sunday

alanna headed off to 4H camp on sunday morning. the house is so quiet without her here. malcolm keeps asking where she is. we are starting to miss her... but i'm sure she is delighted to be away, haha. it's been raining a bit in raleigh this week, so i wonder if she has been rained on as well? her camp is a couple hours from us, towards the mountains. they are supposed to camp out under the stars one night, so i hope that didn't get rained out. anyway, here are a couple photos that dan took when they dropped her off at the bus.

on sunday afternoon, malcolm and i went to a birthday party at my friend lana's house, for her daughter addison who is turning two. you can compare photos from last year here. it's crazy how much they have grown up in a year. funny that malcolm still fits in those swim trunks. last summer they were a little big, this summer they are a little snug. we had a lot of fun, and the kids had a blast playing in the water.

addison is so cute, and so sweet. makes me want a little girl again (sorry danny).

it was a busy party, there were lots of adults there, and most of them i did not know. so i kind of just sat on the sideline and watched the kids play etc. but it was nice to see lana in a good mood, and enjoying herself. a week and a half ago her father was killed in a motorcycle accident. which is so sad and so tragic. i know it has been really hard on her, and that she has had a terrible couple of weeks. so i am glad that she was able to celebrate her daughters special day with lots of her friends, and have a good time.

fathers day, wet 'n wild, anniversary

okay, so here is a recap of the past week. i'm gonna try and do my best to post more regularly and more often, so that each post isn't so long. sorry for the photo overload.

on fathers day we were going to work on moving and go grocery shopping... but i talked danny into playing hookie from chores and errands, and we went and saw toy story 3 instead. much better! we loved the movie. it made me cry and cry. danny thought it was a little too sentimental, but he still enjoyed it. malcolm sat well for most of it, and he got pretty scared a couple times. we kept him preoccupied during the slower parts with a giant tub of popcorn, way too much soda (tisk, tisk) and dum dums, haha.

on monday vicky came over to help me pack and move stuff over to the new house. she was very helpful, and we got tons of stuff done. after we got the first load of boxes packed into my car, i went to slowly shut the tailgate, and i heard a loud pop and then a fizzing noise, and smoke and powder filled the air. it was crazy, and it scared the crap out of me. i was super confused for a minute until the dust finally settled, then i realized that the boxes had pushed up against a fire extinguisher that was back there, and it emptied it's entire contents all over the car. it was awful. what a mess! i have never had to clean up anything like that before. this picture doesn't quite show how much powder was back there. it blanketed every inch of the interior, and took forever to vacuum out. there is still some of it that i missed, and i don't think that my dyson will ever be the same.

the kids on monday night

on tuesday we decided to take a day off from cleaning and packing, and we went to the water park. we still had rain checks from last year that were due to expire on the 30th, and since alanna would be heading off to camp this weekend, we needed to use them before she was gone.

danny went with us this time in place of vicky. he was not a happy camper, and he described it as "his worst nightmare". haha. he had never been to a water park before. ever. (which i didn't know until we got there) so it was a shock to his system. he was not prepared, and he was totally bummed out. but by the end of the day, he was in a better mood. he enjoyed watching malcolm play in the kids pools, while i had fun with alanna on the water slides.

you might not be able to tell... but this is a massive bruise on my knee. a battle wound from moving, i suppose?!

it was really, really hot out

this little water slide totally traumatized malcolm. he cried the whole way down it. it was so sad.

but he really enjoyed walking around the wading pools

and the pretty lifeguard enjoyed watching him :)

this is face was me being pissed about some older kid who splashed malcolm right in the face, while his mother sat there and watched. it was shitty. some kids/parents suck so much.

we went down a kid-friendly water slide a few times

this lifeguard liked malcolm too!

and we ended the day with a slow trip down the lazy river. malcolm started to drift off, but was wide awake again when it was time to get out.

it was a fun trip, but i don't know if we will go back again. danny says he would much rather take us on a trip to the beach, than ever go back there again. and i agree, i'd rather go to the beach where there are less people surrounding us. and less chlorine. and more nature.

yesterday vicky came to the house to pick up alanna for her trip to camp. she always stays the night at their house, and then boards the bus to camp in the morning. she was really excited for camp this year. i hope she has a good week. since vicky was already coming out here, she was sweet enough to watch the kids for us so we could go out to eat lunch for our anniversary. we ate some tasty thai food. thanks again vicky!

