Dynamite

We are down to one car now so that means that the whole family gets to caravan together to and from places whenever we are on the go. One would think this would be annoying, but I have actually come to love this family time in the car. My kids love listening to loud music in our car and they have two songs in particular that for some reason they have grown to LOVE! Their ultimate favorite song right now is "Dynamite" by Taio Cruz. It's hilarious to see...we'll be driving along and they will be reading books, playing with toys, whatever - minding their own business and then we'll switch to start this song and instantly they both start doing a little jig in the back seat. Daniel will actually empty his hands so he can start clapping and then looks over at Abby excitedly as if to say, "Are we going to do it?! Are we going to dance our hearts out right here, right now?!" Watch...



The second song is requested by Abby over and over again and maybe I should be a bit embarrassed of her song selection ;) She loves Justin Timberlake singing "Dirty Pop." I think she mostly loves to hear the "silly" noises he makes trying to beat box or whatever it's called. Regardless...she's a happy camper when this song is on the radio!

Water fireworks...

Happy 4th of July friends! We had a really fun weekend for our holiday. Abigail had a friend's birthday party on Saturday at Pump It Up and had beads of sweat going down her cute little face. She had such a blast jumping up and down and going down large slides and giggling like crazy! She keeps saying, "At my next birthday, I want a princess jumpee with a big pink slide." Happy Birthday Lily Marie! We love you!



On Sunday, we headed up to my Aunt Char and Uncle Bob's house for some fun with family and splashing in the pool. Abby is becoming a little mermaid and is getting more and more brave with the water. She will now go under for longer then just a dip, and she will kick with whoever is holding her. Daniel is "jumping" from the side of the pool to Daddy (not sure I like this ;)...obviously a jump for him is just walking over the edge into Daddy's arms. He gives you the biggest smile after the splash. I really have to keep my eye on him near pools!





The big kids had fun with firecrackers and sparklers and Abby got over her startle with the popping and sparking in front of her and cheered them on...





So much fun at Kamp Kozlowski ;)



On the actual holiday day, we had our HomeGroup friends over to BBQ and watch the fireworks at our next door high school, Del Norte. We enjoyed the familiar smiles, laughs and child play at our home and then headed over to the grass park across the street from our complex.





It was beautiful outside and it was a perfect evening for fireworks. We let the kids play at the park while we waited for the fireworks to begin and by the time they started there were dozens of families on the lawn with us.











Midway through the fireworks display, we hear an emphatic, "You've got to be kidding," with a bunch of squeals and shrieks from behind us, with sounds of sprinklers popping up behind us from the grass. Our little celebration on the lawn got interrupted by the sprinklers and we all, like a herd of sheep seeing a wolf, ran toward dry ground. Abby got real spooked by the commotion and we had a hard time focusing on the rest of the fireworks and along the walk home afterwards, a lone spark went off pretty close by, echoing in our courtyards near our house, making a booming loud sound like gunfire, topping off her scare! We had a difficult time getting her to relax that night for bed, and in asking her what her favorite part of the day was, she said, "I liked the purple and green ones, but I don't like the water ones!" :) All the while Daniel slept right through all the fireworks. Unbelievable! We'll see what next year has to hold.

My Son is One!

My baby boy just turned one last weekend and we celebrated him to the fullest! His actual birthday was on Friday, so we did a little special dinner with the family - Robbie made him homemade mac'n cheese for the first time and we sang to him with a zucchini cupcake and candle and all. I'm sure glad we did too, because we quickly learned that our lil' boy has a fear of candles ;) Seriously, the minute he sees the flame, he starts to freak out and wants to climb out of his seat. He cried all the way through his bday song on Friday, but luckily that was just the rehearsal for his big song at his birthday party on Sunday, where he actually smiled at the audience while they sang and didn't cry until I put the candle right in front of him.





Yep, his sister had to blow out his first birthday party candle ;) She was certainly ready to oblige and throw in the helping hand...after all there is a cupcake involved.



Daniel enjoyed his cupcake and made a cute mess...I say cute because I know many of my friends and family wished to see icing up the nose and in the hair....but that's just not my style ;)



It's not my style, but it can quickly become my family's style if they so choose it...



Abby set the stage for her Lily friend ;)



Happy 1st Birthday baby boy! Your mommy and daddy are incurably in love with you!



Daniel's buddy and cuz, CJ... Dan's sharing his cake eating tips with CJ and giving him the low down on how to get your parents to do whatever you want ;)



You know, I've been thinking I'm not ready to have my babies growing this quickly. Time flies and I keep trying to remind myself when I'm in the midst of it all that the days may feel sometimes long, as I recall them when I'm exhausted each night, but that the years are short as time quickly keeps ticking away. I have to eat up each moment, each opportunity to pinch those chubby cheeks and shower them with my kisses and squeeze and hug them and rock with them. I want to savor the sweet moments of cuddling, the small soft hands reaching up to me to be picked up, and I want to breathe deeply of their baby hair, smells of perfection. I don't want to forget, because I know that time is just going to pick up speed.



I love you little man!

Just for fun...

I was just looking at Robbie's baby pictures for another project and I noticed how strikingly similar Daniel looks to him as a baby...so I also pulled out some of my own baby pictures and it's crazy how it can work both ways....just thought I'd share....



You don't see it as striking with Abby's pics from the same age, but it's still fun to look at...



I'll have to do this again with some others....we'll be back ;)

My camera broke :(

Yes, it's true...and I'm SOOOO sad!! My camera broke while on the camping trip in early May and I think I was in denial, because I kept trying to use it and it just wasn't working right. Luckily the video option on the camera still works, so I'll just need to send it in to get fixed for photo taking. Anyways...this is what's been happening since the camp trip...

