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Hoppa

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Fountain

Girls Day at the Denver Zoo

I was watching a friend's daughter for the day today.  I figured we should go do something fun instead of sitting at home all day.  So I packed up Lily, Noelle, and Kairi and we went to the Zoo!  J and I have a friend, Loren, that is a keeper there and she agreed to meet up with us for lunch.  She ended up surprising us by taking us back through the barns to see/feed some of the hoofed animals after lunch!!

Checking out the Bearded Dragon.

They LOVED the lions today!

How Lily kept herself busy at the zoo.  

Oh, and I have caught her sucking every finger except her pinkies now.  Silly girl.

Gorgeous! 

Taking a snack and play break while I fed Lily.

They spent a good ten minutes or so playing at the underwater polar bear viewing area.

 Yummy Eeyore!

Watching the Sea Lions swim.

Noelle's favorite animal - (African) Penguins

Shhh...he's hiding.

Noelle and Kai feeding Dikembe.

Lily and I!

This is Sam.  He likes it on top of the Giraffe house.  I guess he felt threatened by us.

LOVE this picture of the girls feeding the Zebras some carrots.

Feeding lettuce to an Okapi.

Even Lily got in on this action!

Geranuk showing us a trick.

 They gave the Geranuk some yams.  It wasn't hungry though.  Too busy re-chewing his treats from the last group that went though.

Thank you so much Loren for taking the time to show us your hoofed animals today!!

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The cuteness factor is almost overwhelming!!

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But Mommy it's more fun to play than eat.

Julia's Child

I recently finished reading Julia's Child by Sarah Pinneo for my online book club From Left to Write.  In the book Julia is putting in a LOT of hours trying to make Julia's Child, an organic toddler food company, get off the ground.  The main focus of the book is her struggle with balancing work and home life.  That really hit home with me since I have been struggling with the same since my third child was born almost 4 months ago.

I feel like now that it has been 3 1/2 months since Lily turned my life upside down I have to stop using her as an excuse why my house is messy, I'm tired, and I just generally can't get anything done.  Added to the mix is that I work 5 days a week outside the home and Lily is exclusively breast fed.  Four of those days are very long, I'm gone for 10-11 hours.  I spend about 3-3 1/2 hours out of each day feeding Lily.  Figuring out how to fit everything in every day when I am only home for a few hours before needing to go to bed in order to get up at 5am has been a real struggle.

So how am I finding the elusive "balance" in my life??  I've learned to let go.  It sounds so simple, but for me this is just about the hardest thing I've ever had to do.  I'm somewhat of a neat freak.  Yet I have learned to live with a messy house, or at least what mess is left over after my amazing husband has finished cleaning up.  (His idea of clean is on the complete opposite spectrum of mine.  LOL!!)  If there is something that HAS to be done I ask J to do it, or one of the older kids.  Otherwise it has to wait until after I get the baby nursed and put to bed or for Friday.  Friday is when I try really hard to accomplish everything I can't get done during my 5 day work week (Sun-Thurs).  It is just Lily and I at home on Friday's since I ended up putting Noelle in daycare so I could get more done.  This gives me from 9-3 to get all the laundry done, clean the kitchen top to bottom, and clean the downstairs floors.  I get a jump start on the laundry by having Adam and Noelle gather, sort, and load the first load of their laundry before I take them to school.  They are also required to put away their own clothes that night.

Another change I have made is that I have stopped cleaning up after everybody.  J is an adult and the kids are 5 and 8, they can pick up after themselves.  Again, this is REALLY hard for me to uphold.  I am constantly starting to pick up a mess or put something in it's place and will stop myself and make myself leave it for whoever it belongs to.  So hard!!  But it really has helped my anxiety about a messy house to tell myself that MY messes are cleaned up and that is all I can do.

This post is inspired by the novel Julia's Child by Sarah Pinneo. Worried about what her kids eat, Julia Bailey starts a prepared organic toddler meals business.  Can Julia balance work and family and still save the world? Join From Left to Write on May 24 as we discuss Julia's Child. As a member, I received a copy of the book for review purposes.

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Adam is officially a Wolf now!! 

Next he starts working towards his Bear rank.

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I'm excited to make a Scouts album with Adam.

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Yeah.

Noelle's Spring Fling

Noelle's daycare had a little program today where the kids sang for the parents.  It was short and cute. They sang and did the motions to 4 finger plays.  

I LOVE these little programs.  It would be really nice if just once I could actually see my kid though.  My kids are always in the back row and always have a child standing right in my viewing path.  The top two pictures are the best I was able to see her the whole 10 minutes of the show.  So far Lily is kinda petite.  I guess I have a chance of her being in the front when her time comes.

