[Soon-To-Be] Scorpion

This is what happens when people don't show up for interviews at my office and we have a healthy head start on everything else for the day: 

oh.. it'll get there.. it... will.. get there.

Yeah, that' right.. yoga. Every. Single. Day.

This ugly thing right here is the beginning of my work towards a full-blown scorpion. It's not pretty, I know, but I'm still a yoga newb and have quickly learned that patience breeds progress. Not existing flexibility or core strength [which, let's be frank here... could stand for an overhaul of sorts].. but patience, practice, and in our case... daily rug burn.

I have a yoga mat at the office, but it's easier to dismount and be back at the desk if need be when I'm not rolling up a mat, too... so.. yeah. For now, elbow rug burn it is.

For the record, that elbow burn went great with sand volleyball courts tonight :/ Haha. Oh well.

Namaste.

xo | cmd

Add It To The List

Fact:

I need a personal trainer.

We'll talk about this on another day, but the bottom line is that I just ran a little bit and kiiiind of want to die.

In case you can't comprehend the amount of defeat that was experienced today:

gahhhh..

Sheer. Butt-whoopin'.
I should not be dying after 3 miles.
Stay tuned. This will change.

xo | cmd

My Summer Girl

Since today was one of those [work] Mondays that I'd like to put to rest and never re-visit, I thought I'd share some of the pictures from earlier in the day yesterday, before all of the JG birthday festivities.

Rob, Sydni and I headed in to church, where the theme for the current series is Movies. It's again a very non-traditional theme, and we again decided it may be time to start putting our feelers out there for something that more closely aligns with our doctrinal position. For the time being though, we made the best of what it was; Sydni for the obvious reason wasn't complaining:

my gorgeous girl & her princess heroines!

Sydni walked out of that church with a full supply of energy:

... in the parking lot

On a whim, we decided to stop by the river trail for a quick walk. Still clad in our church clothes, we took a mini hike down to the riverbank, where Sydni entertained herself with bubbles and the tiny toads along the bank.

bubbles!

action shot

bubble whisperer

into the woods she goes ;)

♥♥ my little family! ♥♥

What an awesome little detour that was. I didn't really get a chance to even look over these pictures until today, so this is fitting in and of itself. I realized for the umpteenth time today again that this girl is quickly blossoming into a beautiful little lady.

my girl! ♥

Today was a pretty placid day; Rob and I got ourselves caught up on some things after work and had a dinner date at Mango Tree for some sushi. Rob's knee deep in negotiations over a boat [yes, the saga continues], and from the looks of it, this deal is going to happen sometime in the next 24 hours. I'm excited for him! His hope is to have one in the driveway within two weeks, and if I know my man the way I think I do, that's a deadline that won't be overshot.

Happy Monday, blogbots! Make it a great week!

xo | cmd

Happy Birthday, Grueter!!

Here's my obligatory well-wishing for Jamie's birthday:

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, GRUETER!!!

More in my style, though, here's the customary slew of remember that? snapshots from over the years. Here's to you, and another incredible year, Jamie!

It's August, which is the 8th month. Here are 8 fun little diddies that mark the incredible era that continues to be my friendship with our dear friend Grueter!

1 || This. We'll start strong. This is the embodiment of our friendship. Along with the usual suspects, this was as standard thing on most nights. 

2 || Grueter's apartment. It goes without explanation that this place was a 2nd home to a lot of us. This was a regular occurrence as well: tracing each other on the walls. Here's Jamie tracing Nalom, next to the existing outlines of Catie & myself. Ladd, as usual, provided the soundtrack. [This is completely sober happenings of likely a Saturday morning. Loved. this.]

3 || Antics at Jamie's. There were plenty of others, including [though not limited to] copious amounts of duct tape, industrial sized bubble wrap, parkour yoga, and more.... haha.


4 || One of many random outings on which I somehow coerced my friends into joining. I think this was as "concert" at a local venue, at which we were the only attendees. Hey... 7 people's a crowd sometimes ;)

5 || St. Patrick's Day.. probably 2007 or 08? We were all big fans of theme parties.

 

6 || Family Dinners [@ Grueter's]! These still to this day rank among some of my favorite memories. We rotated turns in pairs of cooking dinner for the "family," which was always enjoyed in this, or a very similar fashion. The cast of Friends probably took notes from this. ;)

 

7 || Grueter's going-away party. Jamie landed himself the job of a lifetime, and was preparing to leave us for Aman, Jordan.

so long for now, friend! :(

8 || MY going-away party! I made a move to Alabama [note, NEVER... again.], and Jamie surprised me by showing up to be a part of the festivities along with, you guessed it, the usual suspects.



 

********

So flash forward to today, when we obliged Carolina's invite to join in the celebration at Jamie's parents' house on the East end. More pictures? Yes. More pictures :D

 

First things first, we got there and immediately Carolina offered to start painting faces [love this girl..] - Sydni was the first one in the chair and before we knew it, had a beautiful butterfly to show for it!

carolina the artist!

my favorite little butterfly!!

love her. to the moon & back, i love her.

The boys took to getting acquainted in the fashion that boys typically do - easily and without much fuss at all. I was excited that Rob finally had the chance to meet Jamie; the two of them hit it off and that was that.

boys & their jenga :p

Grueter's parents' house sits on a gorgeous piece of land, with a mini [stocked] pond included. Sydni made friends with Jamie's nephew, and the two of them were taking tours around the pond as we stood around discussing fishing. 

pretty pond.. pretty sun.. pretty kids!

enjoying the day with my love!

