Happy Birthday Daddy!

Guest bloggers Avery and Nolan here to wish our Daddy a great birthday! We want to tell you how much we love you and why!

Avery:

• you have an amazing ability to calm me down in the middle of the night even after mommy has tried everything and nothing has worked. (mommy isn't as impressed)
• your hair is orange and thats funny.
• you sing songs with us and make up words to them most of the time.
• you keep trying to get me to swing the bat and the golf club even though I always run away
• you always give me a big hug when you get home even though I always act like I dont want one.
• you take me swimming.
• you give me pretty much whatever I want (but so does mommy, so...)
• you hug mommy and help her when she is sad.
• you always remember to bring me a fork to try when mommy forgets.
• you really want me to be potty trained and you always try to catch me just at the right time.
• you tuck me in and re tuck when necessary.
• you are fun and mom thinks you're cute so I do too.

Nolan:

• you do airplane with me and thats fun and it makes me laugh like crazy.
• you turn on elmo (sesame street) for me at every request
• you play with us while we are in the tub and sing songs that make us laugh
• you brush my teeth with bob toothpaste-Bobby!
• you read stories to me
• you teach me words
• you give me jelly beans
• you teach me how to swing the bat and the golf club and I know you are hoping I become a rich and famous pro athlete but you will still love me if I dont!
• you think Im really funny and smart
• you have orange hair and thats just funny!

We love you Daddy! Happy 34th! This will be a great year!

xxoo

Avery and Nolan

we have great friends...

We are just back from a fantastic and incredibly relaxing weekend in Del Mar/Solana Beach (north san diego) with four great friends. The parents of a friend of Red's from high school (thats him and his wife on the left) live there and let us stay in their gorgeous condo right on the bluffs. The couple on the right joined us from Denver (another of Red's friends from high school and his wife). It was awesome to be with friends and just relax without the kids. The 6 of us have 5 and a half kids between us! We left on Thursday afternoon, took BART to SFO, had dinner at a really yummy place there called Firewood Grill-one of the BEST burgers I have ever had. Honestly. After Red got rattled by an older French man's jacket hanging in his salad (crowded restaurant in the international terminal) we headed down to the gate just in time for them to call our boarding group and we hopped on the plane. It was my first time on Virgin America and I was impressed. Kind of bummed it was such a quick flight! They have such cool options on the TV right in front of you. You order all your food and drinks there-and pay with a card at your seat. Genius. We meant to meet the CO couple at the airport and share a rental car but they were delayed due to Tornado warnings in CO. Pretty random, so we changed the rental to their name and our friend whose parents house we were using came and picked us up. We went to his parents other place in Del Mar and met them for a 2nd dinner! yum. Then up to the condo.

It was beautiful-all redone and just perfect. What a view! Our CO friends finally made it in and we stayed up chatting and catching up. The next morning the boys went to golf and the girls grabbed a yummy quick breakfast before heading to the Four Seasons Aviara for spa treatments. My Fave. I had the Walk on the Beach massage and it was fantastic-similar to a hot stone massage but with shells! Then a foot exfoliation. loved it. We then headed to the pool there, had lunch, some foo-foo cocktails and great conversation. We did that for 4 hours or so-kind of lost track of time-even worried the husbands a bit!

We had a fantastic dinner that night at Pacifica-5 Surf and Turfs and one Sea Bass (mine) and all delish. Caught a fantastic sunset beforehand.

Saturday the boys decided to go golfing again-we walked around town, shopped a bit and then met the boys for a yummy lunch. Went down to Del Mar and shopped a bit there. Then some more relaxing at the condo. Hot tubbing and book reading. Ahhhhh. Saturday night we had dinner at Fidel's, a gigantic and fun mexican place complete with mariachi! Back to the condo for some Mexican Train dominoes and then to bed.

