This is by far my most favorite holiday, and to spend it in our new home was almost too much excitement for me to handle! We did our Elf on the Shelf, baked cookies for all our neighbors, visited Santa, drank plenty of hot cocoa and eggnog, watched all the Christmas movies we could and just had an amazing holiday.
Christmas Eve was very exciting at our house, the kids knew what was coming the next day and it was sweet to watch them talk to each other throughout the day telling each other to be "good because Santa is coming tonight" :D But really the whole month of December was filled with fun and it really just flew by too quickly.
One thing in particular that Alyssa really enjoyed doing with me was the cookies for our neighbors. I really wanted to get an opportunity to introduce ourselves to our neighbors, and what better time than the holiday season? I'm not a baker AT ALL, don't really enjoy it because it's such a science that you can't afford to make a mistake because it will affect the outcome; yet my little helper reminded me it was supposed to be fun and she was right. We ended up enjoying baking sugar cookies from scratch, and decorating them. Even though AJ managed to cause a few accidents, we successfully baked and decorated them and walked our street giving them out to our neighbors.
I really did take an insane amount of pictures throughout the month of December, but I'll only share our Christmas morning ones on this post. ;) Back to Christmas Eve, the kids behaved wonderfully and as all kids do, they went to sleep without a fight on Christmas eve lol. That was wonderful for this mommy Elf because I still had some wrapping to do, and with our Elf needing to "move", making reindeer food disappear, and eating Santa's cookies,and preparing our overnight french toast casserole for breakfast the next morning; I could not afford to waste any time that night lol.
Christmas morning came, and the kids woke us up and I told them to wait for 2 minutes as I ran down the stairs set up the coffee, turned on the fireplace and grabbed my camera and phone (for video clips). They were perfectly patient and I was set for them to come down. They ran down the stairs and saw the tree! For a few short seconds they just sat there and admired the tree filled with so many presents that I finally said, "well, don't just stand there guys, go for it!" LOL
Throughout the month, I was trying my best to remind the kids the real reason for the season. And although I know as a child it can be hard to not focus on the fact that you know you have gifts coming your way, I'm very proud of Alyssa because this was the first year she truly seemed to understand that everything we do is to celebrate the fact that Jesus came to this world and he is the greatest gift we could've ever received. She understands that while we don't know his actual birthday, this day was chosen to celebrate his birth, and she knows that it's fun but also important to not get caught up in the presents, decorations, and other things we do to celebrate the holiday. She makes me very proud to see how bright she is and while AJ still doesn't quite understand, I know he will come to understanding as well as Alyssa does when he gets older.
I hope everyone else had a wonderful holiday, spending time with friends and loved ones! Merry Christmas from our family to yours!!
I can't believe it's been 7 years! We've been married for 7 long years. We've been together for 10!!!! We never celebrate in a big way, it's usually going out to dinner at a place that is kid friendly (we don't have any family that live here and we don't have any babysitter so date nights are only when we go visit my mom because she will watch the kids for us).
This year, since we just bought our home, we want to enjoy our house and celebrate everything here, in our home we love so much. We decided to cook a gourmet meal here, together and enjoy it with the kids. We were SUPPOSED to cook together (kinda sexy and sweet to have him in the kitchen with me) but he ended up doing the baked potatoes, and setting up the table. That counts, right?
We had smoked salmon appetizers, organic greens salad with cranberries and blue cheese, lobster bisque, and the main course meal was dry rub ribs with baked potato and sauteed brussels sprouts with pancetta for him. My main course meal was stuffed salmon with mushroom risotto and sauteed brussels sprouts with pancetta. To say it was delicious is an understatement! It was a lot of food, but it was special because it was what we both like to eat, and we have different tastes. We had full happy bellies and that was a great way to celebrate 7 years of being married. :)
This was our first thanksgiving in our new home, and we were excited to start our traditions here, just the four of us. For the first time ever, I would have enough space to have a little certain assistant chef in the kitchen with me, safely, without worry that the space is too tight for us.
