News and more photos

Take two proven baby-makers, send them on a two-week vacation in an incredible part of the world without the aforementioned proof, and voila, more proof is on the way. That's right, we're crazy enough to do this thing again and are expecting a baby early August.

Also, Brandon uploaded his trip pics (finally)!

120 Photos!

Here is a selection of the photos I took on our trip. Brandon is still "working" on "uploading" "his." (Which means I decided to stop waiting before sharing.)



You can click through to Flickr to see captions. Hey, it's much better than a slide show in my living room with watered-down cocktails, stale crackers, and spray cheese. :)

Holiday Spirit?

I went to Kmart Saturday. I parked and grabbed a cart. I noticed there was a Salvation Army bell ringer out front so I put my purse in the cart and dug out a dollar. I had a coffee so I held that in my right hand along with the dollar bill and steered the cart with the left. I walked to the bell ringer and dropped the dollar in the kettle. The bell ringer offered thanks and then said, "I thought you were gonna pour that in the kettle," indicating my coffee. Huh? "That wouldn't be very helpful," said I. How weird is that?

home

Forgot to add that we made it home! Got in at 2:30 am, Wednesday and were asleep by 3. Napped for 4 hours before Amelia woke up. That was a fun reunion and then she punished me for two days. Yesterday she niced up a bit.

Lots more to come!

Nearly Home

We are about to board our final flight I the trip! I just slept for 90
minutes in a cushy leather chair in the Red Carpet Club at SFO. Pretty
awesome. That, and having clean multi-stall bathrooms with toilets
that actually accept tp. :)

Sent from my iPhone

Arrivaderci!

Today we head home. Yay! It's been fun but I am ready. We did a whirlwind walking tour of Rome yesterday. Thank you transportation strike! We also heard there was an Alitalia strike yesterday, so maybe we'll see some of our cruise co-travelers who were scheduled to leave on their flights yesterday this morning when we go to the aiport. This will be especially great for Brandon who has several super-favorite friends. This is, of course, sarcasm. There are some who complain all the time and there are those who complain about those who complain. Guess which one is in our party? :)

Wish us luck in our travels home. Seriously. I think we've demonstrated that we need it.

Blus Seas

No kidding - the Mediterranean is such an amazing shade of blue. I'm sure the photos will not tell the story. And I may not be able to tell it either; the days are running together. We're at sea today after our stops in Greece and Turkey. We hit Naples tomorrow and then on to Rome where the floating portion finishes. Internet access is crazy expensive so the whole story (what I recall as well as many embelishments, to be sure) will come after our return to real life. In the meantime, I'm off to the bar for a fancy drink!

Trip

So, after joining the boat in Corfu, we have docked in Katakalon, Athens, Mykonos and Kusadasi. We've seen some wonderful things and eaten some wonderful food. We have also slept too much and stayed up too late. No one here is complaining.

Guess what?

We are on the ship! It took a few days and many hours in the many airports, but we got here. We got to Corfu after wearing the same clothes for roughly 36 hours. Luckily our hotel was able to give us our room at 7:30am when we arrived so we promptly took hot showers and slept for 8 hours. We got the ship this morning and are currently at sea en route to Olympia.

Thanks for all your well wishes. Wait, you were sending them, right?

Let's try this one again!

About to board again for SFO to Frankfort. We are now missing Venice
and Croatia but will beat the boat to Corfu. This trip WILL happen!

Sent from my iPhone

First day of vacation gets us hours away from home. In the same state!

Our flight was finally canceled. Well, it was actually pushed to 11 this morning. This meant we got a voucher for a hotel and no luggage for overnight.  Luckily we have toothbrushes with us and a few other items to feel freshish as we try this thing again! At this point we only know that we're getting to Frankfort. Brandon is working with the cruise line to figure out when and where we will meet the ship so we can then book the rest of flights/trains/ferries or whatever. 

Adios, South San Francisco Comfort Inn right on the train tracks. We hope to not meet again.

Super! We are still in SF. In the plane. Have been on board for more
than three hours at this point. On the plus side granola bars were
handed out.

