mommy time out

a few weeks ago, i was invited to a sleepover.

that's right, a mommy sleepover.

it was a blast.

 this type of thing rarely happens. my friends hubby went out of town with their adorable children and that left my friend with her house to herself.

so she decided to have a slumber party!

she had a masseuse come in, so we all had 45 min massages.

she made a delightful & healthy dinner.

my friend made the most beautiful & tasty mojitos.

and best of all we stayed up late crafting and talking.

we all slept thru the night without any disturbances.

no barking dogs, no children asking us to scoot over, no snoring...

it was blissful.

the next morning we went to breakfast and shopped for a few hours.

ugh. it was heaven on earth.

i'll look forward to the next time the stars all align and it can happen again.

hopefully in this decade.

a new love...

i was so delighted when pscrubs came in, the morning of my birthday, and put a dvd in the dvd player.

 i was expecting an adorable movie from my chillens.


but instead....


it was..... 


the instruction video to my new......





blender!!! 
  

i am enjoying making green smoothies for my little ones everyday. we add kale, spinach, frozen fruit, greek yogurt, honey, chia seeds, bee pollen, fresh sqeezed juice and viola!!! super strength, vitamin packed smoothie!

we have also made lemon bars, tomato soup, salsa, guac., & margaritas

i am loving this sight......

but not so much this sight....

pleeease.....

courtesy of L....

my 3... err... 29th bday

well well well... my birthday month. not that it's particularly fun watching the numbers get higher and higher... it is fun celebrating and elongating my birthday birthmonth. 

 the first celebration was the night before, as my actual birthday fell on mother's day.

we went to the arrogant butcher downtown.

it was delicious. 

we really lucked out when we found out that we knew the manager and he spoiled us with comped appetizers, a bottle of wine and all the desserts they had with candles in them.

yes!!! lucky me!!!

the next day, we celebrated mother's day at my moms, my sis made me a delicious cake. no pics from that day. too busy relaxing i guess.

then i was spoiled with a lovely ladies lunch with all of the beautiful mommies from school. love these girls!!

cupcake bundt cakes. yessssss please.

we had another decadent night out w my bestie sister friends. missing C from the pic.... :(
& this is actually the day after, when dear M gave me the best birthday present ever..... ;)

another girlfriend celebrated her birthday a few days after mine. so we decided to have our husbands take us on a hot double date. martinis, burgers, statues and ice cream. what is better than that?

i loved reading all the funny cards and thoughtful gifts and especially lunch and pedicures w my ma & sis.

having such great friends and family makes getting older a little easier ;)

can't wait for the next one!!

a day in the life...

i must jot these things down, so that i can look back someday and find the humor, i just have to. oh help me...

it is the end of the year, so all the groups are trying to get one last get together in before summer.

this particular one, a group of fun moms from school, were gathering for breakfast. a vegan restaurant at that. i was a little apprehensive because i knew i would have to take S and R. S would probably be fine, but R.... these are the things i usually have to opt out on because it just makes my life and all the patrons at the restaurants lives easier. but since our brand new coffee maker is broken, and i really needed some coffee, i decided to brave it and go. i was just praying that they had normal creamer and not just some weird non-milk creamer.

we weren't there 5 min. before R had spilled 2 glasses of water and knocked over a room divider.

we finally were served our food and i asked for my coffee. she said "oh i'm sorry! it's a self serve station." so i had been sitting there for 15 min. with the shakes waiting for my coffee. good thing they had regular half and half.

the food was really good, but i wasn't able to talk much because R was not in his best mood.

i know i must have looked bad because before i left, a mom had run out to her car and got him some books to look at. she said how it's a good idea to have things for him to do so he's not bored. i didn't mention that i had packed him a little backpack of all his fav. little toys, but was even second guessing that because of his love for throwing small objects and his impeccable aim. after the 5th time he threw it over his head across the room declaring that, with his lips pushed out and his brow furrowed,  "i hate this back. pack." i decided not to bring it to the restaurant. she was also going to text me the name of a great parenting book for parenting boys. when he chased S around the table and threw his pacifier at her head, i decided it was time to say our goodbyes.

he was very mad that i left the paci there, but i told him he can't throw things or they are all gone. he was feeling remorseful. i could tell, when he confessed his actions to daddy on the speaker phone.

i hated to do it, but i really needed to run into costco. after walking around for maybe 10 min., i was smelling some gas from the sweet little baby. i thought i would check just in case, but unfortunately found a nice rooster tail forming and i pulled my finger out of poo. well, nothing left to do but hurry and finish and go change him in the car.

