The Music Truck

We've been lying to our children for a few years. Really. On purpose.

During the summer we occasionally hear the fabled Ice Cream Truck on nearby streets. The girls will hear the lilting songs playing and will ask where it's coming from. David and I would look at each other and knowingly agree on our approach. He was the one who came up with the brilliant idea to call it the "Music Truck." He'd say something like, "Oh, its a truck that drives around playing music...isn't that cool?" The girls would smile and listen. We were lucky that it never actually came down our street, until two weeks ago.

David was outside playing with the girls one evening and I heard the melody of "Home on the Range" or whatever song they usually play. Then I thought "Uh oh", because the girls have never been outside when the truck came. At that point one of our neighbor's kids, an eight year old boy, came racing out of the house and down the street to flag the truck down. Well people...the jig was up. It was time for our girls to learn the truth.

David came in to get some cash...and admit defeat. Of course the girls were thrilled!! All the kids on our street came streaming out and that truck had a jackpot he never knew about. Funny though, he hasn't been back since, at least when we've been home. Spokane must be short on Ice Cream Trucks...he must have a lot of streets to cover.

The girls scored some cool missile pops and both of them ate every last bit. Morgan even exclaimed at one point, "The Music Truck has Ice Cream!" Hee, hee. I guess we'll have to start calling it the Ice Cream Truck now. At least now we know they don't come around often so we can feel free to let them have the treat when it happens. We were just in fear of having to disappoint them if we had to say no. Maybe next time I'll even have one too!

Wordless Wednesday: New Bike!

Tweaked

I "tweaked" my back on Sunday. We were at the church playground with the girls after the service. Piper insisted on going on the "big" swings. The surface of the playground is bark and the swings have huge "pits' under them from the kids dragging their feet as they swing. I pushed Piper for a while and suddenly she started to let go. I stopped her real quick and went to pull her off and "tweak!", I had a big pain and spasm in my lower back. In fact it was so low, I'd say it was around my tail bone/hip area. I manged to get Piper off the swing, then realized I couldn't move without a lot of pain.

David was watching Morgan on the slide and started shouting to me when he noticed Piper run right in front of the kids at the base of the slide. I motioned him to come to me and told him I needed help getting out of the "pit." He then went into "super-dad/husband" mode and took care of the girls while I tried to get a sense of the injury. All sorts of things went through my head as I realized I couldn't pick up the girls, much less bend over at all. Ugh. It was not a good feeling.

Well, to make a long story short, it is much better now. I spent some of that day resting and lying on a heating pad. A little ibuprofen worked wonders, so we were still able to have some friends over for the Super Bowl. I took the day off of working out on Monday, but was able to resume our P90X program, albeit modified a bit, this morning. I am still sore and don't know when I'll be 100%, but for now I'm happy it's not worse.

This reminds me of how quickly things can change, for the better or worse. All we can do is be thankful for all we are blessed with and do our best each day.

The Spa at the Allendorf's

Who knew Morgan would be into this? I sat down in the afternoon yesterday to start the process of doing a pedicure...for myself. Usually I do this after the girls go to bed, but this time I thought "Why not? I'll see what they do."

Well, Morgan was fascinated! Really, they both were...but Piper just wanted to splash around in the foot bath with her hands. Mmmm...not so much. I asked Morgan if she wanted to paint her toes and she said "Yes! I want purple toes!" She pestered me so much I cut my pedicure short (before the polish part). As you can see from the photo I modified things with a kid-sized stool, but she stayed there so patiently. She even liked the vibrating/massaging part of the foot bath. (This, coming from a kid that ran screaming from the spinning Dora toothbrush the other day. I thought it would be fun...no dice.) She let me trim her nails, but was not so keen on any other "treatments". Of course, she has beautiful, non-callused girl feet, so there was really nothing else I needed to do. She did really well with the polish part too, occupying herself with the TV while I blew on her toes. I had to do a few repairs to some smudges, but nothing too major.

Here's the result! Pretty purple toes! She really likes them. I can see this being a regular thing for me and my girl. As for Piper...I gave her one try on the polish. She did not want anything to do with putting her feet in the foot bath. The polish part was a disaster as she didn't get the concept of having to wait for them to dry. Oh well, we'll try again in a while.

Pick- up fall down

Piper and I were waiting in the car in front of the school today when we saw Morgan's teachers leading the kids out of the building. It is always a funny sight. A gang of three-year olds holding hands, essentially being "herded" along towards the parking lot and buses. I can always spot them by the bright pink jackets the girls wear. Morgan is the only one who wears purple.

