the life and times of

10th Anniversary? Howz about a trip to Greece?

2012-01-20T00:34:00.000-05:00

We've always wanted to go to Greece. A tenth anniversary is a good reason to take a trip, right?

We started off with flights straight to Crete. Arrived and checked in to the hotel. I'll take this after a long flight any day.

Sunset

Tank Wars 2011

2012-01-20T00:17:00.000-05:00

The annual 4th of July event. The Willis family gets together to create mayhem with fireworks and plastic toys.

The logical choice for one side of the fight: African animals, horses, farm animals, dogs and dinosaurs.

Serious firepower

The other side of the fight has army men, cowboys and indians, and aliens of course.

Yes, he's holding two firecrackers.

Oh, the humanity!

Tiny T-Rex? Pantone #5467 Smoke-bomb blue.

Lunch break for Henry, Sarah and Josiah

The Flaming Gorge

2012-01-19T23:54:00.000-05:00

The Spilker Family has started making summer trips to Flaming Gorge. I am personally hoping that this will become a regular thing. Our extended family took a lot of trips here when I was growing up. We'd fish and run the Green River in inflatable rafts. We camped at the exact same place when I was a kid.

The fish in these ponds are extremely wary! They have grown fat on a diet of Purina Trout-chow. So, we "matched the hatch" by tying dog-food flies. Henry had a blast with Uncle Dave.

Jack with Uncle Al

Genevieve likes it!

This is Tinkerbell. Amy gets mad when I say it looks like a rat. But it really does.

Spilker ladies

This is Batman.....and Josiah

Almost the whole family

Uncle Alan's House

2012-01-19T23:30:00.000-05:00

Uncle Alan's house has a nest of baby swallows:

A dock for swimming in the bak yard:

And a nice lake. Heaven for the Spilker kids!

The Rain in Spain Falls Mainly on the Plain - does it make me sound like an old guy if I use this quote?

2012-01-18T22:10:00.001-05:00

Amy and I were trying to find a good location for a summer trip. It just happened that there was a conference for my work in Granada, Spain. What a coincidence? Somebody needs to "take the bullet" and go to Spain for a conference, right? So I volunteered, and Amy volunteered with me.

Our first destination was Rhonda, a town up in the hills. It is the home of the oldest bull ring in Spain. This cat was one of the first to greet us.

I took a lot of photos or random doors in Spain. I thought they were interesting. They'll probably bore the rest of you to tears, but I'm going to include them anyway. This is what happens when Amy leaves the blogging up to her nerdy husband.

This is the Roman bridge that connects the two parts of the center of Rhonda. How would you like to live with this view out of your back window?

Our next stop was Seville. Lots of Moorish architecture.

A nice place to relax in the park.

Views from the gigantic cathedral in Seville.

Serious stained glass!

The windows cast the most amazing light patterns on the floor.

The Spaniards are no slouches in the category of '80s Rock Ballads and the Grande Mullet.

This one is for my brother Alan.......because he speaks Spanish of course!

Amy took a trip to an old olive oil plantation in Granada.

The Alhambra from a distance

Inside the Alhambra

Moorish art does not contain any images of people. Really cool symbols and themes.

Can't argue with the weather in Spain.

I don't claim to be geographically knowledgable at all, but I was really surprised to learn that Spain and Morocco are only separated by 8 miles at their nearest points. So, since we were in Spain Amy and I decided to take a day trip to Tangier, Morocco. It was definitely worth trip with one small problem (below).

We took a brief tour of the estate of a local oil tycoon. Amy likes the Rolls Royce.

This is the oldest tree in Morocco

The downtown market was amazing.

In hindsight we probably should have stuck to the Coke. The food really caused us some problems in the week after our trip. A note for travelers: don't eat the food on the African continent.

But it was really tasty.

We visited a really cool shop with silk and rugs. Amy did her best to pass for a local.....not really.

So, that was Spain and Morocco. We put Spain pretty high on our list of enjoyable vacations.

Robin Eggs! No, the real ones.

2012-01-18T21:15:00.000-05:00

These were our springtime visitors this year.

Springtime is about Genevieve

2012-01-18T00:19:00.000-05:00

Henry and Josiah both have their birthdays in September. Genevieve is a springtime baby. We have some Easter pics and Genevieve's second birthday.

Siah thinks the ladybugs are cool, but it doesn't take long for him to peel off the foil and get to the chocolate.

Amy colored and filled actual eggs with candy this year. The kids had a blast cracking the eggs to get to the candy inside.

Happy birthday Genevieve. That cake was AWESOME!!

2012-01-18T00:02:00.000-05:00

We had not yet taken a trip to Washington DC, even though it is just a few hours down the road.

I hope they're having a good time?

Henry ponders the missing link...?

Josiah takes a page out of the politicians' book and decides he's done with the press conference for the day.

Googley Eyes

2012-01-17T23:36:00.000-05:00

I have no idea where they found these:

The fun's over when kids start punching!

We love a clean San Diego

2012-01-17T23:11:00.001-05:00

The family visited the ships in San Diego with the Willis grandparents.

We always try to visit Balboa Park. Again, with the Wildes, our favorite California peeps.

Our favorite dragon sculpture in front of the folk art museum.

Maybe Henry's abut to be eaten......

But he jumps out of the way just in time!

Raise your hand if you want to be eaten by a polar bear

2012-01-17T23:07:00.000-05:00

We decided to not miss any of the southern California sites, so we also took a trip to the San Diego Zoo. The gist of one part of the polar bear exhibit is that the children (and some adventurous adults) can pretend to be seals, sticking their heads above the surface of the ice. As part of the polar bear exhibit the point is that the seals are gambling with their lives taking breaths of air above water. The kids don't seem to fear for their lives.

More activities with the threat of death for the children. Henry was impaled on the tusks of this charging elephant.

Then his lifeless carcass was devoured by the saber tooth tiger, which of course was just doing his duty as one of Josiah's minions.

Josiah also uses his supernatural powers to control other giant animals. It is kind of like that scene from Crocodile Dundee.

The Meerkats weren't buying the mind control thing. Henry's toothless smile was still worth including in the blog.

Long Beach Aquarium

2012-01-17T22:50:00.000-05:00

We also took a trip to the Long Beach Aquarium during our Cali trip. The Spilker grandparents met us there. We had a really good time. This aquarium is great for kids and not too far from Los Angeles or a short trip from San Diego.

The hands-on aquarium with grandma.

The aquarium has birds of course.....

You don't get a grin like this out of a kid every day.

And this one was priceless.

New Jersey is a lousy place to spend a February

2012-01-17T22:36:00.000-05:00

We wanted to kick off 2011 right, so we took a trip to California. New Jersey is really not the best place to spend a February. Can we ever take too many trips to California? It really is a silly question.

We usually start in Tomorrowland.

One of Amy's obsessions at Disneyland is their carmel apples. Genevieve is clearly starting with the same obsession.

The teacups are even more amazing at night.

One of my favorite photos ever.

Most years starting in about October Amy starts saying "It is almost my birthday". Amy seems to enjoy reminding me about her birthday more than she enjoys the birthday itself. So, this year we were at Disneyland to celebrate Amy's birthday.

Siah finally gets to drive the bumper cars. Isn't this one of life's most important rites of passage? Only topped by the day a kid gets to drive the bumper car alone.

Henry got a new light saber. Josiah got a giant lollipop.

Maybe my personal favorite of all Disneyland attractions is the shooting gallery. Am I really so easily entertained? What can I say? Americans love GUNS! I do miss the days when they had the piano player in the gallery, but they still have the vultures, the owl, the cow skull, the tin cans, the whiskey bottles. Love the shooting gallery!

I really hope this video downloads successfully. Josiah's got some dance moves. He definitely doesn't get it from his dad.

Am I overly excited about chairs? And some snow....

2012-01-17T22:00:00.001-05:00

First for 2011, these are the most awesome chairs EVER! I'm now writing this blog after we've owned them for a year. They are absolutely bullet-proof. They don't pick up stains. They add awesome color to our house.