we found the rest of our items, discovered a broken egg in our $7 flat of cage free, brown organic eggs and asked the kind employee to get us another flat. they were annoyed.

on the way out, i noticed that gasoline was priced exceptionally well at $3.68 a gallon, so even tho i had a half of a tank, i thought i would fill it the rest of the way up.

after changing a really messy poopy diaper and loading the melting groceries into the car, i drove up to the filling station. the only station open was designed for the opposite side of the car. i pulled in anyway.

you know it's time to leave town when you burn your hands on the buttons entering your info. i pulled the big hose to the opposite side of the huge car and out spilled a few drops of gasoline all over my legs and feet.

on the way home, R chanted... "go faster mommy. goo faaaster mommy. moooommmmy, go faster! GO! FAST. TER. MOMMY!"


he was asleep in his seat by the time we pulled into the garage. i kissed his sweaty salty little forehead and tucked him in with his hdb and pray that he sleeps for at least 4 hours so that i can gear up for when he awakes.

little S is movin' on up

i can't believe it, i know i say that all the time, but i just can't believe my little baby S is ready for kindergarten. 

my girls have all gone to the same preschool, and had almost all the same teachers.

all of them have brought in a new baby sibling as show & share at some point. 

the teachers remember S as a brand new baby... and now here she is, all finished with preschool. 

we had a very special class this year, as we have had every year. but some of the classes, especially when they are smaller, give us an opportunity to bond on a deeper level with the kids and parents. we had only 8 kids in the class this year and S was the only girl! all the boys called her their little class princess. she kept them all in line , or at least tried to i'm sure... :) 

p.s. she wore this same outfit probably 2 times a week, every week, since november in which she received it as a birthday gift. she also wore her red cowboy boots, i'd say, almost everyday.

in february of this year, one of the sweet little boys in the class, Ben, passed away from cancer. it was so heartbreaking. several of the kids and parents went to the funeral. his mother was so amazing. she spoke so clearly and beautifully about her only child and son. she told funny stories about him and how brave he was through all of his treatments. she finished by declaring her love for him and said goodbye in all the sweet names she used to call him. benny boo, ben ben, benny bop, etc..... i'll love you forever.

 she just recently, for the last week of school, came back and organized a treasure hunt for the kids on their big water day. she buried all of ben's little toys, cars, trucks, anything small, in the sand and all of the kids got to dig for treasure. the kids each took home a little baggie of "ben's treasures". he was such a sweet boy with AMAZING parents. my heart just breaks for her. i am thankful that she shared her son with us, gave the children the experience of love and loss. and most of all gave ben another community that loved him and will miss him.

 the kids like to think of him running so fast in heaven and his legs not hurting anymore. i like to think that too.

so to say the least, we will really miss this community of parents and kids. it was such a sweet little group.

 i'll be off for a year and then have mr. R start up for 3's preschool.

gulp.

the parents arranged gift cards and flowers for the teachers. but S wanted to give them something just from her. i found this "bloom" idea on the internet somewhere, but i couldn't find the source to link back too.

anyway, i already had a round template in photo shop, typed in S's name and typed "thanks for helping (insert your child's name here) bloom :) happy and simple. then ran over to trader joes, picked up one of their cute little flower tins and viola... a cute little gift for the beloved teachers. S also hand crafted some beautiful drawing and cards that i'm sure are hanging on the teacher's refrigerators :)

nyc

the evening lights....

rockefellar square... me and mrs. B stuffing our faces with cupcakes.

 a few weeks ago, pscrubs and i were able to take a quick escape to nyc with some dear friends.
man oh man did we have fun. we were ready to live it up, since we were free from responsibility for the moment. their 2 older kids are the same age as our 2 older kids and all of those kids were in d.c. so we thought we would be really close by, just in case :)

we rented an apartment, hit up b & h, times square, several bakeries (including magnolia & levain), saw a show (leap of faith), walked and walked and walked, ate and ate and ate, took the staten island ferry, went to the today show, walked around central park, met up with my cousin, went to the met, found some delicious bagels (ess-a bagels), stayed up really late and had a grand ol' time.

enjoying the sights & smells at magnolia....

on a stroll in central park...

we did make it to the today show and saw bear grylls & my absolute favorite ann curry. she spoke to me. all i could say was "you are so pretty". she laughed and said it's all make up. then she leaned in really close and said "see, i have freckles under there. lot's of them!".  then she touched my arm and  said "but really, how are you doing?"

