Grandma and Poppy Bring Gifts.....

Over the weekend my parents came to visit and brought up boxes upon boxes of toys for the kids that were mine when I was little. Cabbage Patch Kid dolls, a Speak and Spell, a Puffalump, a Wrinkles dog, a Fisher Price Doctor’s Kit, hundreds of books and other toys - not to mention my high school cheerleading uniforms, sorority memorabilia and a gumball machine. Samantha’s eyes were gigantic and so were mine, wondering where in the heck we were going to put everything! ;)

 It was as if the 80's threw up in our living room!

 Even Lolly got in on the fun (a scarf, knitted by my Mom).

 Those dolls are named Clark and Leon.  I know this because I saved each Cabbage Patch birth certificate.

 Time to make more room on the book shelf

Samantha will have to wait to read these....

Then and Now

I thought it was funny that I crossed my sister's name out of the book that was inscribed to both her and me from my Mom and Dad.  Not sure why I am always telling Sam to share when apparently I didn't like to either....

Poppy Ron, always popular with the kiddos!

Shoes

I never bothered to put shoes on Thatcher, ever.... Poor thing, it is like he has to learn to walk all over again.

Today's Sample at Trader Joe's was......

ICE CREAM!

Hooray :)

A Boy and His Dog

Does this look like a dog that needs some exercise or what?!  She won't even look at the camera, she's too embarrassed.  She is looking more like a Basset Hound these days.  As soon as I put Thatcher in his high chair, Lollipop is circling him like a shark, eating every single crumb that drops to the floor and stretching herself long enough to get her snout on the tray and just like a vacuum, inhales whatever she can.  Not to mention, Thatcher thinks it is funny to feed Lollipop straight to her mouth.  So basically, Lollipop's waist line is not looking so greyhound-esque anymore.

So off to Elings we went......

 It was straight out of a Disney movie at Elings today.  Birds singing, squirrels scurrying around, Thatcher laughing, Lollipop trotting, green green grass, blue blue sky, fluffy white clouds.....

75 Degree weather.....

 Feeling the grass on his little tootsies

 Picking his Mommy a flower, of course ;)

 On doggy doodie patrol....

 Then Lolly and Thatcher met some friends

And Thatcher became the dog whisperer

If you don't live in Santa Barbara, you should :)

Grandma Marilyn AKA Dancing Grandma

Now that I am back to work part-time, Todd’s mom has been a HUGE help with coming up here to watch the kids for me. I do have a regular babysitter that helps me out but nothing compares to Grandma!  The good thing is that I am able to work from home and my hours are very flexible, so I still get to be with my kids the majority of the time, but I have created a better balance for myself with getting to have some adult interaction, exercise my brain AND I’m getting a check again!! I even had a vendor meeting the other day, you can imagine the anxiety I had trying to find some business attire in my wardrobe after not working for so long.

 
Today Grandma helped by having Samantha to her house.  And for Sam, this is a bonus because she gets to see Papa Ward. I even got a mid-day update with pictures about all the fun stuff they were doing.

They started off the day at a bicycle shop where Samantha got to try out all the different bikes. Word has it that they were eyeing a certain two-wheeler bicycle ;) Then off to the library they went where they checked out a stack of books for nap time and then they went to the park, then swimming, then played hide-n-seek, then played dress-up and then and then and then...... They manage to pack in more activities in one day than I do. No wonder why she never wants to leave them!

It was so nice for me to have the day to myself, well almost myself, I still had Thatcher (and Lollipop).  But after having two kids with me most days, all day, having one is a piece of cake!   In between checking things off my to-do list and getting some work done, we got outside to enjoy the beautiful weather at Butterfly Beach. 

I LOVE that Thatcher does not eat sand, Samantha would shovel it in!  However, just like Samantha, he runs top speed for the water!  When he wasn't trying to swim out to sea, he was in his glory checking out seashells, seaweed, sand, throwing rocks and dragging around sticks.  It is so fun having a little boy!

First Ice Cream Cone

 

1st Birthday Celebration

As we did with Samantha's 1st Birthday Party, we kept it pretty low key for Thatcher. On one of our weekly playdates, I put up some St. Patrick's Day decor, baked some cupcakes, made a green themed spread and called it, "Thatcher's Birthday Party" or "Thatcher's Happy Hour", depending on who you asked. 

Thatchy Boy I promise you a bounce house next year ;)