cake day

The last few days have been a hectic kind of fun. It all started with my mom coming up for a visit.

She couldn't get over the fact that Finn and Calvin could literally sit and drum studiously for hours on end with Tommy. What a good Grandma she is, listening to them drum and encouraging them. We had fun shopping at my favorite local kids store, with a reluctant Finn in tow. I returned some stuff and used my store credit for this unexpected purchase.

a cake clutch.

I had no intention of buying a purse that day, but it was the most peculiar bargain. It had a slight blue blemish, so they sold it 50% off, for $33. However my sister Jessica says it actually retails at around $105. I have not bought a purse for myself since my plastic barbie-pink purse in high school!! Jessica likes to see a picture of a person holding a purse, to make sure the scale is correct. So, here is a picture of me carrying it.

So Jess, is it to scale? I have no idea of such things since I'm no purse connoisseur.

This handy little clutch is made for moms of tots(love the word tots for our munchkins!) It comes with the following features.

plastic wipes case


canvas changing pad

even has a coin purse

However, it's also meant for the evening out. So, I took this little number for a little test drive out to Starbucks with some of the girls. I walked in the door and laughed when I saw that Lorie, Ellie and I were all wearing yellow shirts.

I guess I was not the first person to spot this purse. Christie almost bought it friday, but passed it up cuz she's practicing being fiscally responsible. Good job Christie! Lorie eyed it, but consoled herself with the fact that it did not have better handles.

After coffee some of us went shopping at Target. Soon it was just down to the 3 of us in yellow shirts, roaming the aisles like clones. Ellie and I tried on some fantastic brown pants but thankfully they were too long--we did not want to fork over the dough! Lorie was trying on a bathing suit, complaining about the fit, but Ellie told her she looked so cute like a mermaid. You're always cute to us Lor! To top off all this fun, when I picked up the boys at my MIL's house, they had picked me the loveliest flowers. My MIL has the green thumb--the only flowers at my house come with weeds attached.

Sam I Am

My friend Christie has this adorable little baby named Sam who has the most incredible hair.

She always does it so cute and my favorite is his casual punk style, which he sported to church yesterday--it's half mohawk, half mop. Ollie has been working very hard growing hair and last night when he awoke for a midnight feeding, I noticed a strip of hair on top getting a little thicker. Almost thick enough for a Sammy-style hair do.

Sam I Am

Look at my 2 teeth!

© is for copycat

I am totally unashamed of my blatent attempt to swipe Sam's hair style. Mostly because we weren't even close! Instead, Ollie looked like a little chickie that just hatched. I think I will leave the baby punk to Sam&Christie, and stick to what I know best:

mop tops

Oh and by the way, my little chickie is starting to get to his knees in the rocking motion. He is going to be a happy camper soon, when he can crawl all over and get into all the boys' drum stuff.

The not-so-happy camper in the meanwhile:)

the mini mac

In our undergraduate days, John and I were both Mac users. Then somewhere along the way, John bought a PC, because they were more affordable. But I remained loyal for many years to my Macs, mainly because that's what my boss bought for me. And plus, they were prettier. I eventually caved and started using John's PC. However, just 2 weeks ago, John ordered this shiny white pearl of a macbook. He donated his old gray del laptop to me, which he spilled OJ on and now the "u" doesn't work. I'm happy enough with it, but I don't think Finn is too impressed by it. He's much more smitten by John's new shiny white macbook.

Introducing...

the Paper Thin Mini Mac®

A Finn exclusive.

It's skinny enough to fit in even the smallest child's backpack. Isn't it cute?

Just like daddy's

This picture sooo reminds me of John....

and my dad, with the pencil behind his ear.

I tried to get Finn to smile, but he was much too serious and had far too much work to do to play silly games with me and my camera.

clicketey clack clack clack.

Tag, You're It!

I was digging through my hope chest, trying to convince myself I wasn't completely devoid of sentiment (my last post said gimme $, not flowers). I had to laugh when I came across this index card John gave me our 1st Christmas:

I guess some things never change:)

However, I did feel much better when I came across these lovely flowers John painted for me when we were first dating.

