Time is Moving Too Fast

Riley was home sick yesterday, Saturday after the zoo she mysteriously spiked a fever and it lasted through Sunday so I had to keep her home yesterday with me.  I am super swamped at work with this new job (did I mention I got promoted a few weeks ago???  Took a sales job and am COMPLETELY lost!).

Anyway, I got to spend a good day with Riley yesterday.  Marc left for a trip super early so I had to get the kids up and Jacob to day care alone, I had Jacob downstairs and Riley yelled down.  "Mommy, I think I just heard daddy's plane fly by!"  It was so cute and strangly it very well could have been as his flight took off at 6:30 and it was about 6:45.  :)

Then we dropped Jacob off at school and as we were getting back in the car she said to me "Mommy, don't forget to call work and tell them that one of your children is home sick and you need to work at home."  I was blown away by her thought process and the wording "one of your children" rather than "I or me."  It made me realize how so very mature she is getting. 

She also spent most of the day sitting nicely on the carpet playing Legos for close to 2 hours straight while I worked on a presentation.  I was again blown away by her understanding that I needed to get work done and her attention span to sit and build.  I taught her how to read the Lego directions to build various things with her set and she sat and went through the booklet building various houses and scenes.

Later that evening she asked if she could come to my office because she "would really like to see my desk and where I sit at work" so she knows where I am when she's at school.  Melt my heart.  I told her I would take a picture, she said that would be ok but she'd really like to see it!

Now, she did get sent to time out a few times last night for pushing her brother, snatching toys from her brother and talking back to me but overall her maturity has grown over night!

Fuzzy Slippers the Second Time Around!

I bought Jacob his first pair of fuzzy slippers, Riley was just about the same age when she got her first pair except I brought Riley to pick out her first pair and Riley and I picked out Jacob's for him after our haircuts!  Jacob loved them and kept them on most of the evening, he even tried putting them on himself, which was quite humorous!  They are both just over 19 months in these pictures.  I can't believe how much bigger Jacob is than Riley was!!!  Riley also got a new pair of slippers but she wasn't interested in cheesing it up for me. 

Zoo!

We've decided to take advantage of all that is around us some more, that includes, zoos, parks, family activities.  Riley is still out of gymnastics, well technically she can be back but they dropped her from the class without consulting with us so she lost her slot.  Yeah, I went Momma Bear on them, so she's out of gymnastics until August 19th.  Speaking of bears, we headed to the Oakland Zoo this morning for a morning at the zoo, we got there around 9:30 (even though the website said they opened at 10AM) and found that they were opened so we ventured in.  It was a perfect time to be there, it was not too crowded and most of the animals were out and about.  The kids loved it!  Marc and I also had a great time.  They had docents all over the zoo that were very knowledgeable about the animals.  We were very impressed.  And I know it may not be a popular opinion but I almost liked it better than the San Diego Zoo, it was the perfect size for my kids and had the perfect amount of animals and all of our favorites.  We will definitely be going back!

This monkey was awesome!  We watched him for a good half hour, Marc and I could have stayed all day, he was so entertaining and Jacob loved him as well.  Riley of course was ready to move onto the next thing after a few minutes. 

At the front of the zoo, there are a bunch of kiddie rides, of course Riley just had to go on some so she rode the cars, we have some serious trouble coming our way when she turns 16 because she gets this look on her face when she's behind the steering wheel of a vehicle.  And I rode the roller coaster with her, she's my little roller coaster girl!

Stickers and Lollipops

Dr H's office means stickers and lollipops to my kids.  The stack of Dr office stickers (all you moms out there know them, they are the SmileMaker square ones) that we have is quite ridiculous.  And I have lollipops everywhere.  Friday we added to it with our trip to Dr H.  And of course, what Riley gets, Jacob has to get these days as well.  So of course when Riley got her lollipop, Jacob got one too, and they both got blue.  Lucky me!

