Rest of Vacay Photo Purge.

I wasn't as diligent at taking pictures during our trip as I would have liked... luckily Helen took a lot whenever she was around us and sent me home with a burned CD. So a lot of my pictures are from Helen!

Here is a smattering of the rest of our trip... then I can move on to life again in CA!

We went on tractor rides at my Momma's.
Bianca took quite a few baths at Helen and Ed's. Besides the Tide fiasco at the Mecham's, Hurricane Bianca also hit the Schlotfeldt house pretty good. During a brief 10 minutes of 'fastest shower of my life' time, she drew all over the seat of one of her living room chairs. With a marker. I almost barfed when I saw it. I scrubbed the living daylights out of that chair, luckily being microfiber it came out with some TLC.

I called Helen and may or may not have cried about it to her on the phone, Helen was at work for the day and we were leaving shortly. Having not felt satisfied with just the phone call, I wrote her a note telling her how sorry I was ( the chair was still wet and I wan't sure if it all came out yet)... while writing this note the children were unsupervised. Olivia went potty, left the door open and Bianca high tailed it in there. Flash forward to two minutes later and the entire front of the wood vanity was COVERED in hand lotion. Bianca felt like being an artist and finger painted with the lotion. I ended up cleaning parts of it with a Q-Tip to get all the lotion out of the cracks. Then I wrote Helen an amended sorry note, but made sure the kids were strapped into the car first!
We had BBQ's and good visits.
We played with Grandparents.
We fell down and scraped our knees. This incident was epic (not for the accident, but for the size of the reaction). Olivia went nuclear over the sight of her own blood and her fit exhausted her so thoroughly that she feel asleep like this in the truck.
We had picnics in the sunshine. Helen made this fort. So awesome.
We saw the Abbotsford Air Show from the side of a raspberry patch. They came down so close that I could read the writing on the sides of the plane. I might have squealed like a child, hooting and hollering and screaming with delight. I might have simultaneously scared the jeepers out of my baby girl. I was so pumped to be so close to all the planes swooping down I didn't care who heard or how loud I was being. Bianca was convinced that the planes were going to get her and griped me for dear life. Every time they swooped away she cry out with relief "BYE-BYE!!".
Here I am so pumped about the planes and Bianca so wiped and emotional exhausted over all the drama I was creating about the planes. All the other adults thought the little ones were going to be the ones all excited about the planes, little did they know that another adult would eclipse all the kids reactions!

7 Years Baby.

While we are still in August I better post about our Anniversary. August 14th marked 7 years of marital bliss!
The first picture is the one we sent out with our invitations. Marcus scanned all of our pictures into the computer and these other ones were some of our favorites but just didn't quite make the final cut.
Lesha was our photographer extraordinaire and looking through all of these she had to put up with a lot of gushy, kissy shots. Ain't that what friends are for?
I was in WA for my sisters wedding so this was the second year in a row of being apart for our Anniversary. Last year Marcus was in BCT starting our Army adventure. I am horrible with dates and always forget it is our Anniversary until a terribly embarrassing point during the day. I have really been trying harder lately to remember dates better and feel like I am making progress to that effect!

I love my Marcus. He is such a good husband and wonderful father. He works so hard for us and is so considerate of us and our wants and needs. He is sly with his humor and always cracks me up. He is quiet and calm, totally content to let my big personality take center stage. He also knows how to bring my back to earth when my personality gets a little too big.

It really hit home to me as we were driving back down our street when we got home from our vacation. Even though we haven't been here that long, being with my family makes wherever I am Home. He is the keeper of my heart and takes care of it so well.

The first major mess of hurricane Bianca involved a bottle of ultra concentrated Tide detergent. She opened a hall cupboard, saw the bottle and decided to dump the whole thing out on the carpet of the Mecham hallway. The she walked in it, finger painted with it. In 5 short destructive minutes she created hours and hours of work.

I ended up renting a steam cleaner and it took until 9 pm that night, with some breaks, to get all the suds up.

If I ever see a bottle of Tide again in this life, it will be too soon.

