the things they say...

We were on a stroller walk and on the way back about a half a mile from our house the girls asked to get out and walk. They love holding hands and walking next to each other which I of course think it the CUTEST THING EVER especially because they do it simply because they like to. As they were walking I was behind them pushing the stroller and I hear the following:

Adia: Rasa, can dogs take cat naps?
Rasa: Bahahahahahahaha NOOOO!!!
Adia: bahahahahahahaha

wishing well...

Royce worked yesterday but got off early so we played outside (beautiful day!) and then after dinner decided to wander around Centennial Lakes Park. It's a great park, really close to the house and has a walking path around a little man made lake with paddle boats, mini golf and plenty of places to stop and swing. The girls loved it! As we were walking we came across a little waterfall and Royce pulled out two quarters and handed each of the girls one and told them to make a wish and toss it in the water. They were both excited to do it. After he asked Rasa what she wished for and she smiled and said, "I wished for a pony!!!". Royce asked Adia what she wished for and she quickly replied, "I wished for MONEY!!"

Friday Fun Day! Hot Sam's!

I did a photo session with an adorable six month old at Hot Sam's in Lakeville a few months ago. It's an AWESOME place and I knew I wanted to go back with the girls! The bonus is that it's only 15 minutes away from our house. The owner is paranoid about little kids being there because there are wild roosters that apparently are aggressive and lots of places for little kids to get hurt. We kept a close eye on them (my parents and I) and we had fun. Rasa kept taking off and chasing after the animals but we all had a good time. Check it out if you're ever down in that area just know that the owner will be watching you like a hawk lol! My parents and I met for breakfast first and stopped at the cupcake boutique before we left. It was a fun day for sure!
I wasn't going to bring my camera but at the last minute I ran in and grabbed it. I'm glad I did even though my kids now HATE a camera anywhere near them :)

Everyday Things

It's friday, friday, friday!!

Nana's back from the cabin and she drove down today to hang with the girls and I. We went over to The Cottage House in South Minneapolis to shop their one weekend a month sale. HEAVEN! Everything I love packed into one big old house and everything's dirt cheap! I could have spent the day there but I picked out a few things (thank you Royce!), my Mom bought me some curtains (thank you Mom!) and we left before the girls did any serious damage to the place. Seriously they were like wild animals running from room to room, out the front door, out the back door, climbing on everything, touching everything.....now that I type this it sounds like typical three year old behavior huh. Still, they are normally perfect in public!

We skipped over to 50th and France and had lunch at Barrio. I love their guac! Fish tacos were just ok but the girls were happy with the guac and quesadilas. In the restaurant they were pouring water on everything, jumping on the booth, climbing under the table etc. Oyi! When my Mom volunteered to take them both to the bathroom I happily let her go and giggled a little after they walked away. Public bathroom trips with those two is sickly disgusting. They climb on the toilet to potty and don't care that they're touching EVERYTHING! They touch the booth walls, the toilet flusher thingy, the sinks etc. I have major ocd when it comes to not touching a dam thing in a public restroom and I cannot handle taking them in there! I walked back to check on my Mom's sanity after they were gone about 15 minutes and when I walked in she was drenching them both in hand sanitizer looking at me with her eyes wide open saying, "they touch EVERYTHING!!". Lol yep, I do know that!

After lunch as we were walking back to the car we stumbled upon the most magical of all places! Sweet Retreat Cupcake Boutique. Positively AMAZING! Adia had a princess vanilla cupcake, Rasa a chocolate vanilla, I had a butterfinger cupcake (peanut butter cake with chocolate frosting rolling in crumbled butterfingers...need I say more) and my Mom got a chocolate espresso cupcake...probably the twins fault for her needing a jolt after the bathroom incident. Best cupcake I've had in my life and you all know I've had a million of them so trust me. Cupcake in St. Paul doesn't even come close to these!

After roasting in the car on the way home (it's HOT today) I disrobed both girls immediately and turned the sprinkler on so they could cool off before nap.

We had a great day and what a beautiful start to the weekend!

au revoir weekend!

Our weekend started Friday night with me dreaming of coffee and donuts at my favorite new spot The Donut Cooperative over in S Minneapolis. Royce humored me Friday night and agreed to check it out as early as we all woke up the next morning! I was so determined to eat donuts that I woke up at 6:30 and woke everyone else up at 7 am to head out the door :) The girls were excited and we had a wonderful sweet breakfast in that funky sweet little cafe tucked inside of one of my favorite neighborhoods in Minneapolis. Royce liked the lemon poppyseed donut the best (it was excellent) and my favorite was the almond joy donut....I need another one soon. The girls sampled several but like usual pretty much just licked the frosting off the top and left everything else. All of us ran around all morning and by Saturday afternoon anxiously awaited one of my bff's arrival for her birthday party (girls were excited about cake, Royce excited to hang with Amy's boyfriend, a pro skater). I brought Rasa with me to pick up the cake and she ran beside me holding the ice cream in the store squealing with every step :) We had a great time. Later a couple of old friends came over to hang out by the fire.