As I got out of the car I saw a little "disturbance" of sorts, and one of the kids burst into tears. I immediately knew Morgan had fallen down. As I got closer I saw a crowd of little kids around her and teachers picking her up trying to calm her down. This is not the first time this has happened. In fact I think it's happened at least three times. I cannot remember an incident where any other child in the group fell down on the way out of the school. It is always Morgan.

Poor thing had fallen in the mud and had dirt all over her hand and pants. She was not hurt, she was just upset by the mud and wetness (it had been pouring down rain all morning). As soon as I got her in the car and wiped her hand off she was fine. She said she "wanted my new pants," but they really were not that wet/dirty so I said she had to wait until we got home (if she was much more muddy or wet I had dry clothes for her, but I wanted to show her it was no big deal and she'd be fine). When we got home, she insisted on her "new pants" right away and was very glad when I produced a dry pair for her.

Why does this happen? The more I thought about it... there are only two teachers who help the kids into and out of the classroom (most of them take the bus and a few of us drop our child with the bus kids out front). Usually each teacher has at least four kids holding their hands or holding onto one of the kids' wheelchair. I imagine it is kind of chaotic for Morgan. There are kids and teachers talking while they hold each others' hands and walk into the school. Now, this is a group of special ed kids. Most of them walk, but none of them are particularly agile or attentive. I've watched Morgan walk away with the group when I drop her off. Usually she's shuffling along, looking in all different directions while one of the kids is holding her hand and pulling her in the opposite direction. It's no wonder she falls down every once in a while. I wonder if there's a better way? I'll have to think about that.

Oh Morgan, I can't imagine she's ever going to do very well with multi-tasking.

Morgan and my phone

Occasionally Morgan asks for my iPhone to look at pictures. It used to be a bit of an obsession, but lately it's only once in a while (whew!). I was getting my hair cut the other day and I was looking through my pictures to show some to my stylist and, surprise! I found some pictures I hadn't seen before. I deleted quite a few photos of the couch upholstery and Morgan's pant leg, but I was tickled to find a few pictures of Piper. David said he didn't take these and I certainly don't remember taking these. So...Morgan?

First try, Piper must have been trying to grab it

Surprisingly good. It still make mes wonder if I took this and forgot about it. "Mommy Brain" is still a problem for me.

Weekend Fun

One of Morgan's favorite things to do is swimming. Unfortunately we haven't taken her very often since last Summer. It's easy in the Summer because we can get beyond the YMCA and head out to various lakes in the area. In the Winter we are stuck with the Y's hours which tend to fall right during "nap/quiet time" or later in the evening when we are cooking meals and having our family dinner.

Well, yesterday we decided to skip the nap(s) and head to the pool. Both girls LOVED it, especially Morgan. She went down the slide with David no less than 4 times and even got super brave and jumped off the side of the pool into our waiting arms. BIG smiles the whole time. She's asking to go again today, so we know we need to make this a more regular thing for her. I suggested a once-a-week Morgan/Daddy outing in the evening. It will be a nice bonding time for them. Piper was more hesitant in the water, but I enjoyed the extra snuggle time I got. She loved it when I bounced her in the water and kept saying "bow-bow" if I stopped.

Piper's been super cute lately. She likes to take my hand and lead me around the house. I'm never sure of our destination, but I love that she does this. If we are out of the house she rarely lets me carry her anywhere anymore. She is determined to walk, but will let me hold her hand. It's really fun to walk holding both my girls' hands as we do errands or head to an activity.

Piper also is "getting" her family's names now. Yesterday she sat next to me on the couch, pointed to David and said "Dada," then she pointed at me and said "Mama," and finally pointed at Morgan and said something that sounded like "Mo-an." There was just a hint of the "r" and "g" in there, hard to describe in writing. Something clicked for her. We love hearing her call us by our names. Speaking of names, if asked, Morgan will tell us our "real" names as well as the "term of endearment" names we call each other. I'm surprised she knows these names. She may be more observant than I thought.

That's the latest in our house as of today. It's back to school tomorrow, so we'll be back to busier mornings. The structure of the school day is good for Morgan. What am I going to do with this kid in the Summer?! I've got some feelers out for programs. I hope something good comes along.

The white stuff, with a little red too

So, I unintentionally took a week off of blogging. Oops. No reason in particular...the time just seemed to fly by.

We thought we'd escaped any further winter snowfall, but last week the white stuff decided to appear again. We enjoyed our first official "snow day" on Thursday, so there was no school for Morgan. We spent the day playing and staying cozy indoors. It was super windy outside, blowing drifts of snow, so we didn't think venturing out would be a good idea. Along with the arrival of snow the next few days were COLD! Brrrr! That may have had something to do with the following events...

