2020ing

I'm not sure if Angus is a mama's boy because I baby him or if I baby him because he's a mama's boy and he's the baby. He's also super cute and I love him.

He's had the most attention of all the kids because he's home with me all by himself. None of the girls have had that kind of time with me. 

He likes the new rug.

He LOVES the carwash. He's easy to please to say the least. His favorite place to go is actually Vons. If the whole police officer thing doesn't pan out, he'd probably make a great stay-at-home dad.

Addie: Angus can you hold my backpack? 

Angus: Sure, you got something for me Addie? 

Addie: Of course not!

Angus came over to me bawling and said, "Addie bwoke ma haaaaawt!" I thought he was being metaphorical but she actually did break this heart he made for Vday. I fixed it. 

Trying to give Otter some love...

And got licked in the face. It happens.

The only person I know who eats his ice cream sandwich with a fork.

We went to visit our Higerds. It's pretty much a miracle that all 10 kids were well considering all the colds, flus and viruses going around right these days. 

Got to hang out with this little bittie baby. 

Angus's face.

"Mom can you help me operate this excavator?"

For someone who doesn't know his letters, those are pretty big words.

James: It's okay Angus I'll see you next time.

Angus: Mommy tan we tate Dames wif us?

Every time we visit the Higerds, everyone complains that we don't live closer to them. Angus and Addie don't understand why we can't just live with them. Addie said, "I really do love you mom but I wish Mari could adopt me." On the way home Angus complained about his stupid toys and our stupid house and his stupid bed. He does like his new toys though. He just wanted to clear that up. He'll be fine in a couple of days. Mya thanked me for taking them to see their friends. Love her.

This table is one of the best things we've ever purchased. It was $200 at Ikea. We bought it when Mya and Winter were babies. We don't take great care of it because it was cheap-ish and it's black and we have kids. We pretty much bought it for the sole purpose of trashing it. It's been colored on, spilled on, scratched up and wiped down one million times. I think everyone with kids needs a black Ikea table. 

This stuff is so good. It's been around for a while now but it's one of my favorite things so I thought I'd mention it. If you get bored with water, it's great because it's sugar free and is just carbonated water with fruit juice sweetener and it's not really sweet. Mya loves it because she feels like she's drinking soda. There are a few different flavors but grapefruit is definately my favorite. You can find it pretty much anywhere like Target, Vons and Trader Joes. 

I just watched the series, "Four Weddings and a Funeral" on Hulu. I loved it. I know I'm late to the party since it's been out for months now but if you haven't seen it, I recommend it if you like romantic comedies. If you don't, you should probably not watch it. It's a teeeensy bit cheezy but mostly just super cute with a great cast.

I also watched Miss Americana, Taylor Swift's documentary on Netflix. It was really good if you're a Taylor Swift fan. If not, you probably wouldn't want to watch a documentary about her so yeah. 

Happy Monday! It's almost March which is complete nuts. I love it when the time changes and we can hang out outside after dinner. But ugh here come the bees and bee like creatures like wasps.

inner cheetahs and stuff

Dan often asks me to approve Winter's outfits. They are usually costume like with an abundance of sparkles or bright colors. I usually do because she’s rarely breaking any school rules. She’s channeling her inner cheetah this time. Totally fine.

The spoon that Angus is holding below is the thing to fight over these days.

The kids fight over everything. EVERYTHING. They fight when they're unloading the dishwasher. Apparently there are good dishes to put away and bad ones. They fight over who is going to return a dish to a neighbor. They fight over the front seat, the back seat, the chairs at the dinner table, who gets to use the toaster oven first. They fight over cereal and the "good bread." In fact I took them to school early yesterday because they were fighting and I couldn’t take it anymore. "Get in the car kids! You’re going to be early and have to wait by the red benches." (They hate being early)

This spoon used to belong to my grandma. When she passed away, my mom inherrited a lot of her dishes and things in the kitchen since she and my aunt continued to live in the house. When the kids would go over to mom's house, they would always look for the flower spoon. When mom sold the house and gave a lot of her things away, she made sure to give me the beloved flower spoon. I knew it would cause problems but it reminds me of my grandma so I put it in with the little spoons in our kitchen drawer. 

Every single morning, the kids throw a fit when someone gets the spoon first. I put it in time out for a week. It's back out now. We'll see how it goes. Angus was the first to descover it was out of time out and back in the drawer. 

Whenever Angus sees something he wants on TV, or at a friend's house, or at a store, he always says, "Mom can I have that for my birthday?"  He asks for about 5 things every day. I always say yes. He'll never remember everything he asked for. And the cool thing about Angus is that he would be happy with a bag of cheetos for his birthday.

Occasionally I take him to the thrift store with me. I always tell him I'm not going to buy him any toys. He always replies "Okay mom!" But then he just wants to show me the cool toys he sees there. Of course I always look. And then something happens and I buy them for him. He doesn't even ask me to buy them. This time he wanted to show me this paw patroller. Since he already has a much larger paw patroller pictured on the floor by his feet, I thought well, if I buy this paw patroller, I can get rid of the bigger one and save some space. Everyone wins. 