Sunday morning all of us woke up early again, decided to drive until we found a little cafe for coffee and ended up eating at a little diner in Edina. It was actually very good! After, we went to bachman's to pick up some annuals (Royce's gift to me for Mother's Day) to plant in the side planter and we enjoyed the beautiful hot sun all day and all evening long. I had a beautiful Mother's Day. Royce was sweet, took care of everything and my favorite moment was before I hopped out of bed in the morning when Royce marched the girls into our room with their mother's day cards in their hands saying in the sweetest little munchkin voices, "Happy Mother's Day, Momma". Melt my heart!!!

It will be good to hop into our weekday rhythm but it was a beautiful and fantastic weekend. My little family spent all of our time outside, playing, walking, running around, biking, sitting in the sun and the girls in the sprinkler, dancing and listening to music, eating great food (even watermelon)!

Royce and I tucked the girls in early tonight, before it even got totally dark out because they've been running ragged all weekend. After we put them to bed Adia started asking for hardboiled eggs. I had a dozen fresh eggs in the fridge so I said yes, what the heck I'll make you some and bring them in when they're ready. After the timer went off the girls were still awake excited to eat eggs (simple pleasures!) so I was cooling and peeling them as fast as I could. As I was standing in the kitchen, it was finally black dark outside and I paused for a second to breath in the summer smelling warm air blowing through the windows and I felt excited and happy. Excited that we're finally feeling at home here and happy that this is where we are.

"summer" colds

Well it turns out that my girls aren't plotting to drive me to the psych ward at the local hospital with their screaming, fighting and crying.....they are both battling "summer" colds....again. We thought it was allergies but the hacking coughs started today and things are looking and sounding much more cold like than allergies. Well, at least it explains the past several days of personality disorder!

Oh Adia

Adia's had a rough past few days. She seems crabby (unusual for her), bossy, quick to lash out and quick to snap. I'm not sure what's going on with her but she can't seem to catch a break either! She's been limping on her leg for a few days. Hard to say why being that she's crashes on her bike, gets crashed into by Rasa on HER bike, jumps, falls and spills a dozen times a day! She took a header off the couch earlier in the week, tripped at the playground last night and whapped her face on the bottom of a big plastic chair swing and when we got home she dumped one of our wood lawn chairs on the top of her foot!

Last night we all went for a walk and she wanted to be held the entire time. She said she wanted to be a baby. After dinner she wouldn't leave me alone for one second so I pulled her on my lap and said, "do you just need to be held by Momma?" and she looked up at me and said, "YES!"

I'm going to spend some time with her this weekend, just her and I. Rasa and I have been doing that a lot lately (because she needed it!). The funny thing with these two is we work so hard to focus on the one that's having a hard time that she blossoms but the other girl ends up getting neglected (for lack of a better word, trust me). Rasa is in a beautiful place right now. Her meltdowns are much less, she's happy, she can articulate how she feels, what she needs and wants and is getting it all. Now we just need to focus on Adia and hope to find balance with both of their needs at the same time.

Adia showing me her owie and mending her wounds with an ice cream treat. Ice creams still fixes owies as quickly as a princess bandaid.

snowwhite sighting!

Rasa rocked this frock all over richfield last night. She even wore it to the playground we go to that is packed with at least a hundred kids every single night. Not one of them looked at her like she was odd. Rasa's on cold round two in the bast two weeks, poor babe. She's doing well though and working through it.

super awesome weekend!

Three years ago!

Saturday! (minus Derek)
My bff on the north shore, Jess, came down this weekend and spent the night with one of her babes on Friday. Everyone had so much fun. Weston, her 3 year old, is the one we have affectionately called the triplet because she and I were pregnant at the same time and our babies were born 10 days apart. The above pic is us Saturday morning, un-showered.....we still look pretty good right? ;)

It was hilarious listening to the kids conversations. Adia was so excited to have Weston over she couldn't even stand still for one second! Rasa kept saying over and over how cute he was (uh oh Daddy!). The girls haven't seen him since last summer when we were up at their place. We went for trike rides, to the park, watched movies, played outside, had a bon fire, the kids ran laps for about an hour before bed throughout the house. It was loud, it was chaos, it was a riot. Now I'll I will hear about for the next couple of weeks is how we need to go to Weston's house. Purhaps we do.

This was taken very late on Friday night. The kids are wet and dirty but still having fun!

I wish Jess would pack up and move back down here! I love her like a sister and miss her terribly between visits!