I had a menu planned out very last minute, in true Susan fashion ;) and it was a big juicy free range turkey in an organic herb rub, homemade organic cranberry sauce, homemade "skinny" stuffing, organic garlic mashed potatoes, and hubby's request of sauteed brussels sprouts with pancetta (also skinny-fied), Hawaiian rolls (those are this family's weakness, we all love them!!) and homemade organic pumpkin pie. For the most part it was as healthy as a Thanskgiving meal can be, without sacrificing good taste. We all loved it and ate leftovers for days!
I have to say my favorite part of Thanksgiving was just simply, having enough space to have my little girl who absolutely LOVES to help me in the kitchen be in there with me, and not be cramped or feel like she's not in a safe setting which is how I felt in our old tiny cramped kitchen.
We loved our first Thanksgiving in our new house and look forward to many many more being spent here. :)
My wonderful "assistant chef" mashing the potatoes
She also helped with the stuffing
we had so much space for everything it didn't look as messy as I'm used to a Thanksgiving meal prep looking.
Ok, so, this post has been overdue for about 2 1/2 weeks but me being horrible about blogging in a timely manner, mixed with how BUSY I've been will make it so I'm just now writing this! (oh and I'm only sitting down with enough time to write bc I have a gosh awful cold right now-blah!
Back to the great news- yes, we bought a house!!!!!!!! We had been looking at areas all around the Bay for about a year, but we soon realized that our criteria did not match the price range out here. We needed to stay in the Bay because of hubby's job; in the long run it would be by far best for us to stay here then to be relocated anywhere else (like say, vegas or texas where we have family). We knew some friends who lived in the area and whenever we asked them about how they liked living here they raved about it. It is a very understated area and most who don't know about it or who are a bit "bay snobby" would NEVER move here but they are crazy, lol. It's such a nice community feel here, and we have a huge house, with a huge yard, and our kids have great schools! It's safe and beautiful and for people like hubby who would commute no matter where they lived, this area is also great because there's public trans that takes you anywhere in the bay, south bay, san fran, east bay, anywhere! Hubby takes the train into San Jose and his drive from home to the station is the same as it was when we lived in San Ramon and he drove to the Pleasanton train station. Really the only "negative" is that I no longer have stores to make "quick trips" close to me. They are all about 6 miles away, which is really not the most awful thing, I mean, people who live in mountains (tahoe and crestline and lake arrowhead) have to travel a waaaayyyys to get to the nearest store, but they love where they live and so do we!
So, here's the story of how we found our house. We had been looking at real estate websites like trulia and realtor and saw that there was an abundant amount of properties for sale that met our criteria so we felt comfortable knowing that when we were ready to take the plunge we would have plenty to choose from. Boy were we wrong! We thought this was a buyers market with all the inventory but what those sites don't tell you is that a property on their site can be "pending short sale" and won't tell you because they only show completed sales or homes in the "market." As a result, all those houses we saw on those websites were actually pending sale because most of them were short sales! We were driving around the area and noticed we saw a lot of signs of "coldwell banker" on homes that were for sale so I decided to just call them and ask them for their website so I can see what they had in their office. Now these local websites DO show you when a house is "pending short sale approval" and when it's a "regular sale" and much to our disappointment most of the houses they had listed were awaiting approval. :( I called them back and asked what we can do to set up an appointment with a broker from their office (we had a broker but she was not familiar with the area as she works in san jose and was helping us out because her husband works with my hubby) and the person who had picked up my last call was a broker and he let me in on a "secret" property. Basically his wife is also a realtor and she had clients who were about to put their house on the market and he asked his wife for pictures of the house and sent them to us to see if we would be interested in the house. As soon as we got those pictures, we FELL IN LOVE! It was everything we had wanted and didn't think we would get! We knew that in the area the houses are newer construction and as a result most have small back yards, and finding a house with enough bedrooms for guests was going to be a challenge but this house had it all! We told him that as soon as his wife had the green light to list it to please let us know and at the very first open house we would go and view it. His wife set up an open house, on a late friday morning (not exactly the best time for a house to attract traffic but that was the point!) and we were the first and only ones to see the house, as soon as we got done seeing it we drove to the office and wrote up our offer!