We are still hopeful we'll get to the ship on time but we've lost our
evening out in Venice. Did I say the granola bars fell in the plus
category? What I really meant was where's the damn booze!

Sent from my iPhone

Funny...

...Brandon's face upon leaving the mens room after using the Dyson
hand dryer.

Sent from my iPhone

And we're still here in San Frsncisco. The aircraft problem migrated
from the entertainment system to the interphone system and the amassed
trwvelers migrated from gate 98 to gate 102. It was a mad rush to
resume a wait-and-see attitude. Potential exists for departure.

Sent from my iPhone

ONT - SFO

Made it to SF with minutes to spare. Now facing slight delay while
entertainment system gets repaired. At least priorities are in order.

Sent from my iPhone

First day of travel

Here we sit, drinks in hand, waiting for our first delayed flight. Our
first flight of our trip. Not panicking!
Sent from my iPhone

Trail Blazing Resumes

I mentioned we're on diets. We've been talking about it for a while but with our love of all things cheese and beer, we've put it off. Then we got the email. From Princess Cruises. A 12-day Mediterranean voyage. (That's what you say on a boat, right? Voyage? "Trip" doesn't really seem to cut it.) We'd been hoping to do a cruise after the first of the year but this is the region I really wanted to see and Brandon was able to line up all the appropriate signatures on his time-off request and, most importantly, my mom agreed to spend two weeks at our place caring for Amelia and the dogs. Oh yeah! Did I mention? We are going alone. No kid. So, Nutrisystem got our money and we are now losing weight. We were crazy hungry for a few days. Then our bodies got used to that. They're still adjusting to the increased roughage. Well, Brandon's is still adjusting. (Where are those matches?)

So, we leave the end of the month and fly into Venice. We sail from there and hit Dubrovnik, Corfu, Katakolon, Athens, Mykonos, Kusadasi, Rhodes, Santorini, Naples/Capri, and finish up in Rome. WTF! We are so excited. Now I just have to figure out how much freaking out I will put up with from myself when we leave our baby for that long.

Helpful Child

I definitely have a blemish on my face. I definitely picked at it. Amelia definitely sat on the couch next to me last night, poked it, and said, "Ewww. Yucky. Yucky. Yucky yucky ew."

Um, thanks.

Diet

Brandon and I are on diets. He's in El Centro, California for the week. This is pretty much as close to Mexico you can get. If you're not already thinking gigantor burrito, I feel sorry for you. Anyway, he allowed himself a diet break for lunch the other day and sent me photo proof. Jerk.

Some things

I picked up a couple of DVDs for our family-friendly collection (this is a tiny subset of the regular collection). One is called Barnyard. It's an animated number about which I'd heard nothing. This is often how I shop. Anyway, enough about me, the movie's rated PG. The label explains the rating's for "some mild peril and rude humor." I read this aloud to Brandon.
B - Sounds like our house.
R - Mild Peril? Yeah, we got that.
B - No, rude humor.
R - True, we got it all.

---

Amelia, after much beating training, has been going to sleep for naps and bedtime generally without complaint for, oh, I don't know, a year now? Until Tuesday. Tuesday I put her in bed for her nap around noon. As is our custom. She's been doing a noon to three nap and an eight to eight overnight for some time. So, Tuesday she screamed for a good ten minutes (as opposed to a bad ten) before going to sleep. Tuesday night I went out for lady time to play bunco with the gals. (You have to play bunco with "gals.") When I got home Brandon reported Amelia had a scream-fest at bedtime to the degree he went in to comfort her. This is a super-rare event around here. This screaming continued through Thursday. Every sleep attempt was met with this reaction. When my child is in this kind of distress there is a large portion of my brain (heart?) which kind of clumps up and gets pissed off. Others suffer. Friday rolled around and we were all home and I decided to do an experiment: it was noon and Amelia had played, pooped, eaten - all the important stuff - so I asked her if she was tired. She said no. Okay, we did this for quite a while. When she wanted to interact, I told her that since it was naptime and she was supposed to be sleeping, I would not play with her. No, she could not have more to eat or drink, it was naptime. She persisted with the line that she was not tired. At 1:50 I said, here's the deal, you are going to sleep. We all went into her room and put her freshly diapered bum into bed. She said "no," but we said "yes." She hollered for a matter of seconds and slept until after five. This led to nine o'clock bedtime which was not protested at all. Since then she's napped from about one to four and gone to bed by nine. The screaming is over. This may not seem like a big deal but an hour is big in the land of the 1.75-year-old. Or more specifically, the land of the mama of the 1.75-year-old. Deep breath. Embrace the change. Vote for Obama.

