Some serious catch up

Don't be fooled, folks. This is not an actual catch up post, but rather me acknowledging that it has to happen. 

So much has happened. Easton turned 19 months old, and then 20 months old. Lane and I celebrated 13 years of marriage, I had a birthday, Gabriela turned 5 and had a super fun rainbow birthday party. Oh and we moved the following weekend. Our first week here Gabriela has had summer camp in Alameda. So we have been trying to unpack with two kiddos, while shuttling them around, Gabriela is worn out from camp and Easton hasn't been napping as regularly. Life is like a whirlwind these days.  I am hoping to get caught up one of these days 

July

July started with our offer being accepted on our house. We spent a lovely 4th of July weekend in Santa Barbara with Lane's brother Ian and his wonderful family. We hit the beach, the pool, bbq'd, had a great view of the fireworks, went to the drive-in, and got frozen yogurt. As usual, Gabriela spent every waking and not waking moment at her cousins' sides and we hardly saw her the entire trip. Although I did catch a glimpse of her in a fashion show in the living room one afternoon. 

The rest of the month basically flew by. Our loan and the inspections all cleared, and we closed in 3 weeks. This meant I was going all over town getting boxes and packing up our whole apartment while entertaining two kiddos. Thank goodness for totally awesome friends who watched Gabriela for the entire day a few times so I could get stuff done. 

Somehow, we made it down to Gilroy also and had a lovely dinner with Noal and Elizabeth and then spent the following day with grandma and grandpa at Gilroy gardens. We also got in some visit time with Grandma Chaney. 

We signed the papers for the house on my birthday. We also had a fun bday dinner including Cynthia and Dan (so glad they are on the west coast now), Matthew and Banu, and Theresa and Andrew. Theresa baked me a cake even. I love my family. Somehow, we were able to get seated at our favorite restaurant, Burma Superstar. While we waited to be seated, the kids made faces and acted goofy to the couple dining on the window. Danny Glover sweetly smiled and entertained their need for attention before I shooed them away. 

The next night my totally awesome sisters came back to watch the kids so lane and I could go on a date. I'm not really sure what those are anymore. We went to a totally decadent dinner hosted by Lane's work where I surprised myself by successfully engaging in adult conversation. Who knew I still had it in me?

There is nothing like moving one weekend before throwing a birthday party. Gabriela requested a rainbow bday party this year. I tried to keep it simple and it was a hit. We had rainbow fruits and rainbow veggies, rainbow cupcake papers for our vanilla cupcakes with strawberry whipped cream frosting and rainbow sprinkles. We gave out rainbow watercolor paint sets and rainbow crayons and called it a day. There were easily over 40 people there. There I go, keeping things "simple".

On our anniversary we got the keys to our new house, lucky 13, baby. We had a family picnic dinner on the floor in our empty house and went home to pack. 

The next thing I knew, our apartment was empty, we had two 14 foot uhaul trucks filled to the brim and then emptied again in our new place. We had quite the (totally awesome) moving crew. 

Thank you Cynthia, Dan, Matthew, Banu, Grandpa, Nate, Heather and Serkan. 

We are nearly unpacked but haven't yet hung anything on the walls.  Things don't seem to be slowing down either. 

House Hunting

Wow, we hardly have any pictures recently of our fun adventures, but have we got a ton of photos of houses we have been looking at.  House hunting with two kids is no joke, people. But it can be fun, when this is your partner in the search:

We decided that we would start looking for a home to buy a couple months ago.  We have made several offers on places, and on more than one occasion, someone swooped in with all cash offers, beating us out for the win.

It has been frustrating and so incredibly time consuming.  Sometimes, we were wondering if we were just wasting our time because it felt like we couldn't compete. 

Seriously, who has hundreds of thousands of dollars in cash? Not me. One house we bid on had, get ready for it, 71 offers. And a lady I know just found her house after searching for more than a year and making about 30 offers on different homes. Sometimes I wondered whether it was worthwhile to be spending my precious time scouring home listings and rushing my family around if we didn't even have a chance.  

We have made six offers on different homes.  Our most recent attempts were two offers made in two days. After the first one was one was rejected, we decided it was time to get serious and made a huge list of places we wanted to see ASAP.  

When I got a call from our realtor that evening, I was certain he was calling to discuss our upcoming home touring marathon plan. In all honesty, I didn't think we had a chance on that second offer and had completely pushed it out of my mind.  Imagine my surprise when he congratulated me because our offer was accepted!  I was actually shocked. He said the realtor (who was selling his parents home) and his sisters selected our offer because of the letter I had written to accompany our offer. It was a sweet sappy letter about our family and how right the home felt for us and all the things we pictured doing with the place. Yay!

Lane hasn't seen it yet. So yeah, we need to make that happen. But he told his mom, "happy wife, happy life!" Our inspection is scheduled for Monday and everything looks like it is going well on the loan side of things. So everyone keep your fingers crossed and think good thoughts for us. 

