A Day At The Beach ...

We spent the morning at the beach ...
Eli ate his first mouthful of sand ... Joshua experienced a LOVE/HATE relationship with the water ... he so badly wanted to walk in it but was just ever so terrified ... He had no problem figuring out that he loves "Aba" ... our neighbors came out to spend a few days with us. J How and Ava are great pals!
Ava tried so hard to get Joshua to love the ocean and be brave ... But he just preferred hanging onto his mom's hand ... and I can't say that I minded!

Get Out Your Magnifying Glass ...

A few months ago ... I told you about my brush with stardom!  The guy from Diners, Dives and Dive-Ins came and shot a segment at Joe's Farm Grill.  That program aired last month ... I watched and watched it and unfortunately ... they never zoomed in on the Bost crew.  We were there but the producers just decided to "go a different direction!"  Oh well!

So ... I've been holding onto the slight glimmer of hope that I just might make it into the summer edition of Cottage Living.  The crew was out in Agritopia in December to shoot pictures of neighborhoods that made their TOP 10 list.  Let's not go into the particulars of how I looked that day but let's just say ... I MADE THE MAGAZINE and I'm really thankful that it's not super close-up!  (But if you do happen to get out that magnifying glass ... don't be surprised if my hair looks CRAZY and I appear to have no makeup on.  Your eyes are not deceiving you ... that's how real models show up to work!)

(P.S.  I'm the one in the turquoise shirt! And I'm talking to my neighbor who also had no makeup on ... but like I said ... it's tough to get quality models these days!)

(P.S.S. ... If you feel led to buy a copy of the magazine and frame that picture and put it in your entry way ... I think that would be a great look for any home!)

He's Eight Months Old and We Have a Crawler!

My little guy is not so little anymore ... Eli has 4 teeth ...
He moved into Size 3 diapers ...


And ... he started crawling on Saturday. He's already way faster and Joshua's life has been turned UPSIDE down. His new favorite thing (other than trains) is saying "E-why - stay back. Stay back!" I think he was beginning to like the idea of a "non-moving" sibling! Joshua likes things to be very calculated (hmm .. I have no idea where he got that from) and a moving sibling is just far too unpredictable for his liking!

Vacation Is Tough Work ...

We like to start off our days off in true vacation mode ...
A nice morning beverage of chilled milk in a comfy monkey chair ...
Then some leisure time and a chance to make a few phone calls ...
Followed by a trek outdoors to stretch our legs and scoot around the yard ...
And ... a nice splash in "the lake" just in case we were getting a bit overheated :)
A bit of an afternoon workout ...
And an art project with "Doras the Explorers" crayons ...

I sure hope we can keep up this kind of fun for another few weeks!!!

Our Disneyland Adventure ...

Joshua seems to be concerned with only one thing in life .... TRAINS! Thankfully, Aunt Irene had sent a box to Ben's parent's home and it included his current favorite ... Thomas the Train. Since we didn't have time to set the track up, Joshua made due with his own tracks ... the entryway rug. He's such a creative little guy!
Day Two ... it was off to Disneyland. Record high temps for the southern CA area ... 103 at Disneyland on Sunday. We thought it seemed a bit like spring ...
Joshua and his future Uncle Robert are discussing their Disneyland strategy. Or so I thought. Joshua was eating a snack (chicken and juice) in front of Robert, who is a vegetarian. By the time I came back to give Joshua another piece of chicken, he spit it out. Robert swears he said nothing negative about those feathery little egg layers ...
Auntie Jenn and Eli finally met face to face! Nothing like making him a super fan of his aunt by having her supply one of his favorite things ... FOOD!
All Joshua could talk about was seeing a train. Mickey, who? If Disneyland only had trains ... nothing else, he would have been more than content. Ben and J How were on the look out for the Disneyland Train!
We escaped the heat and went to Mickey's house in Toon Town. Joshua was all about saying "Cheese" for the Mouse!
Are you impressed? Joshua looks confused ... Eli smiles if he sees another human being ... and everyone else is making eye contact! Nice!
Joshua is barely 35 inches tall. He just made it by the skin of his hat on the roller coaster in Toon Town. (I had Ben put his hat on when the gal measured him and I think it added a good inch!) But he LOVED going on any train ride we could find and when we were all out of trains ... horses were the next best thing!
Don't let him fool you ... he slept for 50 minutes from the time he woke up at 7am until the time he went to sleep at 11:30pm. Actually, I think he's totally awake here ... he's just playing a little trick on his mom!
It was HOT! Joshua enjoyed EATING the battery operated water fan! And getting the rest of us wet ... although, we didn't complain!
Ben's mom used to work at Disneyland as a nurse. We stopped off at the nurse's station to see some of her former co-workers and Eli took full advantage of the cool towels!
The boys went down for a nap (correction ... Joshua napped and Eli screamed) and Ben and I went back to the park with his sister and her fiance to hit a few rides. YIPPIE!
After naps ... California Adventure and A Bug's Land. The water feature was a hit! He stayed dry for so long and then ....
His timing was just a bit off!
At the end of the night .... we staked out our spot to watch the light parade.
Is that about the cutest picture?
And ... we've hit a wall. Not looking like someone you'd like to run into in a dark alley!
Can we say ... OVERLOAD?

It was a great day! Joshua had a blast ... we had fun ... and while we had high hopes of everyone sleeping until 10am the next morning ... both the boys were up at 6:45 ... and Joshua was asking to see more trains!

I Wore A Sweater This Morning ...

And not surprisingly ... I found myself in a much better mood. I don't see myself ever moving to Southern California but for the next few weeks ... I'm going to enjoy sitting in the sunshine ... catching up on my celebrity gossip (yeah that my mother-in-law subscribes to People!) ... and LOVING that I have no REAL responsibilities (except of course ... being a MOM ... but even that seems so much easier in the cooler weather!!)

I forgot the USB cable for my camera in AZ otherwise I could show you pictures of the TOASTY day we spent at Disneyland and CA Adventure and Mr. Eli ... who is now getting his 3rd tooth and working REALLY hard on crawling and of J How ... who is loving swimming in "the lake" (the jacuzzi) and is wearing BIG BOY undies!!! So much to blog :)

We're off to Olive Garden tonight for dinner so I'm hoping to swing by a store and pick up a cable. I just have a feeling that you all might go through serious withdrawals if I don't post for another month!!!

The Heat Makes You Do Strange Things ...

It's a common disease. It sometimes hits people worse than others. Small people, in particular, can be severely impacted. In the Midwest, this condition hits people in the dead of winter. But in the desert ... we like to call it SUMMER CABIN FEVER! It typically occurs after several days of being exposed to air-conditioning and the absence of smog-filled outside air.
This disease can cause small children to misplace their shorts and wear PINK shoes ...
Try on their mom's shades and sing "The Itsy Bitsy Spider" repeatedly in front of the mirror...
If it gets really bad ... there is a tendency to start eating furniture in the hopes that it will help eliminate severe boredom ..And when one does make it outdoors, for a VERY SHORT period of time ... your eyes begin to play tricks on you and you start believing your neighbor's slip and slide is actually a tropical oasis!
In the most serious of CABIN FEVER cases ... you might even start to LOVE ON your younger sibling and think HUGGING is a great way to pass the time!

Maybe summer won't be that bad after all!