baby-free anniversary

P loves to go to the park and run around, get close to the pond, chase the ducks, call out to the doggies, play on the playground, rip up handfuls of dirt and grass and throw it, run his cars along picnic tables and benches, pick up old oranges that have fallen from trees...

 there are some nasty geese there that attacked him one time and I'm pretty sure bit him just as I yanked him away! We were both scared of those crazy things!

Work hard, play harder. He loves drinking from the water bottle, and it usually ends up all over his belly and leaves him gasping for air. Then he goes back for more.

My brother, Michael is serving his mission in Laguna Niguel, just 25 minutes down the road from us. His birthday was coming up, so I thought it'd be fun to go and decorate his door and drop off some goodies to ding-dong-ditch him. Steve nixed the door decorating and said he'd definitely hear that and catch us, so we settled on doughnuts, his favorite dessert (Barbershop Quartet), and handmade card filled with art from Parker, and a balloon. After my Mom hassled some ward members for his address, we drove down the night before, scoped out the place, and found an escape route, a hiding place, and a bench to prop up Steve's phone to record the whole thing. We quietly set up the goodies, snapped this photo (twice, because Steve forgot to  get the goodies in the first one), I went and hid in said spot, Steve rang the doorbell, and quietly tippy-toe ran over to me at our hiding spot (we decided he'd be the better runner and less likely to trip and fall :). We anxiously awaited Michael to open the door, but NO, his companion opened the door. BUMMER! He exclaimed, "What?? How did they find us??" and started laughing (Michael emailed me later and said they thought it was one of the girls in his ward that thinks he's cute), then he bolted out and started looking for us...we got nervous and started to back up, but then he went the other way, then back into the apartment. Then we hear Michael exclaim, 

"What the...?"

DANG IT!

We thought it was over. We started to get ready to go back for Steve's phone and leave, but then the door swung open again and he came out again. Again, on a mission to find out who this was, so we started backing up toward the stairwell to bolt, and we did...we waited for a bit, heard Michael come out, then heard one of them starting down the stairs, so we bolted another story down, waited it out until we heard the door shut. Finally they were in for good, so Steve quickly ran up, grabbed his phone, and we bolted for the car. He thought he saw someone peeking out the window, so he waved back. Sure enough, Michael emailed if that was our dark car in their parking spot. Not sure if he was making that up or not (because he knows we have a black car), but I'd say it was a successful ding-dong-ditch!

We get to the car, drive to the front of the complex, and start to watch the video. Hilarious!

Let's just say we didn't post the video because a certain someone came out looking for us, well, not 100% decent. But we definitely got it on camera! Happy Birthday Elder! Love you!

He'd run out into the street ten times a day if we'd let him. He likes to drive his truck, push it over the edge, and say 'uh-oh!'.

Steve's getting all sorts of love notes from these little girls he does Vision Therapy with. He also got a little Easter present! Looks like I have some competition...

We finally got to get away and celebrate our anniversary and being done with boards! Our friends watched Parker for 24 hours, and it was pretty dang amazing. We were talking about something cute Parker did at one point, so I started to miss him a bit, but then I got over it real quick and had the most amazing time. We started out with breakfast, where Steve got the most massive German pancake we've ever seen. Can't you tell he loves getting his picture taken?

Then we got couple's massages with a Yelp deal I had found....that's always blissful.

Next, we headed down to one of my favorite and in my opinion, one of the most beautiful of Cali, Laguna Beach. I love this drive, especially this part: the first time you see the cliffs and ocean jutting right into PCH. Gets me every time.

We got some snacks and set up camp. Weather was perfect (as long as you laid on the sand with a towel, you were warm enough), Steve played with his rockcrawler RC truck without a little man running to it and grabbing it and chasing it, I laid still without moving or worrying about a little man and soaked up the sun, it was probably my favorite part of the trip. Pure heaven.

You can see his little friend on the rocks just to the left of him.

We drove down the road a couple blocks and checked into our hotel (another Yelp deal), showered up, and went to dinner. It was windy and cold at the rooftop lounge place we went to (a restaurant.com deal we bought 2 years ago but hadn't used), so we brought our food inside and finished eating in there. 

Picked up some dessert from Chick-fil-A on the way back to the hotel, plugged in Steve's laptop and watched our Netflix shows until we passed out. We just drank the sparkling cider out of the bottle.

We're real classy like that.

The sad part about the next day, was that Steve had to be back for 10am class, so we didn't really get to sleep in. Boooo....that was what I was most excited for, but one day, at some point, I will get to sleep in. Right???