Remember I mentioned that Abby has been going to a ballet class? Well, she LOVES it so much!! She and Lily girl are having such a great time with learning cute dance moves and getting to get all dressed up in their ballet attire. I have to admit though, I think I've been enjoying her getting dressed up too, because I have been spending too much time on her hair for ballet ;) Haha...I really enjoy it and I almost feel relaxed in the morning because of it. There's something about creating a thing of beauty and when it's as simple as a hairdo, that's easy to do, it gives you a sense of accomplishment...haha...I know that's weird....but look at how fun it's been for me and how stinkin' adorable it makes Abby girl ;)





Oh, the drama...





For mine and Robbie's 6 year anniversary, we were blessed with a generous offer from Robbie's parents to use their timeshare in Newport Beach for our anniversary weekend - thank you Debbie and Steve!! This was an incredible opportunity for some real quality family time together - just the 4 of us for a full 4 day weekend! We had a blast!!

Again, with the camera broken, I was so bummed not to be able to capture all the delight we had that weekend, but let's just say it was a great time to be had by all! Daniel had free reign to crawl to his heart's delight and Abby had to learn not to stomp like an elephant while walking from one end of the room to the other - I felt so sorry for our neighbors below us!

It took a day to really enjoy it at the beginning - this was Daniel's first time having to sleep in a pack-n-play and he unfortunately brought a cold on the vacation with him as well. Abby was in a huge queen sized bed all to herself and a good distance away from our room and I was afraid she'd fall off or need us in the middle of the night - so the first night I got maybe a couple hours of sleep since every noise I heard woke me to a lurch. But by the second day and night we had all gotten adjusted and were enjoying the grounds.



The resort had a wading kiddie pool that both of the kiddos LOVED!! If I didn't have Daniel in my arms, he'd be crawling right into the pool - he is so into the water and doesn't understand that he can't put his head in and that he can't crawl in water. Abby on the other hand is very timid with water, and was just celebrating when she'd put her nose and mouth under water for a few seconds. It was quite hilarious how different the two were in that regard.





This weekend was a great way to begin a summery season - warm days for the pool, suntans, ice cream and dinner on the patio! Looks like we'll be making many trips to pools this summer!

A breath of fresh air

I love camping! I didn't remember how much I loved it until going this past weekend. It totally brought me back to my childhood - every summer going with my parents on an escape to the mountains to breathe in the fresh pine and earthy smelling air, to get away from the busyness of our everyday. I remember many a girl scouting adventures up to the mountains as well and I admit I forgot a lot of the techniques - how to build a fire, how to tie a really good knot. But some others came in handy - I told Robbie he just had to trust me with being responsible for the tent and for keeping us warm in the tent overnight (mom would be a proud leader, because I remembered that you should never wear any of the same clothes you wore during the day, at night, because the sweat from the day will just keep your clothes cool at night; you need a fresh set of clothes to sleep in).



Abby girl had a blast for her very first camping trip!! She was amazing! She fell asleep right away in the tent by herself - we were just outside by the fire with friends - and she slept through the night. Although, I didn't much sleep however, because the mommy in me just kept waking at her every toss and turn to check on if she was bundled up or not to keep warm. It got down in the 30's overnight....it was cold! But she made it without a problem and of course, was up with the sun early, early. To bottle up a 3 year old's energy would make me a millionaire!!







The camp trip was a church family outing and we had a lot of our close friends there to enjoy our time with and to which is another reason I think Abby had such a great experience. We had our own little corner of the campground to share with our friends and to have the kids just roam around freely together. The grounds were beautiful - I highly recommend Hurkey Creek Campgrounds in Riverside for a family camp trip!!













There was a cute little creek just a walk away from our site and all the kids enjoyed taking a dip in it. I didn't know about it ahead of time so Abby just waded in it - it was freezing!! I couldn't believe some of the kids were enjoying themselves in such icy water! The kicker was when Isaiah decided to test the water....he waded out in his undees and tshirt and as the water kept getting higher on him, he continued to pull his underwear up from the back, as if to try and lift his rear out of the icy water....I caught the reaction of the peanut gallery while they were watching him...



We'll definitely be a camping family - so fun!!





Couldn't leave you without some of Daniel though on this post too... We really missed him camping, but we're glad he was home in a warm crib! He's doing this funny little bit now...

May is one of my favorite months

I love May because it's just such a fun month! A memory-filled month from time before kids, but now it's also going to be filled with family memories to be cherished!!

We love checking out the Wild Animal Park...errr....the Safari Park as they call it now. This time, we went for the Butterfly Jungle exhibit. Abby enjoyed seeing the meerkats up close and personal on our way to the butterflies...











Robbie has presented a fun idea for our lil' family to do while we have warm weather and long summery days...we're going to start having dinner on the beach. We tried out our first attempt....it was beautiful. Exactly what we hoped it would be...





Gotta love on our Lily girl - Abby's little friend who she plays with every Thursday, got to come to our house for her parents to go on a little date night. The two were buckets and buckets of giggles raining on the entire evening!!





One of the things that I feel that God has really pressed upon my heart is that I'm made to be a mommy. I love, love, love that God has blessed me with two beautiful children and the satisfaction of seeing them grow into the perfection of human beings that I believe them to be. Mother's day just gave me a moment to breathe that in and let it soak deep...





But I learned how to be a mom from the very best! I love my mom!



Daniel is really starting to strike up the conversation. He talked to Robbie on the phone the other day and now he says DaDa all the time. He always says Abba, but not so much of Mama. We're getting there.



How big is Daniel?! So big!