Chalk Festival and more!

This has been a short weekend so far. It's not *quite* over yet but I thought I'd share some pictures we took.

Yesterday was the La Piazza 'dell Arte in Denver. We went a bit early, trying to beat the heat, so most of the artists had not completed their works of art. Here are some of the ones we saw:

They also had a place where the kids could make their own creations too... It was hot so we tried to be quick. Here they are working on their masterpieces:

Tyler made an apple:And only Gavin knows what he made... :)

After the festival, we headed up to Broomfield to run some errands. Then while Shawn was doing homework, the boys and I went to Shawn's parents' house to spend time with my neice and her parents. They are moving back to Indiana and are leaving tomorrow so we thought we should try to see them before they went. Tonight we're going out for dinner at a yummy buffet. Ironically, it was the first restaurant we all went to when Shawn's family first moved to Colorado - so it's a fitting "last supper" I suppose.

This morning we woke up to some new blooms - aren't they beautiful?

I don't remember what kind of flower the pink one is, but can you see the dew drops on it? And in the middle was a little reserve of water from the night before too. It was so cool! The ones below are my new daisies that I got for a pot on the front portch. They just bloomed for the first time yesterday.

Anyway... other than grocery shopping, errands, laundry, the usual fun stuff - that was pretty much it for our weekend! Thankfully next week I get to have my Friday off again. It makes such a big difference!

10 things I love about Shawn

1. On his day off yesterday, he spent the morning helping the boys clean out their toys - something I have been meaning to do for months but haven't had time to.

2. Then he brought them to visit me at work and took me out for lunch - which was a nice break in the middle of a long a$$ day!

3. He took the boys to their favorite playground - he never hesitates to spend time with them so their time together is quality time rather than some dads who make their kids entertain themselves and consider spending time with their children as "babysitting".

4. When I got home from work yesterday, a very yummy dinner was ready. All I had to do is sit down and eat! Sweet!

5. Today he surprised me with an afternoon visit at work (again a welcome break from the monotony of my day), and brought me a sweet card, a plant for my window ledge and best of all - chocolate!

6. Rather than going home and having alone time when he had a half day off, he is running an errand for me and picking up our kids. Really, I couldn't ask for a better Daddy for my sons.

7. When we fight, even if I'm wrong and he's right, he says he's sorry... sometimes it doesn't happen until 2 a.m. but it happens.

8. He is the best snuggler ever.

9. He likes the same crappy reality TV shows I do.

10. He tolerates my music even though it's not his type at all.


I could go on and on but I will spare you. :)

Shopping & Celebration

First of all, a big belated Happy Father's Day to all the daddies out there, should any be reading my blog. :) Hope you got the love and appreciation you deserved on your special day!

This weekend we did nothing but shop and go to birthday parties, or so it seemed. That, mixed in with some more of Lost. We're about 1/3rd of the way through Season 2... and still loving it!

The boys and I went shopping on Friday for birthday presents and a Father's Day present for Shawn. We also went to a thrift store (my favorite!) to browse and stopped at the grocery store on the way home. They don't love to shop - it's only slightly better than cleaning the house (not that they have to do very much... yet) - but they were good sports about the whole thing.

Shawn was super busy at work doing tons of testing so he worked a lot Friday and then had to be back at work on Saturday. So after we cleaned the house, we went shopping some more (a different thrift store - yes, I am addicted but I did find some cool stuff!) and then headed to Ria's daughter's birthday party. It was a Charlie and the Chocolate Factory theme... and never before in my life have I seen so much candy and chocolate! My children made pigs of themselves and it's a wonder they ever went to sleep that night!! They had fun with their friends.

Sunday, between loads of laundry, we went to yet another birthday party - this one in the park by our house for the little boy across the street who turned one. We didn't stay long because we needed to take Shawn's dad out for dinner for Father's Day. On the way home we stopped at Home Depot to pick up some more plants for our garden... the boys picked out a pumpkin plant (!) and I picked out two types of peppers and some sweet basil. It smells SO good! We still have plenty of room for strawberry plants, should I ever see some in the store. I have looked and looked and have not been able to find any to buy!! I'd love to pick fresh berries from our garden... One of these days I suppose.

Work has picked up a bit - we're having a decent month so far. Next week my boss is going to be on vacation so we're hoping to meet our goal a little earlier this month but I don't know if that'll happen. It's going to be a long week for me as I have to work on Friday to make up for her being gone (the horror! a 5 day week like a regular person!) and I'll have to work longer hours next week as well. Hopefully I'll survive. ;) I really am a part time kinda girl. Or I like to think I am. I just have too much to do and too little time to do it! I guess we'll figure it out.

Hope everyone out in blog world is having a great week so far...

Short for summer!

I got my hair cut and colored yesterday. It's a little shorter than I thought it would be, but it'll grow. Here are some pics! The boys took them... with a little cropping from me I thought they did a good job!

Front view Side view

From the back

And I couldn't resist taking some pics of the boys too... So here you go!

