Macie's 1st Birthday

Time has flown by and Macie turned 1 yesterday. We had a tiny party at Grandma and Grandpa's house with dinner and a cake. As you can see she loved her cake. Ryan enjoyed opening her presents. Macie's such a sweet and cute little girl. We feel blessed to have her in our family. Happy Birthday Macie!

Before. . .

After:)

Swimming in September

I've been meaning to blog about how we get to and from the pool. Well, really how Macie and Ryan get to and from the pool. Last summer, when I was a very large pregnant lady, I bought this super cheapo wagon so that Ryan could haul all of our stuff to the pool. I went easy on the slave driver's whip (except for when he lagged behind). Anyhoo, now that Macie is with us I make Ryan haul all our stuff AND Macie to the pool. Man, my life is cush. Except for the three flights of stairs I have to haul our stuff up and down. Every single day.

Preschool and the New Arm

Today was Ryan's first day of preschool. I was honestly more excited for him than for myself, although having a 3 hour break was pretty nice. He was so great. I walked him in and he said, "Mom, I just want you to stay for ONE minute." So I did. When I got up to leave he said, "Ok mom, but REMEMBER. You need to come back and get me." And he let me go. I was so proud of my awesome little guy as I walked past the wailing kids.


Getting ready to head into preschool.



Macie was sad for about a minute--til she realized she'd get all the toys to herself.


And then she got really happy when she realized that she suddenly had a new arm--we took her cast off. She kept waving and staring at her newly functional arm and appeared to think, "Hmmm, where'd this thing come from?" Here she is waving her new arm and sprinting away.

Our newest roommies

So, I totally hate spiders. Totally. In recent years we've been getting the most atrocious spiders in our apartment. They've driven me crazy because I had never seen them in my whole life and then all of a sudden we were getting lots of them. My arms and legs get all goose bumpy just thinking about them. After much Googling I discovered they're called Zoropsis spiders. They're harmless but horrid. Our summer has been blissfully spider free until this week. And then Whamo! 3 in just a few days. So, yeah. I made Rich tape a quarter next to the most recent visitor so that you could tell how big it was. We'd consider this one medium-sized. If you look carefully you can see the reflection of some of the eight, yes eight, eyes along its back.

Wunderlich the Wonderland

For Labor Day we went on a hike. This is a rare event since we're inherently lazy people. Ok, at least I am. However, we thought it would be something new-ish for us. We went to Wunderlich Park which was beautiful, shady, and free to park at (which almost mattered more than the beautiful part). Ryan was so funny. He kept saying, "Come on guys, we're ALMOST there!" Little did he know that there was still 2 miles away. Macie enjoyed the ride on my back and Ryan walked most of the way with the occasional piggy back ride from Rich. Here are some of the highlights:


Ryan's currently obsessed with 3 things: tractors, trains, and snails so when we saw this bulldozer he was over the moon.


There was a fun tree with a hole right through the trunk. Ryan was born again.


Proof I was there.


Here's a redwood. This lens isn't very fancy and doesn't have a wide angle so there's not much tree in the picture. But imagine bigness.


I'll probably get the Bad Mother of the Year Award but Macie looked really funny "hiking" around.


Come on, who couldn't laugh at that?


Ryan pooped out on the way back to the car.


Speaking of poop there was a lot of it there and Ryan was kind enough to point it out to us every time he saw some. Rich couldn't stop cracking up. Someday we're going to have to grow up and be mature about this kind of stuff. Someday. . .