So lots of good news out of Dr H , I haven't felt this positive about Riley's clubfeet in a while.  Her sprain is healed but he wants her to continue to wear her boot and ease into activity.  (No gymnastics for 3 more weeks but they said swimming was great for her foot).  Miraculously, the correction that we got with the casting last month HELD!  H-E-L-D, held, she still has her dimple on her ankle and he was very pleased with how it looks, I can't believe it!!!  This is fantastic news because I was convinced that her sprain had erased all of our casting work.  We actually think the brace helped hold her foot in place.  She does have a little stiffness but it's not her Achilles, it's her forefoot.  That's causing her foot to turn in more than her ankle SO he ordered her an AFO to wear in her shoe.  I'm not thrilled about her having to wear it, just from a social aspect, I hope kids don't make fun of her.  I hope that she is too young for all of that nastiness, but I still worry about the implications of her in an AFO on her self-esteem and confidence.  But I'm hoping that the long term outcome outweighs the short term apprehension because Dr H went on to say that the AFO PLUS maybe one more set of casts this late fall/early winter may just do the trick for us and there may not be surgery after all!  I've been looking for a sign on what to do with this whole surgery dilemma and I really thought this sprain was our sign that she should have the surgery after all, but maybe I was looking at the sign the wrong way.  Maybe it was the sign that she just needs an AFO to avoid surgery.  Maybe if it wasn't for her sprain and going into the boot we would have never tried the AFO and maybe that's our answer to avoid surgery.  I know her foot can turn (no pun intended) very quickly but I'm riding this high right now because we've been looking down the dark throat of this surgery thing for a while now, this is the first time in a year where it looks like we might be able to avoid it. 

Most importantly to Riley, I promised her a new pair of shoes when she was done with her casts, then she got into her boot so we said when she got out of her boot we would let her get a pair.  When Dr H said he wanted to get her an AFO made, her face literally dropped.  I told her we could probably still get her a new pair once it came in, and Dr H said absolutely, he even had the brace guy (who was shocked at how big Riley now was as he used to measure her for her night night shoes) order it a certain way so that it fit in shoes better. 

So one more week of her "robo-boot" and then we get her AFO, she'll have that for a couple of weeks and we'll head back to Dr H in early August to check it.  She'll be in the AFO during the day for a while and then hopefully we'll be able switch over to night times after that and hopefully that will do the trick!

19 Months

Man, this month went fast, I feel like Jacob just turned 18 months and here we are, another month later and he's another month older and less and less of my itty baby!  Jacob's vocabulary has exploded this month, he still grunts and points a lot but he does have a lot of new words, including his teachers' names and "bubbahs!"  I turned around while driving him to day care yesterday morning and he looked like a little boy, the baby is pretty much gone.  Sigh, I guess I better embrace that fact that he's full blown toddler (he has the tantrums to prove it) and his second birthday is right around the corner!  It goes way too fast!

Getting Our Monies Worth

We've certainly been getting our monies worth of the backyard these days, which says a lot, since we paid a lot of money for that postage stamp we call a yard.  The kids absolutely LOVE to be outside and quite honestly, they need to be out there.  They get along much better outside and tend to get crazy if they are indoors for too long.  Fortunately the weather has been great lately, not too hot with a strong breeze so it makes being out back very appealing.  The day after Marc popped our giraffe pool Target happened to have a big sale on pools (they heart me) so we picked up a gigantic pool for like $20 and the kids love it.  Jacob is still a bit too short to get in by himself but next summer he will own it!  Riley also loves to BBQ outback so we've been doing a lot of that lately as well.  Family fun time to the max!

This boy doesn't miss a meal!

Fun park play date with our KLC play group - love this group of families that we've met through the kids' school

I'm all soaking wet! - My new favorite Jake-Os picture!

Jacob is quite proud of his physique

He loves him some water play

Like I said, they love each other when they're outside

Water baby

Having a snack in their playhouse!

