Days with Auntie Dee

My sister Danielle saved me yesterday and came in to watch the Kiera Rita for the day while I worked!! They had THE best time together, laughing, playing, went to the park, tired her out SO much that she took a THREE hour nap in the afternoon!!! I need her here every single day!! It's so sad that we live an hour and a half away from each other because I would really like to be right on top of her all the time :) I'm stealing the boys for a week in August whether she likes it or not...she thinks a week is too long for ME! But I can't wait!! I have so many plans and am so excited for it! She's been THE best Aunt to Kiera. She's made a conscious effort to be here at least once a month for a weekend so that Kiera will know her and I love that! She doesn't let me do anything while she's here...which I also love :) She cooks, cleans, takes complete care of Kiera...and I put my feet up hahaha...I miss her already!!!

My Little Walker...aka Calamity Jane!

Kiera is our little walker right now! She's up and about and I love about 99.9% of it! I'm so happy that today at the park I didn't have to worry about her having to crawl through the wood chips, she can walk to the front door so I can lug all of our crap, and walking back and forth entertains her for hours on end :)

However, the down side is the attempts at running and then falling. She's so banged up, I feel awful. Every time I turn around she's bumping into things or falling face first into something. She's such an amazing baby though with the best disposition and everything bounces right off of her...not literally unfortunately...but emotionally, yes.

I'm so hoping that this weekend stays nice and clear and hot so we can go to the beach! We have our music class on Saturday and Molly and Rae Ann will be coming with me, so I'm excited for them to see Kiera in action! They'll love it! And Sunday Sean and I are hoping to get to Island Beach State Park again before Danielle comes. Here's to hoping...

I'm off to my 2nd to last day of work tomorrow morning, so off to bed I go!

Daddy Daughter Day!

Sunday was our 2nd Annual Daddy-Daughter Day! We had such a great time, despite the fact that Little Miss had a runny nose, a HUGE molar popping through her gums and a low grade fever because of it! We headed off to Jenkinsons for an afternoon of cloudy weather (but NO rain yet) fun!!

We took Kiera to the aquarium first and she absolutely LOVED it! She would stand on the little shelf in front of the tanks and watch the fish with such innocence and enthusiasm. Those fish are funny...it's like they know that you're watching and come right up to you! She thought it was awesome. She wasn't into the sharks, but loved the coral reef fish...bright colors :) They had the biggest puffer fish I've EVER seen and it scared the hell out of me.

Then we took her to go on some rides. She had such fun on the carousel and loved the Dumbo ride...although Sean's stomach did not. Sean got on all the rides for free, so he was the designated ride guy. Finally, we had a really nice lunch at the Tiki Bar.

Today was the last day of school so I have eight weeks off with my peanut and I'm super excited about it! I just hope that the weather improves because I am completely over this rain! I have so many plans and none of them include RAIN!

My sister Danielle is coming down on Sunday to watch Kiera for me on Monday while I wrap up some curriculum work and I'm super excited to see her! She is THE MOST AMAZING Sister and Aunt and I'm so blessed to have her in my life. She's always made it her business to get down here, but since Kiera's been born she's really made it her business to be down here! I cannot even begin to explain the feelings I get when I see them together...Kiera just adores her...and the boys (her very first cousins). To think of not having both of my sisters in my life is painful...I hope they know how grateful I am to have them in my life...and Kiera's life, especially.

Quick Update on Our 14 Month Old!

Kiera is currently walking/running/falling all by herself :) She's been on the go for a little over a week now and it's super exciting! I love to see her "drunken" waddle all over. She tries to hold things while walking which is always fun. She's such a lovey dovey when she wants to be...kisses, hugs, laughing...but she can switch quite quickly to the big frown and crying. Sigh. But normally she's overwhelmingly happy and we can't get enough of it.

I'll be off for the summer starting next week and it can't come soon enough! I'm so lucky to have a job that allows me to spend so much time at home with my family. I'm very much hoping, however, that this recent rain STOPS! The weekends have been mostly clear, so that's great, but the weeks have been unbearable! I cannot believe how much it's rained this month. I want to be able to take Kiera for long walks, to the beach, to the park and outside in general. We bought her a baby pool and water table for the deck and I want to be able to actually use them.



This weekend is Father's Day...Yea! Kiera and I got Daddy the best present :) Saturday night is also "date night" for Sean and I. We're so hoping that the rain will not dampen our plans to eat at our favorite outdoor restaurant. Our neighbor's daughter comes over to sit on our couch and watch the monitor for twoish hours and it's joyful! Kiera's a very good sleeper...usually 7 to 7 or later...so Brianna usually has a great night of movies to look forward to :)

This has nothing to do with Kdog...except maybe her future...