January 2011 started with some serious snow.

Josiah loves the suicide dish!

Toothless Henry and Josiah approve of the new snow.

Amy takes a turn on the hot green suicide dish.

Henry catching some air!

Genevieve doesn't need the sled.....she just needs to stay warm.

The snow fort. We need more snow storms like this one!

The rest of 2010.....again

2012-01-15T23:34:00.002-05:00

In November 2010 Mark decided to try to ensure that he'd need hip & knee replacements in his old age by doing an Ironman event. The family had a good time in Wilmington North Carolina. He finished without dying. That is an accomplishment. Twelve and one half hours of swimming, biking and running.

2010 Christmas Eve. Our new mantle and fireplace getting some good use. We've really been decorating a lot for Christmas lately. It is really nice to be home.

Snickerdoodles for Santa.

The Haba nativity set is highly recommended!

Christmas morning. Genevieve gets her princesses...

Josiah gets a kit to make balloon animals...

Henry gets something perfect for annoying his brother and sister...

Mom & Dad get the breakfast of champions: Eggs Benedict and Diet Coke!

And Henry loses his tooth just after Christmas.

That's a wrap for 2010!!

Hopefully the rest of 2010

2012-01-15T23:23:00.001-05:00

Where was I? Summer 2010. Our year wouldn't be complete without Jack trying his best to get his ear chewed off by the local werewolf.

Genevieve at our local u-pick farm, The Lee Turkey Farm.

Fall is coming, Josiah's 4th Birthday.

Loves his Pillow Pet!

And chocolate cake!

Henry's 7th birthday.

Boyz with toyz. They play catapult battles with their mixed collection of warriors, including the pink rubber ducky. He's one of the "bosses".

And the Christmas elf that repeats what you say, except it sounds like you've been huffing helium....my personal favorite party trick.

Back to the Lee Turkey Farm for pumpkin pickin'

C'mon its just a gourd

To be continued again for the rest of 2010. Too many good stories to tell.

Huge Gaps in Spilker History

2012-01-15T22:47:00.000-05:00

Enough is enough! I'm posting the abbreviated history for the last 18 months.

A few photos from a trip to the New York Botanical Garden in spring 2010.

We took a 2010 summer vacation with Amy's family in California. The hot tub was the most popular attraction.

Some time at the beach with the Wilde family. Our favorite California peeps!

Genevieve tellin' it like it is...

Tea Cups are a must-do for every California visit.

and family photos....

Genevieve is not a baby any more.

We went to the Ream family reunion in Utah. Mostly everyone slept a lot:

Grandpa Spilker

Grandma Spilker

Josiah

Uncle Alan brought his specialty, home-brewed yeast root beer. Supposedly non-alcoholic, but then again there was a lot of sleeping.

Boating with the cousins.

2010 to be continued.....

backlog: may 2010

2011-03-24T02:27:00.001-04:00

welcome to may, friends.

you've seen those "hatch your own butterfly" containers, right? we have one for praying mantis'. and we sent in our voucher for our mantis egg case, and they send it back to us telling us they've run out and to send it in next year. LAME. so we went outside and found our own cases. we brought home four or five of them, and they all hatched at different times, so for a month or so, we had a constant container full of teeny, tiny babies. i think i liked it more than anyone else. but i'm a nerd like that.

look how itty bitty!

and this ladybug is my favorite ladybug i've ever seen.

here we have siah looking moody

beeb 'sorting' the recycling for me. (at least it's all clean, right?)

henry being, well, henry. and we still need a good nickname for henry...

this was at henry's mothers day program at school. all the pictures the kids drew of their moms were up on the wall and the moms were supposed to go and pick out the one they thought was of them (the kids names weren't on them). and i saw this one, fell in love with it and decided it was the greatest picture of any person i'd ever seen, ever. and low and behold, it was henry's drawing of me - complete with two red bows in my hair and a big warty looking thing on the tip of my nose. good grief i love this boy.

mark's job occasionally offers him some pretty sweet benefits, like awesome tickets to yankees games (and we all know how much mark loves the yankees, right?) here's henrys first mlb game and guess who is the yankees new number one fan is? it can get a little tense in this house with a serious yankees fan and a serious red sox fan. we believe someday henry will see the light.

isn't he too old for shenanigans like these?

b likes to empty out my fabric bins and sit in them. but she always cleans up after herself - good girl.

The Land of Ire

how much did we love ireland? more than mark loves chocolate or i love sleeping. now that's saying something.

upon arriving in dublin, we promptly hopped in the wrong sides our rental car and drove out of there on the wrong side of the road. needless to say, it was a harrowing experience for the first day... and i was only a passenger. the cars are small, and an average 2 lane road is about the width of a king size bed. i'm not exaggerating. ok i am, but only a little.

our first stop was to kilkenny which we figured was pronounced kilk-enny, but no. it's kill-kenny and i still wonder if the similarity to south park is coincidence... anyhoo, i don't have any photos of kilkenny but it's a lovely little town, just don't stay in the place we did. that's the place mark had a traditional irish breakfast and (not surprisingly) the worst food we had on the trip.

on to the Rock of Cashel

down the hill is Hore Abby. yes, just how it sounds. hore abby.

this is where the hore's slept. haha!

oh look at me being all silly.

from here, we went south to Kinsale in County Cork where we learned loads of interesting history and ate some fantastic food to counterbalance the really bad.

aaaand it looks like i don't have many photos of kinsale either. but believe me, it's a very cute, quaint seaside town.

and just look how big their leaves get!

these yellow flowers were growing everywhere - covering hillsides so completely it looked like someone had laid out giant yellow tarps for miles and miles.

oh look! here's Kinsale form a distance

does your gps ever lead you astray? i mean, really astray? ours did on the way to Kenmare. we drove through miles and miles of hilly farmland on unmarked dirt roads for what seemed like hours all the while hearing our nav say "recalculating. recalculating". garmin = fail.

not that it was such a bad thing, we got to see places like this and explore places we never would have seen otherwise. have i mentioned how beautiful ireland is? do i need to?

the only thing that is not beautiful is the roads. like this two lane road up and down a mountain.

but then you pass the garbage truck and try to stay on the narrow road since you can't take your eyes off the scenery. i wish it hadn't been so hazy, these mountains were so unique and strangely rugged.

welcome to kenmare! i don't have any photos of this town either! what's the matter with me?

but i do have this cool one of the foliage around a 3,000 year old stone circle (think stonehenge on a tiny scale)

ooooh, what does it mean?

best street sign ever. someone even drew a little person inside the car as they plumet to their death. did you notice the palm trees? yes! palm trees in ireland - it's actually a temperate place, just not warm temperate.

traveling north through the lakes of Killarney

this photo always reminds me of

this photo

now to our very favorite

Dingle!!

and what better way to welcome you than this?

what i'd really like to do is insert every photo i have from dingle into this post because this area is just unbearably beautiful and full of ancient history and structures and ocean so blue you'd think you were in the tropics.

farmers still farm this land that goes right up to the edges of these sheer cliffs that lead right down to the ocean.

throughout ireland are ancient communities that lived in these stone igloos.

i think the view must have taken the edge off living in a stone hut

we drove the peninsula once on our own and also took a tour bus for another round. the guide made a point to show us the land they filmed 'far and away' on and also the house tom and nicole stayed in while they were filming. really tour guide? that's what's noteworthy?

looking down onto the dingle peninsula

Gallarus Oratory built 1,300 years ago with stacked rocks, no mortar, and is still waterproof

bye bye dingle town!

brandon bay

We spent the night in Portmagee to make the early morning boat to Skellig Michael. As portmagee is very small we went across the inlet to Valentia Island for the afternoon where we hiked up to a WWII fort on a cliff overlooking the ocean.

here's the start of the hike

and the top of the island at the fort (you'll see that in a sec)

now, i'm no ansel adams (obviously) and therefore, i can't manipulate my camera to give an accurate perspective of just how steep and sheer these cliffs are. so, to borrow a saying from a friends father that he used to describe being at the top of Half Dome, "it makes your anal sphincter pucker". very apropo here, too.

how typically irish is this?!

check out that road we walked up. geez. it fades off into the extreme distance.

see the bridge? on the other side is portmagee

this is a slate quarry that's no longer in use

sweet little flowers called sea pink

tetrapod tracks - 350 million years old by one of the first animals to walk on dry land. cool, no? but i'm a nerd like that.