Date Night

Marc's buddy from work is turning 50 so as a surprise his wife rented a suite at the A's game and invited 54 of his closest friends.  We were invited as a family but because it was a night game we decided we would have a much better time if we left the kids with a babysitter.  (On a side note, Riley was 4 1/2 on Friday, I can't believe my baby girl is getting so old!).  So we had Jacob's teacher from his infant room come over, we knew they would be in great hands, Riley loves her as does Jacob once he gets over the fact that mommy is leaving.  When we opened the door and he saw her and ran to me and hid, then clung to me until we left.  Poor guy has major separation anxiety.  We had a great time at the game, seriously a suite at the Colisseum is the only way to go!

Dancing With the Stars?

We know Riley will never be on American Idol or The Voice, but Dancing With the Stars?  That's a possibility, the girl has moves!  (And there really is music playing, for some reason my phone didn't pick it up but she has the end of "Despicable Me" on and she's dancing to that!  And that's not Mr T in the background, it's "The Next Food Network Star")

Shenanigan Kind of Day

We had a fabulous long weekend!  July 4th I spent at the outlet mall with my friend Jen where  I scored some fantastic deals, we're talking Kate Spade purses for $50-$75!  Then we had a delicious sushi lunch together.  Marc had a medical procedure on Friday so he couldn't eat all day.  After I got home I entertained the kids who were waking up from their naps for a bit before we took a family outing to the mall.  Friday the kids went to day care, I took Marc to his procedure, when he was done we had a nice lunch together before getting the kids.

Saturday we planned an overnight stay in Sonoma.  We first headed to Sonoma Train Town which was FABULOUS!  We all had so much fun and it was a perfect size for the kiddos!  Jacob is not so keen on rides and he clenched his fists, screamed and shook with anger as the train approached but once we were on and he settled down he had fun.  The carousel?  Not so much!  He hated it and tried his best to climb off and onto me while it was going around.  Riley on the other hand, she's my roller coaster girl.  I went on a little roller coaster with her and she got off and said "That was AWESOME!  Can we do it again!?!"  She's going to be riding Space Mountain with me at Disneyland in no time!  After a few hours at Train Town we headed to lunch at the Black Bear Diner, the kids were desperately needing a nap but we managed through with very little meltdowns thanks to iPhones. 

A family selfy, the kids really were having fun, Riley was worried the train was about to leave and Marc wasn't sitting

Me and my little man

2 girls as Riley would say!

Getting ready to roll!

Wheeeeeeeeee!

Jacob was NOT down with the carousel, especially when they started going up and down!

Famalamadingdong lunch!

After lunch we went to a winery, some fun for the kids, some fun for the adults, it's only fair!  We went to Artesa mostly because of the views.  The wine wasn't half bad either! ;)

At this point everyone (by everyone I mean Riley and Jacob) was cranky so we decided to pull the plug on the hotel, which had Riley super upset.  It would have just been a disaster with them so tired and we thought they really needed to be in their beds so we canceled the hotel but to make it up to Riley we decided to stop at the Jelly Belly Factory on the way home.  We didn't tell her where we were going but that it was a surprise for her so she was on the edge of her seat in anticipation.  When we pulled up and she saw the sign she got super excited.  We got there a little after 4 and the tours stop at 4 but there were a few other families there asking so we got in on the last tour.  It was great, I had never been there but it was so much fun with LOTS of samples.  Jacob even had his first Jelly Belly (just for the record Riley would have never had a jelly belly at 18 months, I think she had her first one somewhere between 2-2 1/2, curse of the second child!) and he was in heaven! 

She is bouncing off the walls with excitement here and she hasn't even had any Jelly Belly's yet!

Os was very proud to have his own bag of Jelly Belly's!

Jelly Belly Factory hats!

Best picture ever!  Jacob wants more Jelly Bellys!!!

And how did we finish the day???  With a delicious deep dish pizza from Zachary's!  It was an awesome day!