Cinderella cleans

We were cleaning up the houseboat and Callie discovered her Cinderella dress. Of course she insisted on wearing it for half the day. There was glitter all over the house! I thought it might help her clean better but it did not. Instead she just said she needed to cook in her kitchen now. The broach on the front plays the wish upon a drem song and she kept playing it and dancing around. Very cute.

Play doh birthday cake

Today is Jeana's birthday. She had to work so we won't see her until Sunday but Callie wanted to make her a birthday cake out of playdoh. So we made one with candles and all and sent her a photo. Callie was pretty proud of herself.

D did two new things today. First he ate baby food directly out of the pouch. I always put it in a bowl and use a spoon so if he doesn't eat it all it isn't wasted and full of germs. These peaches were left over from yesterday and the end of the container so I just let him. He did great! Maybe I can teach him to drink out of a straw next.

Then I left him on the mat in the living room and went to help Callie put othea on in the garage. When we got back 2 minutes later Diego was at the door about to crawl out on the deck. Where do you think you are going?!

First car accident

Callie got in her first car accident. While

Not listening to my instructions she tried squeezing around my car and ran full force into the edge of the bumper which completely took off the side mirror of her car. She cried it broke. Then said its ok mommy and I said well you are ok but the mirror is broken. To which she started crying again and asked to glue it.

This all happened yesterday. I wish I took a photo but didn't and had to work all day today so I don't have any other photos. So just imagine and laugh along.. 

Handy Mommy fixing Flicker

GiJu bought Callie the Handy Manny tools at a yard sale. It's really a cool set of toy tools that sing and dance in their box and includes a bilingual talking flashlight named Flicker.

Flicker became one of Callies most beloved nighttime toys. She is afraid of the dark and Flicker allows her to have a light in her bed that also talks to her. The best part for me is that he auto shuts off after 30 minutes so it doesn't go through batteries too fast.

Well this weekend Flickers light burnt out. Callie called me crying Flicker was broken and was ballistic. He still talked but no light. I attempted to change the batteries but to no avail. The lightbulb was soldered to the wires and not easily replaced. But I figured I could do this how hard could it be? I did check if I could buy a new one first but it's not sold anymore and a used one is worth $50! So I ordered a new bulb, LED to upgrade from Amazon and waited for it to come in the mail.

Well today I fought this thing for nearly 2 hours trying to fix it. I soldered the new LED bulb in at least 10 different times. While the solder was still hot the bulb would light, for about 30 seconds then it would just go out when it cooled and then wouldn't turn on again. I tried this over and over but to no avail. It was terrible as Callie would cheer, hooray he's fixed and then oh no he's broken again, waaaa.

Luckily PaPa Ed came to the rescue on FaceTime with the answer to use a non LED bulb from a regular flashlight and to test it with a simple wire and battery not soldered. It's the engineer brain I swear because I had it fixed in 10 minutes. Meanwhile I was frustrated all morning banging my head on the table trying to figure it out. Thanks PaPa Ed for the help and problem solving!

Callie and D were both happy to have Flicker and he is in bed tonight with Callie. Crisis averted... Phew it's exhausting trying to be the mom who can fix anything. Where is Handy Manny when I need him?!

Go Diego Go

Diego is learning to crawl faster. Check him out!

Sunday Funday

It was a beautiful sunny 75 degrees out today. It really couldn't have been a nicer day. January just might be one of my favorite months in San Diego. Warm and sunny but never hot and it's really not nearly as cold even at night as December. I'll enjoy the sun before the spring grey comes in.

Anyways since it was a nice day we met Nicky and Hunter down by the beach for brunch and some fun. It is always good to catch up with good friends and have some fun at the same time. Callie loves the rides at Belmont park and she was a little braver than last time and rode the submarine the whole way through without having to have it stopped mid-ride. She still loves the cars and wanted to play the fishing game again. The only redeeming factor of the fishing game is that you win every time, phew no meltdowns. But she somehow picks the good fish and gets a bigger prize. This time she won the raccoon which was perfect because I saw she had her eye on it. We have been reading two books that have raccoons in them and she has been quite intrigued by raccoons lately. A couple nights ago I heard her calling the raccoons, " raccoons come out, where are you, racooooons?" I told her raccoons are scared of people and bite or run away and she says, not me, they aren't scared of me mom. Oh ok. I just left it alone. She has been carrying that silly raccoon all day since we won it. To nap time, in her car around the block, playing before dinner and to bed tonight. Goodnight little raccoon.

D says DaDa

Diego learned to say DaDa today. He is really good at repeating it. He only yells mama in the middle of the night when he's crying. But DaDa he says happy and repeats. Then Callie and him got into this screaming laughing match which was just too funny. This is just a typical Saturday in our pajamas :)

Callies tricycle

I have been trying to teach Callie to ride her tricycle for awhile but she always gets frustrated and quits in about 2 minutes. After Monday at the park being dragged around I tried again to teach her and low and behold she got it!! At first she was slow bs would get stuck but then she got better and better and could pedal and even do a little scoot to get herself going. She didn't own a helmet so I told her since she learned now we needed a helmet. So after nap time we went to Target and she picked out this princess helmet. She loves it! So much she wore it in her car too and even took it with her out for ice cream tonight. Hysterical!