He agreed to get rid of the big paw patroller if I bought the smaller one, so I bought it for $5.99. Then on the way home he casually mentioned that Addie loves the big paw patroller and likes to play with it like every day. So I asked Addie if she really wanted to keep the big paw patroller around. Yes please mom. I love it. So now we have two. A mama paw patroller and a baby one.

I feel like I got played.

I will never stop taking pics of my kids sleeping in weird positions. With granola bars on their laps.

On the way home from picking Addie up from school Angus asked, "Who are your friends Addie?" She replied, "Everyone in my class!... except the crazy ones." I'm not sure who that is but I'm sure she's nice to them even if they are crazy.

This is Addie and Winter doing their homework in the driveway while Angus played with his new paw patroller. Perks of living in SoCal in the winter time. It was 70 degrees out. If you live here, just take a moment to appreciate that. I looked at my weather app just to see what it's like on the East Coast. They are in the 30s over there. And that's nice weather for them.

Dan occasionally just whips up restaurant quality dinner on a whim. Sea bass, asparagus and some kind of pan fried potato. Delish. And it looks so pretty. Tasted even better. Sorry to make you jealous for a sec. Just had to brag. Oh and I can call this my thankful thing this week. My hubby/personal chef. #spoiled.

Laundry will always be there weather I feel like doing it or not. It is a never ending battle to say the least. BUT I have to say that I'm thankful for a washer and dryer upstairs a few feet from my bed. That's why piles of clean clothes often cover my bed. But seriously, I'm SO very thankful and spoiled that I have a washer and dryer right there. 

I feel like I've talked about this before. So if I have, just pretend I haven't. Growing up, we lived in an appartment building with two washers and two dryers for 8 units. Mom worked during the week so she was only able to do laundry on the weekend with everyone else trying to do their laundry. The laundry room was downstairs, outside, around the corner so nights weren't a great option either because it wasn't a great neighborhood and a bit sketchy after dark. With 3 kids at home, often times we would all just go to the laundry mat. So, again, thankful.

One time, I suggested to Dan that we take the kids on dates. The kids took that idea and ran with it. Now they write it on the calendar. So we do it. This time was Winter's turn. She picked Chuck E. Cheese followed by yogurtland. I didn't mind sitting there while eating pizza and listening to a podcast while she brought me tickets to guard. I also love me some ski ball so I played a couple games. Not a bad way to spend an afternoon. 

When we got home, Mya went to sushi with Dan.

Angus and I went to a park playdate Wednesday and decorated heart cookies. 

They do this a lot for some reason. Love Mya's face in this pic.

Valentine's Day. Definitely one of my least favorite holidays. Why? Because I have to buy valentines for all the children. I have to take them to Target and wait for them to decide what they want to give to 30 of their classmates. And a special present for their teacher, and a special one for their bff. And Angus needs some too or he will be just devestated. Then there are things I need to contribute to class parties.

Even before we had kids, Dan and I decided this holiday was not for us. We are not big gifters and we don't like going out to eat when everyone else in the world is also going out to eat. We like a good non-busy tuesday night date night. Empty restaurants. Lots of parking. Great service.

But the kids do love the holiday. The girls went through all of their clothes and wore as many hearts on their bodies as possible. Even Winter's bow had hearts on it. Mya was bummed because in 5th grade the teachers don't do Valentines Day stuff anymore. They don't even give them time to pass cards out in class. She brought Valentines to school and passed them out anyway. 

Dan and I went to the gym with Angus. Isn't that what people do on Valentine's Day? This is such the perfect shirt for my little cop.

A friend told me a few years ago that she makes a special dinner for her kids for Valentine's Day. "How sweet," I said. And something I'd never do. Sounds like too much work. I thought at the time. But for some reason this year, I really felt like I wanted to show them how much they are loved. It probably stems from my guilt for constantly yelling at them and rolling my eyes at their millions of questions every day. 

But obviously I love those little stinkers. So much. So I asked Dan if he would be on board. He agreed and we came up with a menu that would please everyone and he cooked. Rack of lamb for the big girls and Dan, Trader Joe's terryaki chicken for the littles and me, artichokes, pan fried potatoes, roasted asparagus and mushrooms, rice pilaf and strawberries. Lemonade for the kids and wine for Dan and me. I decorated the table and told the kids to dress up which the girls love to do any time, any day. I left little cards and tiny stuffed bear key chains on the table for them. And I added a vase of roses and battery operated candles to make it romantic. (Dan doesn't allow lit candles in the house because they start fires supposedly)

They were DELIGHTED to say the least. It went well I think. No one complained and everyone was so touched and excited.

I got these for our dessert. Everyone loved them. They are so very good. I may have recommended them before but I don't feel like looking back at all of my blogs to make sure.

