mo-tor-cy-cle

Aiden looooves motorcycles. His grandparents got him a fun little baby sized one and he brought it over to take Emma for a ride.

Aiden really is quite the sweetheart to share his mommy's lap with Emma!

ready for school

Grandma and Grandpa bought Emma this backpack for the camping trip and she just loves to wear it around the house. It was kind of scary to see her looking like she was ready to leave for school. Seriously. Kids grow up so fast, thank goodness not THAT fast!

The first time we put it on her we only put about 1 pound of weight it in and she couldn't do anything but walk backwards because it was pulling her back! We need to work on her carrying capacity if we are ever going to take her backpacking! :)

visit with hardy

Emma was so lucky she got to spend an entire day hanging out with Hardy. This is Jens's childhood friend Ricky's little boy. He's just a few weeks younger than Emma and what a cutie! We all wish we could see them more often.

"evil eye"

Emma likes to make me laugh while she's eating by blinking her eyes at me. I started trying to get her to scrunch up her eyebrows by scrunching up my eyebrows to her. It's almost scary the way she does it. I call it the "evil eye". Jens hates it. It's so bizarre because she'll just be an angel one moment, the next it's scary face.

sorta funny bear story

The last night of our stay we had a bear visit. We had heard rumors of people seeing them DURING THE DAY(!) wandering through campsites. It was in the evening after 9pm. I was in the tent with Emma and had just finished nursing her. She was sleeping and I was just laying there beside her. I heard what I thought was someone trying to quietly walk up to the tent, or somewhere around there. Cosmo was growling at something. Then I hear Jens say, "Cosmo, go get it" and then Cosmo took off running and then Jens saying, "COSMO NO!" and "COSMO, COME!" Then I hear Cosmo yelp and cry out. Then I'm on my feet screaming "Oh my God, oh my God!" I grab Emma (who sleeps through this entire thing, btw) and am at the tent door. Cosmo has come back and I'm shaking thinking he just got mauled by a bear. I have no shoes on and Jens tells me to get over to the campfire and bring his headlamp. I get to the campfire, and there is NO ONE THERE. I thought everyone else had taken off running. Apparently it was last call at the toilet. We checked Cosmo out and he was fine. Thank GOD for the e-collar. His yelp was Jens zapping him so he would come back. Jens hadn't meant to sick Cosmo on the bear, he thought it was me sneaking up behind him. Yikes!

first camping trip

Warning, lots of photos!

We did it. We braved a camping trip with babies. There was a total of 5 couples. Four couples had 1 child, and one couple had 2. This was everyone's first camping trip with their children. It was WONDERFUL! We stayed for 3 nights, along with my best friend and her husband and daughter. The rest of the families stayed 2 nights. Jens was convinced we were crazy to stay 3 nights. He kept asking me, "You do know that we are staying 3 nights?" I'm SO glad we did, it was just the right amount of time.

We camped at Sugar Pine Point at Lake Tahoe. Beautiful campsites and lots of shade. The days were perfect in the 80's and nights were cold, probably in the 40's. Lots of bundling up, especially in the morning.

I got to catch up on my celebrity trash, it was wonderful. Cosmo was on his e-collar the entire time, he did great!

Emma loooved playing with all the kids. She slept fairly well and even took a nap during the day.

Playing with her buddy Aiden.

"How am I supposed to get down from this rock?"

Families photo. From left to right - Me, Emma and Jens - Jennine, Aiden and Mark - Sara, Addison and Joey - Angie, Rick and Ashlynn.

I think Emma tired of being dirty and sitting in the dirt. She used other peoples' chairs and even enjoyed sitting on our laps. I guess she decided it was easier to just sit on Cosmo's head and enjoy her snack. It lasted a whole minute before Cosmo couldn't take it anymore.


What's hilarious about this picture is that Cosmo isn't blinking, he actually closed his eyes and thought he was going to get to go back to sleep on Emma. She was very upset about being pinned down!

This is how we spent the days. Joey brought his remote control cars (which the kids loved too) . . .

. . . and the (other) kids dug in the dirt . . .

. . . ok, and ATE some dirt . . .

After bath time in the evening, the kids decided to play in our tent for a bit.

Trying to get a fun family shot, Jens made Cosmo climb up on this crooked tree. Hard to get a good picture when the "kids" keep moving!


See ya all same time next year! :)

serious sweatiness

As most of you know, we live in California with NO air conditioning. Taking a nap and waking up sweaty, is a regular occurence around here in the summer. Well, it didn't help that I forgot to take her "sweat" bands off. I had to wake Emma up to leave for her music class. I was hoping to catch her asleep with her purse on her arm, but no luck.

mountain view obon

Emma's Great Uncle Duane and Great Aunt Melina play in a Chidori band that plays Japanese music at local Obon festivals. We were so excited to take Emma this year since she loooooves music. We also thought she would enjoy the little girls dancing with kimonos on. Unfortunately they weren't performing on Saturday night (when we were there), but on Sunday. At least we had some deeeelicious teriyaki chicken, california rolls, masubi and most of all shave ice (with syrup, cream AND ice cream! -- which Emma loved btw)

Notice, I still have my lei on from Grandma.

How do I spoon me some more shave ice into my mouth?

visit from grandma and grandpa

The one thing we can count on when Grandma and Grandpa come to visit, is that Grandma comes bearing gifts! This time Emma got dressed up with a new scarf, wrist bands, and lei while reading her new books. Cosmo was waiting for his gift too (he always gets some sort of bone of course!)