Me with Gavin....

Look at those dimples!

And finally... good bye from me and my guys. :)

Quick Update

I just heard from Becky, my rep at Alternative Conceptions and was told that because of the delay in getting our contract signed, the transplant is getting pushed back until September! That's good and bad... Good because it means I can party like it's 1999 for my 30th birthday, which is September 2nd for those of you who don't know. And also good because it buys me a few more Mom's night outs with my girls. And also good because I can enjoy vacation with my family a little more as far as alcoholic beverages are concerned. Yes, clearly I have a problem when my three good things revolve around drinking. Hmm.

The bad? Well I'll be pregnant during some of the hotter months - my due date will be in July. Ick. I hate being pregnant in the summer. Also, it will be a little longer until we can start getting rid of our debt... but that's not a huge deal as we're paying our bills. We just don't want to have to pay any longer than we have to on those darn high interest rates. And I'm sure the IP's (Intended Parents) don't want to have to wait a couple more months to have a child - but I guess that's the way the cookie crumbles.

I'm more happy than sad about it getting moved... Looking forward to enjoying the summer with a margarita in one hand and a mojito in the other. Hee hee :)

Seriously, I am not an alcoholic, I swear. Just want to make sure I get it all out of my system before I get pregnant.

No really, I'm not.

Right?

Another whirlwind weekend for us...

We were busy as usual this weekend... I was not productive in any way but we had a good time. :) We started the weekend Thursday night with more Lost. We had rented the rest of the season and needed to return it by Sunday at midnight so we had a marathon. We absolutely loved the first season and are trying to hurry and finish the movies Netflix sent us so we can get started on the second season. Now I can see what all the fuss was about. I'm not too sad that we missed it while it was happening, because we do like the marathons... We watched all of Sex & The City that way. It's nice in that you don't have to wait until the next week to continue what you got all excited to watch.

Friday was shopping at Steve & Barry's for Bitten clothes... which I love but would have liked a bigger selection. It's still early so I'll just have to go back. :) The clothes are great and the prices are even better. I found the cuts to be cute and flattering, even on an hourglass figure like mine. Hooray! After dinner with Shawn's folks, we headed to Ria's where Shawn hung out with Thomas playing video games while Ria and I met the girls at the Rock Bar. We had a fun night, as usual, with a good mix of drinks, dancing and creepy guys hitting on us.

Saturday after trying to get some sleep after staying up 'til 3:30a.m., the boys and I went grocery shopping and got ready for their girlfriends to come over. Ria had a concert to go to with some friends that were in town so we kept the girls for them. We snuck in some more Lost while they played outside and then took them to a Circus that we'd gotten free tickets for. Now, it's been awhile since I have been to a circus, but I remember no circus in my life being as ghetto as this one was. Even the bleachers were part of a truck - they just folded up and got shipped to the next town. It was dirty and gross, but the kids really enjoyed it so that definitely made it worth it. We only stayed until intermission and then told the kids it was over and headed back. We thought an evening at the playground would be more enjoyable and would decrease the risk of a child sitting on a hypodermic needle. ;) And let's face it - a playground is free and just as much fun as a bunch of acrobats flying through the sky! Sunday, after dropping the girls off at Ria's we headed south to the Renaissance Festival. The kids didn't really remember it from the last time we went a couple years ago, but I did and was so excited about it! It really is a neat, albeit expensive, experience. And like I thought, they had a really good time. We saw shows, we played games, we ate good food, we fed animals and much more. A good time was definitely had by all. :) We won't be going back for a couple more years though, so we had to enjoy as much as possible!

Shawn and I tried to end the night with a movie, but after such an action packed weekend, we were exhausted! He is starting to get sick and I just couldn't keep my eyes open any longer, so we stopped halfway and will have to finish it tonight. So far, though, it is really good.

Well hope you all had a fantastic weekend as well... Good bye for now!

The randomness of it all...

Well this is a rarity - I am blogging at work. Shhhh. The boss is gone, the phone rang one time in the last 3 hours (which was not too bad as my first phone call of the day was from a client who literally got his by an RTD bus. And you don't want to take too many phone calls like that in one day!), and my work is all done. Until my boss gets here to give me some more. So I've been reading other people's blogs today. Which I quite enjoy... Here are a couple you might find interesting.
Dad Gone Mad
Rockstar Mommy
The Cleaner Plate Club (this one often has good food info)
Shelley the Republican (this one is just disgusting. Don't eat it if you just ate!)
Some of these I read almost daily... Oh - here's my favorite mommy blog from a woman who has 7 kids! She posts some really interesting ideas on how to handle the chaos of motherhood and makes my life look easy in comparison: Notes from the Trenches.
Ok that's enough of that.

