Fun Friday!

Billy creating a masterpiece with Kai. Once Kai found the paint station we couldn't pull him away from it. The boy clearly knows what he likes. He also knows he likes daddy's sunglass style, he wore them on top of his head the whole time.

Fun with playdough!

Kai finally convinced Daila that the paint station was the place to be!

Still a little confused as to why we're standing in water...

Whoa!!! It comes out of the ground!


What an amazing day. We signed up for an arts and crafts class as both Kai and Daila seem to love making stuff. It was their first time interacting in a large group of kids their age, so we were anxious to see how they both reacted. Well Kai barged in and started chatting it up and interacting with everyone right away while Daila was a little more hesitant and roamed around and checked out the outskirts before venturing in. Once they were both inside it was mainly the play dough and paint stations that they wanted to be at. We had a blast and Kai and Daila were both creating up a storm. It was an interesting situation for Billy and I too as we've rarely interacted with strangers so far in our parenting journey. We discovered today that maybe that's not a bad thing. We've always had a little family mantra that "if it's not fun, we're not doing it." Now i'm sure it has a little to do with the community we live in, it's mostly all young families, and it's no secret there is a major "soccer mom" presence that runs deep around here. Well, let's just say Billy and I are clearly the exception to that. In other words, do we care if you get "washable" paint all over your clothes? No. Is it okay to talk to other kids in a social setting and share your toys? Yes. Duh.. these seem like no-brainers to me. Well, all we know is our kids had a great morning, and then we even followed it up with a stop for lunch at Baja Fresh,where the fun water fountains are right outside. We've always passed it in the stroller, but today we finally stopped and let them play in it. At first they didn't understand it, but as soon as the water started spouting it was game on! Daila especially is the water lover, and she ran to middle of the fountain as soon as we got there. Needless to say they had an extra long nap this afternoon :)

Daila's big photoshoot.

Daila proudly wearing the dress that my cousin JoAnn sent her.

Sometimes I almost think Daila is a little bit psychic. This dress is very special in that is was picked out by my late aunt Candy for her granddaughter Jayden. Well Daila was given several accessory options to wear for the photo shoot. She specifically picked this Rose Quartz necklace that was worn by my Great Grandmother Alice and the purse that I carried at our wedding that our friend Annette had designed and made out of my mothers wedding dress! Here she is sporting the whole ensemble on her "catwalk" the patio :)

My beautiful baby girl.

Kai just had to get in the action and show his cuteness, but while going headfirst down the slide, of course.

Kai eventually won over Daila's attention from the photo shoot and got her to play in the dirt with him. Well... it was fun while it lasted!

The Sisterhood of the Traveling Dresses.

My cousin JoAnn sent this dress to Daila a little while back. Her adorable daughter Jayden wore it and I couldn't wait until Daila could fit into it! Well Daila seemed to love it, and even picked out a couple of accessories to go with.

Passing down dresses in my family is seemingly significant as of lately for a couple of different reasons. This particular dress was actually picked out for Jayden by JoAnn and her mother Candy (my moms sister) not long before she passed away. Sadly Daila and Kai never got to meet her however now Daila can have something that Candy did have an influence on, and whenever she wears it I think about what a wonderful person Candy was. I can't wait to tell Daila and Kai all about her someday.

Another dress tradition that my mom started is to give a family member who is thinking of conceiving a dress to hang in their closet to bring good luck and baby ju-ju... My mom did it years ago for my Aunt Kim, and not 2 months later she was pregnant. Well, I recently sent off one of Daila's dresses to a cousin, so now we're all crossing our fingers for her :)

Family Sleepover!

Max's t-shirts came in handy to make jammies for Kai and Daila. Thanks Max!

Daila Sue, such a good sport. We ran out of diapers right before went came home the next morning so Sally and I had to make Daila a lovely homemade one out of a towel, plastic bag and some packing tape!

Silly Sue... Daila thought that Tigers (Sallies cat) tunnel toy would make a nice hat. Crazy girl, she make's accessories out of everything!

We went over to Sallie and Bobbies a couple of Sundays ago and made a last minute decision to stay over night. The babies thought it was a great idea too and had so much fun. The only problem was we weren't really prepared for a sleep-over. We got the PJ's covered by some of Max's t-shirts and the babies were so cute running around in their little white "gowns". We thought we had everything else covered but right before leaving the next day we ran into a diaper emergency. Good thing between sallie and I were creative enough to "improvise" a diaper and thankfully Daila is a good sport and was patient enough to let us figure it out ...:)

The greatest gift of all time :)

These little faces are the greatest gift and blessings of my life. Seeing their smiles make everyday a happy mothers day for me. I love you my sweet babies! Happy mothers day to Mimi and Gigi and all mama's far and wide!

Taste of Ladera

Auntie Pamela and Grandma Sallie taught Kai and Daila how to "dip" food into stuff last weekend when they took them to lunch. Now they are showing Pamela how good they've gotten at it. Gum Gum sweet potato fries!

Kai Boy kicking back listening to the English Beat.

Daddy and Daila raging!

Billy and Max holdin' it down on the Westside.

Fun family day in the sun!

We loaded up the babies and headed a few miles down the road to Ladera Ranch for the afternoon. They were having the annual "Taste of Ladera" festival and we'd always wanted to check it out. Well this year The English Beat, one of Billy's favorite bands from the 80's was playing so we figured it was the perfect Saturday afternoon outing. We stayed for about 6 hours, and Kai and Daila ran around and danced like crazy people all afternoon! Billy and I spent the whole time chasing them around to keep track of them as this was our first time in a crowded public place since they've learned to wander on their own, so needless to say we all came away from there exhausted and we all slept REALLY well last night :) Pamela, Steven and Max met us for a few hours and we had a great time tasting some food, drinks and listening to live music in the sun!