From there it was an ever so long, seemingly neverending two month wait before we would go through all the inspections, approvals from sellers bank, approval from our lending bank, having documents signed and sent, sending more documents and blah blah blah.... we FINALLY signed at the title company on November 1st and November 6th we got our keys!!!! From there it has been so busy with cleaning, cleaning, cleaning, painting, painting some more, buying furniture and just trying to get settled that it has just been exhausting. We are so happy to be in our new home and although I have TONS of ideas on what I want to do to make it "our own" for now, I'm just so elated to have the house and it's ours, we have the house we always dreamed of and sometimes I still can't believe we live here now. Oh, and just to make sure everyone knows, we could NOT have done this move without the help of my amazing mom and step dad! They flew out from vegas just to help us with the move AND it just so happened to be Alyssa's birthday that weekend so it was amazing to have them here with us. Thanks guys for all your help, we love you!!!!
So, here's the specs of the house: it's a 5 bedroom plus a loft, 4 full bathroom two story house, 3 car garage, it is a modern craftsman style (my absolute favorite!!!) it has a HUGE lot so we have a loooong driveway and a biiiiiigggg back yard! (swing set anyone?!?) It's almost 3000 sq. ft 2968 to be exact ;) and it has all the space we need and then some! I have a laundry room with so much counter space and cabinets and a sink! The kitchen has a gigantic island and we have all stainless steel appliances and the fridge we bought is to die for, it's a french door style with water/ice dispenser and it's just awesome. (Who knew appliances would make this girl so happy?) It has a formal living room which we have turned into a playroom! I'm probably most happy about the playroom and the back yard. My babies needed the space to play and we didn't have that in the teeny tiny condo aka matchbox. We have given our princess her own princess room and our little guy has a dinosaur bedroom. The master bedroom is huge and we will eventually get all new furniture in there because our current set looks so teeny tiny in that room (we have a queen sized bed two nightstands and a dresser; that's it. LOL)
This post is super duper long and if you've read all this, you must be bored or really love us to be interested in our journey that has made us homeowners. Enough writing and let's get to the pictures! :)))
This year the kids were more excited than any other year about halloween. I think it's because AJ was old enough to remember that you get sooo much candy and they both pumped each other up in anticipation for halloween. Like we did last year, the kids went trick or treating with our best friends J and A. A is walking and it was super adorable to see her trying to walk up to the front doors with the big kids!
Before going trick or treating in the evening, Alyssa had a school parade and halloween party. Once again, I was lucky enough to be able to volunteer in her class even though I had to bring AJ with me (I know many schools/teachers are very strict with a no sibling policy) and we got to see Alyssa have such a great time in school. The party coordinator set up 5 different "stations" a science experiment, snack table, craft table, decorating a cupcake, and a halloween game table. It was a great celebration and really got us excited for all the fun we were going to have after too :)
In the evening, we got together with our friends and took to the streets and hit up houses right away! The girls were adorable holding hands, and baby A looked so cute in her costume! Alyssa still gets freaked out with houses that have spooky decor, but AJ seemed to be oblivious to anything scary and only wanted to get candy LOL. The kids were adorable saying "trick or treat" and "Happy Halloween" every time they got candy. :)
This halloween was so much fun and I can't wait to see how much fun we will have again, next year!
Alyssa and some of her school friends :)
Walking the parade, all the kids looked great!
At the science experiment table at her classroom halloween party
It's that time of the year when Uggs and pumpkin spice lattes are a must. It's my favorite time of the year, it's fall! One of the many fun things for the kids to do is go to the pumpkin patch, and this was the second year in a row that we went with our best friends, the Hoglans. Last year the kids had a blast, and this year was no exception. We did go to a different patch but it was super fun just the same, we even got yummy pumpkin spice cupcakes with the most delish cream cheese frosting. yummmm :)
The patch had a farm animals and the free straw bale maze and corn box. The kids played in that corn box for most of the time we were there! They went in and out of the straw bale maze I don't know HOW many times! They picked Indian corn and then came picking pumpkins! Just when we thought we had all the fun there was to have, we went and ate super yummy cupcakes! It's become a tradition for us to do pumpkin patch and trick or treating with our friends and can't wait to go with them on wednesday and get lots and lots of candy :)
We must have taken a hundred pictures and some the last ones truly show how the kids felt about it LOL. I love the pictures just the same because they captured their honesty and they are still just as cute when annoyed and over picture taking. After bribing with the promise of cupcakes we did get just a few more with smiles. Great parenting to use bribery but hey, we like pictures! lol.
