Time in a bottle

Time flies...back in the day, almost a year ago. Cleo was just weeks old, and Gus was practicing his little sis kisses.

Soon Cleo will be 1 and Gus will be 3. I just cannot believe it some days. Sometimes I just want to stop time so I can savor these days. They are just growing up, up, up...like the speed of light. I guess that's how it works, right? But some days I just get super reflective about youth and how fast it goes by.

Gus' vocabulary expands daily. Some of my favorite lines right now are:

• "Mom, you're NOT being my friend!" (he uses this frequently if we get mad at him)
  
• "Mom (or Dad), I have to tell you something!" (he pulls this at night when it's time for bed, but he really has nothing to tell us...just delaying going to sleep).
• "Momma, I'm reeeeallly, reeeaaaallly, hungry! I NEED food!" (very dramatic...wonder where he gets that?)
• "I love you this much (spreads his arms out really wide)!"
• "Mom, I love Keeo-o soooo much."
• "Mom, where's Keee-o? I need Keeee-o!"
• "Look! It's going down, down, down!" (this is what he often says after he poops in the potty and then watches the poop go down, down, down the toilet).

Cleo looks like a baby, but acts like an (almost) toddler most days! She wants to walk, and crawls sooo fast, it freaks us out. She's VERY spunky, this one. She is pretty Zen most of the time, but if you make her mad, watch out. She has a little temper and arches her back if she's pissed! I keep telling myself that this is good...she won't be a pushover, right?! :) I don't think she's officially said her first word yet, although it does sound like she says "hi!" to us when we say it to her. So maybe that's her first word?? Not sure yet. She adores Gus and everything he does, so she pretty much follows him around all day and they love playing together (most of the time). Gus is really protective of her and loves having a playmate who isn't just a crying baby anymore. He makes her giggle more than we do these days.

Fast forward to now...bath buddies!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

We've been meeting up with friends at the downtown wading pool every Friday morning. Gus and Cleo both seem to love it. We try to make it to the downtown pool, too, but so far I haven't tried that by myself, so I wait for weekends when Andy can join us.

We're set to drive to Crested Butte, Colorado over July 4th, to visit my sister, Kerry. We've rented a condo with my parents, so it should be really fun. I know the road trip will have its challenges. We've never gone this far with both kids, but thankfully they are both pretty good car kids. And we're going to stop on the way to stay over so we don't have to make the trip all in one day. This trip will be a great test trip for our longer road trip in September to Michigan. But I'm excited to be in Crested Butte over the 4th of July. Kerry said the town has a huge 4th of July parade and fireworks display that draws a huge crowd, so that is something to look forward to. The guy we rented our condo from said we will be able to see the fireworks from our condo balcony...yes! And I think Kerry lives literally down the block from where we are staying, so that's great. We're staying in the mountains, right next to some of the ski lifts. Kerry said our views of the mountains will be amazing. I'm sure I'll take many photos to post here.

I've been keeping up with my weekly celebrity gossip blog. Check it out if you so desire (link over there to the right of my blog). And I've posted a new poem to the right. I thought this poem was beautiful and kinda hopeful.

Summertime makes me a happy lady

This one does not have stranger danger at all...

Anthony and Gus share a moment

Mr. Solomon Thomas in the house

Mom and Cleo

Keenan!!

Oliver and Gus riding on Thomas the Tank Engine

Photos from our summertime, thus far. The birthday bbq was awesome. It was so good to see everyone, and all the kids played and played and played. Gus and Cleo are still catching up on sleep from all the partying this past weekend.

On Sunday Gus and Andy went to Baldwin to ride on Thomas the Tank Engine, and they met up with our friend Blake and his son, Oliver. Gus and Oliver have just become little buddies. They are so cute together, holding hands, hugging, hanging out. An immediate bond, I tell you. Andy said they had a great time.

Sunday night we had our first kickball game with our team from Blue Collar Press (the official name of our team is The All-Beef Blue Collar Kicking Ball Society). Our kickball shirts have cheeseburgers on them. I've already met new people, which is always fun, and although my playing was pretty "meh" Sunday night, I'm excited to improve throughout the summer. Andy and I will have to take turns playing the late games (7pm) b/c of the kids. Andy plays this next Sunday night and I'll play on June 14. We're going to grill some grub at the games and take turns buying beer. You can tell how serious we are about playing if we're eating and drinking while playing. Yeah...gotta love Lawrence kickball.

I guess all good things sometimes come to a screeching halt...Andy and I got very ill Monday early a.m. and it lasted all day. After some serious investigation, we found out about 1/3 of the bbq attendees also got sick, so we assumed it was some kind of food poisoning from something at the party. But then the more we looked into it, the more we thought it could even be a virus that we passed around the party, b/c we know of a few folks who had the same illness who weren't at our house Saturday. Either way, it sucked for many. My stomach still isn't back to normal. I hate that, b/c I love eating so much. I get bummed out when food loses its meaning.

Work is ramping up b/c of all the changes, so I'm a little stressed, but so far it's manageable. We're gearing up to visit Kerry in Crested Butte, CO, over July 4. We finally have our condo rented, and we're going to caravan with my parents. Should be a blast, and I miss Kerry, so it will be really great to see her. We're also searching this summer for a new car, so that's exciting. I think we'll take a day off in July to get one. I'll miss the ol' Buick in ways, but I'm excited to listen to NPR on my morning drive to daycare without hearing screeching static blasting from the broken speakers.

I've been keeping up with my weekly lawrence.com gossip blogging, so check it out, if you so desire. New photos at our Flickr site, too.

More later...