a few moments

we just got home from a few days spent w/ family and good friends in oregon.
the weather was great, and we had a blast.
liam was less than an angel on the flight out... he was "THAT" kid for the first 15-20 minutes of the flight when he yelled "OUUUUT" or "DOOOOWNNN" at the top of his lungs... it was awesome. i was glad that we were able to somehow distract him for the rest of the flight.. but it was exhausting... luckily the return flight went MUCH smoother.

speaking of exhausting... i am exhausted tonight... so just a few teeny moments of the fun filled weekend.. more this week...

gramma and liam ride the carousel at the salem waterfront

liam rides daddi-o's shoulders on the morning walk to get the newspaper

getting the paper (liam calls it the papierre - he thinks he is french).. i thought this picture was cute... liam was saying hi to a neigbor dog (dough-gie) as doting gramma and grampa beam on.

cousin alex was sweet enough to share his "raging waters" with liam during the visit at great-gran and great-gramp's house.

cute brother mikey and his lovely girlfriend christina

ladies man

Meet Tiffany... or "Tiff" as Liam calls her. She is our summer nanny! Yes... Nanny - we have a nanny albeit temporary... she is awesome. Our regular daycare provider (Gail) retired July 1... which left us without daycare for the summer.. as Liam will start preschool Sept. 1. Tiffany has been the lead babysitter during our small groups, and we just love her... lucky for us, she was looking for a temporary summer gig before she heads off to College in San Luis Obispo. Win - Win! We absolutely love having her around... more importanly... Liam adores her.

Today was Tiffany's birthday, and she asked if she and her friends could take Liam to the Santa Barbara Zoo... we said "sure" and they were off this morning. Here they are in front of the Lion's Den.

Did I mention that Tiff is super duper cute, and so are her friends... look at Lucky Little Liam!

a short little video - they got to feed the giraffe, you can kind of hear Liam saying graffff

splash pad

We live just a few minutes away from a really cool park. A big park with lots of hiking trails, a dog park, a duck pond... and our favorite new activity... the SPLASH PAD! We took Liam here last year - but he wasn't really walking well enough to have a blast. What a difference a year makes. Today the weather is in the 80's not too hot, not too cold... but just perfect to get a little wet outside. Liam was in need of something to DO... so I took him this morning. We sat on the sidelines for a good 20 minutes while he watched the kids run and squeal and laugh and get absolutely drenched. I honestly didn't think he was going to get wet. He would barely get a finger wet... then I started getting wet... then he followed suit. He got upset when his clothes were getting wet - so he wanted to take them off... good thing I had a swimmy diaper. So - he stripped down... and after he got his feet a little wet - there was no stopping him. He was a natural... he had SOOO much fun. Just a few shots. His face says it all.
I have a feeling we will be stopping by this park regularly this summer!

happy little water boy

just one of the kids...
he was the littlest one there - but it was cool because all of the big kids were very sweet to him.

splash!

wheeeee!

... and he was running!

cute-daddio's

Kurt's good friend Brad and his two lovely daughters are visiting from Boise Idaho this week. Today was a special treat for the whole family. Brad's dad "Saul" owns Cali Camp which is an amazing summer camp for kids in Old Topanga that has been around longer than 50 years! This place is indescribable... acres and acres of native california landscape with all the fun things... swimming, horses, zip line, mini golf, tumbling, fishing, acting and dancing - arts and crafts... you name it! You need to be at least 4 to sign up for summer sessions... but we were lucky enough to get invited for lunch today. After lunch we were able to play a little mini golf with the kiddos.

The Daddy's even turn into little kids when they step on the property... the camp slogan is "It's a GREAT day at Cali Camp now that YOU have arrived!"
And it was!

How cute are Brad and Kurt teaching the babies how to play?

Brad is really getting into it - he is even wearing Brooke's red camp back pack.

Kurt is giving Liam a pep talk before the big shot.

...and setting him up for major sucess while Abby looks on.

All the kids have their own special "form" - here is Liam's style. Looks to me like he might have inherited Great Gran's shuffle board skills.

Brookie looks cute on the sidelines.

Liam is a little unsure of the INDIAN man.

Good friends playing together.

Brookie is a little-mommy and loves taking care of Liam.

BEE STING!!!

Sweet boy stepped on a bee tonight!
We were playing in the pool, he climbed out to get a towel, and all of the sudden started yelling "hurt hurt FOOT HURT HURT HURT!!!" We thought he stubbed his toe, but when he didn't let up, i went over to pick him up, and sure enough a bee fell off of his foot and was buzzing in circles on the ground... errrrrr!!!

so - he cried for about 20 seconds, and calmed down enough for me to explain what had happened - we whipped up some baking soda and water mixture to put on, and he was more concerned about the "mess" of the mixture on his foot than the "hurt"....

he was a trooper - his foot is a little swollen - but all of the rest of him is ok... we gave him a drop of childrens benadryl before he went to bed... so, we'll see how it goes.

updates to come.

any awesome bee sting advice to share???

my other life...

I am finally home!
Back from my other life... that one where I work... and set up restaurants and try to grow revenues based on increasing participation, raising check averages and train on the importance of merchandising - the one where i attend LOTS and LOTS of meetings oh yes, and there is that ever present calculation that discusses variable and fixed costs... break even points and contribution margins... (are you bored yet?) So - I am so glad to be home - but i will say, I work for a great company. A company that believes that food is life, that breaking bread together creates community... and that investing in your community is one of the most important darned things that you can do. So - one night, our VP of communications opened up her home to all of us to spend a night of cooking together... we shopped at her local market and were broken into teams (hors d'oeuvres, appeys, entree, dessert) and given 30 minutes to shop (top chef style). she also has a wood burning pizza oven in her back yard - so her husband cooked up some amazing pies while we were in motion.

the menu ended up something like this:

hors'doeuvres:

-home made tortilla chips with fresh guacamole, pico de gallo and lime sour cream.

-grilled cheese quesadillas

-smoked portabello mushroom quesadillas

salad

-local greens with point reyes blue cheese, red onion, strawberries and a white balsamic/honey-dijon vinaigrette

entrees

-grilled citrus and white balsamic halibut served on braised curry fennel (this description doesn't cleary explain this dish)

-red wine marinated flank steak with an onion balsamic reduction topped with fresh herbs

desserts

-gourmet smores bar with home made gluten-free graham crackers

-strawberry rhubarb cobbler with lavender whipped cream

-apricot - white chocolate cookies

-gluten free grilled peach crisp

the pizzas ranged from classic margherita to gorgozola, and walnut with mushrooms etc.

we ate... for hours....

although the food was delish... i am so blessed to be getting back to regular life with liam and kurt.

looking forward to a GREAT HOLIDAY WEEKEND!!!