In other news... it doesn't look like I'm going to California just yet. We are not finished with the contract. The lawyers are duking it out and since we missed our June 1st deadline, no one seems to be in any hurry. July is when we're going on vacation so that month is probably going to be out as well... so it looks like I won't be in a hotel room for three days by myself after getting knocked up until probably August. Which is fine... I will have a couple more mom's nights out to look forward to in that time! :)

Oh! And if you aren't on my shit list, you might already have heard me talk about this, but Sarah Jessica Parker has a new clothing line which is available in stores tomorrow! It's called Bitten and is a very novel idea - clothes for women sized 2-20 with no piece being more expensive than $20! Needless to say, the girls and I are going shopping on Friday. :) To find something cute to wear that night when we go out. Woohoo! It's going to be a good weekend!

We actually have a super busy weekend planned, which I of course will fill you in on later... But for now I should pretend to be busy in case my boss comes back.

Hip... Hip...

... Hooray! For no surgery after all that is! Apparently the doctors in Colorado and the doctors in California went to different schools. This is a little complicated as the CA doctor is the one responsible for getting me knocked up while the CO doctor monitors everything up to the pregnancy. The CO one is the one who found the polyps and thought they needed to come out to allow my body to get pregnant. She said the polyps will act like an IUD and reject the pregnancy. The CA doctor disagrees and wants to move forward without surgery. Which is fine by me, though I do worry about wasting everyone's time and money flying me to CA for the transplant if it might not work because of the polyps... But it's his call, ultimately, and he says we're good to go!

We had a busy weekend, as usual. Friday we ran errands and cleaned the house. Usually I wait until Shawn can help me with it because it's no fun to clean up after 4 people all by myself. However, he's in school now and I thought I'd be nice and let him come home to a house he didn't clean. Because hell, I'd appreciate something like that! Well he wasn't quite as excited as I was, but it did give him time to do homework and such Saturday morning and he was able to join the boys and me at the pool. Which was heated and in fact warmer in the pool than outside it, so we froze, but the boys were so excited to go swimming for the first time this season. I was trying really hard to enjoy it while I could because lord knows it'll be 90 degrees before we know it! After lunch we decided to go see a movie... and then go to a festival. The movie was pretty long - we liked it but it wasn't the best of the three. Gavin had a hard time sitting through it. The festival was fun, but would have been more fun without kids as they were not too interested in anything but, well, the kids stuff. Can't say as I blame them but there were lots of vendors there with next arts and crafts type things. We grabbed some Greek food on the way home and then Shawn and I put the boys to bed and resumed Lost. We never got into it when everyone else did but decided to put the first season on Netflix and we are hooked! We are about halfway through the season and are waiting on more DVD's to come in the mail.

Today we went to a thrift store and then Home Depot where I bought some pretty flowers for our garden... it is looking better. And look how big my green beans are getting! The boys and I spent some time with my sister-in-law and her daughter who got some cute new kitties!
One of the treasures the boys got was a new paper airplane making kit... Here they are trying to put one together.

So that's all the fun we had this weekend... Hope yours was great as well! :)

A light at the end of the tunnel

I feel like the fog is lifting. Things are getting better in my head. My funk is less funky. :) It's been a really rough week but there is a light at the end of the tunnel.

I had a great time with my Mamas as usual last weekend. We also had a nice cookout and watched the Indy 500 with my in-laws. Memorial Day we spent hiking in Estes Park and lordy my kids like to hike!! We went on a huge slide and did some shopping while we were there.

It was a short week at work since I'm off Fridays and Monday was a holiday. My boss has been sick a lot lately and sat me down to make sure I was doing Ok with all the time off she was taking. When she's not there I run the office alone. Luckily, my co-worker Nicole comes in to do some work once in awhile and she was there a bit last week which was nice. Anyway, my boss and I decided to change my pay structure... It's good for me because I can count on each month what I'm going to get paid (which is actually good for her too) and it ended up working out to be a $2.24/hour increase in my pay as well! I won't be bringing home too much more because it throws me into a different tax bracket, but hopefully it'll mean a bigger tax refund at the beginning of the year. Business seems to have picked up a bit too, which is nice.

We are in the process of signing the Agreement for the surrogacy. Right now the lawyers are duking it out but it looks good to me so I'm ready to sign. I am thinking that the transfer date might get pushed back a bit because the clinic needed to start meds soon and we have to have a signed contract before that can happen. That hasn't happened yet so there may be a delay. Which is fine with me... but I know the IP's (Intended Parents) are getting antsy. One thing that might delay this is that I have a couple small polyps in my uterus that they found in an ultrasound yesterday. They have to be removed surgically but it should be a quick and relatively painless procedure. They don't put my health at risk but can prevent me from getting pregnant - they act like an IUD somehow. I'm not sure why I have them but as long as they are benign (which I'm told 99.99% are), I'm not too worried.

We don't have a lot going on this weekend... I already cleaned the house and I've promised the boys we'd go to the pool. I think the outside one will be too cold yet so we might do the indoor pool. Hopefully the other swimmers won't be blinded by my pale legs. ;)

Have a great weekend, everyone!