Auntie Helen's

We spent a good chunk of our time during the weekends and Helen and Ed's house. Have I ever mentioned how magical they are? Oh, I have? Oh, only a kerbillion times already? Oh. Well I am going to tell you again, they are MAGICAL.

Bianca loves her Uncle Ed. Like she would follow him into the ends of the earth. If we couldn't find her someplace, chances are she was making a royal mess (more on that later...) or following Uncle Ed around.
We had picnics on the front lawn, napped a lot, slept in a lot! Like Bianca would sleep until 9:30 or 10:30 every time we were there. It was always the perfect storm of a busy week and then a quiet weekend at Helen and Ed's that made us all suddenly feel how tired we were.
We played with lots of bubbles, or if you are Bianca, dumped outs lots of bubbles.
We also swung in the hammock, cuddled, watched HGTV, read magazines, ate food and stayed up until at least midnight every night talking. Staying there, with all it's sweeping views of the pasture land, is refueling to my soul.

Her Happy Birthday

My sweet, sweet girl turns two years old today! I really feel like she is in a big growth spurt right now and she just seems humungous to me.

Her smile lights up any room she walks into. She has such joy for life and is living every minute to it's fullest. She makes more messes then I thought could ever be possible for someone so young, but it is rarely (if ever) done with malicious intent. She is normally grinning ear to ear doing whatever high jinks she happens to be doing.

Bianca is the Ying to Olivia's Yang. Where Olivia is quiet, shy and mellow tempered... Bianca is loud, outgoing and spunky. I call her my Konks, my Konka, my Sassy Molassy. She doesn't walk anywhere, she runs instead.

She can say Hi and Bye now, with a wave that is reminiscent to royalty (as in fingers together and side to side swaying). She knows how to work it, when to be coy and act shy and then when to bust out the smiles and laughter. She bends to to talk to other kids so she can look them straight in the eye. Her hugs are done with such vigor they can topple me over.

We love her so.

Happy Birthday my sweet Konka girl.

First Aiwpwane Ride.

We spent the last two and a half weeks back home for a visit. My sister Myriah got married, which I don't have any of my own pictures, I am just now realizing. The actual wedding was so busy and so much preparation that I neglected to snap any shots of it.

I did, however, remember to take pictures of our plane ride. Olivia was so excited to go back home and visit everyone that she asked me every night for a week straight if we were going to the Airport yet.
The plane ride itself was a short one, just over two hours, which was really nice because in case you haven't met my second child, trying to keep Bianca contained is like trying to control a wild jungle cat who has ADD.
So I had a couple of bags of tricks, lots of fruit snacks plus praying my brains out that we would arrive to our destination safely as well as not cause a riot on the airplane. Mission accomplished.
Olivia had her buddies on the plane with her. This little rag doll of Jessie (Toy Story) is her favorite, favorite and according to Olivia, Jessie was very excited about the plane ride too!
And here the girls are on the plane ride home. I figured just lump all the plane shots together, right? We lucked out with the plane ride home being less full so I could claim the extra seat for my lap child. We flew home later at night and while we didn't use the portable DVD player on the way to WA, we sure as heck busted out that bad boy for the return flight to CA.

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Airplane highlights?

~Trying to fit all three of us in the bathroom to empty our bladders, respectively, before we landed in WA. There was barely enough room for us to all stand with our bodies touching, let alone with someone sitting down on the commode. For Mommy's turn I had to hold Bianca straight out over my legs so Olivia could have room to stand in there as well, beings how none of my offspring were willing to wait outside for Mommy to do her business. 30 lb child held straight out parallel to your body is an awesome workout.

~Realizing, after Bianca dumped out her apple juice, that I had left the wipes in the family bathroom by our gate BEFORE we entered the plane. Which was quickly followed by Olivia announcing to the plane that Bianca was stinky.

~Trying to change Bianca's diaper in the "changing table" they had in the bathroom and using paper towel and soap to clean up her abundant mess. I use the term "changing table" loosely as it was a fold down table directly above the potty that I am sure she surpassed the weight restrictions on.

