Author: Pam Kocke

NOLA mom of identical triplets. Talent Acquisition at Automattic. Enjoy reading and photography and sewing and bookbinding.

UK2016 Part 1: Wales

We got home yesterday from our epic trip to the UK, and buckle in because I have a lot of pics and stories to share. I’m going to break up my posts into the three places we went, so let’s get started!

The trip started off with an enormous amount of stress, when I got a text that our flight to Houston was delayed. The delay would mean we would miss our flight to Heathrow. Um, not an option. I got on the phone with United, and after 40 minutes of being on hold, we got put on an earlier flight to Houston, which would get us there in plenty of time to catch our flight to London.

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Waaaaaiting and waiting and waiting at the airport

But then that flight kept getting delayed, to the point where again, we were going to be in danger of missing our connection. Fortunately, the flight took off with some time to spare, and we landed in Houston. And sat and sat and sat on the tarmac. My blood pressure was rising a bit more every moment, until finally we got off with a few minutes to get to our next gate. Read More

Merry Christmas Eve!

We have been having an amazing time on our trip so far, but I didn’t bring my laptop so I won’t be posting much until we get home. But I can’t resist sharing a few from my phone….

On a walk in Caerleon
Off to visit St Fagans in Wales
Linus doesn’t want to take a pic with me
Miles at the seaside in Barry Island (Wales)
On the train to Cambridge
On the train
In front of the crickety clock in Cambridge
Punting in Cambridge
Daddy and his boys
Mince pies!

Good, bad, and ugly

Good:

The boys had their slumber party (now over a week ago!) The cake was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen in my entire life. Love so much. They had a great time, and most importantly, I survived a night with nine 8 and 9 year old boys.

Oliver had his last day at the zoo classroom. Got to watch him in a movie and he gave a presentation on endangered species.

Oliver’s new purple hair:

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Miles got his roots done:

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Bad:

How I felt the day after we went out for tiki drinks. But it was totally worth it. 🙂

Linus is currently sick. His asthma is acting up. We’re leaving soon for our trip, so I really need everyone to be healthy again. Yeesh. I mean, look how sick:

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Ugly:

Ziggy has heartworms. 😦 I was so upset when I found out, but I’m a bit calmer now, after doing some research. We seem to have caught it pretty early, thank god. Not looking forward to keeping him still for two months, though.

These sweaters:

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Happy Ziggy Day!

Can you believe? One year ago today, Ziggy came into our lives. I was a little nervous about getting a dog (a DOG? ME?) but now I can’t imagine life without Mr. Ziggerson. And yes, there were some adjustments to be made (I have learned Ziggy has a taste for running shoes) and some furniture has been chewed on, but it’s all worth it for this face. ❤

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April 23 – With Ziggy before the last game.

Beyond giddy!

Ever since I read Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, I’ve been obsessed with seeing the play while we’re in London. Considering the entire run through 2017 sold out in like four seconds, I wasn’t super optimistic about getting a ticket. Also, it meant asking George to entertain the boys while I spent six hours over the course of two evenings seeing this play. (All I can say is, the boys are going to be very familiar with pubs by the time the play is over.)

I’ve basically been checking the ticketing websites constantly for the past few months. You’d see tickets come available for other dates, but never the week we’ll be there. But today, while on a call at work (TOTALLY PAYING ATTENTION), I idly checked the site and THERE IT WAS! There was an available ticket! And it wasn’t even at the £200 level (which I was perfectly happy to pay for this experience) but at the £40 level! Yes, it means I’ll be sitting in the second to last row, way up in the balcony but WHO CARES?

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So I click on it, hand shaking, a bit hysterical (and by now my coworkers know what’s going on, mostly due to the ear-splitting shriek I let out) and it’s suddenly NOT AVAILABLE.

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So I click back and try again AND THERE IT IS!

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But then my browser just freezes. Nothing will click. I close all the other tabs and somehow it starts working again and I’m able to get my ticket and pay for it and now it’s MINE ALL MINE!