we are pretty much best friends now.

mr. B in R square...P really likes the time lapse app :)

mr. B attempting to make it thru the occupy demonstration...

the staircase that lead up to our apartment...

a view of the city from central park...

shake shack, grand central station, the garage (a bar that had a huge jazz group.. so so amazing) ping pong at the fat cat, st. patricks's cathedral, and some pics from out broadway night. we saw leap of faith, it was really cute. we then crashed an after party, not knowing we were crashing it. someone offered us champagne so of course we stayed. it wasn't until after a few glasses that we noticed an old lady giving us the stink eye. she finally approached us and said " it's just that this is a private party" and then shook her head. we finished our glasses and then snuck out...

we headed over to carmines for a delicious italian dinner. then we closed down times square looking for some action. we finally settled on a 2 am snack at a deli.

views from ess-a bagels, the most delicious bagels i have ever had... ever. levain bakery... so delicious, huge cookies, central park & one pic of our night out on broadway.

some views from the met, the chrysler building, & soho....

we did see a rat, which just about killed me, but other than that, i'd say the trip was flawless.
we decided to make a tradition out of it and go back every year.
also, i just saw avengers and couldn't help but notice that it was filmed right on our stomping grounds... 39th & park!

random day in the life...

i found these pics on the ipad....

i'm guessing D & S decided to have a photoshoot

i'm not even sure who this is... maybe S?

 glad those girls play with all that stuff.......

 i was wondering how my quilt was getting so torn up. it could be the bench...

 S loves her dog Ruby :) doesn't Ruby look happy?

 a little mary.... that's what they call it when they put a blanket over their heads like that....

last night i solved a mystery. we had a toilet plugged up for a few days. i kept trying to plunge it but was unsuccessful. i asked the big man on campus to come and use his manly muscles and try to plunge it. he didn't seem that concerned and said he tried but he couldn't either. hmm.....
so last night i gave it a good try again.

up came a toothbrush.

that was a new experience for me. usually it just clears up and flushes down. i had never actually plunged anything out of the toilet. fun times.

today i had carpet cleaners come and clean our disgusting carpets. i should know better, but decided to use one of those cheap coupons. i wasn't expecting much, but needed something done.

the coupon was advertising $4.95 a room. i wanted 4 rooms done.

so guess the quote....



$387.36


ummm no. crazy.

i wonder how many times people actually pay those crazy amounts. especially to cigarette smelling- rough looking guys.

they were irritated with me. they didn't even clean under a very large area rug, even after we discussed moving it. they just cleaned around it. i don't even think they used soap. i swear they just wet the carpets.


oh well.

14th year

14 years ago today

i married the love of my life :)

 i was 21 by 3 days... so i could toast at the wedding ;)

it's been a crazy & interesting ride.

14 years and 5 kids under our belt, several big moves and 4 dogs, who knows how many cats & fish, date nights, trips all over the world, good times & bad times, ruined laundry, lost items, new cars, broken cars, employment and unemployment & definitely lots of laughs....

i would do it all over again in a heartbeat.

i love you pscrubs.

seasons

there is a feeling of change in the air.

the kids are wrapping up the school year.

my pretty spring flowers are starting to die due to the impending heat.

birthdays, anniversaries, & end of the school year projects.

it's exciting thinking about summer. the freedom, sleeping in... no schedules

(i usually get tired of that quickly, but still look forward to it every year)

i plan on the kids getting along and not fighting even once. i like to set my standards unreasonably high 

i love to see them doing this....

the really do get along pretty well. i hope we are able to have lots of fun this summer. finding adventure, exploring nature. maybe even a big road trip.
we will see......






here are some of the spring plants that are on their way out.....

not sure what these pretty things are, but they caught my eye,

 petunias

 my pretty urinal plants. i love my vintage urinal :)

my boy is getting big. the baba keeps him little ;)

my sweet L. she's growing up right before my eyes. she did a great job with her end of the school year project on mount vernon.

S did hers on the hope diamond.

they both went to washington d.c. this year for their big school trip. it was scary to have them that far, but alas they returned safely home. my aunt and uncle, S's godparents, live in d.c. they surprised the kids and left boxes of georgetown cupcakes at the hostels for all the kids. wow were they ever popular after that :) lucky!!!


we are off to run thru the sprinklers now until the sun goes down.


 yes, i am definitely ready for summer.