Hey Batter ,Batter

This picture was at the end of my blog but I accidentally deleted it. Does anyone know a trick to insert photos in a specific spot? Ahh that frustrates me! Anyway picture this picture at the end...

We spent our weekend watching TJ's brother, Caleb play baseball for UW. We wore our purple and Husky gear to show our UW pride (expect I forgot to take a picture of all of us in our shirts...Sophia was adorable)! Sophia loves the ferry boat rides and can spot the car racing games from miles away. Look at her style. Miss pimpsta driving...

The fun continued on the ferry when TJ fed our left over french fries to the seagulls. All the kids around thought that was great!

And Sophia even wanted to try it, which totally shocked me. The seagull swooped in so fast that I couldn't get a picture of her holding the fry. After she realized what happened, she ran to me and started crying, hahaha! I was proud of her for at least trying it.

Sophia is quite proud of her Uncle Caleb and cheered him on.

We actually got to wear our sunglasses for part of the game. She is starting a new fad...glasses upside anyone? She ALWAYS puts them on like this and says she's a "cool" girl!

After a long weekend and in the 7th inning, Sophia fell asleep to the sweet sound of baseball (which by the way is SOOO not like her). She fell asleep on my lap sitting up, with her sunglasses still on, but I made her more comfortable. I think my right arm got stronger for it! And TJ caught me a free shirt (thank you size M) that Sophia sported as her blanket!

She woke up just in time to say bye to her Uncle Caleb. UW lost against Fresno, but we had a good time! (Go back to the top picture...ha!)

Valentine's Day

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY!

I always have to make something or do something corny for TJ on Valentine's Day. We were keeping it quite simple because V-day was on a Sunday, but I still wanted to surprise him with something. So I taped this to our bedroom door (he got home late Saturday night to find it)...

Good ol' Post-Its! We have a large blank wall that we haven't done anything with in our bedroom, so I wrote things I love about him on all the post-it notes. Everything from having a nice butt, to being a fun daddy!
We also did the Valentine's Fairy with my family on Sunday. The fairy doorbell ditches and leaves V-day goodies on the porch with my dad's famous and oh so delicious heart shaped oatmeal cookies! Boy do I love traditions:)!

Will You Be My Valentine?

Sophia is having a Valentine's Day party at her school tomorrow. I wanted Sophia to be a part of making her Valentines and since she can't write she colored over all 16 cards. She also helped put the candy fish in the bags. It's so much fun having her get into holidays. It's also been "wear what you love week" at her school and her teacher said to let them be unique and creative. Every day I have asked Sophia what she loved to wear and she always said, "Jammies," so she has worn jammies to school all week. I am totally jealous!

Here are her Valentines: Simple, but cute!

Sophia's teacher, Ms. Shelby is trying really hard to eat healthy and has been staying away from sweets, so we decided to give her a healthy Valentine!

Binky?