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EEEEEEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!

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(And a special thanks to my husband for letting me take this much time away from everyone to see the play.)

9 years old!

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Inside because it rained all day. Hard to get this one because they were a tad tired after last night’s slumber party. (Finally went to sleep around 1, only to be up for the day by 6:30. When are they going to sleep like teenagers already?

But I had to use some hardcore emotional manipulation (and Minions on Netflix) to get them to “smile” for this picture. Whatever works.

Catching up

 

I’ve been a terrible blogger. I get my awesome new .blog domain and then I just fall apart.

To be fair, life has been awfully busy. I went to Los Angeles for work, then Thanksgiving week was mostly spent in Baton Rouge with my family, and this week Linus was sick one day and I’m getting ready for their birthday and school stuff and gah.

So let’s get this out of the way.

Los Angeles:

Hot butterbeer!
Automattic-versary cupcakes!
Working hard
Hardly working
I got to see Ellie there!

From my pictures, it may look like we spent most of our time at Universal, not working. But I assure you, lots of work got done, it’s just not as picturesque.

And then the day after I got home, the boys and I headed to Baton Rouge to spend the week at Grandee’s, since my brother and sister and everyone was there. We also celebrated my mom’s 70th birthday a bit early.

And oh also last week we had our annual holiday party for the New Orleans Moms Blog and I got lots of fun swag and that was awesome. And I made a lemon cake from lemons picked from my tree! And also lemonade that was crazy delicious.

I suppose that brings us about up to date. I am getting ready now for the boys’ slumber party tomorrow night. The problem with a slumber party for triplets is the guest list is exponential. At first I said “one guest each” but that seemed stingy, and what about their mutual friends? So it ended up being two guests each on average and now I will have nine little boys running around the house and ACK! But I’m sure it’ll be fun. RIGHT?

Christmas card attempt, take 1

A cute picture, to be sure. But Miles has on dirty socks, Linus is standing on his toe knuckles, and I had to do a lot of terrible photoshopping to remove the reflections in the glass. I think we’ll just take a family picture closer to the holidays and maybe (gasp!) not send out cards this year at all. We’ll see.

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In case you’re wondering how I got those adorable smiles…

This is Beau. I might have to hire him for the monthly pics.

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pyjammy dot blog!

Got my new .blog domain today! (Don’t worry, you don’t have to change anything, pyjammy.com still works just fine.)

You can get one now too! Go forth, [dot] blog!

Three years!

Goodness knows I love an anniversary. Three years ago today I had my first day full-time at Automattic. Still have to pinch myself.

Me and my great coworker Marjorie
Simon and Livio and T$
Zandy and Deborah
Me
The tattoos we all got
You can see where we got our t-shirt inspiration
Daryl again
Team Athena
JOEL and me and Simon
It was v foggy/cloudy up there. And snowing a bit? Or sleeting? Let’s just say snow.
Happy!
KarKar and me.
Beckett bought me a birthday crown!

You want in on this? We’re hiring!

The first race!

The boys had their first race yesterday, and I’m so proud of them! Naturally, I took a ton of pictures.

Before we left the house:

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When we got to the race:

 

Lined up, ready to start:

 

They’re off! Miles takes an early lead.

 

The race was half a mile, two laps around the track. I told them it was okay if they walked some of it, since they hadn’t run a half mile straight before. But they were having none of that.

Here comes Miles, first lap almost down! Linus is still right behind him.

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Here’s Ollie! (Love that he’s airborne here.)

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And at the finish! Miles first!

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Followed closely by Linus!

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And Ollie, bringing up the rear! His brothers were there waiting to high five him. Aw!

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Just the order they should have been born in, actually. Random.

I was so proud of them for giving it their all. They didn’t stop, and they finished a heck of a lot faster than I expected them to. Miles is all ready to do another race, at least. I might sign the two of us up for a two mile race coming up next month. Hope I can keep up with him!

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