A new Costco goody. Actually I'm not too sure if it's new. It's new to me. It's kind of dangerous because if you're the only one eating it, you might just eat the whole thing. I may or may not have done that twice. I'm so bad at getting prices, sorry... I'm going to guess $12? I'll correct it the next time I go to Costco. If you like spinach, mushroom and goat cheese, you'll love this pizza. The combination of these flavors is just amazing.

Another recommendation/fun fact. I accidentally deleted all my emails. I'm not sure if I needed any of them but I feel this giant feeling of relief and freedom. I highly recommend it. Happy Saturday night! 

pricey shoes and stuff

Today, I'm thankful for this blog. I'm thankful that I live in a time where I can post pics and write about my kids. Technology gets a bad rep sometimes but I'm thankful for it. It lets me keep my family informed and make them feel closer to us even if they live in other states and other countries. For instance, my dad and some of my siblings live in Honduras but they can feel like they aren't so far away by just keeping up to date on here. I'm thankful for the phone I have that lets me take pics wherever I go. I didn't have that 10 years ago. Crazy right? 

Their fabulous yet scary robber disguises. As always Angus is the swat guy who's trying to bust them.

Obviously we don't get a lot of traffic on our street. The line is drawn in the middle just in case anyone thinks about getting anywhere close to her sister's drawing.

Last week I scheduled haircuts for the littles after I picked up the big girls from school. When we got to the salon the girls piled out of the car and as I was unbuckling Angus I noticed that he didn't have shoes on. He was also in his PJs. Not the end of the world. I thought, no prob, I always have some backups in the trunk. I checked the trunk and couldn't find any spare shoes or clothes for him. I guess I need to restock my backups. We arrived 20 minutes early since we drove there straight from school. So I yelled, BACK IN THE CAR GIRLS! ANGUS HAS NO SHOES! 

I had 20 minutes to get shoes. I was too far from home to go there and back so I thought I'd just pick up some cheap flip flops somewhere. I knew there was a shopping center with Old Navy and Kohls about 5 minutes away. The parking was better at Kohls so I chose to go there. Turns out they didn't have any flip flops because it's winter time. They should talk to Target. They are promoting their bathing suits right now. 

I should have gone to Old Navy because Kohls didn't have any shoes under $38. I thought it was a super affordable store but I don't normally shop there. If you know me well, you know that I NEVER buy clothes and shoes for my kids at full price. I'm an avid thrift store shopper and hand-me-down receiver. It physically pains me to buy shoes even at Target on clearance unless they're like $5. I took a deep breath, let out a sigh and walked quickly to the check out. I didn't even have a coupon. Angus has never had brand new shoes before. So I figured I'd go a size up and buy him light up paw patrol blue shoes that he would be smitten with. And he is.

Angus: Mom when I was getting off the couch I fell...

Me: Awe sorry buddy

Angus: That's okay I still love you!

Angus had his first complete meltdown outside the other day. There may have been others as a toddler but not in a good while. He did something I told him not to do, so I told him to go inside. He started to cry and yelled, "Noooooo mom!" We went back and forth a few times and then he ran away from me. Anytime I have to chase one of my kids down the street, it's impossible for me not to laugh. So Angus was screaming and smiling and I was laughing and yelling GET BACK HERE! NOT FUNNY! YOU'RE GROUNDED! It was quite the show. I caught up with him and threw him over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes while he kicked and wailed. A nice neighbor couple was going for an early evening walk and wasn't about to make eye contact with me. But I didn't want to be rude and awkward so I said "Hey guys, hows it going?" in between bloodcurdling screams. They replied, "Umm good, fine, how are you?!" Walking quickly back to the house and trying not to drop the crazy 4 year old thrashing over my shoulder, I replied "GREAT!" and carried him up to his room where he remained for the rest of the night. 

If you don't have small children, our lives may look a bit different. For instance, I spent my morning sorting this giant pile of toys and putting them into the appropriate bins. 

I love that Mya is now starting to do Winter and Addie's hair. I'm going to go ahead and let their teachers think that I take the time in the morning to groom my children. 

"Yeah I wook puetty tute wight now."

The two biggest huggers in the family. I'm glad they have each other.

Addie made herself a Simba mask.

After a bit of a break, the girls started gymnastics back up. And Addie joined. She was super nervous but quickly loved it. Her cartwheels are atrocious but I'm sure she'll be awesome in no time.

We got to see a couple of Higerds. One who's a teenager now, whattt? 

And the newest Higerd, Nellie! We did a little thrift store shoppin. 

Including more pics of Dan as he requested. 

Rocking this fluffy unicorn sweater of Mya's so I didn't have to go inside all the way upstairs to grab one of my own. Perks of having bigger kids now.

I'm recommending a salad I bought at Costco. It came in a two pack. So I ate it and went back and bought two more and ate them. Hopefully they still have this one. I cut up the pieces of steak so I get one in every bite or so. 

Happy Saturday! 

Shoot! Just remembered I gotta go get valentines with the girls tomorrow ugh. Wish me luck. It usually takes a whole hour for them to decide which ones to get.