Don't be the one

She noticed the "shoo" (airplane noise) outside the store yesterday. For the first time. She pointed to her bum and said "seet." I helped her up and she sat. And she loved it.Here's the thing: she doesn't know it can move.
Here's the warning: don't be the one to teach her. I'm looking at you, grandparents.

This is what you get when you say, "Show me your teeth."

Morning, Sunshine!

18-monther gets first haircut (operation mullet-be-gone a success!)

Father's Day

Happy Father's Day to all you fathers. We threw a party last night for the neighborhood. We were pretty much ready for a party around here. I suggested that we switch Mother's and Father's Days this year because I got Brandon a kick ass gift and I didn't want to wait. It's a bounce house. It is awesome. We had it up for the party as well as a couple of kiddie pools and the climber and the teeter-totter and the picnic table and the inside toys and a bunch of juice boxes and cookies and cupcakes and sugar, sugar, sugar!!! Thank god for the bounce house. I was asked by another mom if I'd laid down the rules for the bouncer. Huh? Rules? Oh, apparently there should be big kid time and little kid time. Okay, got it. And then she asked if I was gonna let the kids eat then bounce then throw up in the bouncer. Huh? And then she said, "You really haven't thought this through, have you?" And she was right. Luckily there was no vomit. You're welcome. Here's a video of the baby dancing with her papa this morning. Her papa is sitting in LAX right now, waiting for a rescheduled flight which puts him into Washington DC at midnight. After that he only has an hour drive. Talk about a happy Father's Day!

Also, while we were readying the backyard for the party, we found a very swollen-with-eggs black widow (killed it), a two-inch scorpion (relocated it to the desert), a partial rabbit (offered it to the coyotes) and a dead baby bird (put it in the trash)! Yay!

We three

Photo by Grandpa Scott (Haku) who, along with Grams Judy, surprised us with a quick overnight visit on their way to a Yosemite trek. (Okay, it wasn't a total surprise, we got a few hours warning.)

A True Trail-Blazer

One of the brightest bulbs in our family chandelier burned out before his time. Brandon's grandfather, LeRoy, died when his plane crashed on Friday morning. Details are still coming in. I was asked to set up a blog site to centralize info.

http://leroypoulin.blogspot.com/

Please visit. There is an email address to which to send photos and remembrances which I will then post.

Ancient Mama-ese Wisdom

"The raisins eaten on a Wednesday afternoon will be re-plumped to grapes on a Thursday morning."

I'm a winner!

A couple weeks back I was cruising through my morning routine - drinking coffee, sitting on the couch, checking the internets - when I read this post on a fave shopping blog:

Dudes. Dudes. 696 valid entries* into the contest to win the 60-minute Flip camcorder. Sometimes I say to my husband, “They really like me!” and he replies “Yes, dear. They really like you…r stuff!” Regardless, I’m glad to have you all along.

I have but one Flip to give, and Ye Olde Random Number Generator picked number 65: Rebecca! Congratulations, Rebecca! (Check your email, and mail me back with your address, please.)

"Self," I say, "Your name is Rebecca." I moused over my name and saw my blog address. I did it again. I blinked, rubbed my eyes, drank more coffee. Could it be? I gingerly tabbed to my email and lo and behold. There was the aforementioned email! Dag. I was a winner.

The shopping blog is wantnot.net and is owned and operated by the lovely Mir. I have been reading her personal blog, Woulda Coulda Shoulda, since Brandon was deployed and have come to include it as one of my daily fixes.