David got up before me on Friday and left early. As he was heading out the door he warned me that he'd had a bloody nose in the middle of the night and that some had gotten on the sheets. I needed to wash them anyway, so I just thought OK, no big deal.

After she woke up, Morgan was playing nicely in her room. I went in the say good morning and she kept playing for a bit. Then I opened the door to Piper's room. She was standing in the crib with her arms outstretched and, as usual, a big smile on her face...then I noticed something that always comes with a shock to a Mama...her face and hands were covered in blood! Ack! I hurried over. She didn't seem bothered by it. She had not been crying before I went in to get her. She was looking curiously at her hands as if she was thinking "what is all this red stuff?" Poor thing. The bleeding seemed to have stopped, so I gently wiped off her face and hands. The mess in her bed could have been worse, just some blood on her sheets and pajamas, all blankets and loveys were spared.

THEN...later in the day the girls were in their nap/quiet times and I heard some louder-than-usual noises from Morgan. This usually means a poopy pull-up, but we'd already done that routine. I went in and she was half-asleep on the floor with, what?! Again? A bloody face and hands. I wiped her all off and put her in her bed. She sleepily said as I left the room, "thanks for the wiping Mama." OK, sweetie, no problem. Then she slept for almost two hours. Unheard of!

So strange...I'm the only one that seemed to be spared from the bloody nose. I don't know if it was the dry/cold climate that caused it, but no problems since then. So strange that it happened all in one day.

Little Mamas

Piper has an uncanny ability to attract other little girls when she is out and about. The girls are usually older, and must be "nurturing types", around three or four years old. I call them the Little Mamas.

Twice she has been to the play area at a mall in the "north side" of town and BOTH times she has had these little girls start following her around to "take care" of her. They'll help her up, and sometimes down the slides and walk around the play area with her. They'll usually try to get her to do the things they are doing, climbing and jumping on/off various things.

The funny thing is, Piper really wants nothing to do with them. She is so independent that she wants to do everything on her own. She kind of let's the Little Mamas play with her for a while, and then she heads over to the stroller, hands me her shoes and jacket and tries to climb in, saying "help, help!" Basically she's saying "I don't want to play with this girl anymore." Each time, the poor little girl seems a little hurt, but I try to thank her and give her a big smile! "You're such a great helper!"

Yesterday, I took Piper by the doctor's office to get some routine blood work done (on me, not her). We were in the waiting room for a bit and another Little Mama quickly attached herself to Piper. This time it included a little tackling and kissing too! Piper was not amused. The girl was so adorable! She spoke Spanish and kept saying "busso bebe!" because she wanted to keep kissing Piper. Her parents apologized and kept pulling her away. I just laughed and said it was OK. I knew one of us would be called into the office soon.

Piper's pretty cute, especially with her ponytail on top of her head. I have a feeling we'll be seeing more Little Mamas around. She hasn't attracted any little boys yet. Let's try to keep it that way for a while!

Greenbluff Fall Festival 2010

We finally made a trip up to Greenbluff this weekend. This is usually a really fun time of year with the Apple Festival events and pumpkin patches. Unfortunately it didn't go so well this time.

The last few years we went earlier in the season. Well...we learned that going earlier is better because it was so CROWDED! It overwhelmed us as well as the girls. I don't know where the saying comes from, but I hear it a lot lately. This trip was an "Epic Fail."

Everything was overpriced and we had to wait in lines for everything from train rides to food. I've mentioned how much Morgan loves the bouncy houses. After waiting (not very patiently) with Daddy, she finally got in one another little girl fell on her before she even got to jump! We managed to get out of there with a few pictures and a lot of wailing.

Checking out the pumpkins with Daddy

Jumping her way through the patch

Taking a rest

Piper strolling

Is that a good one over there?!

This brought a few smiles. Pumpkin doughnuts. Yum!

Today I got a tip on another farm we can try that is closer and less crowded. Maybe we'll try that one before the season is over.

Ice Cream!!!

I was so proud of Morgan for her good progress reports last week! I decided on Friday that she deserved an ice cream treat. We don't give her a lot of sweets at home, so something like this is a real special event for her.

During my pregnancies I started a "tradition", well, more a "habit" of giving myself a treat of a Cappuccino Blast at Baskin-Robbins once a week. Sometimes David gets one for me when he's out on his sales calls, but every once in a while I take both girls with meto the store. This time we walked in and Morgan immediately started saying "please, please, please..." over and over. I think she'd figured out what they sell there. I told her to sit down at a table and I presented her with a cup of vanilla ice cream... sorry no bright blue, bubble-gum ice cream for this kid. We'd like to avoid that for as long as possible. Ick.