I had jobs this weekend on Saturday and Sunday and met some neat people. Royce had a lot of Daddy duty this weekend and was good about getting the girls outside every chance he could between rain showers. I was lucky to get sessions in-between the rain too!

my little thinker.....

We spent the entire morning, day and night outside today in swimsuits, in the sprinkler, at the water table and in the sun and when the sun went away we walked and biked until it was too dark to see what we were doing. HELLO SPRING we've been waiting for your return!

At about 9 we came in, popped in a movie and all of us even after a good dinner felt hungry. Rasa was laying across me when Royce asked if I wanted to run out and grab some grub and Rasa didn't want me to leave so I whispered to her, "shhhh do you want to come with me?". Her face lit up and she literally ran into the kitchen whispered to Daddy to be quiet but that she was coming with me so Adia couldn't hear. Off we went. It struck me funny as I was strapping her into her car seat that it was such a treat for her to come along but hey if she's this easy to please than I'm all for it!

On the way home she asked if I would sit next to her when we eat our food and I said of course. Then she paused and said, "I think it would be a good idea to eat at the table. I don't want to spill any of my dip on the couch". Um ok, you're way ahead of me there and would you please just be THREE!! You're starting to scare me.

weekend wrap....

Saturday morning was cold and rainy so Royce and I decided to check out Edinborough Park just down the road. It's a big indoor park with little waterfalls, trees and plants and also home to a monstrosity of an indoor kids playground (like nothing I've seen before!). It was FILLED with hundreds of kids and bewildered parents. Part of me (and by part I mean most of me) wanted to turn around and head home but as soon as the girls caught a glimpse of the playground we were stuck there......for three hours. It was fun though and I mastered my serious claustrophobia by climbing through the massive play structure not once with them but twice! Next time I'm totally showing up in heals to show those stuffy moms that not only can I master that giant slide at the top but I can run through that beast in heals like nobody's business. Lighten up ladies, have some fun! PS your kids think I'm cooler than you.

Sunday the girls and I headed to the old hood (holla, Jill!) to drop off a cd for a client, visit my Mom and spent some time with our friends, who used to be close neighbors. The girls had fun and I got my "home" fix so I'm all charged up for another week here, in my strange new place ;) Did I mention that I miss my home terribly?! I do love Richfield and the house and location but it's missing a piece of me that I'm still having a hard time saying good bye to. If I could move my best friend, my old neighbors and family here it would be my definition of paradise.

We arrived home and Royce had cleaned up the yard (looks great hun!) and the girls took a quick nap. When they awoke Royce entertained them outside and captured our Lucy escapee with our new bff Dave, aka next door neighbor. Side note: I believe Dave is seriously concerned for Lucy's well being. He appears out of no where every time she escapes and helps us capture her lol!

As I cooked dinner I saw the girls having fun and grabbed my camera for a couple pics. Just as I ventured outside Adia had discovered one of our lilac bushes for the first time. Pics below :) PS I love my kitchen window. I cook and do dishes (such a domesticated goddess, I know) and am able to watch all of the action from that window. Ironically I've been dreaming of a kitchen window for years so I could feel just like June Cleaver hollering out to the kids that dinners ready. I know what you're thinking and I don't care.

Adventure Day - MN Zoo!

My Mom and I brought the girls to the MN Zoo yesterday. To my delight it's only 15 minutes away! I hadn't been there for about 12 years and had forgotten pretty much all about it. What a great place! The girls have been to Como Zoo a couple times but now that we've been to the MN Zoo I doubt I'll ever walk through Como again!

We went early and it was chilly! We got there shortly after it opened and decided to hike up to the Farm first so the girls could see the farm babies. The baby goats were hilarious playing with each other and running and sliding across the floor. The girls loved seeing the cows, and pigs. They've always really enjoyed going to farms and love those types of animals. Adia asked that I give her one of the newborn pigs yesterday. When I told her I couldn't and that the baby would miss his mommy she sobbed crying, "please Momma! PLEASE! I want one of those babies! I want a real baby piggy!". She went on for a while and we negotiated getting her a piggy toy instead which she agreed, even though she ended up choosing a pink tiger instead! Last night at dinner again she said, "Momma I want one of those baby piggies. I want a real one!". Oyi.

Rasa loved the shark tank and the penguins the best. Adia said she loved the babies and the penguins the best. They both really enjoyed the monorail ride and being able to see the camels and bison. When Royce got home from work the girls were talking so fast about all of their favorite things he could hardly keep up.

My Mom, the girls and I always have a great time together! It makes planning stuff like this so much fun! What a difference between age two and a half and age three! I'm noticing it so much more every time we go out with the girls. It's so much more enjoyable with so few meltdowns, if any at all!