Skellig Michael

there really aren't words to describe a trip to skellig michael. i'd venture toward awe-inspiring, humbling, breath-taking and spiritual. without a doubt visiting this island is among the most memorable things i've ever done. just thinking about approaching those sheer cliffs and climbing those steps still makes my heart race. it was first inhabited by 6th century christian monks who sought isolation as a means to come closer to God. the island is more than 700 feet tall and a mile around with a cluster of beehive huts where the monks lived, worshiped and buried their dead. 'chiseling the most rudimentary life out of solid rock, the monks lived a harsh lonely disciplined existence for more than 500 years. they collected rainwater in cisterns and lived off fish and birds. to supplement their meager existence, they gathered bird eggs and feathers to trade with passing boats for cereals, candles and animal hides.' read more about it here and here.

leaving the dock, see the fort on top of the island? that's what we hiked to.

i don't know how, but we managed to get aboard the s.l.o.w.e.s.t. boat in ireland that day in some of the bitterest cold wind in recent history. the ride over was extremely painful, but i forgot all about it as we approached the island.

see that little blue dot down there? that's a boat and they have to steer these boats basically into a cave in constant choppy seas where we dock against a 15 foot sheer rock face with some slippery steps carved into it that we have to manage to climb onto amid all the rocking and try not to fall and get crushed between the rock and the boat. all that adventure just to get ON the island.

if you look closely in the green area, you can see one of the three winding stairways that have been carved out of the stone that leads up to the stone buildings.

off we go! halfway up the 600 steeeeep steps. did i mention that people die here climbing this every year? this place does not mess around, you have to watch every step you take.

this is the stairway that leads down thru the greenery on the above photo

the cemetary

what was i saying earlier about your anal sphincter? and look, you can see those steps again.

thousands of puffins nest on the island every year, they're so dopey and cute.

thanks ireland!

keep reading to see what happened in april!

the backlog: april 2010

2011-03-23T22:33:00.000-04:00

i'm not quite sure why i've decided to blog stuff that happened a year ago, maybe just waxing nostalgic and like looking at pictures. so why not share them with people who've already seen them? or not. or who don't care. but if you didn't care, i guess you wouldn't be here. so enjoy.

and how can you NOT enjoy this cheeky picture of siah on easter with his new stilts. why's new nude? i have no idea. like i said, it was a year ago.

more obligatory photos of the new york botanical gardens with some fine friends

if you haven't deduced it yet, we love the nybg. we're nerds like that.

here we have four friends being adventurous

and my little b - i can't believe she was so small only 12 months ago

the girlfriends

and the GIRLFRIENDS BIRTHDAY PARTY.

we had it at the howell living farm, which is awesome and i think i've blogged about it before. it was a perfect day, warm sunshiney day - just right for 2 little ones to celebrate their birthdays. luckily kristen is super creative and we pulled together a fine little get-to-gether with lots-o-friends and fun and super yummy food all put together in cute little baskets.

don't forget the delish cake from everyones favorite Sugar and Sunshine

candace looking so springy and kristin making sure candace isn't thieving any extra delicious lunches. one, two, three...

lunch pick-nik style

don't drink the water for the horses! says the man in suspenders

bite my finger and see what happens.

da boys

wheeeee! a tractor ride to watch people plant potatoes!

what stunning ladies!

happy first birthday, bean!

happy second birthday, miss!

thus ended april.

busted! (in a different way)

2010-12-18T18:46:00.000-05:00

beneath the suspicious looking 70 degrees farenheit, the thermostat was mysteriously set to 93.

busted!

2010-11-05T15:12:00.001-04:00

remember that time on halloween henry fell off the 5 foot drain in the back and broke his arm?

halloween!

2010-10-31T18:49:00.000-04:00

happy halloween!

look! i'm posting! i'm posting! and maybe i'll even fill in the blanks between march and the end of october... we'll see.

so today is halloween (officially), although we've had 3 days of it already. friday henry and siah had school parties and costume parades, last night was the trunk or treat which caused me a little stress and loss of sleep (cuz i'm in charge and all) and tonight was the neighborhood trick or treat. and now the kiddies are snuggled up in blankets on the sofa eating candy, drinking hot chocolate and watching the nightmare before christmas and all is right with the world. (and mark just walked by and said "are you actually blogging? shocking.")

some of the neighborhood kids went as a group this year and sadly, some of them i've never seen before. that's new jersey friendliness for you.

i usually try to hide the costume catalogues when they come in the mail to keep the kids from being influenced by the lame, expensive, popular culture costumes but they found one and henry and josiah both found a ninja/samurai/something warrior and that's what they wanted to be. henry already had a ninja costume from a few years ago and at the last minute josiah decided he wanted to be jiminy cricket - much to my hearts delight. so i went to work on his costume and had so much fun making it, and i think it turned out pretty cute with spats and all. beeb was wearing my favorite little spider costume that has made it's way through 3 kids so far.

henry was not the happiest boy today, he fell off a drainage ditch ledge earlier this afternoon and sprained his elbow, but he was determined to push though the swelling and pain so he could wear his costume and go trick or treating. of course, he had seal for comfort.

little jiminy. we painted his face green at the trunk or treat at the church, but it was just a big mess, so skipped it today.

little spider with craaaazy hair

henry even made a costume for seal. this kid just kills me.

new york botanical garden... yes. again.

2010-03-23T00:20:00.000-04:00

what? we love it (and i have completely skipped blogging about this years trip for the train show, no one really wants to see that again. your welcome) and would live there if we could. except for these: these nasty, wicked harbingers of evil. yes, i'm talking about you, black squirrel. oh how i loath you!

you may not think so, but they are so incredibly creepy, and they chase you. at least, they chase me. this one did along with a few of his best friends. i had flashes of them attacking me, pulling me to the ground and nibbling on my face. but then i said a quick pleading prayer for salvation and they backed off. satan isn't all powerful, you know.

is that a wet mop on my head? close, it's just my real hair.

time to go!

this and that

2010-03-22T23:23:00.000-04:00

i hate blogger. this photo should be down with the other house ones, but i can't move it. i've opened up a tumbler account and i think i'm going to start using it. anywhooo, here 's the new fireplace.

second snowman of the year -even taller than the first, and the neighbor girl who's father recently forbade henry and josiah fr

om going within 15 feet of his property because when they are there, "it's just chaos". yup. those are our boys.

obviously henry has been listening to the bangles...

reversible kimono dress with my most favorite fabrics

we celebrated johnny's birthday in style.

cord dress with skully/flower embroidery courtesy of yours truly.

cute sweater cousin katherine knitted - she hearts it!

beebah's room

el tile-o

new-ish floors and tile

new sweet stach

removing tooth via floss and swinging door.

beeb says colorwonder paper is most delicious

christmas day (concise version)

2010-03-22T22:39:00.000-04:00

peeps!

red eyed babe loves wrapping paper best

who knew connect 4 was so super exciting?!

christmas eve

2010-03-22T21:46:00.000-04:00

since i haven't figured out how to load photos from my phone, we'll just skip over the previous 24 hours when josiah was in the hospital for swallowing poisonous chemicals. the photos are just really sad and pathetic looking, anyway. so here we are at home, like nothing had ever happened. (huge sigh of relief).

so this was they boys christmas eve fun - hours in the snow - this does not sound fun to me, but i'm glad they like it. this was the first giant snowman of the winter season. henry rolled that second torso piece by hiz own seff, and was pretty proud about it.

beeb is ready for her first christmas. and how much do i love that smile? i don't even have the words.

this is bixie the elf (from the elf on the shelf) and he is a wonderful wonderful ally to have, if only for a month or so per year. henry named him (?) and he keeps an eye on them and reports all good and bad behavior to santa at night. i love him. and i want him to be here every day.

the new christmas eve pj's. yay!

henry's thanksgiving program

2010-03-22T21:40:00.000-04:00

my first baby's first school program.

how is he this old already?

classic henry.

da towwah

2010-03-22T21:35:00.000-04:00

henry already begins to exhibit engineering prowess...