She did so well eating it all by herself! Only once did she get too big of a bite. It was so cute, she scrunched her eyes together real tight...I can only imagine the possible "brain freeze" she was experiencing. Once she finished, she pointed at the candy toppings and said "please, please, please" again. We've gotten to know the owner a bit since we're regulars and she was so sweet and let Morgan have a few gummy bears. Then Morgan didn't want to leave the store. I gently coaxed her out, promising a few sips of my Blast. No worries, she had a great nap that day.

Oh, and she kept saying "3", "1" several times while we were there. It took me a minute to realize she was saying 3,1 for 31, thirty-one flavors. Too funny!

Our Dear Friends

As mentioned in the previous post, we had some dear friends, the Chen's, come for a visit this last weekend. They were in town for a wedding and we jumped at the chance to have them stay with us for the weekend. Their 18 month-old little girl, Leilani, is so precious and sweet. We loved seeing her interact with our girls.

I have known Kathy since Jr. High School. Can you believe we were cheerleaders together in the 8th grade? She is such a wonderful friend and I have loved keeping in touch with her over the years. It hasn't been easy, but we've managed somehow. Kathy and I also went to church together in San Francisco in our twenties and early thirties. David and I were introduced by mutual friends who were involved with Golden Gate Community Church and Kathy and Pete met while attending there too. Great memories.

We had a lovely time catching up and were even able to visit with the Tait's, another old "Golden Gate" family who now live in Spokane too. Here's a few pictures from our wonderful brunch at the Tait home.

Loving catching up, Danell, David, Pete and Time (Piper too, of course)

Leilani and Morgan hanging out

The Tait Family
Danell, Jeremy, Colin, Clive and Tim

The Chen Family
Pete, Leilani and Kathy

The Allendorf Family
Piper, Meg, David and Morgan

Lookee what I got!!

My sweet sister Ali gave me a beautiful "Mommy" necklace! I LOVE IT! It has my girls' names and birthstones as well as their birth dates on the back. Also notice the little charm near the clasp that says "Hot Mama." I think that is the company's name, but it works for me! Morgan calls it my "neck-a-less." I'd wear it all the time if Piper didn't try to grab it every time I pick her up. :-)

Thank you Ali! This gift will be treasured!

I never win things...

...until now!!! Yipppeeee!

We used an AMAZING local photographer to take some family photos when Morgan was about 7 months old. We got some beautiful shots and bought way too many of them, of course.

This past week she ran a contest for a $500 Gift Certificate and I WON!!! I can't believe it! When we did the photos last time I was still working and she's pretty expensive so we haven't been able to use her since. Now we can!

I'm going to talk to her this week to get an idea of dates. She does incredible outdoor photos, so we will probably wait a while until it's warmer. It will be good to wait until Piper is at least sitting on her own too, so we have some time. I can't wait to get some pictures of our newly expanded family!

Here's a link to her website www.amywaddington.com. Check out her beautiful portfolio and also see the "blog" link where she announces the winner, ME!!

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!!!

Piper's Wall Letters

It's Piper's turn for wall letters!! Here are Morgan's letters. I've started working on them, but Grandma B may need to help me with the ribbons and bows. She did such a nice job on Morgan's.

First Haircut

Morgan got her first haircut on Saturday! It was a long time coming. This first picture of Morgan in her kitchen is somewhat of a "before" picture. Her hair has gotten rather mullet-like and scraggly. She did really great, no crying. Towards the end she wanted to get "down," but timing was perfect and the haircut was done.

Cooking in the kitchen

Just arrived at the Hair Zoo. Sitting on her rhinoceros.

First snip!

She likes it! She also had a video of Elmo to watch.

The first lock of hair. They gave us a cute certificate for her first haircut with a bit of her hair attached.

Getting to hold the combs

Smiling at Mama and Grandma

Helping comb her hair

Mama's checking out the final product

Making the bangs a little shorter

We don't have a great "after" shot. I'm trying to retrieve one from my Mom's phone. Will post soon!!

Recall

Morgan's crib was recalled a while ago. Two weekends ago we finally disassembled it so we could send in the hardware to get a voucher for a new one. It was recalled due to the possibility that the slats could break and babies could get their head and/or limbs stuck. Well Morgan's really been pounding on the crib with her feet lately, so we decided that it couldn't wait any longer. She's currently sleeping in her play yard. Not so much space, but she's being a trooper. Once we get a new crib she'll sleep in it a while until the new baby is ready for it. Possibly around the holidays...then it will be on to a toddler bed. It's all going so fast!!!

