road warriors

just like on Gilligan's Island

Why yes, I am wearing sweatpants. And you? Are you loving the cooler temps and cotton luxuriousness of fleece all over your bottom half?  I am not really sure how it can possibly be Sunday already and how we can be expected to face another week. We had one of those way too busy weekends that leave you feeling depleted on Monday. By the way, I had an odd week at work... highlights include a drunk student and another student who wanted to meet at Muffaleta for lunch with his parents to create a "more relaxed environment"' and being filmed for an online commercial. 

On Friday I totally suppermommed my ass off. Cleaned house, laundered lovies, bathed daughters, grocery shopped with two kids ( this deserves its own paragraph, like how pushing a cart with rusty wheels with two kids in/on it adds about 75 pounds of drag and I bagged my own groceries after standing in line for 20 minutes), worked out, and got everyone ready for a party. We celebrated Jake's cousins Joe and Dominic (brothers, not twins) who both started U of M medical school this week with a BBQ at the Decker home. The girls got to play “don't touch the scalding hot grill or fall in the man-made pond" with their little cousins, Ava Joan and Isla, while we caught up with the family.  

On Saturday we spent way too many hours in the car. First of all, let me say I loathe driving and/or riding in the car. Second of all, if  we are going on a road trip we should at least end up somewhere cool, not just making laps around southern MN. We went to Fairmount to meet up with our birth father, Paul, at a park for our first visit in over a year. He moved back from Alaska and is living with brother doing some temp work for Dell. We had a nice visit and he brought both girls sweet gifts. Then we drove over to Austin to see Grandma Rosie's new condo and visit Grandpa Dick in the nursing home. It was hard to see Grandpa Dick so confused and Grandma so stressed out with all the changes, but I am glad Jake got to get there this weekend. We got stuck in construction traffic on the way back so we spent a grand total of 8 hours driving, but we never even got to see the Crazy Horse Monument!  The girls were champs; the only fussing and moaning came from my birthing hips in the front seat. 

Today we got caught up on household duties and attended neighbor friend Estelle's 5th birthday party. She had a bouncy house and a reptile show which is almost as cool as the time we had Gramsie do face painting on two kids. I made my first soup of the "fall"... it was lentil soup and no one was very excited about it, but it was yummy!  Jake kept offering to make buffalo chicken sandwiches instead.  I get lentils and legumes mixed up so originally I was making bean soup. Are lentils even beans? I think they are. My style of cooking is the pre-prepared-make-ahead-of-time kind... so if you want me to cook, it's going to be a soup or in a crockpot. But my crockpot sucks so it’s going to be a soup.

Ginger

diaper cover still  attached inside new dress, oops.

cousbos (found the diaper cover)

enjoying books on CD

vintage playground equipment

RoboHen: must never not stop moving

testing out the antiques at Great Grandma Rosie's

Moments later Grandma Rosie ate the entire apple core! true story!

Just an alligator, NBD

boa constrictor love

this girl loves to bounce!

Hey! That's my line!

this photo inspired by a bribe of chocolate chips

Henny is now a climber, she made her way up the step stool to the sink and was caught brushing her teeth all by herself. Um, baby you are only 14 months old. As the youngest child, she is a master of self-defense but also goes on the offense. If she is mad at you, she will literally scratch your eyes out while pulling your hair. Don't mess with Foose. We are trying to teach her to be gentle and kind and she gets Time Outs which are more for Nori's sake so she doesn’t think the brutality goes unpunished. Henny loves to kiss now, with a great big "mwah!" at the end. I asked Jake if he had made out with her yet and he gave me a weird look. I just meant she gives quality kisses and I enjoy it, mom to baby. Hen still loves to meet strange ladies and win them over with cuddles and hugs. She also loves to be funny so she will bonk her head and blow raspberries if she thinks you might laugh at her. I don't know where gets that from. She also says “pretty” when she sees flowers and “uh oh” when she intentionally drops stuff. 

total ham

I love her

Nori & I had a girl date at Caribou. She sipped her hot chocolate and we read a couple of chapters from A Little Princess before walking over to the BreadSmith to get Daddy a chocolate bobka roll. Oh, and we stopped by the St. Paul Cheese Shop to sample, too. I am going to cash in my 401K and spend it all on cheese. We enjoyed our little escape together and she reminded me how she can act so grown up when wants to. She uses words like “function" “process" "suspended animation" and “pollution".  This from the same girl that will have a tantrum when she feels "drinky". We have these weird sayings that evolve to become even weirder over time. For example, because Nor is also so slooooow to do anything, I am always saying "scoot your boot" to remind her to hurry up. Well, that turned in to "scoot your boot to the toot toot toot". Then when I would say, "scoot your boot", she would chime in with “to the toot toot toot", to which I would reply “Hey! That’s my line". So now, we both say, in unison, "scoot your boot to the toot toot toot!  Hey! That's my line". So far, not that weird right?  Then we stared in with other things like "tink your wink to the stink stink stink, Hey! That's my line" or "hop your top to the bop bop bop! Hey!  That’s my line". You can see how this continues to get more bizarre until we are speaking our own dysfunctional language. And we like it that way.