He had picked the brightest yellow flowers from the side of the road,

on his way back from Hume.

Then, as I rooted through my box of souveneirs, I came across a bunch of loot from our early days of college. I'm not too sure who started it, but we played a game of tag that lasted over a year. John's very 1st tag was a banner over my college dorm door that read "Tag You're It". I think my response was this pitiful little note I slipped into his chem lab drawer.

It started out simple, but grew a little more elaborate as we tagged each other back and forth. Here are a few of the "tags" I made. In case you get confused, I was the "weird cat" (or girl in triangle dress) and John was the "tom cat".

sock/crocheted tom cat, that I tagged John with.

I was terrible at crocheting--my scarves always twisted and curled, like this cat's tail.

I made the necklace and wood-burned-sign at Hume the summer we worked there together. Here are a few of John's handiworks.

paper dolls and cats

landyards he made at Hume--the girl is supposed to be me:)

John's most elaborate tag involved this lamenated bound book.

I also found a box of old Valentine goods that we made. My boys had a hay-day playing around with all our stuff.

cards from my pre-scrapping era and a heart from my pre-sewing era

I also found reminents from a complicated scavenger hunt John engineered for our 1st Valentines Day.

clues everywhere

an entire box of Valentine's cards to spur me on each step of the way.

The scavenger hunt ended in Smith Hall with a spaghetti dinner with roomate Andre serving us in a tux.

So John, if you're reading this, Happy Valentines Day and
TAG, YOU'RE IT!!!!!!

Flowers

Ever since Finn drew me his very first flower, he has been smuggling me flowers every chance he gets.
And drawing me flowers every chance he gets. He handed me this drawing the other day and explained that the one on the left was his practice flower and that the one on the right was the real thing.

And this drawing I found taped onto my bathroom cabinet:

He said, "the blue things are the woots(roots) and those green triangles are thoweens(thorns) so that you know them are roses".

I definitley think all his practicing is paying off. Unlike his first flower attempt, these are recognized by even the most casual observer as actual flowers. He seems to think that all of the world's problems can be erased by giving me flowers. If we had a rough day of disobeying, Finn tells me he will give me flowers. I don't know where he gets this from, because John rarely brings me flowers as a gift. I tell John it's a waste of money, and to just give me a bouquet of cash instead--I am hopelessly romantic:)

I will take this little hand-picked flower as a gift though.

(or any hand-picked flower for that matter!)

self-portrait

Can you guess who this is?

no, it's not Joseph and the coat-of-many-colors

(hint:look closely at the feet)

I'll give you another hint:

my version of the blue door

Yesterday, I awoke to this little email.

"soo, what are we going to do today??"

Followed by a whirlwind morning of me gobbling breakfast, throwing on clothes and make-up and packing a lunch for Ollie and I. John agreed to keep munchkins 1 & 2, and I headed out the door with #3.

I'll call it a spurt of the moment photoshoot with Lorie Beth and Ellie.
So, I'm standing there with my wee little digital elph, with Lorie and Ellie busting out their big guns...Canon D 1000's or something. And they're talking all professional. Stuff like "set it at 2.5". I have so much to learn, it's not even funny. And then Lorie glanced at me, with my little point-and-shoot and said "Oh how cute. You brought your camera too!"

Yes, I did feel cute. Adorable I tell you.

And she smiled encouragingly and said, "I love it, you've got to start somewhere!"

Too true, too true.

So we horsed around for a bit, like we always do. I took a few amateur shots of these *professionals* doing their thing.

Then I tried to sneak in a few of my shots. Lorie and her fabulous new camera strap.

Ellie and the bambinos.

We had fun playing with the fisheye and if you care to see any of those shots, change the channel to Lorie's station .

p.s. Hey Lorie, if Plan A fails, we can always move to Plan B:

This bag has someone's name written all over it.

One of Petunia's newest diaper bags in the "glazed canvas" collection. In person, it is absolutely breathtaking. And so water-proof. Muy bonita!

p.s.s. I'm convinced that their is a little gnome that does all the spell checking...and this gnome went on strike with the Hollywood writers. Come back little gnome. We desperately need you in blogland!