Parenthood

No one tells you how to do this. Sure, there's books. There's websites. There's "experts." You can read all that stuff and it might help. Odds are though, it won't. They're ideas and things that worked for others. Your kids are smater than that. They won't fall for the experts tips and tricks. They make YOU figure it out - the hard way.

Mason has been fully potty trained for #1 for at least a year and a half. Its like clockwork now. He can correctly identify all of his ABC's, 123's, colors, and car engine parts. He wouldn't poop in the toilet though. He'd politely request a diaper and then void.

Then something changed. Wednesday, March 25, 9:30 AM I receive a call at work. Mason POOPED in the TOILET!!! And I beamed for the next 12 hours.

I hadn't taken any time off (aside from unplanned snow days) since last summer so I decided to take last Thursday and Friday off. On Thursday, Luis and I took the kids to Enchanted Forest.
Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall...
Luis found a 'coon in the Enchanted Forest.

Luis and Siena in the Witches mouth. Mason was too scared to go in...

Standing under the tree seemed safer to him than the witches mouth.

He was also a little wary of the crooked house. Siena loved it though!

Luis and Siena did the slide...

Then we proceeded to the Wild West!

Takin' a break...

And smilin' all the while...

Happy Nannies at the bottom of another slide...

The kids LOVED the kiddie Bumper Boats that they got to drive themselves.

Mason went on it twice, the second time while Siena and I were on the big toboggan ride (the one he was scared to go on).

He wouldn't do this ride either but Siena was game!

The choo choo train was also a big hit!

Making sure Siena was tall enough to ride the roller coaster - and she is by a good 2 inches!

Siena did GREAT on the roller coaster. She loved it. She was a little wary of this one though. Too much frog hopping perhaps.

It was a great day. All of us enjoyed Enchanted Forest. Course, on the drive home the kids had to try to provoke each other. Siena wailed...

and apparently Mason's bottle of juice was the cause. Nevermind that Siena had half of the bottle of juice in her own cup. Nooooo, she wanted the bottle.

Friday the kids went to spend the night at YaYa and Papa Ron's. Luis and I enjoyed our first movie in the theater since July (we saw Duplicity which was good) and had a great dinner out with the DeCicco's.

Saturday was back to more family time. The kids were a little tired after a night at YaYa's (she was probably tired too) so we stayed close to home. Today too.

I spent 45 minutes in the bathroom with Mason today trying to coax him into pooping in the toilet again. Finally Luis was able to get him too. Apparently I thought after going once, the seal would be broken and all pooping would flow easy. Nope. Now we have 2 down though and hopefully more to come.

Luis went downtown today to see if he could get a part as an extra in a movie being filmed in town next month. Unfortunately, the rest of the Portland unemployed had the same idea...

He's not quite Hollywood enough to wait in this line...

Back to my messy house for another week.

Bracket Bust

I know. Its been 2 weeks again. No, I have not lost my dedication for my blog. I've been busy. The good news (work wise) is the 10K was filed last week. Now I can have a life again until May when we are busy again with first quarter reporting. Darn SEC...course, at least it keeps me employed.

Last weekend we hit Old Chicago for Joel's birthday party. I drank black and tans and ate a lot of Chicago style pizza. It was a double Pepcid night for me.

Mason and Trystyn are good pals...
Siena always has a good time.
Sunday, I battled taxes. 2007 taxes. After receiving a nasty-gram from the IRS, I attempted to prepare an amended 2007 return through Turbo Tax. Easier said than done. After 2.5 hours of misery and angst, I gave up and hit the Wii...

At least we had some good Mexican food with Yaya and Papa Ron.

I also partook again in the annual tradition of the March Madness bracket. I always start out each Thursday morning before the games start with such high hopes for this years bracket. By the end of the weekend (aka now), its all but over (thank you Wake Forest). In fairness, I'm in the middle of the pack but I sure don't have much luck.

Last night we went over to the Evanses for Dan's b-day. We all had a great time. The kids all got to play together and the grown-ups got to play together (Wii again - Heidi and Dan are rockin' nerds like us).

Heidi made a fabulous turkey dinner. I think Berren liked the jam better than anything else though.

We rocked so long into the night that the kids stayed up a whole 2 hours past their bedtime. Mason is doing great today but Siena has already had 2 naps. Guess we wore her out.

The only problem with the Wii is that I haven't figured out how to take pictures while playing. At least I was able to get a cute shot of Heidi and her babies. Ellia had her shirt off for a good 2 hours. In her defense though, it was a little warm upstairs with tall the drumming and my off-key vocals.

I'd post more but its time for me to go watch some team I picked in my bracket to lose.