The kids having a blast with all that corn
Silly BFF picture, that sun was a tad too bright for their eyes ;)
My sweet babies showing me their indian corn
LOVE this picture!! they were so DONE taking pictures
AJ showing me his pumpkin
Alyssa was on "a quest to find the perfect pumpkin" and she succeeded :)
The FOUR kids in a wagon (last year we took exact same picture but there were only 3 kids then) :)
smiling again after hearing they'd be getting cupcakes!
I'm almost certain that the next few weeks will hold a LOT of changes for our family. Can't say for sure but i'm 99% certain that these will be some great weeks with memories and I can't wait for it all to happen and share it with everyone!!! :)
My birthday was amazing and I truly felt loved by my honey, kids, and my friends. It started with breakfast in bed, my FAVORITE breakfast, triple grande non fat no whip pumpkin spice latte and a chocolate croissant from starbucks :P Yes, the hubby made an early morning run to starbucks and arranged it on a plate but my little babies didn't think that was good enough so they wanted to add some "homemade items." Alyssa made me a delish nutella toast, and AJ, well, he added some raspberries to round off the meal in a more healthy way ;)
I had already received a pretty awesome birthday present the day before, an Iphone 5, so I wasn't thinking I'd get too much more than that on my actual b-day. I.was.wrong.!!
We like to give presents first thing in the morning in this family, and I was more nervous this morning because for the first time ever, the hubby braved getting gifts with OUT my help. Let me just explain this about my hubby, he is the stereotypical man in this department where he is known to be an absolutely terrible gift giver. He is well aware of this and it's because of it that he has always asked me what I've wanted to perhaps "splurge" on myself and he then picks something from there. This time, I didn't really tell him anything because I wanted him to try on his own. I was VERY happy to see that he got me something I needed; a wallet, ( as my poor 2 year old juicy couture wallet was falling apart) and a few things I didn't "need" but definitely LOVED, a new purse AND a new fragrance set. I am not as big of a collector of perfumes as my mom is, but I do love me some delicious smelling perfumes. I do believe a woman can never have too many purses so, seeing that new bag, in a color I didn't already have was a MUCH welcome sight. ;) The man did GOOD. I thought, at this point, we are done with presents and could just hang out at home and be laid back for the rest of the day but he had other plans for us.
He told me I could go on a shopping trip and get some much needed clothes to help my severely lacking "fall wardrobe". I loved what I got, and I loved that he was amazing and took care of both kids while I shopped 'till I dropped. I didn't take a picture of those gifts, but low and behold, my sneaky 5 year old was snapping pictures on my new phone and I saw this:
How funny she got a picture of some of the shopping bags, "perfect for my blog" I thought :)
After shopping all day long, I was exhausted but hubby had planned to take the kids and I out to our (used to be) favorite sushi restaurant for dinner. So we went and we met up with my closest girlfriend, Kelly and her girls :) I'll keep the bad part of this to a minimum and just say that rickey and I had been to this restaurant a billion times before this night just us, and the ONE time we bring someone to the place, everything except the food was awful. We won't ever be going back but we did at least have wonderful company and had a great time, despite the restaurant's shortcomings. I'm so bummed we didn't think to take any pictures at the restaurant but I did take a picture of her great gift she gave me.
After dinner, we went back home and Rickey and the kids sang happy birthday to me and we enjoyed some yummy and naughty cake. We tried to document the moment with pictures and I can honestly say that we are absolutely horrible at self-portraits LOL. here are a few funny pictures but I loved all the pictures. I really felt super special and I appreciate everything my family (and friends) did for me on my birthday. <3
So, I've done this potty training once before.... and it was completely different from what I'm doing now. My first experience was a girl, a VERY talkative girl who was potty trained in 3 days at age 2 yrs. 2 months old. Now, I'm here with a BOY, who is 3 years 4 months old... and could care less about being in a dirty diaper to teach. It has NOT been easy by any means; for starters, he would not sit on the potty... even if it was that cool "cars" one that doesn't yet attach to the "big toilet" AND it was set up in the living room so he wouldn't feel like he was missing out on any playing time or even precious tv time. He just merely saw it as a cool new Cars toy and NOT what is really is, a POTTY.
We've been at it for 2 weeks and the first week he would only sit on it but not with his pants down... the second week he would mostly sit on it nakey but would hold it so he never went in the potty. We have had the best of luck when I ask him EVERY.10.MINUTES. to sit on the potty but let's be real, I've got to take big girl to school and make breakfast/lunch/dinner, and clean the house and run errands, so I can't remember to ask him if he needs to go THAT often... and that's when the accidents would happen. I know a lot of you will say that if he's not ready to be telling me that he needs to go then I'm "pushing him too soon" but I'm sorry, he's almost 3 1/2 and if I don't at LEAST get his toes dipped in this "potty pool" he won't get it done till he's 6! (total joke, btw!) I'm just really ready to be done with diapers and I know he's able to learn how to use a toilet at this point.
He has been pretty good at going when I ask him to go, as now I have a good reading of when he should be ready to go but for the first time ever, HE asked me to take him to the potty saying these exact words: "mommy, it's gon come out, go to potty" so we rushed to the potty and he went 1 and 2!!! I was very happy to have him tell me he's ready to use the bathroom for the first time ever!!!
We felt brave enough to go run errands today and were out about 3 hours wearing undies and not diapers and we were accident-free and he used the potty when we got back home. I cannot tell you how happy I am to see him take the first very crucial steps towards potty training because there for a split second I thought I may just not know how to teach a boy to stop wetting and pooping himself and use a toilet! Alas, he is proving me wrong... one day at a time. :)
Here he is smiling, so proud after telling me for the first time he had to go potty.
Before I start this post, yes it's outdated.... but I'm terrible about blogging on time and at least I'm trying. So back in August, august 13th to be exact, our family from san diego come up to the bay area and we wanted to get together with them. So we decided it would be tons of fun for the kids to go to the san jose discovery museum. It was so much fun for the kids and we spent all day there. Towards the end of the day, we were just about ready to leave the museum, when Alyssa comes to us crying and tells us that she fell and hurt her arm. She didn't want to move it and said she wanted to just go home and go to sleep. This is NOT like her because we had plans to go to dinner after the museum with our family and for her to say she wants to just go home, we knew she was definitely uncomfortable. Lucky for us, Aunt Dori who was with us that day is a pediatrician in san diego and she tried to get somewhat of a "look" at her arm. It didn't look broken and because Alyssa wasn't screaming and hollering or showing extreme pain we didn't think it to be broken, maybe just bruised. We iced it and gave her pain medication and went home. Aunt Dori told us that we could of course take her the the ER or just wait overnight and see how the arm looks in the morning.
The next day, her arm was swollen right above her elbow and did NOT want to move it at all! I knew something wasn't right at that point and scheduled an appointment with her pediatrician to take a look and get some xrays. We went in and of course, it was broken!!!! It was a very tiny tiny fracture and because neither Rickey or I have ever broken a bone we did not know what to look for or expect other than a bone popped out of place which is what most people think a broken bone would look like. Since her brake was not like that, it was definitely a shock to hear it was indeed broken.
We got a splint cast put on that day and the very next morning she was an orthopedic specialist and got a cast for 3 weeks. She did ask first thing if she could get a pink cast, after all, injured or not one Must be stylish at all times right?!? She was such a brave girl and went through the whole experience like a trooper!
She just got the cast taken off last week on friday, so she's slowly getting full mobility back to her arm (it was stiff from being in the same position for 3 weeks) but she doesn't miss having the cast at all.