{who's freakin hot with those slippers on, huh?!}

the best part

november at the shore

2010-03-22T21:11:00.000-04:00

one sunny warmish early november day we went to the beach and it was such a great day. mark and i have learned to really appreciate those days when everyone is happy and gets along, because it sadly doesn't happen all that often.

notice the people on the pier? can you see what they're wearing? pants. coats. hats. and i'm positive they were all up there thinking about calling DYFS to come and pick us up for child negligence.

but kids don't notice the cold, and siah was having a riot.

we all saw that one coming...

what happened to halloween?

2010-03-22T21:01:00.000-04:00

i have no idea what happened to the halloween photos with them in actual costumes, and i have no idea what is going on here, either. but here is what i have for posterity. josiah's pumpkin on the far left, henry's two are on the right - he even carved them himself.

happy halloween.

the obligatory pumpkin pick

2009-10-20T21:07:00.000-04:00

to the lee turkey farm!

ohhhh, so sleepy.

gobble, gobble.

if they only knew...

remember 'rock boobies'?

two birthdays, a tooth, and a race

2009-10-20T20:29:00.000-04:00

happy third birthday josiah!

i wish i had other pictures to show, but as it turns out siah didn't feel like wearing any pants or underwear during the opening-of-the-presents. and that's something no one needs to see.

i made out like a bandit - he only wanted cupcakes, so off to sugar & sunshine. no baking for me!

happy 6th birthday henry!

superman cake? easy. or so it would seem. after a disastrous outcome with royal icing, i managed to pull it together for a decent cake. henry was going to have a real party with friends and games and a theme but lost it because he can't seem to keep his seatbelt buckled in the car. he's done pretty well since that. i just love that my children don't even respond to threats.

what's a mom to do.

1st baby tooth gone - a huge rite of passage. he pulled it out himself and walked into the room holding it out in front of him, looking a little terrified and probably thinking: this thing just came out of my head. i might die. but quickly got over it when he learned about the tooth fairy.

marks 2nd half-iron man.

which he ROCKED, shaving over an hour off his time from the last race 6 months ago.
he still smiles when he thinks about it.

joe, matt and mark

our three amazing athletes

beeb loooves a good race!

the boys helped me find cool mushrooms in the forest. and when josiahs hair gets long and puffy like this, we call it 'mushroom head'

a tale of two holidays: one that was, and one that was not to be

2009-10-20T14:48:00.000-04:00

i'm sure you've all heard the ireland-vacation-debacle of '09, and so let us move on.

jain was here for two weeks, and we packed in as much as we could in one because, obviously, we weren't supposed to be around the second. so here is a week of our summer, jains 1st big trip east, and some firsts for me as well.

let us begin:

how friendly is new jersey already?!

we ate ice cream. lots and lots of ice cream. here we are at gil & berts, a cute little icecream shop in someones home in cranbury. they have the bestest of the best cookie dough ice cream. it's worth a trip here just to try it. promise.

si and dixie sent me these three giant boxes of packing peanuts! ok, so there were a few things in each box, but mostly peanuts. and it mostly made my life a living hell. i'm still finding them in random places around the house. but the boys loved it.

did you know i'm in love with the target clearance rack?

found this little beauty on it the boys had been asking for all summer. for 10 dollars.

regularly 40. kiss kiss. did i mention the sharks teeth are in 3-D?

we went to the butterfly festival, and this was the most interesting thing there.

jain and i went on a little tour of central jersey, starting out in colombus trying to attend the giant flea market/farmers market, but it was an off day and there were about 4 people there. so we packed it up, passed this lovely blow-up-rat,then through scenic trenton and onto lambertville and new hope. here we are on the bridge overlooking the delaware, to the left nj and the right pa. two great little towns. and just down the river a piece is washington crossing. historical!

another day was a trip to ellis island and the statue of liberty, which were both new to me. we didn't get to go inside the statue, but after seeing the line to get in, we decided that was ok.

if only they loved eachother like this all the time.

one afternoon we skipped over to the shore where henry almost got sucked out to sea and then burried alive.

here we are in new brunswick after an amazing ethopian feast, considering our options...

jaunting to princeton, quite the quaint townand it also has the worlds best toy store.

jain had her first water-ice/custard at ritas, and east coast institution.

onto philadelphia

where we saw the liberty bell, and caught jains boyfriend with another woman in the line for independance hall.

grabbed a philly cheesesteak at a vendor for the ride home.

la piece de resistance:

nouveau york

pizza at lombardis - americas first pizzaria

typical new york stuff:

30 rock

helpful hint:

guard your dwight poster with your life, cuz someone will want to steal it on the subway.

summer junk

2009-10-20T14:22:00.000-04:00

-here are some random shots of summer in the MC-

as promised, more photos of little beeb. sadly, most of that hair is gone and is NOT coming in blonde as i had hoped. oh well.

henry and si love looking for the pretty mantis...

siah isn't as big of a bug lover/holder as henry, sometimes he screams his really high pitched scream and runs away. and i try not to laugh out loud.

new jersey is the garden state after all, so we think it's our right to tresspass on private property to enjoy fields of sunflowers and try not to get stung by bees.

utarrrrrh

2009-10-18T20:40:00.000-04:00

tank wars set up. an intricate process.

messy siah. not enough hot air.

the horror.

the sacrificial cow.

a little squench, a little "yuh puh puh puh puh puh..."

when good cats go bad.

MEOOOOOW!

summer fun at uncle al's

IT'S A WHOPPER!

summer fun at flaming gorge

beeb hearts camping

catching straight-from-the-hatchery lunkers on flies tied to look like dog food.

(seriously)

then to muffins when they got wise.

no. sleep. till brooklyn! yay dramamine

Microsoft XBOX 360 Problems - a tale of poor customer service

2009-07-29T23:03:00.000-04:00

This is a post out of pure frastration. Our XBOX 360 is less than two years old and has been "repaired" 3 times. We have seriously spent more than 10 hours on the phone with technical support trying to explain the problem multiple times. The past two times the unit was sent for repairs, and they simply returned it telling us that nothing was wrong.....yet the problem continues. Now we are waiting for them to "call us back" aftern they speak with management. Last time they didn't call us back.

My personal recommendation is to stay away from the XBOX products. I believe in customer loyalty. Amy and I are already talking about buying a Wii.

smiley

2009-06-27T14:58:00.000-04:00

mark is half-iron

2009-06-27T14:32:00.000-04:00

last month mark did his first half-iron man triathalon. for those wondering, that's a 1.2 mile swim, 56 mile bike, and then a 13.1 mile run. people that do this are insane.

mark has been working his tail off the past year and we are so proud of him for his great accomplishment!

next year = FULL iron-man

(hopefully somewhere nice. like cozumel.)

farmoid

2009-06-27T09:24:00.000-04:00

we were heathens a few weeks ago and went to the howell living farm on sunday thinking they would be doing blacksmithing. to bad for us we were a day late, but we were practically the only people there which was a bonus. so we wandered around and did farm junk - watering horses, feeding various animals, grinding corn, gathering eggs, and avoiding the swine.

henry found this tiny turtle wandering thru the grass, he loved it in spite of the fact it would "stink" on him.

when i say "camden!" --- you say "scary!"

2009-06-26T18:20:00.000-04:00

we are so proud of our little city of camden. she has recently been bumped from her position of "murder capitol of the nation" by st. louis and now stands the proud number two. nevertheless, she does have a pretty fun aquarium which we went to a few (6?) weeks ago when the grandparents were here. really, who doesn't love an aquarium?

longwood gardens

2009-06-26T17:47:00.000-04:00

we finally made it to longwood gardens after 5 years of talking about it, and it was beautiful! they have a fantastic little childrens garden where the boys got wet from head to toe, and a great outdoor fountain you can actually play in - unlike the ny botanical gardens. in fact, i prefer longwood to nybc by a pretty big margin. i just wish it wasn't such a trek to get there.

