Thursday thirteen

Man, couldn’t we have any numbers lower than thirteen that start with “th”? Maybe I should save this for tomorrow so I only have to come up with four things to say. Or maybe I don’t have to have alliterative post titles. Hmm.

However, it has been a while since I’ve posted, so I shall try to come up with thirteen things.

Third grade is going well so far. The boys all like their teachers and when I pick them up, are in good spirits. Woo!
Speaking of school, we now have five kids in carpool! Ann Francis started preK-4 this year and I love having her in the car. She is so dang cute, I can hardly stand it. And she calls me Pammy and it’s freaking adorable. Gah.
Took the boys to see two movies last weekend. Kubo and the Two Strings and Pete’s Dragon. Kubo was fantastic and Pete’s Dragon (or Elliot’s Human, as the boys called it) was good, but suffered by comparison. We all decided we should have seen Pete’s Dragon first, then it would have seemed better.
Two weeks until I head to Whister, BC for my week-long company-wide work trip. So excited to see all of my coworkers and to work together in person and all that good stuff.
I volunteered to be a room mom in Miles’s class. Figured it was time to give back a little.
I had to pick up Oliver from school early today for the second time this week. Back to school germs suck.
Last weekend was the fourth annual New Orleans Moms Blog Mom’s Night Out. My hair looked great. It was a wedding theme, so I had the hair people put my wedding hair clips in. Aw!
I really need some new brown boots and am having the eternal struggle – buy cheap and toss them after winter’s over (like I do every year) or buy quality for once? The problem is, apparently only people with thin calves want nice boots because even the “wide calf” versions are too small for my, ahem, athletic calves. Boo.
We got to play with tiny puppies and now the boys are convinced Ziggy needs a friend. I am not convinced at all, but dang, those puppies were adorable!
My hair is finally getting longer. And look at this great necklace I got from my friend Bea! Proceeds went to a family she knows who lost everything in the floods.
Carpool chaos. Don’t worry, we weren’t moving.
Miles as a troll.
I’m all about puppies this week.

I did it! 13 things!

23 hours at the beach

My friend and coworker Deborah and her family went on vacation to the same resort Kiki and I took the boys to, two and four years ago. So I said I’d drive up for the night with the boys and hang out.

I got a free hotel room using rewards points, and Saturday morning, Oliver, Miles, and I hit the road. (Linus didn’t want to be in a car for that long, so he got plenty of quality time with Daddy and Ziggy.)

We got there in the early afternoon and swam and floated and ate and drank and swam some more until the evening, when the boys and I drove five minutes down the road to our hotel. We snuggled in bed and watched House Hunters Renovations and all konked out after our busy day. We hit the beach on Sunday morning, and spent a little more time in the pools, and then it was time to go home.

A short trip, but a really nice one! Next year, we definitely need to go longer!

I understand Linus wanting to stay home, but I wish he’d come. I’m in love with these pictures of Oliver and Miles. 😍 Really wish I had one of my green-haired boy!

And some more random pics taken with my phone:

Swimming at the Caribe

Bushwhackers!

Me and Deborah

Late afternoon overlooking the bay

Hotel breakfast!

At the beach

Beach

Miles rocking a hat

One last pic at the Caribe before heading home.

California wrap up

I have let so much time pass, and I haven’t finished blogging about our trip to Los Angeles, so I’m just going to drop a bunch of pics in here and consider it done.

Flying there, In n Out, visit to Uncle Evan and Aunt Jennifer’s office, monthly pic (with Ellie.)

Train to the beach! Santa Monica Pier, Ferris Wheel, playing in the water.

Dave & Busters, Oliver hits the jackpot, everyone gets stuffed animals, I got a Pikachu! Trip to the park Evan and Jennifer designed.

Only one kid wanted their picture taken. Guess who?

UNIVERSAL! HARRY POTTER WORLD! SO FUN! Even with a 2 hour wait in line for the HP ride. Butterbeer. Minions. Simpsons. Donuts. Good times.

Last day, boo! Lunch at Pink’s with my friend Robyn. Trip to the Grove for ice cream and a trolley ride. More cousin time, then back on the plane to go home on the redeye.

