Sunday, June 29, 2008

Friends

Who is that girl? The girl reading the Pink Princess Cookbook and who has those gourgeous pink and purple nails?


Why, it's Nicole! For those of you who don't know Nicole, let me introduce you. She's one of my very best friends who I used to work at West Group with. I trained her 14 years ago, and now, here we are all this time later. If you knew us separately, you'd probably think we were an unlikely pair. She can't believe I wouldn't do my hair and makeup every day. And she believes everyone should have three sets of china (you know, winter, summer and Christmas). But she's really great. She's taught me a lot about what friends do for each other, and in so many conversations I have with other people, I often think "What would Nicole ask?" She's extremely inquisitive--which makes sense considering her master's degree in journalism and her current PR manager role at AAA Chicago! Anyway, Nicole's husband Dennis flies Blackhawks in the Illinois Guard, and has recently left for a year-long deployment to Kosovo. It's very difficult, but I'm lucky in that it means Nicole comes up to visit! She doesn't have any kids (by choice) but did a valiant job of playing with mine...

Here she is letting Abby do the beautiful nail job you see above while Nolan and Max look on.


And what good is beautiful nails without beautiful hair? (Nolan was doing my hair while Abby was doing Nicole's... you won't see the pictures of me!)


Here's beautician and client posing together, and then below letting the other kiddos get in on the action.



And, to end the evening, Nicole read a rousing version of SkippyJonJones, the siamese cat who wants to be a chihuahua, in her best Spanish accent. She was a real trooper!


This morning we got up and made Princess Wands (in Nicole's honor). The kids loved them, and they were actually pretty cute and tasty! (Pretzel rods in colored almond bark, for anyone wondering!)


THANKS FOR A GREAT WEEKEND, NICOLE!

And, since I'm on the subject of friends, I thought I would share some observations about the kiddos' friends as well. We certainly have great neighbors, which I know I've written about before. Here's a random day last week... Kyan, Rayva and Max hanging out with Nolan looking on.




Kyan, Max and Cody, again with Nolan looking on.




Rayva and Max enjoying some little kid time on the slip and slide.


Kyan with Nolan looking on...


Cody with Nolan looking on (what's with that kid???)...


And Max and Rayva in the little pool.


But one thing that I didn't expect from being at home is having the opportunity to meet so many new friends of the kids, good, bad or otherwise! Last week Wednesday was Andrew. Andrew lives around here and is Abby's age. He came on his bike down the middle of the road looking for Cody next door, but Cody's at daycare. So he came into our garage (we were outside) and started playing. Ok. I asked him if his mom and dad knew where he was, and his dad was at work and his mom was sleeping. Alrighty! They played for awhile and then Abby asked if she could go to Andrew's. Considering the sleeping mom and the boy riding his bike in the middle of the street, I said no. Abby didn't even argue. I can't believe I forgot to take pictures of him, though!!

Then there's Ziichiah. Ziichiah is a true sweetheart who's the niece of the family who lives up the road from us. She was visiting last week from her home in Milwaukee, and she, too, came over looking for Cody and I invited her to play with us since he wasn't home (she's been over before when we've all been hanging out). She's 8 and has great manners. I'm guessing the kids will learn more from her than just manners, though. After the afternoon with her, I was with the kids in the car and Nolan said "Not everyone has a daddy." Um, nope, I guess they don't. Then Abby said Ziichiah doesn't have a daddy because her daddy is out looking for a new mommy. Ah, I see. Then they told me that Ziichiah's mom yells at her if she has an accident. That explains why she apologized profusely when she droped some freeze pop on the kitchen floor. Those stories, along with her awe at my subway sandwich (she had one once with bologne and cheese, but she had to share it with her brother since her mom didn't have enough money for two), makes me think the kids will learn some life lessons from her!

What I thought was really funny, though, was that she knew how to Wii, and played all kinds of games with the kids!


And then there's Grace from Birchwood. We met her at the beach, and she was there with her grandma. She's also 8, and was going to Grandparents camp the following week. How fun! Here's Grace and Abby running into the water while Nolan looks on. (Geez, Nolan!!) Oh, and for anyone wondering, Abby's suit is not a bikini... it has a full front. But, doesn't she look old?