Daddy's Coming Home Tonight!

Morgan's been saying Da-do and Da-da a lot more today. I think she's wondering when Daddy will be home. I tell her he's coming tonight and she seems satisfied with my answer. We've been talking on the phone with him a few times a day and Daddy sings Old MacDonald to her. I think she gets it that it's him on the other end.

I'm proud that we have made it through this long 5 days without Daddy. Not that I thought we wouldn't, but I figured I would be much more exhausted at this point. I did have a coffee drink this morning, so that might be playing some tricks on me that will hit me later.

Oh, that's a story in itself. Long ago, I was addicted to Frozen Lattes at the House of Coffee in Burlingame. That's way back when I was just a few years out of school and working in management at Baby Gap...so long ago. The coffee shop has changed hands many times, but it must have been in the contract somewhere to keep the Frozen Lattes because they still have them. I think I got one on a trip or two ago. Anyway, from time to time I wonder if something like that exists here. Morgan and I were walking the mall this morning and I wandered into a Thomas Hammer coffee shop. I spied something from outside that looked maybe like they had those "granita" machines that makes the drink icy, not just blended like Starbucks does with Frapuccinos. That how the House of Coffee made their Frozen Lattes. I hit the jackpot! They had two flavors and one tasted JUST like the one in Burlingame. I'm in for it now. I might have to start asking for Thomas Hammer gift cards now.

I digress...we can't wait for David to come home! He's had a good and productive trip and I'm sure he can't wait to sleep in his own bed. I've also been lagging on new Morgan pictures, so I promise I'll be working on that as well!

Snowblower Guy

There is a new character around our house since the snow starting flying. I call him Snowblower Guy. He pops out of bed early...usually it is to the sound of the neighborhood snowblower. There are actually two snowblowers on our block, one electric and the other gas powered. Snowblower Guy is especially in tune to the sound of the gas powered one that lives next door. This morning he peeked out the window and spied it at work. He said "I'm going to go out and shovel the driveway...and since I hear the snowblower maybe I'll get to use that too." And off he went!

This morning Snowblower Guy was outside for over two hours. Every time I peeked out the window he was in a different neighbor's driveway or working on the sidewalks. That is something great that has happened with all the snow we've had this year...many of our neighbors within a four house radius all help each other out. We borrow each others shovels (I think ours has been at the house across the street for about a week now), snowblowers and if someone is out of town we make sure their driveways/sidewalks/walkways don't get too snowy. I was especially grateful for this when David was out of town when we got our first huge storm about two weeks ago.

I think the secret is that Snowblower Guy really enjoys the social part of the neighboorhood snow clearing...he gets to keep up with all the latest details and hang with the guys. Once he walks out the garage door I'm not sure when he's coming back...but he enjoys it...and enjoying something that most people think is an annoying chore is a big bonus! We hope Snowblower Guy stays in service as long as the weather keeps calling!

Let it Snow!

We have had quite the snowfall in the past two days! David was out of town in the Tri-Cities, so I tackled the driveway the first night. I think we had about 8-12 inches at that time. It took me about an hour to clear the driveway and sidewalk. Luckily Morgan was napping during this time. I was pretty proud of myself for getting it done! Luckily the snow was pretty dry and fluffy.

The next day I woke up and driveway was covered again and then some. Our nice neighbors/friends offered to use their snow blower on the driveway that day since they knew David was out of town. I was keeping David in the loop on the storm throughout his trip. He'd managed to avoid a lot of it, but he set off for home a little earlier than planned to make sure he could get home yesterday. At about 3:00 pm he walked in the front door (note: he usually comes in the door from the garage)with his suitcase, announcing that he'd made it within 3 blocks, then the car got stuck, even with 4WD. A few hours later another neighbor with a truck/snowplow contraption plowed a lane through the neighborhood so we could get in and out again. Yay! David was then able to dig out the car and get it home. Whew!

These are a few shots of the neighborhood this morning. The sun is out and it's beautiful, but we hear there's another storm coming on Sunday. Here's David snow blowing the driveway:

A view the other direction down the street:

Here are a few shots I tried to get of the back slider door in the kitchen that leads to the backyard. I hope you can make them out. The "shadow" at the bottom of the door is actually how high the snow was blown up the back of the house. If you look further out in the backyard you can see big snowdrifts. The snow is pretty deep throughout the yard. Crazy, huh?

The blob to the left is our Weber grill...oops! It didn't make it into the garage before the storm hit.

I guess we're pretty much guaranteed a white Christmas this year! I heard we set a record for snowfall in the area, about 20 inches within 24 hours. Some areas got up to 37 inches!