"here josiah - let me help you..."

huge hill, perfect for rolling down

seriously cool topiary garden

soooo many opportunities to get wet

yay for fun places!

i heart my boys

2009-06-26T17:27:00.000-04:00

80 degrees outside, pouring rain.
why wouldn't you wear heavy cotton hats, mittens and scarves?

these pictures make me happy

for veena & neela!

2009-06-26T17:15:00.000-04:00

just look at these cutest outfits vie's aunties got her -
i promised weeks ago i would send them pics, and am finally fulfilling it.
thanks gals!

"rock boobies"

2009-06-26T00:58:00.000-04:00

seriously. he picked up those rocks, held them as pictured, and said

"mommy look - rock boobies!"

another classic from henry.

meet little genevieve

2009-05-01T19:35:00.000-04:00

our teeny tiny little girl has made it here - and is already a week old today. where does the time go? so to celebrate her birthday, i'm finally going to post about the whole experience. oh my, was it an experience.

but i'll start with some stats: genevieve mae spilker, born april 24 @ 4:12 am, 6 lbs 1 oz., 19 1/2 inches.

~disclaimer: this story may get long and tedious, so feel free to skip it and just look at some super cute photos of my girl. ~

on tuesday mark hopped on a plane to phoenix - no big deal, my due date was may 10 - almost three weeks away. both the boys were late, why should this one be any different? so there was no concern about him leaving. wednesday afternoon came with some pretty serious contractions and lasted until the day was over, the boys were in bed, and i was able to lay down and relax. i figured they were just some braxton-hicks because they went away once i stopped moving around, but i had called mark and told him about it and that the baby may come soon (haha). i also put my emergency labor-friend (soon-to-be-life-partner) kristin on alert in case i ended up calling her in the middle of the night. but the night passed uneventfully and thursday came, and the contractions came back with avengance - very irregular but very strong. i just kept thinking 'i have three weeks left - i can't have contractions like this every day for three more weeks!' i began to feel despair, but went through the day trying to ignore it and the contractions. that night my friend candace came over to watch the office and 30 rock and have some dinner. i was terrible company, just miserable and working my way through ever increasingly painful contractions. she went home at 10, i went right to bed thinking they would stop as soon as i lay down, but no such luck. after an hour and a half of sleeping for a few minutes and waking up to a contraction, the entire time in total denial that this could be actual labor, i started to time them. three minutes. three minutes, three minutes, three minutes. really? this really can't be happening. i didn't have anything ready, no bag, no plan for the kids, and no husband. i continued in my denial for another hour and a half convinced it wasn't real because neither of my other labors started out anything like this, but the pain finally convinced me that labor or not, i needed to go to the hospital. i finally made the call to kristin around 1 am, and called another friend katie to come and stay the night with the boys. angels, those two gals. i called mark and told him i was going to the hospital and that he needed to get a flight home, which proved to be virtually impossible, so he ended up going back to his hotel for the night. meanwhile, at the hospital, labor was in full swing and i was only at a 4. this fact made me incredibly bitter because with josiah, i was a 10 when i go there and just had to push a few times and ta-da! baby. not so this day, my friends. so two hours later, which really doesn't sound like a long time, but you moms out there know how long each second can be, with the support of my life-partner kristin had a tiny little girl to hold. and i honestly can't thank kristin enough - i really don't think i could have made it through those last 20 minutes without her. i'll forever be in her debt. i called mark to tell him we had beautiful little nameless girl, and woke him up from a peaceful slumber. the response i got was "huh?" "what?" "who is this?" he was completely out of it, it was hilarious and i'm surprised he remembered i had even called when he woke up. more amazing friends coordinated watching the boys until mark got back, and a couple of secret agents who will not identify themselves came that morning and cleaned my incredibly embarrassing filthy house (hey - i had been having contractions for two days, don't judge me). and i wish i could thank them properly and apologize for the grossness of it all, but i will have to do it here. thank you ladies! you are amazingly kind and thoughtful, and it is all very much appreciated! back at the hospital, mark finally made it at 5pm and got to meet his daughter and the boys got to meet their sister. henry is just ga-ga over her, josiah is pretty much indifferent and dad just keeps asking when she's going to get a personality. here we are, a week later and still trying to catch up of the two and a half weeks we didn't get to prepare. it has been such a blessing to have her come early, though. heavenly father knew my kids couldn't take another moment of me being the witchy mother from hell and mark having to take it as his wife. cyd, you were right, the bitchiness comes out with the placenta! yay for that! in fact, my first night home from the hospital mark said "i'm so glad to have you back!" me too, it's not easy being the grouchiest person on earth. getting a little oxygen - the nurses said she was the most un-crying baby they had seen.

tiny girl

me and my new life-partner kristin

first day home

hooray for baby girls!

day in the ditch

2009-03-21T20:11:00.000-04:00

this was the first warm day of spring. well, warm enough for me to actually go outside and play. nevertheless, it was loverly. we walked up the the crocadeli/gatormart on the corner and got some gummy aquatic fish and spent the afternoon in the drainage ditch behind the house.

and i have to say, i am a fan of the drainage ditch. at first it was a strange concept for me to grasp, (like most things in jersey) but then i began to see the beauty in it. namely:

1. no one will ever live behind us

2. it's endless fun for boys in summer (rolling down the hill) and winter (sledding down the hill)

3. now our house won't flood (knock, knock)

this is one of the favorite past times - henry picking up the heaviest rocks he can find and building retaining walls with them. then we find a gross old basket ball that's always down there and roll it down the hill in an attempt to knock over the wall. endless hours of entertainment.

hooray for the ditch!

shootah

2009-03-21T20:05:00.000-04:00

a few times a year mark and some friends from work drive out to who-knows-where and go "sporting clays" (as i've just been informed it's called). henry is a boy, he loves guns, and they're shooting at clay discs - is there really any harm in it? i vote no. i love shooting guns. i'm good at it. i encourage it. if this makes me a redneck, so be it. mostly henry got to push the button and release the clays, but i believe he got to pull off a few rounds, too. seeing him in his gear and all excited to be alive is my favorite part, though.

shaggy aquaholic in a dirty unfinished kitchen

2009-03-21T19:59:00.000-04:00

uh, from january?

2009-03-21T19:51:00.000-04:00

so what if these photos are two months old. i'm over my blogging strike and ready to share again.
the first real snow of the year and josiah just didn't know what to make of it. until he started to eat it. and then he couldn't be stopped. snow from the ground, snow from the car, snow from the street all went in his mouth. and that's all fine and good, but soon he began licking the soles of his shoes as soon as he got in the car. that was a little much for me.

harold's

2009-03-21T15:16:00.000-04:00

so mark's new job is in edison where there apparently is a "world famous" deli. his first day at work his new colleagues took him there for lunch. the waiter was told it was marks first time eating there and he actually said it was his honor to "deflower" mark. classy. anyway, this place had such an effect on mark he called me right after lunch to tell me about it. and i really couldn't believe what he was telling me until i went there myself. sandwiches twelve inches tall? an eclair a foot and a half long? world's largest pickle bar? cakes two feet tall and a foot and a half across? add beef tongue for two dollars? who ever heard of such overindulgence?! but, alas, it's all true. the mind boggles at the sight of all these things. the "big" sandwiches feed about 10 people with plenty of leftovers. mark and i got the smallest (at 13 oz) and still brought half of it home. this is a real new york style deli, and the owners credentials testify to it - claremont diner and carnegie deli namely. i had never had pastrami before, it always seemed a little off to me. but i figured this was the best time as any to try it, and my life will never be the same again. nor will i probably ever eat pastrami anywhere else but here. it was like a little bit of meaty heaven. my 32 oz root beer float (32 oz of root beer that is - ice cream and whipped cream weighed separately) was something to behold and was also mighty fine going down. so i suggest you visit the sight - http://www.haroldsfamousdeli.com/ - be sure to look at all the streaming photos on the home page for an idea of the sheer scale of the food, and then be sure to read up on the "sandwiches" menu page. it's all just so new jersey... and we slowly begin to embrace it.