She also got really good at the hello kitty car. In the afternoon I let her drive nearly 3 blocks towards daddy's work until we ran into him and he picked us up. She was even stopping at the street corners and crosswalks then saying look both ways for cars ok let's go. So cute. D enjoyed her old red car and I think she is finally ok with letting him ride that one since she has this new pink convertable.

It was a big day. She's getting big fast. Next she says she wants to learn to ride her Barbie bike with training wheels. I don't doubt her, she will do it soon.

D has vampire teeth. I snapped these few earlier in the week. Today he has two new teeth coming in so it won't look like vampire fangs much longer...

First ride Afternoon ride with her new helmet

Pass the football D

Callie and Diego miraculously played well together yesterday and were passing the football. We were waiting for Juan to get home from work and I was surprised at the two of them playing nicely together. Diego sure thinks she is funny!

Diego finally crawls!

Today is the first day I have seen Diego actually crawl. He has been getting around by moving from his hands and knees to sitting back and forth in a sort of strange scoot, but it's slow, inaccurate and looks ridiculous. Today he started crawling more than one arms length forward and I'm sure by the end of he week he will be much faster. We also got a new floor mat today that I just love. It has a farm theme with animals and tractors, numbers and alphabet on he opposite side. It's soft and squishy for Diego's head when he falls but water proof and easy to clean when he pukes on it. Our alphabet mat worked for awhile but was just yucky between the cracks and letters no matter how much I washed it it always got crusty puke in the cracks. So this is a big improvement. I only wish we had it sooner!

Follow the leader

Callies been takung more driving lessons. Today I let her go to the end of the street and cross the street at the short culdesac. Boy did she think that was awesome. She almost crashed once but the neighbors thought it was funny. Lucky for me they also have kids otherwise their expensive car being hit by hello kitty pink convertible might not have brought on giggles. 

If this is any indication of how I teach her to drive as an adult I'll have a lot of grey hair. Here's my view these days..

And off to bed super early. Callie tucked me in before she went to bed :)

Happy MLK Day

I had the day off for MLK day and so I took the kids to the park and lunch with my work friend Amy and her kids. It was a beautiful sunny day. Diego played in sand for the first time and loved it! Well until he put a handful in his mouth, yuck!

Besides that I started a new thing with Callie who cannot clean up her toys well. For any toys she refuses to clean up and I clean up without her helping, they get put away for a week. I thought this was going to work well but she just shrugs and says I'll play that when I get bigger it's ok. I think she has too many toys so it doesn't phase her that today I took away: all the playdoh and playdoh toys, wipe off markers, tea set and a board game. I think if this still isn't making an impact we definitely have too many toys and it's time to clean out and give away some and put away some that she may enjoy more when she older. This kid is always outsmarting me!

Catch up

Yesterday was so busy I didn't even get to posting. In the morning we made pine cone bird feeders. Then we headed out to Cabrillo Monument to see the tide pools at low tide and have a picnic lunch. After nap time I ended up taking Callie to the doctor as she had been complaining her ear hurt and she had a fever. They said she has a minor ear infection but we can wait 1-2 days to see if it improves before having to give her antibiotics. I have been putting essential oils on her and her fever has dropped and she says its feeling better. I have one more day to hope she really turns around.

After I got back from the doctor, GiJu babysat the kids so Juan and I could go out to dinner. It was so nice to go out to a nice dinner just the two of us. By the time we got home I was exhausted and didn't share any of the photos from the day.

Today GiJu had to leave, I dropped her off before any of the kids were awake. We had such a great visit. GiJu sure was busy as she spent the most of her time babysitting so I could get a lot of other things done and worked 5 days. Callie finally understands that GiJu visits and then leaves and is not sad when it's time. At bed tonight she already said when GiJu comes back in January... Wait when is GiJu coming back? I said March. Oh, right March and she moves on. 

Today we went to Grandmas house so she could drive her hello kitty car. She is finally getting good at it and only crashes sparingly. She drives up and down the driveway and around the loop. We even brought it home and she drive down the sidewalk on our street later in the day.

Olive Garden

Callie wanted to take GiJu to Olive Garden. It's her new favorite restaurant since they have stickers, chocolates, crayons, bread sticks, grapes, noodles, chicken, and lots of cheese. So many good things for a two year old.

I attempted to quickly take a photo of the three of them before we went into the restaurant. Instead D and Callie decided to yell and so I said everyone just yell.... This was the outcome. Pretty funny if you ask me.

It was so sunny and nice out. During Callie's nap GiJu and D went walking around the block. D sat in Callie's big girl stroller but he needed a hat. He looks so cute in his Chargers hat, as long as you ignore the pink stroller.

GiJu and two

Gig braved watching both kids all day while I went on a job shadow day. I tried getting a photo of all three of them but it turns out to be harder than you think!

Callie did a bunch of fun art projects with GiJu today and this is my favorite one. She drew Diego. I think this is the first drawing I can actually make out something in. Maybe it's coincidence but it looks like a head body and legs to me!

Also Diego learned to pull to stand. Yesterday he did it in his crib and today on my pants and GiJ saw him do it with a chair and lots of other items. I tried to get a video of it but he wasn't cooperating. Maybe later this week I can get one. Until then I thought the safest practice would be to lower the crib immediately, already done. Phew! Just in time before he pulled some kamikaze move over the side.