I'm not usually a cause-head...those people make me INSANE and FRUSTRATED...but after seeing Oprah's Earth Day special so many weeks ago, my kids at school, whom I showed clips of the Great Pacific Garbage Patch to, have been psycho about recycling....so here's just a little update about what we've been looking into.

I don't know if you were unaware like we were, but plastic water bottle tops, and other twist on caps, cannot be recycled by most recycling plants! Not only that, but they can create a hazardous environment for the workers in the plants. They can cause the bottles to explode in the machines or they can jam them. I feel like I've been really trying to do my part and some of my part has now been negated...so sad. So make sure that you take the tops off of ANY bottle that you recycle...shampoo, laundry detergent, milk containers, etc. Look into your local recycling rules and whether or not they'll take the caps with your recycling or if you have to throw them in the regular trash. But either way, take them off your bottles!

Here's some information about bottle caps:

http://environment.about.com/od/recycling/a/plastic_lids.htm

My kids and I have been looking into things that we can do with our bottle caps. There are the obvious ones like use them to create a game or crafts, but how many games can you make out of the hundreds of caps we collect a week...and we have been collecting them. So one of my kids found a website from Aveda Haircare and they will collect your bottle caps and recycle them back into shampoo bottles! I'm enrolling my school for September, the Intermediate School already does it, and I'm so excited about it!

Here's the website just in case you or your place of work wants to get involved!

http://aveda.aveda.com/aboutaveda/caps.asp

And some fun ideas of what to do with them if you don't want to throw them away or get involved with Aveda:

http://www.ehow.com/how_2186733_recycle-bottle-caps.html

The Pugs Formally Known As My Kids...

Let me preface this blog by saying that I love my animals...all freaking four of them :) However, they are driving me up the WALL!! To go through the laundry list of nonsense that I have to deal with on a daily basis would take forever, but here are some of the highlights from just this past week...

• Molly and Rae Ann were over for dinner and we were eating in the dining room. We kept watching the dogs go up and down the stairs...clue to something being up...so I dash upstairs to find poop in the hallway and pee all over the shower curtain!!! WHAT??? They're seven and five!! They are outside all the time!!
• I brought animal crackers to the beach in a zip lock bag...you know where this is going...Kiera didn't eat them all, so in the beach bag they stayed. I come home from a walk to find the beach bag torn apart, the zip lock bag in shreds, and no animal crackers. Sigh.
• Yesterday I'm playing with Kiera in the living room and the dogs are futzing in the kitchen. All of a sudden I hear a rustling sound like they have paper...but that's not the case, Luke has THREE diapers that he managed to fish out of the garbage. I can't win!
• Finally, I don't have a whole lot of time or energy to vacuum, vacuum, vacuum...but last night I vacuumed for over a half an hour getting every last piece of animal annoyance that I can off the carpet in the living room...what do I come home to today you ask?? Poop on the carpet...not only do they enjoy pooping during the day (after I've let them out twice before I go to work in the morning) but they DIG in it...Nice, right??

Maybe some of those things are my fault...like leaving the cookies in the bag and the bag in reach of the pugs...but the others?? What else can I do??

And don't get me started on the cats! Sera hides out in the basement because she hates the dogs...I wonder why...and if we let her up at night, she scratches up the carpet so badly that we can't get it back to normal. This with every scratching post I can find showered with cat nip which she loves...Leia, well Leia, she's a pee-er...and if you've ever smelled cat pee, you wouldn't forget it. We can forgive Leia just a smidge because she has very bad back legs and has since she was a kitten...but she's constantly peeing out of the litter box...and sometimes will just be lazy and go on the floor...it's overwhelmingly gross. Our downstairs bathroom in covered in wee-wee pads like we have a puppy or she'll pee all over the floor.

Honestly, I just can't take it anymore! I'm ready to lock them all in one cage and let them work it all out themselves. Who would have thought that I would have to deal with this crap with two cats who are nine, and pugs who are no longer puppies. It's so frustrating! It's funny too because if we had stuck to one cat and one dog it would have been Leia and Luke...the worst of the four of them. Sera, other than the scratching is a great cat and Bella is wonderful too...most of the time...so I would've been SOL anyway :)

And believe you me...they get attention! They're always with us, Luke right now is laying with me and my left arm is resting on his back as I type. They also still sleep with us...which I wish with everything in me that I never started. He was just so damn cute as a puppy. Urg.

On the upside...Kiera loves them. She kisses them constantly, laughs when they play, and is getting really good at giving them pets. I also enjoy petting them and watching them do silly pug things. I wish it could always be like that...