Brunch on Sunday morning, pack and then to the airport. It was so special to see the kids again and we are so thankful to gramma and alexis for taking such great care of them for us. Red and I had a lot of laughs. We have great friends-thank you for making the weekend so special!<

just some photos

It was ridiculously nice out yesterday so I took a million pics of the kids. These are the best ones-Im so glad I can retouch b/c Avery currently has a huge scrape on her forehead! She fell at school on Friday. I had watered the veggies garden and left the sprinklers on a little longer than I needed-hence the puddle. Nolan digs puddles. He was dropping rocks in for like 20 minutes! He has to have his shirt off like Daddy now!
Nolan found a puddle...

Puddle found his pants!

Thanks to Leah for the awesome new hair clip!

The "good side" of Rett

Last month at the natural history study, we were told to go meet another new family out in the waiting room...so we ambushed them. Avery ate all their apples. We chatted briefly and they got called in for their appointment. We learned they lived fairly close by in Mountain View (about an hour away) and their daughter had gotten her diagnosis about 10 days before Avery had gotten hers. Their daughter is just 7 months younger than Avery and also walks and doesn't stop moving!

We didn't get any contact information from them so I went home and starting stalking them online! But I didn't know how to spell their last name, or her first name for that matter! I couldn't find her. I was bummed. Then I went to check my blog updates and up pops a new post on a blog I have been following for months-and its THEM! I had been following their blog already for MONTHS. what a dummy. I didn't put 2 and 2 together.

So I fessed up on the blog-I messaged the mom and she messaged me back. We became pen pals and exchanged many emails. We found there are so many funny little similarities in our daughters journeys. And similarities between the two of us as well.

Yesterday they all came over for a visit and lunch.

It was really like hanging out with people we had known forever and it was neat to see another little girl "playing" the way Avery "plays". There were many snacks on the floor, finger prints and mouth prints on the table, a couple falls and tons of smiles. Also forced photo opportunities.

The time went by ridiculously fast and I wished they didn't have to go. If Red didn't get called in to work, I might have asked them to stay for dinner!

So, if there is a "good side" to Rett, this is it. Meeting fantastic people with whom we have many things in common, but if not for Rett, we would never have had the privilege to know.

See this girl? She is SMART.

Yep, she is a smarty. Tonight while in her room I asked her to go get my box of tissues in my room from my nightstand (they had just been moved there) because my trusty zyrtec isn't holding up to this nightmare pollen and she DID.

Smart girl.

As promised...bird in the house video.

im not typically that girly, but when the bird is in such a small space and flapping all over, its kind of creepy.

Happy Dance!

Yesterday was one of those good days. We certainly have come a long way from last Easter.

Good friends of ours have a brunch around easter every year and we do an egg hunt for the kids (Avery is the oldest by a year and a half or so). Last year we left before brunch in tears (Avery and mommy). It was that day that it became extremely apparent to me how different Avery was. All the 2 year olds (who had all JUST turned 2) were running around finding eggs, so cute with their little baskets. Avery was on the opposite side of the yard pushing a baby stroller alone. I was already on the verge of tears...and then she fell down and had the biggest meltdown you can imagine and I could not calm her down. I was fragile and frustrated and embarrassed and lost it. I spent that day pretty much in tears. But I realized later that it was good for my friends to see me struggle a bit as I usually put on such a brave front.

This year we did it at our house and it was GREAT. I already knew Avery wasnt going to care about the egg hunt and she didnt. She was, however, so happy to have everyone over and loved being outside pushing her stroller. She also loved snatching candy here and there-all her friends did all the work and she reaped the rewards. Smart girl.

Nolan dug the egg hunt. He was happy with the 2 eggs he had and then he caught on and really got into finding more. He had so much candy, in his mouth, on his hands and on his shirt.

We will be spending the evening with family tonight. Im going to have to use yesterdays positivity to stay strong tonight-Averys cousin will be there who is 3 weeks younger. Glaring differences. Positive thoughts!