Brothers

Watching for Dad to come home. These boys are super Daddy's boys. Mommy becomes chopped liver as soon as he pulls into the driveway.

A hug here, a kiss there. Or is that just a couple of tackles?

Farewell, Friends

We are very sad to say good-bye to our friends, Kristin, Craig, Dominic and Gabriel. They are pursuing a new job opportunity in a town far away. The job has the added bonus of being near family, a very attractive benefit indeed!

Here are the boys for a final day at the park. I was impressed that four 2 year olds would actually sit on the bench (table) for any length of time. The most we could get to look at the camera at once was three however.

While we will miss them, we wish them all the best of luck in their new adventure.

Happy Father's Day

For Father's Day, the boys gave Phil some nice backyard furniture. As you can see, it is getting lots of use! Alex immediately commandeered the lounger for his cars and if we tried to sit on it, he would demand "Mom, get up please". Or Dad as the case may be. I wasn't even allowed to rest my feet on it while sitting in the chair. He has relaxed his standards a bit since then, but you can tell he really prefers we not actually sit on the chairs.

We marinated a nice piece of salmon to cook on the grill along with green and yellow peppers and onions on kabobs. Here is the totally safe cooking method Phil employed. It is so nice to have helpers. Since no one was hurt, and the food was yummy, no harm done!

He's a Talker

A few months ago, as I was getting Zachary out of his car seat, I said "Hi. Hi. Hi Zachary". I could have sworn he said "HI" back to me. I didn't want to get all over excited and jump to word conclusions, so I let it slide. I did tell the other play group moms about it and they all agreed that he definitely said hi! In the last week, Zachary has added quite a few words to his repertoire. "Up" is one of his favorites along with "Cat", "Hi" (of course), "Ma", "Dad", "Hat" and "Cup".

On another Zachary note, he still prefers to use his commando crawl tactic, but more and more he is getting up on his hands and knees. He is really skilled at pulling himself up, and will walk while holding onto two hands. I can't wait for him to walk, it will make things more fun for him and easier on us!

Market Face!

One of the many reasons we love living here in Crazy Cali is the year round farmer's markets. Alex has always enjoyed going to the market and sampling the wares. Now Zachary has discovered the joys of berries too! Alex is modeling a mango lasse mustache and raspberry while Zachary is showing us strawberry and raspberry.

Playing

In an attempt by everyone to get out of the house, I did some grocery shopping while Phil and the boys went to the playground. Here are some fun pictures from their adventure!Zachary enjoys swinging so much, it was hard to pick which picture to post, he had the best smiles in every one!

I'm pretty sure Alex was at the top of this climbing wall before Phil had a chance to react. It was the first time he has really been interested in it. Zachary wasn't quite coordinated enough to make it to the top.





For Alex, the fun doesn't stop at the playground gate! He still loves to push anything on wheels.


I wish it wasn't blurry, but this was just a fun shot.
hmm, when the picture is full screen, our stroller really looks messy.

Daddy does Wee Play

After our flight out, Phil thought it might be best to ask for a one day extension on his leave. Good thing with the whole AF1 debacle. Anyway, even though we would have liked to sleep a lot more, the boys wanted to join their friends at Wee Play. It was great for Phil to be able to join them and see what it is all about. I know the boys were excited to have him come along! Phil's comment afterward was something like "I didn't realize Wee Play was such a mad house."

This time, Zachary drives!

Heading Home

Lately it has seemed like we are always pushing our time and luck getting to the airport. This time however, we made sure to have plenty of time. We had time to return the rental car, check in, get through security, get sandwiches for the plane, and even feed Zachary. It was so much nicer than being stressed out about how long every step takes. So just when we were feeling pretty good about the journey home, our flight is delayed. After we are on board and pushed back from the gate. Wonderful. I'll spare you the long and gory details, but when we finally were cleared for take off, an hour and 20 minutes had gone by. Throughout the delay, the Captain did a fairly good job of keeping us informed, but the control tower wasn't telling him anything. When we finally started moving, he told us to look out the left side windows. Air Force One was sitting out there. Presumably this was the cause of the delay. Typically AF1 comes and goes from Andrews AFB, but for an upcoming trip they were going to need more runway. Why this move wasn't scheduled a bit better is anybody's guess.
Although it was a rough couple of hours to start the flight, both boys ended up sleeping all the way home. Zachary woke up during the descent, but Alex didn't wake up until it was time to leave the plane. That definitely made it easier for Phil and me!

Overheard

A couple of funny things we heard from the boys during our visit.

Ryan is singing some silly song and replacing a word or two with 'poop'. When he finishes, Alex chuckles and says "poop". They're 2! Who knew this started so early.

Me: "Alex. Honey, what are you doing?"
Alex: "Watch TV. Poop pants."