20 months old and 21 months old too

So Easton turned 20 and the 21 months old. This has been two months of insane language development for him. In June, he started calling both his aunties and uncles  Annu. Now he calls any nice lady I am talking to Annu. It must be so confusing with all the aunties he has, lucky guy. 

Easton also started calling all dogs Abby. We met two dogs with that name so it just stick for him. 

At 20 months, Easton told me one day, "Hey Mommy, that mine!" And his other most frequently used phrase is iwannmore.  this was the month that Easton started repeating just about anything we said,  giraffe, nice, yes, hippo, octopus. And he started calling Gabriela aye-yah-yah. 

If we knew what Easton was talking about last month, he would clearly say yes. Like this:

E: bah-bo, bah-Bo! (On the way to Costco)

Me: are you saying Costco????

E: yesssssss 

This month it is full on sentences. 

Mama, Iwannmore milk peeese 

I want mama back!!!

I touch mama!

He also says his name now. Easton calls himself , "eeny" it is so cute!

The sentences include telling on Gabriela, much to her dismay:

Aye-yah-yah! Owl shoes back!

He even talks in his sleep sometimes! He other night, Easton said, "no! My peach!"

Easton is constantly stringing words together. 

Blue sky

Baby owl

Eeny nice

I watch 

And he knows and properly names things that are the colors blue, brown, orange, yellow, green, purple, pink, and black. 

Some of his signs have been replaced with words, but he still signs where, popcorn, and sorry and cold, maybe a few others. 

This language development business is fascinating. 

Easton loves to drive the car. So much that for a while, every time we entered the car there was a fit because he really (really, really, really) wanted a turn driving.  

Los Banos Fair

Nana and Papa invited us down to Los Banos to attend the fair in May so we packed our bags and hit the road for some fun adventures with Nana and Papa and Auntie Theresa and Andrew. 

Easton and Andrew loves riding the tractors.   

There was a cute children's exhibit on farming with lots of activities. 

Of course, we went to the petting zoo. Here is Easton discovering that, yes, goats have eyes. 

Gabriela adored the tiny goats. 

There was a baby cow too. But perhaps the strangest animals in the farm petting zoo were the camel and the zebra. Yes, you read that correctly. The camel was huge and Easton was not at all interested in going near him. 
He did, however, enjoy the doves and the chickens with auntie Theresa. 

Andrew went in this crazy harness contraption connected to a giant trampoline and practically jumped into the trees. He had a blast. 

We sat down and enjoyed a snack while he wowed us with his mad jumping skills. 

And then we watched the Mexican folklorico dancers do their thing. Gabriela was mesmerized by ther twirling colorful dresses. She kept asking me to take photos of each different dancing group and I happily obliged. 

At the end, volunteer got to go dance on stage with the performers. Of course, Andrew and Gabriela jumped on that opportunity. Unfortunately, we didn't have a good view of Gabriela, but Andrew was up front and loving every second of it. 

We ended our afternoon of fun with some kettle corn and a round of rides on the Ferris wheel. 

Nana, Andrew and Gabriela all took pictures in the photo booth. I will have to upload those pics too. They are super cute!

Thanks for thinking of us Nana, we had a wonderful time together with you at the fair!

Gabriela's Preschool Graduation

Well, Gabriela is finished with preschool - forever!  Her graduation was at the end of May.  It was pretty cute.  The kids lined up and came outside to the tune of Pomp and Circumstance and their little graduation caps.  Gabriela was making all kinds of funny faces. 

 Here she is with her teachers after receiving her certificate.

 There is a group photo of all the kids on the other side of the certificate. I just love the expression on Gabriela's face as she checks out her classmates in the photo.

Gabriela grew so much and adored every second of her two years of preschool.  She had some fun field trips, awesome activities, she learned some Spanish and some tennis, and made a lovely group of friends. 

19 months old

So, I didn't post right when Easton turned 19 months old.  It's been busy around here (I feel like I am always giving that excuse). Easton loves to do the laundry.  He will put an entire load of laundry in the washing machine.  It's not nearly as fast as when I do it, because his style involves only one article of clothing at a time, and there are sometimes numerous attempts before it actually goes in the washing machine.  But after each sock or shirt, he runs back to the clothes, asking for more.  I love having a little helper!

 

Easton wants to be a big boy so he tries swinging in the big boy swing now.

His hair is getting so long!   Easton knows how to rock a mullet and some wild bed-head.  It's almost time for a haircut.  I just know he will look so different so I am procrastinating as long as possible before getting the big boy haircut.

Easton loves playing in the water. He is often caught leaning precariously on the edge of the toilet to wash his hands or brush his teeth.  The tooth brushing thing is a little ironic, because while he adores brushing his own teeth, Easton thinks having someone else brush his teeth is an act of torture.  Gabriela was like this too.  I am hoping he will come around soon.