not pictured: rabid sister fight over LMNOP

this photo represents me with my two piglets climbing on me 24/7

Let’s face it, when you have kids you need do things or the time between wake-up to nap to bedtime or time goes really slow. Angie and I chaperoned a double date:  Nori & Liam, Henny & Graham ...we made salt-dough handprints which I somehow under baked (old dough habits die hard). The little couples are looking forward to their arranged marriages in 2032 and 2035 respectively. In the future, we will celebrate Christmases at the McIntyre’s and Pat will cook the meal. Life solved. Side note: I always wanted to marry someone whose last name started with Mc. You know, so I could be Megan McSomething, but that never happened so the year before my wedding I unofficially officially changed my name to Megan McBicki.

her future MIL

maybe a beach wedding...

just doing some fashion moves

Henley's easy chair

quit being so pretty!

baby's 1st ballet "lesson"

listen to teacher

You have to WANT it!

post lesson reflection

Happy 11 Year Anniversary to my main husband!!!  17 years ago we had our first date at TCBY and now look at us...still eating frozen treats hand in hand.  May we die together in the nursing home of heart disease while complaining how our kids never visit us despite all we did for them. Thanks for choosing me, I love you!

I locked that down

the former Miss McBicki

On Saturday we took the kids to the Highland Park Pool on a family date to celebrate our anniversary. Nori was so brave-- she climbed the steps all the way up to the big slide only to be rejected because she was too short. She.was.mortified. Seriously, do not ever mention it.  I was so happy she even tried, but then she went on a rant about she is NOT a baby and did NOT want to play in the baby parts of the pool. I am hoping she will channel some of that energy into her swimming lessons. We followed the pool up with deep dish at The Italian Pie Shoppe. Today, we walked up to Paws on Grand to pamper Dorothy. File that under things I never thought I would do. You should have seen the look on Jake's face when I mad him dip her paws in paint so she could create doggie art.

Good morning, sunshine!

even Dorth is embarrassed

Petting Barney. No, we can not "trade" Dorothy for him.

park  playmates

I am running out of time so I will not even mention how I got the best curly haircut ever from Brentt at Moxie on Grand nor how he used chopsticks to style it. If only they had fresh spring rolls, too. Finally, Grandma Liz and Grandpa Steve bought a house in Saint Paul!!! It is super cute and located on Woodlawn, just one block from the river. Can't wait till they make the big move up here in a couple years!

Lost & Found

My brand new cell phone has been missing for three weeks now so I will officially declare it lost. If you have an old AT&T compatible phone you no longer need, let me know.

Is this your bra? It was found in the playroom in March and no one has come to claim it. Don't worry, I already asked Jake's girlfriend and it is not hers. Vanity Fair 38C free to big jugs!

relaxed

My girls are home after a great weekend all around. After a few hours I managed to get out of Mom Mode and enjoy myself. Jake & I had two real dates, read  books, and got lots of projects done around the house. Norelle &  Henley did crafts, played at the park, and ate at  the Lakeview Drive In with Grandma Liz, Grandpa Steve and Gramsie Holly who were wonderful babysitters. Thank you all for taking them so we could have a weekend alone.  I am still in vacation mode until tomorrow so I gotta run, season finale of Dexter is waiting....

institutionalized

6 hours and 17 minutes ago my girls piled in Grandma Liz's red van and left for Winona.  When I suggested this weekend a month ago I thought it was a fantastic idea idea, but now that it is here I am having trouble relaxing without them. I have been alone maybe 3 days in the last 14 months so I truly do not know what to do myself. I am used to giving 753 hugs and kisses a day so I feel kinda empty without my babes  demanding "something cold for my tongue" or climbing up my body to flop down into nursing position and scream for "mi mi!".

After they left I went back to sleep for 45minutes. Then, desperate to take care of someone, I took Dorothy (we have a dog?) down to the river for a long walk. I have cleaned the house, showered, and taken a  trip to Target. Yes, I have already called to check on them once. And yes, I have also called Jake at work 3 times to tell him how lonely I am and I must have sounded so pathetic that he suggested I go buy a new outfit for our date tomorrow night, despite his recent pep talk to me about staying on a budget (what's that?). I will probably just be learning how to  relax when they return on Sunday. Breaks are good, they remind me how much I enjoy all aspects of motherhood. In the meantime, I hope to have some old-school times with Jake...we have big plans to order a pizza and watch the Olympics tonight before spend tomorrow staining the fence while fighting over which radio station to listen to. Yeah, that's how we do.

the golden years

"Remember when you were a kid and your mom would blog about you? And you were like, "Mo-om, that is so embarrassing!". Excerpt from my girls' forthcoming memoir, working title "Smothered to Perfection".

I have two Go To foods this week: peanut butter sandwiches and yogurt tubes from the freezer. They are easy and appropriate at anytime of the day. Oh, you are starving at 6:00 a.m. for "something treatable"?  Okay, you win, have a treat - here's a peanut butter sandwich. Oh, you have four incisors cutting and wicked diarrhea, here have a fro-yo!"

My oldest daughter is into yodeling and can also do a mean loon call. My youngest knows to say "baby! baby!" when you have something she wants, as in, "give it to the baby, bitch" She is also a professional dog spotter saying "dog" every time she spies one. My favorite husband just found out he is going to Hong fricken Kong in September! And as for me and my hobbies?  See above.

Nori's cautious nature and Hen's bravery make them well-suited  playmates at Eagl'es Nest

Eaglet in her nest

neighborhood backyard puppet show

this girl dug $5 out of her piggy back to donate

Slip N Slide 2012

hoodlums

like big sister

like little sister

best friends

VID00007 from Megan Seltz on Vimeo.



VID00008 from Megan Seltz on Vimeo.

One year photos