When Sophia was a baby I pretty much decided for her that she was going to like a binky because I knew that it was easier to get rid of in the future than her thumb. The only type of binky she liked was the ugly hospital one, so we went with it (even though I really wanted the cute kind, ha!). Well...Sophia has been only getting her binky in bed for a long time now and has been fine with that until recently....She has 3 cousins who suck their thumbs and a couple of kids at her preschool and she has been smart enough to catch on to that. This is probably what she was thinking, "Why do they have their thumb in their mouth? I guess I'll try it, but I'll suck on my pointer finger instead. Ohhhh wow, that does sooth me like a binky! I'll suck on my finger now when I don't have me binky." Seriously, she's 2 and she's now sucking on her finger! Isn't that a little backwards? In the mean time I was trying to figure out what to do. I noticed that she sucked on her finger more when she was in the car and tired, so I started to give her the binky in the car because I didn't want that finger in her mouth! One day she threw her binky in the car and we forgot to bring it inside. That night TJ went to play basketball with the car and the binky. Oh great is what I thought, but Sophia didn't even really question it because she had her finger to fall back on. She has been sleeping without her binky for about 5 days and asks for it occasionally. We explain that it got lost and we can't find it and she's okay with that answer. Bye, bye binky. But in the mean time, her finger was still being sucked and it really bothered me. Over the weekend I talked with Sophia about it a lot, but not a huge change was happening. When I dropped her off at her preschool Monday I told Ms. Shelby about the binky being "lost" and about the finger (which she already knew about) so she could help remind Sophia about NO FINGER. When I went back to pick Sophia up Ms. Shelby had her tell me something. She told me, "Sleep with no binky and no finger!!!" Hallelujah! I asked Shelby her trick and she told Sophia a story about a shark with sharp teeth and that she doesn't want to put her fingers in her mouth because they might get hurt. I didn't get the full story, but if "shark teeth" works, I'm in! We are only 2 days in but there has been no binky or finger! Hopefully Sophia will continue making this an easy transition. She said she wanted a soccer ball, so we made a deal...No finger=Soccer ball! I am all about deals with this kind of stuff!!! I do have to say that I am lucky because there has been not big fight about it (so far...keep my fingers crossed)!!!

SOLD!

TJ's cheesecake sold for $50!!!! Oh yeah!

And here it is...

I know I've already bragged about my hubby, but I have to add on to my story. The dessert was done at 11:00pm, but little did I know that it had to cool for an hour or more. TJ stayed up later than me (1am) to make sure the cheesecake got in the fridge and woke up this morning to put it all together.

WA-LA....WHITE CHOCOLATE CHEESECAKE (with dark chocolate topping) ALA TJ!

Fancy huh?! Looks beautiful. I think it will go for millions at the auction:)!

Why I love my hubby

I came home last week and told TJ that I signed up to make a dessert for an auction at my school to support 5th grade camp. I basically just told him so he could help me remember, but little did I know that he was totally going to do it for me. He said he wanted to look up something fancy since it's for an auction and we want our dessert to go for lots of mula! We remembered on Friday night but he still didn't know what he wanted to make, so we said we'll do it on Saturday. Well, Saturday came and went and Sunday came and went and the dessert topic never came into our conversations. So here we are Monday night at 10:55pm waiting for the dessert to finish baking. TJ ended up making a white chocolate cheesecake (every thing from scratch-so not how I bake, ha!) and hand dipped chocolate strawberries to place on top and around it. Going once, going twice, SOLD!!! That is just another reason why I love my hubby. He supports me and my school, he was eager to help, and still hasn't ditched me for bed (11:00pm). I am one LUCKY girl!!!

Little Einstein Party!

"We're going on a trip in our favorite rocket ship, zoomin through the skies, Little Einsteins!!!"

Sophia chose her birthday theme this year. When giving ideas about her party theme she would respond with "no" until I said, "Do you want a Little Einstein party?" YAH! This is the only movie she will sit and watch...

I made her cake (got the idea online) and am quite proud of how it turned out!

This year we only invited her cousins and had 9 of them come. They decorated rockets that they used to help them with a mission at the end of the party. The mission was to find Sophia's party bags using the clues given. They followed the clues and found the party bags in Sophia's bed...MISSION COMPLETE!
The gangs all here (except Jackson is sitting by himself at the little table). Lunch time- The menu was a classic kid choice: Hot dogs, macaroni and cheese (homemade), and veggies.

After lunch was presents. I love watching kids open presents. The kids who were watching kept creeping closer and closer to Sophia and the presents. Isn't that a classic kid for ya? TJ thought of a good idea....Get one of those huge baby gates, make a circle with it, and stick the person opening the presents inside so no one else can help them, ha! Sophia didn't mind the help though:)

Sophia liked the happy birthday singing, but then turned her head when it was time to blow out her candles. She had too much attention on her (which by the way was so like me as a kid) so she got some help from Daddy.

I also made cupcakes...yummy!This girl has had a week full of celebrating...Until next year!

More Birthday...