The next day, Heather had offered me tickets to go see Dancing With The Stars with her, and timing actually worked out perfectly so Steve could watch Parker, so off we went! We stood in line for realistically 3 hours. We had regular tickets, but as they started going through the line, they told us that we had priority tickets and moved us into another line that only had a handful of people in it and that would get in first. Woohoo! So then they started picking young girls out of this line, (including us) and brought us to this other separate line that again, they said would get priority seating. Crazy to think they actually hand pick where they want audience members! I've thought they do that whenever you see all those 14-year-old girls dressed up and waving to the camera on American Idol, but to be a part of it and witness it was somewhat surreal. Little did they know that I'm almost 29 with a kid a home! We finally get in, and they tell me to go sit in one seat, and Heather in another. I ask if we can sit together, and they said they would make it happen. We're waiting around, and it's not happening, so I go up to the guy that separated us and ask him to make it happen. It finally happens, but they tell us it might only be for the pre-taping (they pre-tape part of the dancers' dance). We're hoping we can stay, because we're front row, literally 5 feet directly to the right of the judges. Carrie Ann smiled and waved at us when they came out! Then, Derek Hough came over to our section and shook some hands and talked to us, but neither Heather nor I could get anything out of our mouths. The pretape is over, they're moving audeince members around, the show's about to start in 5 minutes, then they last minute grab us and move us off the stage because we were sitting in some reserved celebrity's seats. Another couple minutes goes by, and we're thinking we're done, no seat for us for the show. Heather walks out and talks to this girl who had picked us before out of the line, told her what was up, and we got our seats back! We run over, sit back down, and the show literally started 1 minute later.

We got lots of camera time (mostly to those who knew where we were sitting), and Heather got some serious face time, and Sean Lowe even waved to us and said hi as we were leaving the stage.

Incredible experience, thanks Heath!

Just as we took this, someone yelled us at to put the camera away, no photography on property?!

The next day was back to my reality of slugs and dirty little boys.

It's OK, I kinda love my little reality.

He went over to a plant and picked it off all by himself. He wouldn't put it down, and I kept saying "gross" and "yuk", mostly involuntarily, so he started saying them too. He was squishing it, and when it started to ooze and come out of its shell, he got a little nervous so I rubbed it off his hands and got rid of it. Then he wanted it back, so we had to leave so he'd forget about it.

My friend, Julia, has been working with her band and just released an album. They had a celebratory show at a local venue (smoky, indie, some mellow songs, some more happy and upbeat) so Jason, Geri and I went to watch, and met up with some other friends there. She plays keyboard and sings backup vocals, they were amazing! I told Geri she was going to have to get up and dance with me, so when the chorus hit of one of the more upbeat, 'dancier' songs, I got up and grabbed her and we had ourselves a little dance party! Dinner followed to celebrate, and we even got a pic behind the venue with her cop friend's cop car in the background. Niiiiiiice.

This little squirrel and Parker played chase around and around this tree, he was not afraid of little P! He got super close, I started to wonder if he was going to attack or bite him and if I maybe shouldn't let him get so close? P would get close, the squirrel wouldn't move, so he'd inch even closer, then get scared and run away. He kept calling it a doggie. Mmmmm, close buddy....

Multiple times a day, Parker runs over to the front door and yells, "side! side! (outside) shoe! shoe! walk! walk! side! shoe!" and has a fit if I say no. Whenever he wants something, and I repeat it back to him, he says, "oh-kaye!". That's when you know you're getting it right. So several walks a day we go on, and even more frequently since our recent pool day, where he overcame some fears he had of hanging out on the steps alone.

He thinks he knows his colors, but most of the time he just calls out 'bue! lellow! reh! uhnj! geen!' until he gets the right one. My favorite word he says right now is either 'cat-pill-yuh-ee-yuh' (caterpillar) or 'flow-woah' (flower).

He's a grumpasoarus when he wakes up from every nap, and has developed a routine of watching Elmo when he wakes up. It usually cheers him up, so it's fine by me. He's quite the dancer (i.e. stomping his feet quickly) when the music comes on, or if we're in the car and I start dancing, he starts karate-chopping the air with his hand to the beat of the music. He likes to rough-house, run around, throw things, and is just all boy. We love his little face and personality. 

We've been hard at work on my friends' and my food blog, Oh So Delicioso. We've been redesigning a new, awesomer website and working with our web developer and putting in lots of late nights at the computer and lots of back and forth decisions. We're hoping to launch in the next two weeks, and for the launch we'll be giving away a Blendtec, some super darling recipe cards, and a bunch of other loot. You seriously don't want to miss it. It's been so fun working with these girls, and the food part is always a blast for us too. I really, really, really hate poor food, but love me some good food.