And finally, the traditional “Uncle Evan with Ellie and the boys.” See the others here.

First day of 3rd grade!

Here we go again.

And in case you were wondering, they weren’t making the WordPress “w” with their fingers, but a 3 for third grade. Not sure why they didn’t want to use three fingers on one hand, but whatever. Cute.

And for funsies, the first day at their school, five years ago…

They’ve grown a teensy bit since then. (Look at the window, to compare.)

Relatedly, I wrote this post the other day for the New Orleans Moms Blog.

Back! (with more mountain pics)

I can’t believe it’s been ten days since I last posted. It’s been an extremely busy ten days, so I’m going to start trying to catch up with posts about our trip to Los Angeles (which was fantastic.)

First up, pics from our hike from the Griffith Observatory to get a good view of the Hollywood Sign, which the boys were fascinated by (mostly because of the sheer size of it.)

We went about a mile out (and then back), and I was impressed by how much the boys enjoyed it (and how little they complained.) We got pretty high up, and the nervous mom in me was freaking out only slightly. (Can’t you tell by the look on my face in this pic?)

This was steeper than it looks in the pics. They loved it.

Nice view of the Griffith Observatory as we made our way back.

On top of the world!

Posting from atop a mountain. (Possibly “mountain.”)

Number 104

The boys and I are in Los Angeles, visiting my brother, sister-in-law, and niece. We’re all loving the mild weather, and I love that Ellie made another appearance in the monthly pics.

I really wanted to use one of the pictures I took against the hedge wall they have alongside the driveway, but this is the kind of tomfoolery I had to deal with.

So. Sitting on the front porch, it is.

So much for brown.

I insisted several times over the summer that the boys were going to start third grade with brown hair. I may as well confess right here that part of the reason I wanted it was because I miss them looking alike. Terrible, right? After all my talk about letting them be individuals. But they still would have different hair cuts, so not totally the same.

But you know, it’s just hair. It makes them happy. Who cares what color it is? And let’s be honest, it’s better for everyone involved if they’re easy to tell apart.

So.

And they pretty much have the same haircut now (yes, Oliver went short) (though you can’t tell here because someone whose name starts with Mi- and ending with -les had a heavy hand with the styling paste), so I guess I kind of got my wish.

They’re so happy with their freshly dyed hair (Miles in particular is over the moon) that I can’t help but love it too.

Mohawks

Not that it would be that strange if I let the boys have mohawks, considering their other hair-related hijinks, but these are just shampoo mohawks. I figured if they were going to be playing outside with the hose, I may as well get them clean while we’re at it.

The Great Race!

Here it is, the film you’ve all been waiting for (I mean, since last Friday, at least.)

THE GREAT RACE

Who will explode in a fiery crash? Who will fall in a volcano? Who will lose their engine because of a ninja? Who will win!?!?

You have to watch and see…

Thanks to the Mini Art Center for such a fantastic week!

Pokémon hunting

Who knew, that hunting for Pokémon would make for such great pictures? The boys and I are spending the weekend in Baton Rouge with Emily and my mom and Larry. My sister will be here on Sunday with Andrew, so I expect I’ll corner that little one for pics when he gets here.

I’m just waiting for some photographer to come out with a “Pokémon Go Photo Session.” Maybe this is how I can make my millions.

And then I made them all stand for a sec in the golden late afternoon light for individual pics.

20160715-IMG_2601 — Emily, her mother’s daughter for sure

20160715-IMG_2613 — Oliver, pre-teen in training

A week at art camp

For a change of pace, I signed the boys up for a different camp this week. It was at a little studio in our neighborhood called the Mini Art Center. We really enjoyed walking the six blocks to camp every morning (Ziggy accompanied us and he probably enjoyed the walk most of all) but thanks to typical NOLA summer, weather, walking home didn’t work out so well.

(We got completely drenched on Tuesday.)

The theme of this week’s camp was cut out animation, and all week the whole class of ten kids worked on a film together. This afternoon we got to go watch the (almost) finished product. Next week we’ll get a finished video that I can post, but in the meantime, here are a few pics from today: