Sunday, March 30, 2008

Popcorn popping on the apricot tree!

After my race we drove over to the National Mall and checked out the amazing Cherry Blossoms! We seriously live in a beautiful world. In one week's time I was amazed at how DC changed. The blossoms literally bloomed overnight!

As part of the festival they have kite flying by the Washington Monument. It was crazy how many kites dotted the sky. Enlarge the picture to see.

Pretty sweet lizard flying high!
Shark, diver and little fish.

The gorgeous blossoms over by the Jefferson Memorial.


As a side note from all the awesomeness, I can't even tell you how many people had our stroller down in DC yesterday. We met up with our friends the Huff's and they have our stroller in red. Well we probably saw 4 other red ones there, plus a ton of each of the other colors. What can I say, when it's the best - you gotta have it!

Run Lisa Run!

Waving hi to my kiddies!
Erin and I. We ran the Baltimore half 1.5 years ago together.
Our cheering section.
I can't believe my race is over! So much time and energy goes into training for a half-marathon (and tons more time for a full marathon - side note: no desire to run one of those : ) and now the race is over and I feel...hmm great in mind, but not so great in body! The aches of a fast long run have taken over my body! It's all worth it though. I proved to myself that I could train throughout the winter months without a treadmill and I beat my previous two half marathon times! The race started at RFK stadium in DC at 7:00 am which made for a short night and an early day. I ran with my friend Erin and it was awesome! It was the start of the Cherry Blossom Festival so the sites were beautiful! Thanks to Cody, Tucker and Aubrey for being there at the end for me. I loved coming around the corner and seeing them cheer me on! Running rocks!

Do Wah Diddy Diddy

Sorry the quality of this video isn't the greatest, but we FINALLY have a video of Aubrey walking. She's been teetering around for awhile, but gets excited when she sees the camera. This video was taken Tuesday or Wednesday night of this week and she is SOOO much better now than in the video. She walks everywhere! Her new favorite thing to do, besides walking, is to shut doors. She goes into a room and shuts the door whether we're in there or not. 1 week until her 1st birthday! I can't believe how fast time has flown by!

Friday, March 28, 2008

Greatest City In America


Now, I don't want everybody at once to jump up and down for joy, but I have some great news today. First, Aubrey is walking all over the place. She is now closing doors, getting into drawers and generally being a dramatic girl. Second, I cemented my last bridge for dental school-yippee! And third, which is even more important, I bought my very last monthly metro pass today! Woo hoo! That means the end is in sight, and that I won't have to walk by street benches like this one that promote Baltimore as the greatest city in America. Maybe later I'll do a post about all the wonderful things of Baltimore-both the seriously wonderful things and sarcastically wonderful.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

More Visitors

We've had a whirlwind of a week. My sister left last Tuesday and we had more visitors come Thursday morning. My mom, brother, aunt and cousin flew out to visit for their spring break. They took the horrible red eye flight into town and we met them at the airport and drove immediately to D.C. We had a tour of the capitol building that afternoon. Cody and I had never gotten around to doing that, and it was pretty neat. The below picture is of the domed ceiling in the rotunda. The blossoms have started to bloom! I'm so excited because I'm running my race on Saturday. It's the start of the Cherry Blossom Festival and it's supposed to be one of the peak days!

On Saturday we drove to Annapolis and visited the Naval Academy and then went to Baltimore's Inner Harbor. This is my brother, Spencer, with Tucker on the deck of the visitor's center.

We dyed Easter Eggs Saturday night. It was a first not only for my kids, but my cousin, Haley as well.

After church on Sunday we had a big Easter feast and then I drove with my relatives back down towards D.C. Cody stayed home and let the kids get some much needed naps. My carload of people went to the D.C. Temple and then toured the National Mall. Oh and I just have to say that the GPS system I got Cody for Christmas is AWESOME! Unfortunately our car cigarette lighter doesn't work (should've thought of that when I bought the GPS) so we haven't really been able to get much use out of it yet. But, my mom's rental car worked and it took us the fastest, easiest way into D.C. I wish I would have known these routes 4 years ago. It would have saved a lot of wasted time!
Monday we headed back to D.C. for one final day of Smithsonian touring. We went through the Air and Space Museum and then they stood in line for the National Archives and also saw the Natural History Museum. I opted to refill our meters with coins and bypass the Archives and Natural History Museums. I let the kids play around in the car for awhile and then explore the grassy/dirt areas of the mall. I'm sure they had much more fun exploring the outdoors than sitting in their stroller staring at artifacts.
We ended the afternoon by going to Arlington Cemetery and over to the Marine Corps Memorial (Iwo Jima). I'd never been to the Memorial and thought it was amazing. I had no idea how HUGE it was! I don't have pictures yet, they were all taken on other cameras, but might post a couple when I get them.
Yesterday we headed to Fort McHenry in the morning and then they were off for their flight home. We had a wonderful time with all our many visitors and Tucker is still praying for each of them at meals and bedtime. Now we can get back into a normal schedule for a few weeks before Cody and I are off to hopefully buy a house!

Monday, March 17, 2008

Happy St. Patrick's Day


DON'T FORGET TO WEAR GREEN!

Sunday, March 16, 2008

Visitor

My sister, Heather, flew into town Tuesday afternoon. She lived with us our 2nd year out here, so she's seen and done all the touristy things. That has made it for a nice relaxing vacation with plenty of shopping and fun. These pictures are in reverse order with the most recent events posted first.
Tucker decided to haul his bike outside yesterday afternoon and after pushing him around the block I let him go down the hill by himself. Now he's realizing that he can pedal and so hopefully this summer he'll be cruising around by himself.

I guess Aubrey really does have my hair color. Sometimes I look at it and think it's a lot darker or the wrong shade. This picture is proving otherwise.
Cody and I took Tucker to Ringling Brothers Barnum & Bailey circus yesterday. We bought tickets with Tucker's best friend Sydney and her family and they loved it! Unfortunately we bought our tickets before Heather knew she was coming out here, so she didn't get to go, but she spent the morning bonding with Aubrey. : )

They had a preshow where you could go down on the floor and see the acts up close. Tucker's very favorite animal is the elephant and he loved them all!


Friday morning we drove down to Baltimore's Inner Harbor. I felt bad taking this picture, but at the same time didn't because it really shows off Baltimore. There is a big area next to this church that is full of homeless people. It is referred to as 'tent city'.
We went and ate lunch at the Cheesecake Factory and loved the great weather at the Inner Harbor on Friday.
Tucker thinks he is captain of a pirate ship. Ahoy Matey!
Heather bought him a Thomas the train bubble blowing kit. He loves it.
Our little humming bird-always flapping her arms and legs.
Last night we all went to Red Lobster to celebrate Cody's passing of the NERB's. Despite some unforseen stresses of the day, all turned out well and he did great on them.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

311



Happy 311 day today! In honor of this magnificent day, I will be playing 311 on my ipod/itunes all day. I had to beat Collette to this post.

Monday, March 10, 2008

Good News - Bad News

Like my dad always said, bad news first. The bad news is that the North East Regional Boards are this Thursday. That means, in order for me to get a license to practice dentistry when I graduate, I need to pass these patient-based boards on Thursday. For all those unfamiliar with these, let me just say that they are extremely important and extremely stressful. I am required to find patients that fit a very narrow criteria with cavities and then fix those cavities with some intense examiners looking on and trying to fail me at every turn (another reason why I hate the NERBS and should have taken the Western Regionals). Anyway, on any other day, these cavities would be a piece of cake and would be terribly easy. But because of the stakes at hand and the tendency of the NERB examiners to give an "F" if you look at them funny, the stress levels rise tremendously.
This isn't the bad news though. The real bad news is that the patient I had lined up for my class II and class III lesions long ago is no longer available to come in on Thursday. SON OF A GUN!
That kills me to find this out 3 days before probably the biggest exam of my life. Normally he is a very, very reliable patient. So, with this being said, any guesses on why he can't come in? I'll give you a hint-he lives in Baltimore........that's right. The dude got arrested and will be detained for at least a couple of months. Great, I must be the luckiest person alive. Now I have to scramble like a mad man to find patients to fill that void.


On to the good news of the day. Tucker went pee on the potty today! He told me, "poo poo daddy" (he calls both the pee and the poo "poo poo", he's a little confused still). Lately he has been saying that and it means that he has just gone in his diaper. So I went to change his diaper, and lo and behold- it was dry! I had a nifty idea to tell him to run to the potty and give it a try. After I sat him down, I walked out for a second, and when I had come back, he had successfully done his business. And, like a true boy learning to go potty, he managed to do the firehouse effect and spray more than just the potty. Thata boy! Hopefully he will be excited to move on to pull-ups soon. We are so excited for him.

Where a kid can be a kid!

Saturday night we went to Chuck E. Cheese's with our friends the Huff's and Nielsen's. We thought it would be fun to do something the kids would love. I was told about some great coupons online so I printed off enough for all of us and off we went. It was soooo crowded. I suggest NEVER going on a Saturday night at 6:00pm. After waiting in line and trying to cram all of us into 1 booth (5 adults, 3 kids and a carseat) the table next door opened up and we got our pizza. We bought tons of tokens and it was awesome because each game or ride is only 1 token.

Aubrey was so crazy and grabbing everything off the table. When the food came she just shoved it in her mouth and bounced around.
This is by far Tucker's favorite ride. The big smile says it all!
After numerous attempts to get Tucker to put the ball in the high scoring area, I finally gave up. He was having fun and he didn't need pressure from Mom to try to get him to earn more tickets. : )
I didn't think Aubrey would get into the night as much as she did. She loved the games and wanted to push as many buttons as she could.

Birthday Surprise

This past weekend was great! My friend, Katie, flew in last Thursday night for a quick trip to Baltimore. Her husband graduated from dental school last May and they moved to Spokane (hurray for us!). Anyway, she came out to surprise our friend Lis for her 30th birthday. Friday morning I was scheduled to babysit Lis's son. She dropped him off and before she was about to head back out the door I told her she had to see what I "picked up" yesterday. Around the corner we went and there was Katie! It was so fun to be in on the birthday surprise. Saturday we had a huge get together of 20 friends at Red Robin for lunch to celebrate Lis's birthday and for Katie to be able to see her friends. Great food, fun and friends! Me, Lis and Becky
Katie, Lis, Jayne, Erin, me
Of course we took tons more pictures than this, so if you didn't get them emailed to you (and want them), let me know and I'll send them on.

Sunday, March 9, 2008

Random

This RARELY happens! We tried this out for fun! (end result didn't look good enough to take a picture, but she looked so cute with the curlers in!)
Little fix-it man! (Our door handle has been broken for about a week and the fix-it guy came on Friday and replaced the handle. Tucker sat on the couch babbling to him and checking out his work. He found this tiny screwdriver and has been "fixing" the door ever since!