And Max is just a little to young for real friends yet, but I just couldn't pass up these too cute pics...



For all of my friends out there, thanks! From little to big, at all ages, friends make it all worthwhile!

Sunday, June 22, 2008

A Little of This, A Little of That

It's funny because there are some days that I don't feel like I have anything to say. But then I upload my pictures (download?) and look through them and remember that there was actually quite a bit going on! On Thursday, I watched my sister's two youngest kids, Erin (almost 2) and Cole (nearing 4) while Jen and Mark took their oldest (Chad) to a Brewer's game. The day was a little tiring, but very nice. The kids play good for the most part.







The only tricky part was keeping an eye on both Max and Erin, who seemed to want to go in different directions both at the same time. Unless, of course, they wanted to occupy the same space, in which case they fought. Usually Erin won out, but Max held his own, too! Here's Erin yelling "NOOOOO!" at Max. After this, I think Max may have pulled those pigtails! :)


It was fun, though, and I know Chad had a great time at the game. One other exciting thing about the day was that we saw this in our field and in our backyard as it slowly made its way toward the pond.




Friday was the ZOO! Abby and Nolan had a polar pals zoo class in the morning with Kaitlyn, the daughter of Chrissy who I used to work with. So, it was just Max and me in the morning, which was a lot of fun. No one was there yet, and the animals were all up and walking about. Very neat! I of course took the opportunity to take some pictures of Max and the animals.












After spending a ton of time by the fish, it was time to pick up the kiddos. They showed up with black polar bear noses and polar bear heads and hands! It sounded like they had a great time... even Nolan, who was with the girls and a little apprehensive about the whole thing.



They wanted their picture taken everywhere! here they are with the birds, with Kaitlyn's little brother Zack. I walked around with them and their Grandma after the class, which was fun.


Here are the girls making fishy faces in the aquarium.


The one amazing thing to me is that Kaitlyn and Abby haven't seen each other since last summer. How awesome to be a 5-year-old girl without a care in the world, where you can just jump in and be immediate friends. Life gets too complicated when you get older. Wouldn't it be nice if we could all just put our arms around each other, run and joke around, laugh and enjoy yourselft like you've seen each other every day your entire life? When does all that self-consciousness and worriedness set in? I wish I could keep them this age forever! (Ok, maybe not forever, but still...)


And here's my two polar bears in full costume.


Saturday was the Brewer game! Yeah! We had a suite for Dave's work, but this time it was with kids... the first time! There were seven kids there, and it was fun but challenging. I think I saw about 5% of the game, but Nolan was so excited just to get to the park, that it was really worth it all.


And what would be more fun than having your own sausage races?

And then there's today... the stuff summer is made of. Once again, Dave set up the slip and slide at the bottom of the slide. I just love this picture, all three of them in action doing their own thing!

And then there's Dave, not fitting down the slide.

It must run in the family, because here's Abby, not fitting in the baby swing!

And Nolan, who loved his sausages all day today.

Happy week to everyone!

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

The Writing on the Wall

Ok, so luckily the writing wasn't on the wall, but it was in Abby's fourth quarter writing folder. I just laugh at so many of them, but this one was classic...




Translation: I had the worst service ever. Because Max was screaming and we had only one napkin. And the fries were hard and the bottom of the chicken was crunchy. All in all, the food was worse.

Ha! That was the night after we got our new van and went to Tumbleweeds to eat. I go there a ton for lunch for work, but not usually at night and now I know why! Everything was wrong... no napkins with three kids, they screwed up Abby's order and we waited 15 minutes for the new order to be done (as the rest of us ate), Max was crabby, the guy never came around to get new soda, it was crazy. So when the manager came by, I stopped him told him the service was horrible. I guess Abby heard me! Scary how much they truly pick up on...

Monday, June 16, 2008

One-Two Punch

The kidlets aren't so little anymore. I think I will lament that fact quite often. Especially when they learn this, both on the same night...





And, not to be outdone, Cody next door went without the extra wheels tonight, too!



But Nolan, little Nolan. He still needed some help, thank goodness. But not much. For him it was complete determination of getting on his bike and starting all by himself. He wasn't even phased after he did this with his wheel:


I can only imagine what they'll be doing by the end of summer! Luckily, I get to see it all. I couldn't ask for more.