i gave danny the new htc evo phone for fathers day. since it was a bit pricey, i didn't really get him an anniversary gift, which he didn't mind. not very romantic, be he absolutely loves this new phone, so i know he is happy.

this is the very thoughtful gift that danny gave me

remember my post about "i am a bunny"?! he made me my very own framed prints! how totally sweet, i love, love, love it! he just used one of the board books, and then found a frame that fit the images well. he tried to get one that would hold all four seasons, but he could only find ones with three spaces. but it's okay, i don't mind leaving summer out, it is my least favorite season since i don't like the heat and humidity, haha (although i do love the rain in the illustration). he says i can switch them out too. i cannot wait to find the perfect place to hang it in this new house. thank you so much danny.

and this may seem silly, but i got myself an anniversary gift too. i ordered this necklace awhile back, and it came in the mail last week. i LOVE it! it turned out perfect. i got it from lisa leonard designs and i chose the sweetheart tree because the 5th anniversary gift is wood. perfect indeed. there are a few other items on her site that i would love to order too. she makes very lovely pieces.


my parents sent us this, this week. we stayed at the new york, new york casino when we were married in las vegas. what a thoughtful postcard. thanks mom and dad! we love you guys.



after malcolm was in bed, danny and i ended the night with a little "bubbly" (italian soda) in our fancy glasses that we were given at the graceland wedding chapel. they were a gift from dannys parents, since they could not attend the ceremony. we joked about watching our vhs tape of the wedding... but opted to start season 6 of entourage instead, haha. it was a nice day :)

5 years

happy anniversary husbandito! these past five years have been crazy and amazing and i wouldn't want it any other way! i love you! xoxo

(a few more wedding photos are here)

i'm still here

this is what malcolm is doing right now... and it's totally what i would love to be doing too, haha

oh boy, am i exhausted. i just wanted to do a quick post to let you all know that i am still alive. but maybe just barely. we are completely moved into our new place. we have slept here the past two nights, and today we actually used the shower. there are a few things left at the old house and in the garage, but we don't have to have it empty until the 1st. and i still need to do a bit of cleaning over there before we can give the keys back.

our current place looks like a bomb went off, there are piles of boxes everywhere. we are slowly but surely getting things organized and put away. and we have already purged tons of stuff for goodwill and to sell at the kids exchange in 2 weeks. we might even have a little yard sale too! it feels refreshing to get rid of so much stuff that is taking up space, and causing disorganization in our lives. but phew, is it tiring.

this new house has lots of storage, and the kitchen cabinets are fantastic. our old kitchen was awful, simply awful. so i am delighted to be living here. there are a few things that we don't love about it, but we will just have to get over that. and wow was it a mess. we seriously cleaned some of the nastiest stuff i'd ever seen before. the couple who lived here before us are the owners daughter and her fiance, and they must have never cleaned a thing. ever. it was horrific. but we scrubbed and disinfected and it is really nice now.

i will post lots of photos when it is looking livable... which might take a few months, haha. i need to do a post about last weekend and fathers day too. and i hope to be back to doing "friday favorites" next week.

i will end this with a HUGE thank you to dan & vicky, and also danny's sister catherine and our friend garrett. they helped us out SO much this week, and we really would have had the worst time moving over here without all their hard work. so thank you, thank you, thank you!! we love you and appreciate everything!

happy fathers day

to all the amazing men in my life!

i love you danny. i'm so happy that i (we) found you. we love you sooo much!

thank you dan, for everything that you do to help us out (all the damn time)!

i love and miss you dad. more than you'll ever know. i hope we will get to see you soon.

it's official

we're moving!

we signed the lease today on that house that i had mentioned a while back. we are to be all moved in by july 1st. yikes! this is gonna be a busy next couple weeks for us. this week alanna is taking art classes in the morning. next weekend is fathers day. the weekend after that is our wedding anniversary, and also the start of alanna's week at camp! she will actually be gone during the end of the move, so she is starting to pack up her room now.

i will need to clean the new (to us) house thoroughly before we can start to take things over there. and then once everything is all out of our current house, i will need to clean the crap out of this one as well. oh my! just thinking about it makes me exhausted, haha. believe it or not, but i've only ever moved twice before in my life. the first time was a week after danny and i were married, when alanna and i moved from utah to north carolina. and then again when i was 8 months pregnant with malcolm, since we needed a house with a third bedroom. we plan on living in this new place for only a year, so i have another move to look forward to in 2011, haha. wish me luck.