Stay tuned... More on our WA trip to come!

San Biscuits-so

If you asked Olivia where we were, she would tell you "San Biscuit-so!".

So here it is folks, our San Biscuit-so Trip!

We decided, a day before we left, to blast up to San Francisco for two days. It was a ton of fun! We got lost a lot. Like as in we drove down every street of San Francisco lost, but we saw a lot of architecture which was really cool.
Day One was Fisherman's Wharf and Ghirardelli Square area. Day Two was Golden Gate Park. Day two was my favorite. That park is ginormous and it was so fun to go exploring there. The actual playground area was so fun for the kids and we rode the Carousel.
When we rolled in to San Fran (Sunday) it just also happened to be the day of the San Francisco Marathon. So about a million people there and main roads blocked off. So that was the reason for the first day of being lost, trying to navigate around the marathon. The second day was all my fault in the lost department because I am just no good as a co-pilot navigator. Marcus pulled a few Jason-Bourne-Car-Chase-Scene maneuvers complete with stop and look at the map and then whip out into traffic. Alls I can say is I am glad at least one of us has a good inner compass.
The girls loved the Carousel and were completely enchanted the whole time.
I was completely enchanted as well.

We also drove down Lombard Street! Eeeeek! Thanks to all of our getting lost shenanigans we were able to get in with zero wait. Everyone was lined up the other side of Lombard to drive down the twisty street, whereas we came through on a side street and whipped right in. The other unsuspecting tourists were waiting in a line way down the other side of Lombard for an hour! Go Radders!
Our clutch is cursing us for this trip. Lots of way steep hills with lots of stops mid hill=unhappy clutch.
GOLDEN GATE BRIDGE! Many times I got verklempt at all the cool things we would see. I would gasp and go "Oh my Goodness!". At first Marcus thought I was being sarcastic and would get mad at me for making fun of our adventures and then he looked over and saw that I really was misty eyed. Then he would just look at me, totally flabbergasted and at a loss for words about how overly emotional I am. Then we would both start laughing at how ridiculous I am, all the while I kept exclaiming... "I really feel these things!".
Rainforest Cafe! Food was not so good but the atmosphere was amazing!
Our neighbor at our table was Gary the Gorilla...according to Marcus. He kept trying to explain to Olivia that Gary was nice and that he would hurt her. Olivia kept insisting we leave the Restaurant and go someplace else. You really couldn't blame her for as much as Marcus reassurance was calming to her all of Gary's grunting and tree shaking freaked her out.
After her food came she warmed up to him and by the last thunderstorm that went off she was thinking it was pretty cool. Thunder would boom and the lights would flash and all at animatronic animals would go berserk. Both my girls went berserk too, Olivia out of fear that everything would attack her, Bianca out of sheer joy in all the craziness!
Ghirardelli Square.

We came.

We ate chocolate.

We left.
Sack lunch on the pier over looking Alcatraz in true foggy San Francisco fashion.
Our hotel was a raging success! It was affordable and a short ride over the Golden Gate Bridge, which crossed that off our to see list. It had a pool, was clean, had a kitchen area and granite countertops with a swimming pool that we relaxed in that night!

We also made a late night run to get Haagen Daz and Olivia was still up to eat it with us. It was so fun, sitting on our bed with Olivia in between us, chowing down on ice cream.
I love these girls. In the closet in the corner, Bianca made a little thievery nest. As we were leaving, we couldn't find a bunch of our things and they were all there in the closet in a little pile.
Golden Gate Park had so much to explore.
So much climbing and running around.
There was this big amphitheater thing that the girls thought was really cool.
We opted to pay to see the Japanese Botanical Gardens and it was so beautiful. The koi fish were huge and the girls were totally mesmerized by them.
A lot of the koi fish were all gathered in the bottom right on the picture and the girls just parked it right there and stared at them. Well Olivia stared and Bianca yelled at them.
Olivia loved getting her picture taken....
....and being the picture taker. Unfortunately most of her pictures ended up being crotch and boob shots.