I had to ask Noelle to "please change into a pretty dress" this morning.  She wears some pretty atrocious outfits sometimes since she fully dresses herself.  She was originally wearing a Rockies jersey with purple/blue capris.  Doesn't sound too bad, except that the purples DO NOT match at all.

Gorgeous Lily

I bet you thought it was going to be a picture of Lily, right?!  LOL!

Our friends sent me this picture of the first Lily to bloom in their yard this year.  It is so beautiful and vibrant.  Now I want some for my own yard.

I've got a clean desk top!

So do you remember this from just a few days ago:

I worked hard during the Grey's finale (it wasn't all that great anyway) and today to make it look like this:

It feels great to actually be sitting at my desk typing this.  Now let's see how long I can make it last.

I do still have more work to do though.  Mainly it is cleaning out the filing drawer to shred unimportant billing statements that are not marked 2012.  After that everything in the clear tub to the right on my desk will get filed in the drawer.

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What's happening in my house this afternoon....

Adam is playing LEGO Ninjago on the desktop.

Lily is was napping.  She just woke up and it's time for her to eat now.

Noelle and Zach are playing I Spy Junior on the kid's laptop.

Bonus:  Look at these sup adorable chubby thighs!!

Happy Friday!!

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Playing on the kid's game computer.
It is not hooked up to the internet and is older than her.
It was our first laptop.  I bought it for J when he got his associates degree way back in 2003.
It's really heavy and thick.

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That is bird poop.  I was innocently driving down the road when it happened.  Not sure what I did to offend the bird who so rudely dropped it on my windshield. And yes, I had to watch it streak up my windshield as I drove.  Yuck.  Even Noelle was disgusted by that.

I should have taken that and the incident 2 minutes earlier as an omen.  That first incident?  I needed to get over to the right a couple lanes.  When nobody would let me over I slowed down so I wouldn't miss my turn.  The person behind me was so impatient that they cut to the right real quick and raced around me.  Seriously.  I yelled a naughty word.  Then I had to apologize and explain to Noelle that what I said was not nice or acceptable.  Then I drove right through the parking lot and back out to the street.  I didn't have time to wait in the huge line I could easily see through the window.

I dropped Noelle at school and went to a Starbucks closer to work that is always real quick if I go inside.


Got to work and fed Little Man a great breakfast, which is not an easy feat.  Within 10 minutes he proceeded to puke ALL of it back up.  He keeps getting constipated and pushes so hard to attempt to poop that he pukes up anything in his stomach.  It is literally driving me insane!!  It's made worse by the fact that he is VERY underweight at this point and I work very hard to get good meals into him.

The rest of my work day went fine until 5:40pm when I was giving him a bottle.  He didn't want any more after about 3-3 1/2 ounces so I was capping the bottle when he proceeded to throw up all of it in my lap.  So not kidding here.  And it was not due to pooping.  All it takes is one bite/drink too many for this kid to bring back up whatever you just got in him.  I walk a very fine line feeding him.  Thank god I had made a full formula bottle instead of part formula and part whole cow milk like I should have.  (I was trying to cut back on the dairy in my desperation to get his poop to soften up.)  I can live with formula smell.  If it had been cow milk I may have thrown up myself.  As a side note:  I don't do throw up.  I literally spend the whole time cleaning it up gagging and trying not to puke myself.  So anyway, my entire lap and crotch/butt was soaked with formula.  Had to live with it till I got home too.

I went through the Starbucks drive through on my way home.

Is it Friday yet??

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My current project.

I would LOVE to actually be able to use my desk for scrap booking.

First I have to sort, organize, and file the heck out of it.

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Eeyore love

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Mother's Day cards from the kids!

Birthday Celebration

We had Sheri, Stef, and Steve over for dinner Friday evening to celebrate mine, Justin, and Adam's birthdays.  Justin grilled up some hamburgers to go with the potato salad, baked beans, and chips that they brought with them.  We also enjoyed yummy marble cake.

The kids recently got Apples to Apples Junior so we played a rousing game, LOL!  There are a lot of food cards in there and I seemed to get them all.  It got to the point that anytime a food was put down everyone looked at me!  We had a great time and need to do it again soon.  Thanks again for coming down to spend the evening with us!

I hadn't realized Noelle was taking pictures of the evening until I unloaded the camera this morning.  Some are blurry since it was Noelle taking pics.

Auntie Stef

 Stef and Steve

(Also, it might be time to take down the birthday stuff from Adam's party a month ago.)

I was clueless as to what was going on!!

I guess the forks were interesting?

 

LOL!!

Lily and her Auntie Stef!  (I actually took this one.)  She was SOOO tired from a busy afternoon and evening.  Every time anyone but myself or J held her she got all pouty and started crying.  Poor kiddo.