Birthday Fun...

I knew if I went to work on Sophia's birthday, then I would be grumpy and wishing I was with her on her day, so TJ and I took off the day to spend it with the birthday girl!

Her day started with:

Waking up to balloons covering the floor in her room, which she thought was pretty cool.

Then, we went downstairs to open presents. We got her a basketball hoop (and yes it's in our family room, which is not my favorite...come summer, it's outside).

And her baby was even spoiled! We have now been "baby-fied!"

It's amazing how naturally it comes for little girls...Such a good mama!

Then,

We went to the Children's Museum in Tacoma. I was hoping they changed their theme since the summer, but they didn't. Sophia didn't remember though and still had fun. I think her favorite was the market with all the fruit, veggies, and food.

What a multi-tasker: Making food, answering the phone, and dealing with money in the cash register.

Time to pick apples

We traveled to the Native American area. Sophia caught a fish!

Hiding with Daddy in a cave

Painting time. She would paint with each color for about 3 seconds and then say, "All done!" That's the attention span of a 2 year old:)

Next,

We ate lunch at a little cafe near the Children's Museum.

Finally,

We met some of our family at Red Robin for dinner. We can't pass up the FREE birthday meal! Sophia sees arcades and asks for quarters now. Good thing Gamma was there. Sophia put her quarters in the stuffed animal/candy machine...No Animal, but got some candy. TJ had to try it too! $1.00 later, he won a doggie! So lucky on Sophia's birthday!!!

Here's the gang that joined us for dinner!

I was not sure how she would react with the LOUD "Happy, Happy Birthday" song from Red Robin, but she actually enjoyed it (whereas last year, not so much). For some crazy reason she didn't want her ice cream, so her 2 cousins enjoyed it! Ahhh look at her...So big!

One Last Thing:

After we got home, got on our jammies, we sang, "Happy Birthday" to end the night! (You'll see her nicer cake for her party).

More fun is to come at her family birthday party!!!

The Big 2

2 years ago our baby was born

Date: January 12, 2008

Time: 5:10pm

Weight: 8 lb, 11 oz

Height: 19.5 inches

Most frequent comments about her: "She's beautiful and She's SO Alert (and still is)!"

1 years old
Happy Birthday Sophia...The big 2...Such a big girl! Lover of:
- Singing
- Playing with cars, balls, trains, babies, kitchen, blocks, etc.
- Reading books (Favorite: "Go Dog Go" and can say it word for word)
- Non stop talking (picks up everything!)
- Learning (counts to 30, knows her ABC, can spell her name, knows how old she is, etc)
- Her family (her mommy is her favorite:))
- Gumballs
- Playing outside (asks to go to the park all the time-which we miss these days)


Does not like:
- Animals up close
- Some puppets
- Strangers
- Riding in the shopping cart for a long time
- poo in her diaper
- Santa up close

How Time Flies:
I know everyone says that, but it's true. All day I thought about the day I had Sophia and can't believe that it was 2 years ago. TJ and I are grateful for Sophia. She brings so much love, entertainment, and laughter to our family! We can't wait to see what her 2nd year of life brings her....(even if it may be terrible 2's, ha!)

New Years Day

We celebrated New Year's Day going to the snow with Kevin's family. We drove up to Snoqualmie with the plan on tubing down Hayak, but everyone else had that plan as well. When we got there it was full, so we found a different spot that was perfect for the kids. I wondered how Sophia would do in the snow seeing as though she was scared of it last year, but she ended up loving it.

Here she is in her snow get-up. She had on thermals, footie pj's on top of that, and then her snow overalls. She wasn't too excited about the gloves at first (I think because they didn't match, haha j/k), but she got used to them and stayed very warm.

Sophia started down the hill with me a couple times to warm up. Jackson rode with us too! (Later on we walked across the street and found a bigger hill...Sophia went down that one with TJ)
Now she's comfortable...Ready, set, go!!!

Making snow balls.

