun take home prize. They are perfect pool bags. 

We also had a dessert potluck. I was so impressed with all of the delicious treats people brought. We had to set up another dessert table because we had so many. Totally my sort of party :)

I have seriously never been so exhausted after a party ever. Fortunately clean up was easy and Andrew and I finally made it home around 9pm... after having been setting up and running party errands since 4pm. 

This morning I woke up and every bone and muscle in my body was sore. Definitely means the night was a success! Can't wait for the next one!

Sweet Moments

Andrew is currently obsessed with rockets as I mentioned in my post yesterday. We have done this rocket craft many times over the last few days. On a whim today I decided to sneak a little rocket note into his Kinderprep lunchbox. I am usually lucky if I remember to give him a lunch... let alone put anything cute in it, but today I took 5 seconds and made him a rocket note.

When I went to pick him up at 3:30 at school he ran outside holding the note and said, "Mom! Thank you for my note. I loved it! How did you know I liked rockets so much?! That was so awesome!" His teacher told me he had been holding onto his note since snack and hadn't put it down the rest of the day.

I loved how excited and grateful he was!

Another sweet moment came tonight when we were saying prayers at bedtime. My Grandma Ewart is not doing well. Andrew and I have talked about her a lot over the past few months as she's been going through chemotherapy. After my recent visit to see her, he has consistently remembered her in his daily prayers with no reminders from me. Tonight when I told him she wasn't doing well, he asked if she was going to die. We talked about that a bit and decided to offer a special prayer to help her feel peace and comfort right now. In his prayer he said, "Bless Grandma Ewart to be happy and bless her to have a lot of fun in Heaven with Heavenly Father." 

Love that boy! He had just drawn with crayon all over my white dining room walls a few moments before and yet I just couldn't be mad at him any more. I am so grateful for my family and especially my cute kiddos!

I love this picture of Andrew with Grandma at Mattas about two years ago... 

he just cracked her up all evening and thinks she's pretty much awesome 

since she is Grandpa Kim's mom.

6 Things I Love This Week

1. Speed racer

Andrew and I had a shoe shopping date on Saturday. We raced through the mall trying on shoes. Andrew's main goal was to have ones he could call "speed racer" shoes that would make him extra fast. We finally found some stylin ones at Stride Rite. He had to wear them out of the store so he could speed race around the mall... so we bought socks too. The shoes don't look good in this picture because they are shiny, but they are seriously awesome shoes. He is in love. He had to look at himself in every mirror in the shoe store. It was very cute. Then we got cookies and goofed around a bit before heading home.

2. Rockets

Andrew's newest obsession is rockets... along with space shuttles. Kevin let him watch scenes from Apollo 13 a few too many times when I was gone last weekend, so now he rocket races with Catie around our house all day and is loving making all sorts of rockets.

Here are two he's made recently

And this space shuttle is now on his Christmas list (I take photos of anything he has to have right now when we are at the toy store... usually that pacifies him a bit... this shuttle keeps coming up though and he is very certain he cannot wait till Christmas for it... so he's going to do some extra work around the house for me to try and earn money to pay for it sooner... we'll see how that works :))

3. Tiddy Tat Pictures

Andrew loves drawing and now Catie has jumped on the band wagon. She is so cute to watch and will actually spend quite a bit of time (for a toddler) scribbling. She is also very descriptive about what she is drawing. Today she said, "yook mama, yook! tiddy tat!" again and again as she drew a large scribble all over my "to do" list. While I made dinner later in the day she drew several more "tiddy tats" and then Andrew had to draw his own to show her the right way to draw a cat. It was pretty adorable to watch them both drawing together at the table.

4. Cop Catie

I absolutely love how into dressing up both of my kids are right now. Catie spent the evening giving us all tickets while Andrew dressed up like an astronaut and sang songs for us on his bed.

Then he turned my bed into their space ship and they assumed their positions for take off. 

Love that he made sure they both had comfy pillows for their departure.

5. Lots of loves

My little Catie gives me loves out of the blue all day long. When we are at park day she'll just come up behind me and hug and hug me... or just sit on my lap and turn around and hug me. She also loves to climb up behind me on the chair when I am doing my hair and give me hugs. It is so sweet!

6. Virtues

To start off our day a bit better, I picked seven virtues for us to focus on this week. We may repeat the sames ones again and again for the next few weeks. Each day we have a new virtue based on things Kevin and I think we can work on as a family. The ones we chose are: Gratitude, Kindness, Obedience, Self-Mastery, Helpfulness/Good Works, Honesty, and Patience.

I have started off each morning introducing the virtue to the kids with a little thought or scripture to go along with it. Then we do activities during the day related to the virtue (sing songs, do projects, have little discussions, etc.). Today we sang the song "Kindness begins with me" a lot and worked on being kind to one another. We also did a few kind acts for other people. Wow, has this little exercise changed my attitude this week!

I'm sure there are plenty more things I could add to this list... but these are my favorites today!

Later this week I will have fun posts about the daddy/daughter camp out that Kevin will be taking Catie on AND the HOA Neighborhood Barbecue I am throwing. Fuddruckers is catering it so I can't wait for my Fudd fries from the Fudd truck!