We had a lot of fun, argued a ton when we were lost, said sorry a lot for the arguing, almost pooped our pants, ran around, were overwhelmed by crowds and made memories that we will have forever. San Biscuit-so rocked our worlds.

Block Party

So after our Zoo experience we had a big party with some of our new friends here. The actual 4th of July was pretty cloudy and cool but we still whooped it up in our front lawn with a feast of food. Sadly for living on a military installation there were no fireworks but we still made the most of our firework-less 4th of July.

All the kids were at the "kid" table and they laughed non-stop through the whole meal. It was hilarious. And it wasn't just giggling, as you can see in the above picture, it was throw your head back and laugh til your guts hurt kind of laughing. That picture has Olivia and our neighbors kids, Otto and Kate. My girls love playing with them and Ariane and Mark are so nice. We really lucked out in having some really amazing neighbors. Ariane and I babysit for each other when we need it and swap for date nights and stuff and it works out really great. Otto and Kate are actually over here as I type this!

We seriously had the feast of the century. WAY TO MUCH FOOD. It was all so good and of course I had to do my darndest to sample all the food that came so I could compliment all the cooks! (Jayme! Do you see the rolls?!?)
Here is our full party lay out. It was Radder's, Nielsen's (AKA our neighbors), the Harrison's (Oakland Zoo comrade in arms) and the Enkey's.

Military life means you often make friends only to have to move away from them at a later date. Here your time together is even shorter with the longest stay here begin around 18 months. I can't tell you how many I people I made friends with who are moving next month. The Enkey's will be leaving just as we get back from my trip back to WA. Tammi is always up for getting out of the house and heading to the park. She has two boys that are a little younger than my girls respectively. We also do trade outs with the Enkey's for babysitting. If either Tammi or I make extra food at dinner we will text the other and invite them over. They have gone to the beach with us and often Tammi is my running buddy at night, she really got me on a good routine of getting out and running.

Bianca loves Tammi and talks the best when she is talking to Tammi, which is kinda hilarious because Tammi is from North Carolina and has the MOST fabulous deep south accent. I could seriously listen to her talk all day. I tell her that all the time. I also start talking like her when we are together, which is embarrassing that I copy her accent but I own up to it freely. So I joke with Tammi that to get Bianca to articulate better, I just need to talk to her in a thick southern accent! Who knew that a little taste of the south was the only thing Bianca needed to get her speech rolling! Anyway, they are going to be stationed at Ft. Hood next! I am going to miss them when they move away.

Oakland Zoo

Like a month ago we went to the Oakland Zoo. I was pretty excited as I have never been to a Zoo before and we got a pretty good deal with our military discount. We went with some really good friends of ours that we have made here, The Harrison's. They have a little girl named Brennyn and my girls love her. Brennyn is younger than both of them and they like to take turns mothering her.

This picture was meant to be last, but oh well! After we were done with our Zoo adventures both the girls totally passed out in the car. We don't have AC in our vehicle which is fine 99% of the time because Monterey doesn't really get hot-hot (between 60-70 degrees average) but when you head in land.... HOLY HADES! It is roasting. It was just under 100 as we were leaving Oakland so we unrolled all the windows and the girls passed out with the wind whipping through their hair at 70 mph. As we reached the peninsula the whether dropped 30 degrees in a matter of 5 minutes, it cooled off so fast it felt like we had turned on the AC!
Olivia snapped a shot of me pushing them around in the stroller.
Olivia really loved the Edephants.
This was us stopped for lunch. There was a really big field that you could picnic in but hardly any shade and as it felt like we were literally in Hades we lucked out with finding one of the few tables under a canopy area.

The girls really liked it and I really felt like we got our money's worth. I mean it rocked my boat, but that is also coming from no Zoo experience. The Harrison's said it was lower in the Zoo food chain as far as size and animals but we all agreed it was a steal of a deal for what we got. We also went over a holiday weekend (4th of July) so there were quite a lot of crowds but we still had fun anyway!