Early Spring

2009-03-19T21:18:00.000-04:00

Some photos from around our yard. Winter is long enough! We try to plant early blooming plants to get started on Spring.

The daffodils just started....we'll post them next.

Sometimes Chinese New Year is February.....sometimes the Spilkers blog our Christmas in January.....it makes sense....

2009-01-25T18:31:00.001-05:00

It is about time we posted some of the family Christmas photos. My (Mark's) commentary isn't as clever as Amy's but we really need to keep family & friends from forgetting that we're still kickin' it in Jersey.

"Au naturale". Amy made ornaments out of fruit, popcorn, gingerbread.

The boys ate any gingerbread within reach. They mostly nibbled off the royal icing and crunched the cookie into the carpet. But a good time was had by all.

Amy's hubby got her a SWEET camera, so she was shooting the photos including this close-up of our German Christmas windmill.

Two Spilker-Willis household traditions. First, reindeer tracks on the porch with half-munched reindeer carrot food, and second the Christmas pajamas.

Henry scored some Lego Star Wars mini kits!

Josiah gets his very own Robot Galaxy robot with "chompers" for a left hand.

The remote control car which lasted a grand total of two hours before Henry launched it off the stairs onto the tile floor. All the King's Horses and All the King's Men tried to revive it, but it was WRECKED!

Last but not least was the biggest hit of all....Piranha Panic!!! This got the biggest reaction of all!!! A marble game....with....of course....chompers! All of the marbles (yes, every single one) were flushed down the toilet within a day.

accident prone

2009-01-02T19:40:00.000-05:00

lately, josiah has been having some safety issues. he's constantly falling down, tripping on nothing and falling off everything. are his feet growing too fast? does he have vertigo? labyrinthitis? some inner ear issue? is his head too big for his body? (this is my guess - he got marks head)

christmas eve eve we ended up in the e.r. after he fell off a child size chair and his chin met up with the vacuum. a lot of blood and 4 stitches later, he's going to have a sweet scar.

exactly a week later, right before bed, he's going up the stairs, slips and rams the tinker toy he is holding into his eye. it swelled up instantly and was bleeding and he was hysterical. he stopped crying after a while and i figured if his cornea had been cut he would still be writhing in pain and unable to open his eye, so i opted not to go to the e.r. again. which was good, because with 2 visits in a week, they probably would have called d.y.f.s.

it's a christmas miracle!

2008-12-23T21:11:00.000-05:00

it's a little girl!

mark and i are still in disbelief and shock, and i've been grinning like an idiot from ear to ear all day (except for that trip to the emergency room with josiah, i don't think i smiled much then, but that's another story - he's ok, though). so now comes the happy task of choosing a name (i'm open to suggestions), painting the bedroom and basically going on a shopping spree... none of which mark is too excited about ;)

Amy's refusal to Blog!!!

2008-12-21T10:14:00.000-05:00

Amy has flat-out refused to post a blog about our Thanksgiving vacation, so here it is, Mark's first attempt at blogging! We visited family in Utah for a couple of weeks.

We took a trip to the dinosaur museum at Thanksgiving Point in Lehi. The boys spent some quality time digging fossils......with a paintbrush.....

Henry's take on the build-your-own dinosaur exhibit? Tastes like Chikin!

Living in New Jersey I didn't know pony rides still exist, or even ponies for that matter! Rest assured Lehi has ponies....just like the wild west....even if they are chained up to a motorized carousel and compelled to walk in circles. Josiah loved it either way

Henry thought it was great too!

this. is a tree. (for krista)

2008-11-15T17:52:00.000-05:00

so ever since may, henry had wanted to be a tree for halloween (again, i don't know). and then he wanted to be a monster tree, but hated the green and black face paint, so here we just have a tree. not a great photo of it, but you get the idea: afro wig spray painted green complete with some fall foliage, birds, a nest with eggs, (imagine a green scary face instead of just this scary one), and, my favorite, a squirrel climbing on a limb - get it? a limb? har.

josiah got the shaft and was woody, although he did look pretty cute in the costume.

henry does it again.

2008-11-11T16:01:00.000-05:00

i don't know where he gets this stuff.

you asked for it

2008-10-27T15:07:00.000-04:00

due to a rash of complaints regarding the spider image on my last post, i am finally giving you something deeper, more soul stirring, and more psychologically puzzling than anything you have yet experienced here.

is it mikhail baryshnikov? could it be a voodoo curse? or perhaps a young impressionable boy who found his mothers leotard from the second grade?

search within yourselves for an explanation. i have none. ( just try to ignore the big pile of dirt in the lower left and we'll all be just fine.)

the full ensem:

fred astaire?

this last move is oh-so-very modern dance.

happy birthday henry!

2008-10-04T12:47:00.000-04:00

at least it didn't take me as long to blog about henry's birthday as it did for josiah's. that's something, i think.

THIS was definitely the highlight of his day.

he came running and yelling through the house to find me and dragged me into the living room to show me what he had found. i thought it was fake as he has tons of plastic, grossly oversized insects he likes to pretend are real and crawl and bite people (by people i mean ME). so i got up pretty close to it and breathed on it and the demon MOVED! and i screamed, so help me, i screamed like a little girl. understand, the picture does not do this heinous creation of nature justice. it was a good three inches long from front leg to back leg - i have never seen a spider this big NOT in a little glass box at the zoo before. i managed to cover it up with a glass and made mark deal with it when he got home. henry was beside himself when i realized mark was going to flush it, so they did the humane (i think not) thing and let it go outside. really though, that spider made his year.

as we had just returned from our trip to florida the night before, his birthday was also pretty low key. he had some friends over and got a few gifts and had a spider-man ice cream cake.

he didn't even notice there were no balloons - thank you mr. spider under a glass!!

land of the fat and the home of the trashy

2008-10-04T11:39:00.000-04:00

yes! orlando! who knew, right?

mark had an annual convention there this year. i just find myself wondering what happened to the exotic locations like puerto rico, cancun, hawaii and the bahamas... i guess orlando, atlanta and san diego are where we go from now on. not that i'm complaining. really.

we had a great time in the orlando and don't think we need to return anytime soon.

one afternoon was spent in the fountain at the mall across the street. generally i'm a little o.c.d. when it comes to water and clothing and avoid it at all costs. but it was three thousand degrees outside and we didn't have anything else to do, so why not. they spent about 2 hours and only gave up because they kept slipping and falling on their rears (or buttocks, as henry now refers to them). hey, all i had to do was sit and watch and really, that was all the energy i could muster at the time.

most of the following photos were taken in the last two days when we had mark with us. i've found it's tricky to take photos when you are the only adult with multiple kids. the boys and i did go to sea world, the animal kingdom and disneyland (or the magic kingdom if you want to be all technical - i just hate calling it that) but really don't have much to show for it. for several reasons. but all the good stuff happened with mark, so: onto the highlights

GATORLAND!!

wow, i mean, what can you say about gatorland?! it was so white trash and so very cool all at the same time. we started out small with the baby nile crocodile and baby gator, and then moved on to bigger and better things.

gator wrestling, anyone?

henry ponders: hmmm, i think i could do that...

yes! i can do that! i knew it wasn't hard...
yeah, i totally dominated that gator.

