march iphone dump

I LOVED dressing as the Drapers (pre-divorce) for Purim. A typical mess. A text from Nikki. Avery got air hockey because...Vivi got a free purse from a stranger. How we ride. Tucking her babies in. Carousel kids.

Packing up to head to Chicago. Naked time out (a favorite iphone pic). I love this girl. A typical morning on the porch. New clothes from Tati-hannah. Look at all the bubbles I made. Better than on the wall. Shopping. Snack set up. Music truck treat.

Our new housekeeper. Our new vacuum. Nerd. Avery's first Wii avatar! In the bath. Reading during rest. Reading Calvin and Hobbes for the first time. I'm thinking of you, Sarah.

All of the photos were taken by Avery at Red Rocks. I love the tire.

soccer school

It's that time again. The tongue is back!

Told ya. There it is again.

Hooray! He's already faster than Scott. He might just be the first turbo Turbow.

After just plain running, they got to try it with the ball...and tongue.

Water break

This picture cracks me up. Avery in a scrum of girls :)

Score!

Meanwhile...Daddy put someone in timeout because of whining.

I probably cannot express through words just how excited Avery was to start soccer. We have been counting down to March 31 for at least 5 weeks. You see, Avery likes swim class, likes doing active things and sports, but this year, his passion for soccer has increased exponentially. He positively beams and can hardly be bothered to leave the field to take a water break. It is awesome.

What is even more, um, surprising is that he might actually be good. The second week of soccer (yes, I'm post dating my entries and am writing this on April 8 - Happy Birthday, Mady!) after he scored 5 of his team's 7 points, the coaches put him on the opposing team so that they would have a chance to score. He scored 2 more goals. It's not that he's naturally a 4 year old soccer whiz, but he is fairly aggressive, keeps himself by the ball and loves playing so much. It's nice to see him have a strong affinity towards something other than organizing :)

I LOVE that my son has something in his life that he is willing to work hard at, have fun and learn some very valuable life lessons from. The popsicles after the game don't hurt either. 

the music truck

Avery carefully making his selection

So many choices

Oh yeah. He was excited.

I give a lot of credit to the Driver. He told me he was about to hand Avery his treat and asked if I was ready to take the picture then suggested I should have brought my video camera.

Spiderman!

You may not be able to tell, but we are not close to home :)

Happy, happy boy.

What you're not seeing is how we actually got to the ice cream truck. We've been hearing the music in the neighborhood the past week because the weather has been so nice, and this year the gig was up. Previously, we told Avery it was the Music Truck in an attempt to not have him begging for a treat each time he heard the music, but the first time he saw it this year, he read the side, corrected me and said it was an ice cream truck. I honestly think he thought I was mistaken.

I told him that I would get him a treat the next time we happen to be outside and the truck goes by. However, it usually comes around during nap time. On this particular day, we hear the music, Avery asks for a treat, and I tell him that the truck is already gone. It's not like we can just open the front door and walk out. I can hear the truck getting further and further away and make a split second decision to grab my camera, leave a sleeping Viv behind and RUN with Avery to catch up to the truck. It was a good 4 blocks away by the time we got there. Luckily, the driver was flirting with some girl and was stopped for quite awhile, giving us time to get there. 

Avery was so excited. It was an awesome adventure for Avery's first Music Truck treat.

 

vivienne's big bump

I document the bad as well as the good. Below is a copy of the email I sent a few people after Vivienne fell onto the concrete at Whole Foods. Over a week later, she is absolutely fine with only the tiniest scab on her head:

Well, we had our first ambulance adventure today! (That exclamation point is sarcastic).

Everyone is fine but Viv has a mild concussion. We were eating lunch at Whole Foods and I had a weird premonition that she was going to fall out of her chair, so I kept her on her bottom the whole time. Somehow she slipped through the seat and seat back and knocked her head on the concrete. When I picked her up, she turned grey/blue and her eyes rolled back in her head like she was about to pass out. It was at this point I asked the woman next to me to call an ambulance and then asked her to walk to to parking garage where there is always one parked because I knew she needed medical attention but I wanted to keep her upright and couldn't put her down. It took her a full minute to start crying, but even then it was weak. She was super loopy and out of it . 'Shit' may now be a part of Avery's vocabulary. The paramedics were there in about 2 minutes. Avery freaked out when we had to go into the ambulance, but did pretty well. Vivi had started to come around and by the end of the exam they said that they could drive us to the hospital or I could take her. I chose the latter, but the whole time I was thinking "Take us to Children's!!!"

Anyway, she checked out okay at the hospital and is doing great. Surprisingly, she was uber charming to the young male doctor :) I told him something was very wrong because she's never this friendly.

Sorry about the email, but I wanted you to know and I'm still decompressing. Scott did meet us at the hospital so I haven't had to deal with this by myself.

daddy loves soccer

Intently watching the game.

It was pretty windy and I love her hair.

Eventually game watching lead to game playing

She'll play soccer too!

Those are some soccer loving boys right there

Daddy and his lovies

We have been joining Scott on Sunday evenings at the Big Dick (it's hilarious, btw to hear Avery yelling from the porch where he's going to people passing on the street below). We take a picnic dinner and some toys and have great time both watching and playing. At halftime, the kids and I take to the field to use the big huge nets and Avery is actually getting pretty good at soccer. He likes to play goalie and is showing great improvement over last year. Maybe we do have a little athlete on our hands and he certainly LOVES playing sports!

red rocks

One of my goals for this summer is to spend more time in the mountains with the kids, so our first outing was to Red Rocks on a particularly beautiful Colorado day. Avery was amazed by the amphitheater but truthfully spent more time looking at the construction workers and their equipment. After we toured the theater, I attempted to take the kids on a hike but they both wanted to ride in the stroller. Well, if you've never tried to haul 60 pounds of kid up a mountain, then you haven't burned hundreds of calories per minute and thereby could eat two desserts that night. There are some stroller friendly trails, but this was not one of them. I decided to have a picnic and let the kids play in the red dirt instead. 

We all had a fabulous time, enjoyed the beauty of our state and at one point Avery asked me why I was wearing snow pants.


I still have plans to take Avery 'mountain biking' but there have been some serious forest fires, so we're going to let those subside before our next mountain adventure.

brady's 1st birthday

The birthday boy and his cute cousins.

Oh, Avery. Nice 'smile,' son.

I swear, there is something hard wired on that Y chromosome that makes boys LOVE trucks.

Hannah is one of Vivienne's most favoritest people

Daddy, seriously, give me that water bottle!!!

Rock harvesting was the big activity of the day for the older kids.

Like a lot of babes, Brady was very skeptical of his cake.

It was the weekend of birthdays, and we got to celebrate Brady's very 1st birthday the following day. For the most part, the kids alternated between the trucks and rocks, stopping briefly for cake. Brady is absolutely adorable and is BOY through and through. Luckily he has Reuben and Avery to show him the ropes! We can't wait to celebrate more birthdays with him, and I'm guessing by next year, he'll really dig into that cake.