This post is a belated thank-you for the Flip, Mir. We love it!

This thanks is in the form of a video of my kid being cute. You would’ve gotten it sooner but Amelia just wasn’t being cute enough. Kind of a bad deal for her since the agreement is love in return for cuteness. Hopefully she’ll continue to keep up her end of the bargain from now on.

Rebecca


(Try to ignore the creepy way I tell my first-born to "shake it")

I'm not sure what this says about me

Carl's Jr. has Cap'n Crunch shakes and malts. I had a malt last evening. Last night, I dreamed about it. Was it that good or is my life that small-town. Hmmm.

Bubble Dance

Taken March 14.

Survival guide excerpt - Amelia-style

What do you do when a big, yellow dog sits in your lap?


Why, you hug it of course!


Yay for puppies!

Things you've missed out on...

Him (from behind the bathroom door): No, no, no! Aargh. Gah.
Me (greatly concerned): What happened!?!
Him: I accidentally read Cathy!

A month later, repeated with substitution: Mutts.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Me (unloading groceries): Look, Albertson's has organic milk by the gallon now.
Him: Cool, how much is it?
Me: Seven dollars.
Him: Gah!
Me: The half-gallons are usually $3.50 or a little more, so...
Him: Gah!
Me: Hey, what's more important than the food we feed our family?
Him: How we're gonna pay for our iPhones!

(Editor's note - Fear not, we found a way)

AC went to the birds

Grams and AC - nature lovers, originally uploaded by Monkey loves Kitten.

And to the fishes. We went to the Monterey Bay Aquarium with Grams last week. Brandon was on yet another business trip (4th one this year) so the dogs and kid and I packed ourselves into the car and headed to Haku and Grams' place for the week. We did a couple of runs to the fantastic playground that is Dennis the Menace park. One of those was with Grams and the other with Uncle Josh, Aunt Julisa, and Cousin Jocelyn. Joss is a year older than Amelia and they're now at an age where they interact and play with one another. Good times. Nothing better than babies chasing babies.

Valentine's Day 2008

Valentine's Day 2008, originally uploaded by Monkey loves Kitten.

Hope you all had some monkey love of your own!

What's in a name?

I made a new friend a few weeks ago. Her husband is new to Brandon's squadron and they have a daughter four days older than Amelia. Another wife put us in touch and we've had playdates at home as well as the park. Today we ventured downtown (that is hilarious if you've ever been here). We were in a shop where we each made a purchase. I went first. After she paid, the shopkeeper said, "Oh, Rebecca, I forgot to get your signature on the slip." Naturally, I walked back to the counter and looked at the slip. It said "Rebecca FriendsLastName." Quoi? I was perplexed to say the least. You see, my new friend is named Annie. So...

"Oh!" says Annie, " "Rebecca is really my first name. I was gonna tell you."
"Wait. What? How is that not something you would tell me right away? P.S. We have the same name."
"No one ever calls me that."
"Okay, you are definitely weird! And now I don't trust you because all the Rebecca's I know are untrustworthy."

I think I may really like this gal.

Thought

This is the hardest time of the year for me. The weeks between ordering the Girl Scout cookies and their arrival. *sigh*

safety

Bounce Houses is having a "Blowout Sale." That's one of those product categories where a blowout really doesn't sound like a selling point.

Sorry, Crimson & Gold

I was at the grocery store with AC today. We were nearing the end of our trip, looping back from beer to ice cream (we're healthy like that), when an elderly white female riding a Rascal gestured to display.
"I wonder if there's a UCLA shirt under that USC one."
"I think there is. I see blue."
"I went to UCLA, I want to put it in front."
"Let's check."
So we did and there were in fact UCLA tees hidden behind the SC sweatshirts. There were two SC shirts showing. I offered to assist. I moved the SC shirts to one rack so the Bruin shirt was showing. That wasn't enough.
"Cover up the other one, too."
Happy to oblige, ma'am. Happy to oblige.

Words do no justice