Daddy's Home!

WoooHoooo! Christopher has returned to us after an eight day trip to the middle east. Good news all around: he had a GREAT trip and the rest of us are still alive and loving each other! I now have an even more profound appreciation for my mom, who did this once a month with us four young kids when my dad was flying in the Air Force and for all those moms who are doing this while their husbands are deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan. Tough stuff.

While he was away the kids had check ups at the doc and both are super healthy. Simon is four months old today. He's long (27"/90th%) and lean (14.6#/50%). Millie is also right on track and almost three feet tall!

Our Millie-phant and Simon-o-lantern

What a fun night! Millie LOVED trick or treating....the adventure of climbing stairs, meeting new neighbors, practicing her thank-yous. She loved all the pumpkins and decor along our journey, too. What she did not love, what put an end to our trick or treating actually, was the neighbor handing out candy wearing the SUPER scary mask. Yep, that's all it took to send us home for the night. Thankfully my mom had homemade chicken and noodle soup and apple pie waiting for us. It might have been over 80 degrees here, but we really made the best of this awesome fall evening.



Story of the costumes:
Millie's adorable elephant costume was a gift from our friend and Christopher's mentor Jo Anne. We've been waiting months and months for her to wear it. Then this totally amazing butterfly/fairy costume came in the mail this week from my friend Amy. Millie loved it instantly and has been wearing it (or asking to wear it) non-stop. It's big enough to save for next year, I think. Simon, on the other hand, was a victim of his mom's hopeless craft skills. Oh, I had all the materials and equipment to make him the cutest little peanut to coordinate with his sister's elephant, but the execution of the plan was disastrous. Thus, the last minute (but still cute) pumpkin outfit.

Millie checking on her brother in her fairy costume

The Zoo!

My mom has a big birthday coming up in a few weeks, so we had a joint celebration for her and Mils at the San Diego Zoo. This was no ordinary zoo trip, though. This was a super-special, VIP, 'behind-the-scenes' tour set up by my sister (who seems to know the right people here in SD). It was awesome. My DC friends know that I have...ummm...'issues'...with zoos and am not usually a fan. But when you get kissed by a Sea Lion and feed leaves to giraffes and stand just feet away from a polar bear you can't help but be amazed by the experience.

After the zoo we ate a fish-taco picnic at the beach

One? Three? TWO!

Here she is...our incredible two year old Millie:

We are in a birthday celebration marathon and having the best time. My WHOLE family is out with us. Yammy and Poppa are here from Maryland and the Uncles are in from Colorado. We even got to celebrate with Gamma and Gampa Greer via the webcam on Skype! Here are a few photos from Saturday (her actual birthday):

Checking out her new bike

With Julie and Mike at the neighborhood Halloween parade

Serving up cookies and sandwiches (aka hamburgers and hotdogs) at her new kitchen

Two funny things about this picture: it's pitch black outside and she's still playing, and check out all her new animals that she has lined up at the bar!

So it occurred to me that we should be practicing the answers to the two key questions she's been getting from strangers:

1) What is your name? Answer: "Mee-eee" (if you say it out loud it does kind of sound like Millie);

2) How old are you? Answer: One? (nooo...you're not one); Three? (nooo...you're not three); Two! (yes...you're two!). I think she knows the correct answer and she's just messing with us at this point.

It has never been more fun to be a mom. Millie is so funny and happy...I love watching her dance around the room to the Sesame Street theme song or the iPod commercials; I love that when she wakes up and remembers that her house is filled with extra family members she runs out to my sleeping brothers and screams "UNCLES" really loudly in their faces; I love that she is giving real kisses and extra tight hugs...not just to us, but to her friends at the park, their parents, our friends at church...; I love all the hilarious things she is picking up from listening to our conversations ("Oh goodness!"; "It's so exciting!"; "I hook you up" (with more drink, a new diaper, etc.); "Love you baby/honey/babe."); and I absolutely love how much she adores and protects Simon. It all just keeps getting better and better.

Another Week, Another Picnic

Last week we hit Balboa Park, a real treasure here in San Diego. It's the second largest urban green space in the country (after New York's Central Park) and it's packed with fountains, museums, theatres, the San Diego Zoo and lots of other attractions. We camped out on the lawn of the art museum and had some lunch after playing around the park. Check out that beautiful blue San Diego sky!

THE PHILLIES ARE WORLD SERIES BOUND!!!

A note from our guest blogger, Christopher:

We decided that Simon's first Phillies game should be memorable for us, even if he will only be able to remember it from pictures. I could not possibly pass up the opportunity to see the Phillies reach the World Series for the first time in 15 years, so Stacey arranged child care for Millie, fixed dinner in the crock pot for Millie and Aunt Julie, we bought some tickets online and headed up to LA on Wednesday night to catch Game 5 of the National League Championship Series. We knew traffic would be horrible but it was even worse than expected. I have no idea how LA residents can deal with it on a regular basis. We got to the stadium and the parking lot was pure mayhem with cars everywhere. Finally, 3+ hours into what should have been a 2 hour trip, we made it into the stadium in the 4th inning.

We were definitely a minority in our Phillies red surrounded by Dodger blue but the fans were very friendly - of course, Simon might have had something to do with that and I'm pretty sure that he prevented a few cups of ice from being hurled our way.

The Phils won so we stuck around after the game for a while to celebrate with the 200 or so other Phillies fans who attended the game. It was a great night, one we'll always remember and will enjoy telling Simon about when he's old enough to appreciate it.

Simon

Simon, three months.

Punkin' Patch, Part One

Millie's making her lifelong farmer Great-Grampa King proud!

The three of us made it out to a great pumpkin patch with our Thursday morning playgroup. We had some good, hot, stinky fun (it was also a working dairy farm complete with methane-treatment facility)! This is just part one of our pumpkining adventures because Daddy and Aunt JuJu were promised a big family outing in a few weeks.

Children's Museum

Within weeks of moving into our house we became members of the amazing New Children's Museum downtown. The kids and I go about once every two weeks, so we are making good use of the investment. There was a threat of rain last Saturday, so we all packed up and took Dad with us to see what all the fun was about.


When we get about two blocks away from the museum Millie starts screeching from her car seat "Yay! Playin'!" I'm really amazed at what she knows and remembers. This time I finally remembered to put her in some get-dirty clothes so she could really get to painting the VW bug. Isn't she getting tall?


And this room is just pure genius. Yes, it's entirely covered in mattresses and filled with foam tire-pillows! If we had an extra bedroom in our house, I'd consider my own mattress installation.


I'm usually running around around this room with Simon attached to me. He and I were both thankful that Dad was around for the chase this time!

New Pajamas...

... which one is the ham bone???