DISNEYLAND (aka magic kingdom-gag)
these two boys lavaed the teacups and after multiple rides, henry even threw up.

that's a sure sign you've had a good time.

but who knew it was a topless ride? huh.
mark took henry on the splash mountain and the big thunder mountain, both of which he hated (surprise) but not quite as much as he hated space mountain.
it was really entertaining watching henry eat this ice cream bar.

examine, bite. examine, bite.
examine,
bite.
the kids had the best time, and henry cried and cried when we told him we had to leave. if he had the choice, he would live in a hotel forever and go swimming everyday just to make new friends. josiah really was there with us, i think he made it into a few pictures...

monkey's two!*

2008-09-14T20:20:00.000-04:00

i can't believe this guy is two already. i still call him 'the baby', maybe i'm just in denial my sweet little monkey is growing up. despite that, or maybe because of it, his birthday was pretty low-key. just some cup cakes and a few presents. cup cakes? yes, amy totally slacked this year and didn't do anything even remotely creative (unless you count silver cup cake papers creative). sorry little si, i promise i'll do better next year!

here's the general excitement over fire:

and the obligatory excitement over frosting

and then the expected reaction of: 'i'm not gonna eat this junk. i don't like sweets. i only like nutella and goldfish. so i'm just gonna smash this box-mix cup cake. and i'm gonna love it.'

sweet automoblox ... maybe more for me than him?

i was pretty excited to find yo gabba gabba stuff at target. i should have bought muno and stopped there.

only then i saw the dancey dance mat and thought how cute it would be to watch him shake it...
if only i had known how incredibly irritating it would be...

since it was such a slacker birthday on my part, we didn't even have balloons. this fact really really bothered henry as he feels no celebration is complete without them. so, being his fathers son, he took matters into his own hands and made his own balloons for josiah... which was incredibly sweet and cute.

*2 weeks ago, anyway.

cape cod II

2008-08-16T20:13:00.001-04:00

once again, mark had to go to boston for a few days and rather than stay home, we tagged along for a mini-vacation to the cape before a few days in the city. this time we stayed in hyannis which isn't a great place it's self, but pretty central and has larger stores that we ended up needing for shoes, fans, whatnot and whathaveyou. we spent most of our time at the harbor in brewster again and i'm convinced we need to buy a house there. mark can commute to boston everyday - it's only an hour, right?

we took the ferry to nantucket for the day to have lunch with marks boss and his family who were vacationing there. the boat ride over was big excitement for the kids who ran laps the entire time. both ways. mark was not thrilled about chasing after them, but josiah is going through a 'daddy' phase and generally doesn't want anything to do with me. it's fine with me because henry is still, and always has been, in the 'mommy' phase. it's definitely dads turn.

henry took this one, aren't we pretty.
the shore in nantucket was full of shells and henry thought he was in heaven. until he had to walk on them with bare feet.

henry and his first sour patch kid. classic.

ice cream in brewster after a great day in the water. just look at that mischievous face.

walking on a trail at the cape cod national seashore. if you're ever there, you must go to the visitors center and see the educational film 'the sands of time' which is at least 40 years old.

we all love treasure hunting in the harbor and found some pretty cool stuff this time.

amy having some much needed alone time

we found this big horseshoe crab and two others. mating. what is it with nature?
little starfish
henry found this big old shell with a starfish on it. and in his other had are about 5 sea snails he just couldn't part with.

we found plenty of crabs, which josiah now calls (as he runs the other way) 'bite you!'

goodbye, fair beauties!

2008-08-16T19:44:00.000-04:00

after 5 years, we finally did it and purged our lives of the all-consuming, time-and-money-sucking orchids. all but two, anyway. since mark has started training and spends most of his spare time on a bike, in a pool or running, they began to suffer from the neglect. why couldn't i do something as easy as water them you may ask. and i'd reply: have you ever met my boys? that should be enough of an explanation. honestly, i feel liberated. a huge weight has been lifted of my shoulders. they were always there, nagging and taunting me to take care of them. but i was strong and didn't give in. bless freecycle. all 20 of them were gone in an hour. never, ever underestimate the power of the word FREE.

the coldplay: we went. we saw. it kicked arse.

2008-08-16T18:47:00.000-04:00

seriously, i'm in love with those 4 boys. and mark knows it. so it was a good thing the concert was so amazing and he could at least appreciate the infatuation. here he is bored, waiting for the lights to go down with a foot sticking out of his ear.
and us looking oh-so-lovingly at each other. still waiting...for those of you still waiting for the show, i won't give away all the special treats they have in store for you. you can use your imagination and hope you have a lucky seat.
they're coming back to philly in november, and i may just have to go again...

happy birthday marky-mark!

2008-07-13T22:33:00.000-04:00

my sleepy husband is 37 today, much to his dismay. he is such an amazing, caring, hardworking, brilliant, handy, loving and crazy boy. i really couldn't live without him.

mark you win the prize for great husbandry and fatherness -

we love you so much!

fyi - those shorts that mark's wearing that were almost too small in this photo? basically fall off him now - way to go sleeps!

brothers getting along

2008-07-13T22:22:00.000-04:00

we just got a new grill to replace the old one that had basically disintegrated from the inside out. how does this happen? i don't understand. at any rate, the boys loved playing in the big boxes it came in, i just love it when they get along & play together like best friends. i thought this was so sweet, my boys sitting in a box, sharing a bag of target popcorn.

lovin the henster

2008-07-06T21:00:00.000-04:00

henry and the tower of power - he has become the stacking king, but the best part for him is still knocking it down - something i don't think boys ever grow out of.

this is what happens when you leave a new package of play-doh out on the counter at night and have a kid that sneaks downstairs in the morning to scavange for food. then dad comes down (it's saturday morning, so where mom is needs no explination) and joins in the action and you end up with spikey killer play-doh people and beasts. i'm kind of sad i missed out on this one, but sleeping in until nine thirty was sooooooo dreamy.

i love that wink on his cute face.

do girls do this too?

2008-06-29T21:59:00.000-04:00

is being outside, naked, making mud pits and sitting in them just a boy thing?

or do girls participate in such shenanigans, too?

henry always goes outside fully dressed and 9 times out of 10, moments later , he is naked as a jay bird, up to some kind of craziness.

what a boy, oh my. what a boy.

the cape of cods

2008-06-15T22:12:00.001-04:00

mark's company just bought a business outside of boston and so he's been going up every couple of weeks to babysit them. so this time, the boys and i tagged along and went up a few days early and stayed on the cape in a great little town on the harbor side named brewster. we stayed here on our honeymoon, so it's a little sentimental and cheesy, but it's a nice place regardless.

on this particular day, i told henry we would be in the car for a long time and he should take a nap. so what did he do? this. it was awesome.

the tide was waaaay out and we walked and walked around the harbor finding crabs, shrimp, sea bass, sea shells, snails and flounder. it is the best place for little kids because the water is shallow and there are no waves and plenty to search for.

down the showh

2008-06-15T21:21:00.000-04:00

finally, after a week of the stomach flu, a week in ocean city, a week of recuperation, a few days in cape cod, another few near concord & lexington, three days baby shower prep, a day of baby shower, and a father's day i am finally up to blogging again! so only a month overdue are a few pictures of our fun-filled week in ocean city. for some reason, blogger won't let me move my photos around, so bear with me here as there's no rhyme or reason to the order of them.

here are all the cute daddys taking their cute kids out into the freezing water for a little wave action.

ohhh to be a boy.

josiah had the time of his life at the beach digging and splashing and running after sand crabs, balls, and kids.

matt, phil and mark finished their first triathlon - way to go boys!

the henster on the boardwalk: excited to be there yet hesitant to go on any rides...

think henry loves the water?

some very happy, very fun kids.

all in all, a spectacular time was had by all. there was plenty of guitar hero, rock band, poker, 4 gigantic puzzles, poker, poker and more poker, and loads of yum-o food. there was even a decent mexican place which made my tummy soooo happy. fun place, fun friends, kids to keep all the kids entertained, AND, amazingly, we got our whole deposit back from the house! woo-hoo! a miracle!

i could just eat this boy up

2008-05-06T11:09:00.000-04:00

i'm such a sucker for onesies - babies just look so darn cute in them.