Papa Brown came with us too. It was nice because the hill was right by our car, so you could take a rest if needed. Mollie and the hand warmers were best buddies.

Kevin and Jayden striking a pose

Mollie, Hollie, and Jackson (oh no! I didn't get a picture of Miles, but he was there too:))

Look at that form!

Happy New Year

Happy 2010!

For New Year's Eve a group of our friends got together and hung out in Seattle. While Sophia spent her night with Gamma and Papa (thanks mom and dad)!

1st Stop: Ferry Ride

(TJ, Mark, Kim, Rachel, and Chris)

2nd Stop: Cheesecake Factory

We knew it would be a long wait considering it is usually an hour wait on a typical Saturday, but we waited for almost 2 hours. Good thing we weren't in any hurry!
3rd Stop: Gameworks
Thursday night special: $10, all you can play from 9pm-1am (18 and older). It's been awhile since we just played like kids, so it was really fun! TJ and I raced in the hummer together. It went in all crazy directions, but I had to turn off the motion because I was about to throw up.

Kim and Mark did a little motorcycle racing

First picture of 2010 with my very hot hubby!

These videos should be flip-flopped. We ran outside of Gameworks to see if we could catch the fireworks, so Mark did a little count down action for us. 3, 2, 1 Happy New Year! We ended up seeing the finale to the fireworks through 2 buildings. If you look closely you can see the space needle.

It was a fun night...good company, good food, good games, good fireworks, and to top it off we drove right onto the ferry and didn't have to wait at all....I say that's a pretty perfect evening!!!

Christmas Day

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

We had a very nice Christmas day! It all started with me at 3:30am. I woke up and couldn't go back to sleep, I was so excited! I have always been a lover of Christmas, but having a child makes it even better!!! I laid in bed and finally got up about 6:30am and woke up TJ too (haha). We woke Sophia up about 7:15am to see what Santa brought her. When Sophia saw the plate she left for Santa she said, "Santa ate my cookie all gone." "Drank my milk too!" Santa sure was hungry!

Sophia was good this year, so Santa brought her all this stuff.
Sophia LOVES this marble set. She has a similar one at preschool, so I knew it would be a hit. It took "Santa" about an hour to put it together and there are even more pieces. You can build a bigger one than this, but this track it good for now.
Whenever I would ask Sophia what she wanted to get Daddy for Christmas she would say, "motorcycle." Little does she know he would love a real one, but Sophia picked out this one for him instead! TJ's main present was his truck he got last month and we got him accessories for it (including a license plate cover that reads, "1968 THE BEAST", jumper cables, garbage bag, etc). TJ TOTALLY surprised me with a new road bike..watch out triathlons...I'm in business now:) (I forgot to add the picture).

They both got gummy bears in their stocking. When we asked what she thought Santa would bring her or what she thought was wrapped under the tree she would either say, "candy" or "gumballs".

After we were done with Christmas morning at our house. We headed over to my parents house for another Christmas morning. Christmas morning is the best there. All the kids and adults pile up on my parents bed and then make it down the hallway while my dad gets all the cameras ready. After many pictures, my dad says, "On your mark, get set, go....!!!" We all run down the hallway to see what Santa brought us!

Sophia has been wanting her own scooter! Love Radio Flyer! Thanks mom and dad!

YAH! A baby doll stroller:) Graco even makes little ones! She is quite the good mama these days.

After looking at our Santa gifts we had our traditional cinnamon rolls, eggs, bacon, sausage breakfast we opened presents for the family. My Aunt Sarah got her this hat...isn't it adorable! Around 12:30pm we went over to TJ's brother's house to do Christmas with TJ's Dads side. We got to visit with Nana, Aunts, Uncle, and cousins. We enjoyed Nana's special and delicious fried chicken! After being with them for a few hours, we headed back over to my parent's house to enjoy dinner, games, and dessert with them. It was a busy day, with no nap for Sophia, but it was all well worth it. We are truly blessed and spoiled!!!!