This was definitely a new experience for all of us because like I said before, neither Rickey nor I had ever broken a bone so she was the first in our family to have broken a bone. I'm glad her arm is healed and can't wait for her to get back on the soccer field and on the monkey bars, as she has to wait 3 more weeks before doing those types of activities.
Here she was with her cousin Ryen doing one of the activities at the museum before the big brake :(
Getting the splint cast, what a trooper with a smile on her face!!!
After getting the pink cast on, still all smiles :))
She has the BEST abuelita who sent her a "care package" as soon as she found out her arm was broken! <3
Picture Day in school, cast and all, still styiin'!
I can't believe my Princess is a "big girl" and started 1st grade!!!! It feels like just yesterday I was teaching her the ABCs at home and doing her first puzzles with her and now, here she is in the first grade, writing and full on reading now!!! I'm so proud of her and I could go on and on about how wonderful she is and how she is an amazing student but I don't like to brag. LOL
I tried to make her first day a little special since she told me she felt a "little itty bit nervous" (her words) about eating lunch at school for the first time in the cafeteria. In kinder she only had snack time and it was not in the cafeteria with the older kids, so I completely understood her nerves.
So the night before her first day, I crafted up a cute little table set up I found on where else but pinterest lol. It was so unplanned that about 3/4 of the way being done I realized I had nothing to use the toppers with. So at 11:30pm I whipped up some healthy banana muffins and cursed myself for baking so late because as tired as I was, I couldn't fall asleep because the whole house smelled so good. :)
She absolutely loved her first day and has been having such a good time every day and she actually doesn't like the weekends because she doesn't go to school! I'm looking forward to another great school year for her and can't wait to see how much she learns and how much fun she will have.
Yet again, this is a blog post that should've been done in the beginning of august, when the trip actually took place but hey, better late than never right???
I try to go out to vegas to visit my family as often as I can. Anytime any of my old friends from LA go I try to see them too. It was a 3 for 1 deal for me this trip because not only was I going to get to see my old childhood friends, but we would see my mom and step dad AAANNNDD from Rickey's side of the family we were having a mini-reunion!!!! LOTS of people to see and lots of catching up to do!
I was there for a total of one week in vegas with the kids... rickey flew out a few days later and met up with us there. I went earlier than him because my old childhood friends were going to be there to celebrate our friend Lindsay's birthday!!!! I could NOT pass up the opportunity to catch up with my old "dreamer" friends LOL... so off I went on a road trip, just me with both kids in the car for 11 hours!!!! but I would do it all over again for those girls, I love them very much and I'm sad I don't get to see them as often as I'd like. The celebration plans included one night of a "menswear" theme and all of us ladies dressed up in our glam fabulous menswear inspired outfits and EVERYONE looked soo gorgeous!!! It was definitely one of those "what happens in vegas, stays in vegas" kind of nights ;)
All the ladies looking beautiful!
The birthday girl and me!
A few days later, Rickey's mom and step dad, 2 sisters and nephew drove from LA to Vegas, and his sister from texas flew with her two little kids. He also has another sister in vegas so we were able to get all the cousins together for the first time!!! We had a girls night out for us grown ups, the girls Alyssa and Ja'Lynn had a "slumber party" and just overall it was a lot of fun to see family members that we rarely get to see. The kids had never been with all their cousins before so that was a really nice thing to be able to see them all together. They are all very close in age so we knew they would love playing together and spending time together. We were together for 5 days and that time just flew by way too quickly :( it really is hard though to get the whole family together when we have his mom and 2 sisters in L.A., one in vegas, one in Texas, and us up here in the Bay.... but we are glad we were able to get together and hope to be able to do that again very soon and not let years go by before we all see each other.
Of course we stayed with my parents so the kids and I also got to spend time with them, which is always nice because my mom has a very close relationship with my kids and when they get together it's really special for all of them.
It was a good week trip to take and as much as I loved seeing sooo many people I love, by the end of it I was VERY happy to be back home, in my own bed, in my tiny matchbox condo LOL.
There were LOTS of pictures taken but I don't have them all so for now, I'll just post what I do have.