henry rocks the casbah

2008-04-25T19:06:00.000-04:00

henry has proven himself to be a rock-star of the highest degree. here he is with teeth freshly cleaned from the dentist - and STRAIGHT because it's the 6 month anniversary since he officially stopped sucking his thumb. i really couldn't be much prouder. also, you will notice the spoils from his completion of the responsibility/goal chart he has been working on for the past few months. that stop whining goal was a doozy and took a loooooong time to finish. but he did it and chose spidey-with-glow-in-the-dark-web and venom-with-4-web-shots as his rewards. this kid kicks my butt and i love love love him!

here is the chart we use - for you veena and anyone else looking for a good one. it's made by melissa & doug. i found ours at the local nice toy store, but there are plenty on-line. for you utahners - i'm sure red balloon or babinskis has them or can order you one.

teenie tiny ones

2008-04-22T11:38:00.000-04:00

i'm so glad i finally hung up our bird house, and just in time for egg-laying season! we have
6 little chickadees growing inside. the eggs are so little - about the size of my thumb nail and shiny white speckled with reddish-orange dots.

chickadees are my favorite little birds and i'm so excited to see them emerge from their home.

to those interested:

2008-04-21T19:30:00.001-04:00

the sweat test was negative! hooray!

grand day out: part II

2008-04-20T20:38:00.000-04:00

yesterday we trekked to the nybg. again. and THIS time there were 188 photos to show for it so i guess you could say the day was a fantastic success. the sun was shining, it was warm, and my oh my, there were blooms and blossoms to spare. i have to give the east credit for it's spring-time beauty. i don't think there are many places on earth where there are so many blooming trees in sheer number or variety. it's something that i genuinely love about here... and that's saying something, don't you think?

we started out the day in the hot house looking at tropical and desert plants. i don't think i'll post the flowers photos on this blog, but you can go here and see them soon. part of the building was closed for show preparation and we got detoured to the back of the building where the boys were delighted to find a big pool with ducks and koi they could go splash in and touch the fish.

here are my boys in a magnolia tree - that face on josiah just kills me.

this is the worlds largest blooming cherry tree (not really but it's a giant, anyway) with the all the boys and then 2 boys and a mom.

this is a sneak peak at daffodil hill with two of my favorite people in the whole world.

and here is my other favorite boy. don't you love that hill?! i just want to go lay down in the middle of all those flowers and day dream.

big boss scooby

2008-04-19T21:02:00.000-04:00

little monkey likey flowers

2008-04-19T00:39:00.000-04:00

grand day out

2008-04-13T13:34:00.000-04:00

yesterday we drove up to the new york botanical gardens to see the daffodils and blooming magnolia trees, unfortunately we were about a week too early and there wasn't much to see. but the boys loved being outside and running around and climbing on rocks and throwing stuff in the river; like the hubcaps, action figures, and broken beer bottles that had washed up on shore. nice. and i did get a few ranuculus to plant in the yard, i'm so excited! so with nothing to see, we decided to walk down the street to the bronx zoo. it's maybe 3/4 mile down the street from the garden, but that 3/4 mile is like night and day from one place to the next. it's kind of sketchy walking to the zoo and trying to find the entrance, it looks like a fenced in, boarded up condemned bio-hazard site. (wow, i'm making this sound nice, aren't i ?)

once we were inside, the zoo was pretty nice and you almost forgot you were in the bronx. that is until you look up over the fence at the projects (ok, they aren't the projects, but like i would know the difference.) to the woman yelling at us from the roof of her apartment building saying "look at all dem white folks" that's the one phrase i did catch, but believe me - there were plenty more. maybe it was a convalescent home? (and she was the bronx version of 'old yeller' - what do you think meme and mark? maybe they are related?) anyway, it was a pretty unconventional unkempt, but i'm sure it will look much nicer once the trees have leaves on them. but in a way that was nice. i was almost like you were out on safari and the lion would just have to jump a chain-link fence to eat you alive. fun! it did have it's stars, though. they have a building called the house of darkness and it's full of nocturnal animals and bugs and, my very favorite, bats. i honestly wasn't sure i could go in, but i decided to face my fears since henry told me that he wasn't scared of bats and that they are nice. and i did fine looking at the sleeping ones in the trees, but then we got to the exhibit with hundreds of them flying around and another exhibit with some climbing/crawling on trees and that's when i lost it. it gives me the creeps just thinking about it. flying rodents with pointy ears, hooked claws on the end of their wings that eat blood and sleep upside down, are you kidding me? what about that isn't creepy?! i made it out alive, and henry and mark thought it was the best part of any zoo they had ever been to. we also saw a male peacock courting, which was amazing. they put up their tails, as we have all seen them do, and they have these shorter gray feathers behind them that also stand up and make a fan, and then they make them vibrate which makes this buzzing sound as they hit the other feathers. AND i saw 2 mallard ducks mating one hen. at the same time. yes, yes, nature at it's finest.

this was on the way TO the gardens - i tried to capture the grumpy furrowed brow he was sporting, but it's hard to see.

and here is henry riding a camel at the zoo. i love the face on that girl. classic.

can you believe they still do this? i'll be honest though. i loved riding the elephants at hogle zoo when i was little. i just thought it had been outlawed by now...

this was the only photo we took at the zoo - how lame are we?!

faces

2008-04-09T12:02:00.001-04:00

josiah has entered the terrible 2's about as early as henry did, and mark and i are almost deef already. when little si was a wee babe he had a serious set of lungs that could make screams and shrieks a person his size shouldn't have been able to make. seriously, i didn't know babies could scream that loud. it's was mind-boggling. but after a few months the screaming abated and all that was left was a quiet, content little boy.
enter 18 months. the shriek has returned with avengeance. my even tempered boy has gone the way of the dodo and in it's place a clingy, screamy, needy baby has formed. it's a good thing he's so damn cute. (and that i have ear plugs)
here is henry rockin' to motab on his home-made guitar. really, there was conference music playing in the back ground. that is a pretty sweet guitar his dad made for him, though. henry is a completely different boy than he was even a year ago. 4 years old is a magic number in the maturity of kids. i guess he and josiah have swapped personalities... the scream should stop in a few months, though. right?
rock on, henry. rock on.

baby henry

2008-04-05T04:37:00.000-04:00

i must be feeling nostalgic tonight... i mean this morning.
here is cute cute baby henry.
what ever happened to those curls???

i'm delirious (did i even spell that right?)

2008-04-05T04:33:00.000-04:00

so what if it's 4:30 in the morning and i'm sitting here looking through all our photos?
i guess i kind of deserve it after drinking a liter of diet coke today.
at least i'm not alone - josiah has been up talking to himself for at least 3 hours - does this kid ever sleep?

anyway, i had to share this one of mark and little henry at the getty, i think it's perfect.

words ending in -oir always sound nicer.

2008-04-05T04:20:00.000-04:00

i was just looking through my photos and thought everyone would get a laugh out of this one from berlin

easter!

2008-03-26T18:22:00.000-04:00

easter has come and gone again? didn't we just have one about two months ago? i guess the big difference this year was that josiah was up and at-em, ready to find and throw as many eggs as possible... and why not? i've chillaxed quite a bit since henry was this age. it took me a while to realize it, but sometimes you just have to let "it" go, whatever "it" may be at the time. otherwise i would go crazy, as in looney, as in nuts-day-out, padded cell, drooling crazy.

it was really a blast to see these two boys together, henry has turned into a stellar big brother. he loves to help josiah and is great (most of the time) at sharing and guiding him and keeping him out of danger. henry can crack joisah up like no one else. it's hysterical to hear them laughing together when they get going. it's that infectious-make-your-face-hurt laugh. the funny thing is that they have the exact same laugh, and you can't tell them apart at that point, i love it.

can they get any cuter? gosh, i love these kids!

100th post

2008-03-16T14:25:00.000-04:00

these balloons are from our wards enrichment night rs birthday party. i tried and tried to pawn them off on countless people, but they all laughed at my scheme and said 'these aren't going to MY house.' in other words, 'good luck with that, amy.' so they came home with me and provided a few laughs until the boys began biting them at which point they received the scissor treatment. that would be the balloons, not the boys.