We weren't really sure what to expect coming out for the afternoon, but I'm absolutely glad we did! Thanks to Jamie, the Grueters and Carolina for the invite!

my world :D

So HAPPY BIRTHDAY to one of the funniest friends I have. Cheers to this one and many, many more!

hbd, grueter!!

xo | cmd

 

SCHOOL SHOPPING [STAAAAHP...]

So uhh ...

this is happening.

It's everywhere. Yeahyeahyeah, I know: This happens every year. Kids get out in May/June, and by the first of July, the [at that point] premature signs of all things BTS [Back To School] can already be sighted from the big retailers down to the mom & pop shops. This used to incite unbelievable frustration when I was in high school, trying to breathe in the freedom of summer without the driving reminder that I was headed back in like, 90ish days.

Fast forward to that thing we always talked about in high school: "Someday, when I'm a mom....."
When I was 17 and joking about this with my friends, we overlooked the details of mommyhood, including but certainly far from limited to: school supply shopping.

It sounds mundane to the childless folk out there, and like a mastered science to the seasoned parents, but if for a second I thought this would be a boring affair, well... nope & nope.

kindergarteners need earbuds ;)

First, Sydni's kindergarten check list includes the standard staple items that I would've expected:

Backpack, lunchbox, markers, highlighters, pencils, box of tissues, hand sanitizer, box of bandaids, etc. On the list also: One set of ear buds, which made me simultaneously laugh and feel ancient, because obviously that wasn't a thing in 1990 when I hit the halls of elementary school.

And then there were glue sticks. Not inherently a crazy request, but I'm still trying to lend a plausible guess as to what they plan to do with 18 glue sticks per child. I mean, in our house, as crafty as we are, I could easily rationalize maybe... 18 glue sticks per a period of 12 months, if even that many [glue sticks]. That's 360 glue sticks per class of 20 kids, and this isn't just for the AM goers. Guesstimating at 20 kids for each session, that's a mere 720 tiny tubes of stickiness. Haha. Yay, adhesive kids!

Anyway, Sydni was beside herself as we entered the glorious, glowing [literally, due to the neon signage.... everywhere] archway of the seasonal school supply section of the store. We knocked everything off the list with little to no fuss, save for a washable stamp pad and sticky-back velcro dots. Kindergarten supply scavenger hunt? Challenge accepted. We finally tracked down the velcro dots, and eventually left sans only the stamp pad, since the store didn't carry them. I think that's fair, and not a job badly done for first-timers.

*Whew!
Sydni exhausted herself into a celebratory nap, which we occupied with some catch-up on laundry and cleaning [trade ya, Syd?] before she was back in action and ready for the park. 

"the blur" - she's on the move!

Off to the park we were, with bike in tow. We squeezed the last bit of daylight out of the sky before we loaded back up and circled on home.

Happy Saturday, to you & yours!

xo | cmd

Flashback Friday..

Here's the reality: TOMORROW, Rob and I will embark together on the journey that is school supply shopping with Sydni. Of the three of us, Sydni is actually the one maintaining composure the best. Her primary objective for tomorrow's outing is to find everything in the store that is labeled, emblazened, embroidered, stickered, macrometed or otherwise adorned with anything My Little Pony. The girl is obsessed. Haha.

But that's tomorrow. We are kindergarten school supply shopping... tomorrow. 
For today, that meant reminiscing over the last nearly 5 years of life for my little girl, who in just a couple of short weeks, becomes a "school kid," as she calls it.

I'll be doing this whole flashback thing in much greater detail a few short weeks from now when Sydni turns 5, so we'll just consider this a precourser to that.

Just a couple of my favorite then & nows:

Crafts:


2010, 2011, 2013 & 2014

Eating [More specifically using any type of silverware]:  


2009, 2010, 2012, 2013
& mostly ice cream, apparently.. haha ;)

A Taste of the Seasons:
Summer:


2010 & 2014

 Winter:

2009, 2012, 2014

Carseat Memoirs:

2010, 2012, 2014

 The "Mom, I'm DONE With Pictures" Face:

staaaaaahhhhhp!

 & of COURSE, Enjoying Life!

LOVE LOVE LOVE.

Haha.. Miss Syd certainly is the epitome of love in my book. I can't believe my little girl is growing into elementary school. I'm so excited for her, and simultaneously wrecked because it's happening already.

Let's go do this [tomorrow], Syd. ♥♥♥♥.

xo | cmd

LBYC & London Bridge

We've been talking about going for a visit down to the Ludlow Bromley Yacht Club for a while now. The last time I was there was back in 2008, when we celebrated Jamie's birthday and had no idea what the LBYC really was. Oops.

lbyc!

We finally made plans with Becky to do dinner and decided LBYC would be the venue. We even brought along the same Whispering Beard coozie just because.. well, just because our minds both function that way. Hah.. 

becky!

Kalyn & Brian joined us soon after, and we made a little crowd of it all.

awh.

& of course, my best friend ♥♥

After LBYC, Becky called it a night and headed out. Kalyn, Brian, Rob and I were left with a decision on where to round out the night; we opted for the London Bridge back in Mt. Washington. The Bridge is exactly halfway between both Kalyn's place and ours, so it worked out perfectly; we could walk home from here had we so desired.

♥ this gal

That's a wrap, folks! We still have one more day before the official weekend, so it's time to call it.

xoxo.

G'Nite!

 

xo | cmd