Luis Got Tagged By A Grannie Fart!!!

No, it wasn't a YaYa fart! I know that's my MOTHER you were thinking about!

Losing an hour on a Sunday sucks! Lets get that out of the way at the start. That being said, we had a nice family weekend at YaYa and Papa Ron's place at the beach. Luis and I had a goal on this weekend to eat at places we hadn't tried before. Neither of us had dined at Kyllo's (mainly because the line always looks intimidatingly long) so we did lunch there. It was good but not as filling as we would have hoped for our $30. We pilfered from the kids' uneaten leftovers.

The kids LOVE playing on the beach. She may look sweet and pensive but that particular scoop of sand Siena is holding is about 1 second from getting chucked at me as I was taking the picture. I got a good picture though! That's the dedication I have to this blogging endeavour.

The kids, working on their sand masterpieces...
Once the sand sculpting was done, Siena and Luis headed for the safe confines of the great indoors but Mason wanted to do some rock climbing. He's pretty agile on those rocks. that was one of my favorite things to do as a kid too. Guess the proverbial apple doesn't fall all that far...

This is how my kids play with Hot Wheels. The word "anal" comes to mind...or perhaps traffic jam.

Brotherly and sisterly togetherness. Mason didn't take his coat off all day. I think he was afraid that if he did, we wouldn't leave again. This was just before a tasty dinner at Gracie's Sea Hag. I highly recommend the crab and shrimp al graten, which I ordered. Luis stuffed sole was good too but he wished he had ordered what I did. Oh, and the kids were thrilled with their mac and cheese.

I should mention that Mason dressed himself this morning. He had his coat on before we saw how he did and left it on all day until after dinner. Turns out "Houston, we have a problem..." Well, its the effort that counts, right?

So after an unearthly early wakeup call (from the kids), we headed to our favorite breakfast place - The Spouting Horn. So much for trying new places although, if it ain't broke, don't fix it. The weather broke about the time we got to Depoe Bay and the waves were incredible. There was even a rainbow...

I had to take a couple of pictures. You don't get to see scenes like this every day.

The Spouting Horn was the site of Luis' grannie fart. While he was sitting, minding his own business, sipping some coffee, an overweight elderly woman behind him stood to leave and cut one directly in his face. Course, Luis first blamed Mason until realizing what had happened. I think he lost his appetite for a good stretch of time.

A good weekend was had by all. Since we spent so much of our weekend Wii time at the beach enjoying some so called "family time," Luis and I tried to squeeze a little in this afternoon. As a result, this blog took me about 4 hours to draft. The sacrifices I make for my art...

and speaking of art, this stuff is CRAZY: http://listoftheday.blogspot.com/2008/05/3-d-sidewalk-art-of-day.html

Wii Rock!

I would have blogged last week but I was still recovering from the fright of having THIS directly above my head as I was relaxing on the couch watching tv one evening.

Midway through Amazing Race Luis shouted "GET OFF THE COUCH! GET OFF THE COUCH!!" I complied. Then I looked up. The camera doesn't do it justice. This was a spider out of Animal Planet. It could have consumed a small cat.

Okay, the spider incident is 100% real but the real reason I didn't blog was due to a nasty sinus infection that left me less than enthusiastic about engaging in computer time. Not as exciting as the spider.

Siena has had more success on the potty this week. We no longer had a week's worth of laundry that looked like it belonged to the Duggar family...just a normal amount for a little girl.

First, Luis turned 33 on Tuesday. He's been asking for a Wii ever since playing with his brother Jr's over Christmas. I kept putting him off but to surprise him on his birthday, that's what I got him. It was a surprise and we love it! Course we don't just go for the Wii...we go for the whole Guitar Hero Rock Band!!! Oh yeah.



The kids like the Wii too...with a little practice,

this will soon be Mason: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8z2usjj46Ek

Siena was briefly relegated to guitar (my instrument of choice) but when Mason wasn't looking, she took to the drums too. And she sang. This will be her soon: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6dJUnh6N8-U less the eating disorder, of course.


Saturday night we had dinner at my parents with the Walker clan. The kids rode bikes. Here's Siena. We call her "Dark Helmet."

Barb and Mom with their babies! Toby was really into little Harley. Really. A little too much. Down Toby. Cold shower Toby.

Ryder and Kaden check out the tractor, which seems to have flipped its lid. This looks like something out of the Cars movie now...

How many kids can you fit into a footstool?!?

So Luis and I spent the better part of the weekend as rock stars. We've officially passed the "easy" level. I will be picturing the colored notes as I go to sleep tonight...green...green...yellow...red...green........