talkin' and drinkin'

Dear Maria- I have no idea where you picked up on this. . . .

lazy sunday

yay! maria slept all the way through the night last night! i hope she is on the mend and this cold is going away. she was pretty quiet this morning. chris made french toast and then we hung out on the sofa and watched some cartoons for a little bit. maria is starting to look more like a little kid and not so much like a baby anymore. i am also feeling very, very, very pregnant these days.

cute pix of Maria

These are my newest favorite pictures of Maria.

She grabs on to this little bell on the back door whenever she wants to go outside. She grabs it like every 5 minutes! Unfortunately she picked up a post trip cold and we've been dealing with snot and coughing and several wake ups through out the night. I hope she gets better soon. 

LA: Day 8

This was our last morning in LA. We got packed up and checked out of the hotel. We turned in our rental car at Hertz and they were nice enough to leave us in the car and drive us to LAX. Let me just say- the Hertz rental car place at LAX is huge!!! The guy that drove us said this location is the biggest Hertz in the world. I believe him. We thought we had left with plenty of time but alas we had to get bumped up in the baggage check line for American Airlines. I don't know what the deal was but there were about 100 people in line to check bags and 3 agents checking bags. All I can say is at least they pulled us forward and took our bags before the check in time expired. Security was a breeze to get through- I guess because everyone was stuck in the baggage line. The flight back pretty emtpy. We had a whole row to ourselves! We enjoyed our trip out to the west coast but we were very happy to get back home too.

BTW- way to go horns!!!!!

LA: Day 7

Today we didn't do much- after chasing Maria around all day yesterday I was totally exhausted! This pregnancy is wearing me out! I took Maria to Downtown Disney and we shopped around for awhile. I loved going in the LEGO store and Maria just liked being outside. We bought Chris a vinyl TRON Mickey figure. I think he liked it.

LA: Day 6

Today I took Maria to the beach! I was 33 years old the first time I saw the Pacific Ocean- Maria was 16 months! She hated it at first. She hated the sand, the water, the breeze- everything. I took her to a little grassy area with picnic tables and her let pick up sticks and feathers for a while. I took her back into the sand and she decided she liked it. I took her to the shoreline and she decided she liked the water. Since she had gotten braver I decided to put her swimsuit on her and let her really get in the water. OMG- she went from crying at the water to running full force towards the waves! I was glad she liked it but it was exhausting chasing after her. We spent the rest of the afternoon at the hotel pool talking to other wives/ moms.

LA: Day 5

Today was fun- we drove down to Oceanside to meet a friend of mine- Sandy and her son Sean. Sandy and her husband Sonny produce a podcast all about geocaching called Podcacher. If you want to check it out click here. (If you listen to show 337 you can hear my intro!) Sandy picked up lunch for us and we met up at a neighborhood park. Sean and Maria had a great time playing on the swings and slide and sand. Sean showed off a little stuffed dog we gave him when he was 6 weeks old. He loves that dog! Here are some more pics of the day (taken by Sandy).

We ended the afternoon with a trip to the hotel pool. I met another wife/ mom and her girls and they were from Austin! What a small world. . . .Damn! That song is still stuck in my head!

LA: Day 4

i don't have any pictures because we had a relatively quiet day. we were pretty exhausted from traveling and disneyland. i found a hike and bike trail with a park not too far from the hotel so maria and i drove there. i found 2 geocaches and met a geocacher on the trail. he and i helped each other out finding caches- it was pretty fun. later in the afternoon i took maria to the hotel pool. the pool was fun but kind of cold!!!

LA: Day 3 Disneyland

Today we went to Disneyland. Maria was such a good little trooper. I wanted to go on more rides but seeing as how Maria didn't meet the height requirement on many rides and I am pregnant we had to settle for more of the attactions and fewer rides. We have more pictures than the ones I am posting but they are on our phones and I don't feel like trying to copy them to the computer. We did splurge and buy Maria some Mickey Mouse ears and got her name sewn on them. She instantly started crying everytime we put them on her. Awesome. The other super awesome thing was that she fell asleep just before we got on Its a Small World ride. The one ride she would get a kick out of and she slept through the entire song- over and over again. . .

LA: Day 2

Today we sort of slept in and had a late breakfast at Foxy's with Tony, Austin, Rachel and Lyric. Afterwards we regrouped at Tony's house and then went to Rocket Fizz- a candy and soda pop shop in Burbank. It was pretty fun. I had to open a can on Chris though.

After we were sufficiently sugared up we went to the Japanese Garden in Van Nuys. The whole park is part of a water reclamation project. The smell was a little funky but the scenes were pretty.

LA: Day 1

Today we flew to LA to spend the weekend with Chris's brothers. Surprise of all surprises we got upgraded (for a fee) to first class when we checked in at the Austin airport. The first class flight was awesome- Maria did great and we enjoyed the hot towels and warm nuts! Ha! After we got our car we drove to Glendale to Tony's house in the hills. Maria got to meet her cousin Lyric for the first time. I think she was more into chasing the cat and torturing Grendel but she seemed to like Lyric and his adorably cute baby face. After that we ate at Outback Steakhouse to enjoy some nice steaks cooked by Austin.

Bug Life: Month 16

Hey bug-a-bugs! Today you are 16 months old! Guess what we are doing? We are flying to California- Los Angeles to be exact and in first class! I haven't done a post for you in forever because the summer was so amazingly hot!! You started walking in June, went swimming a lot, played with your little friends James and Evie and Vedder, went to the library story time, bounced around at locomotion (an indoor inflatable play place), went to Utah/ Idaho and Montana to see family, friends and national parks. You also got molars and learned how to gently place yourself on the ground and scream/ cry. Those last 2 things are very forgettable. This will be a short posting but at least I posted something. I will try to do a better job with your month to month updates.

the austin zoo

today, lynn and james and maria and i went to the austin zoo. despite the later start (our fault) and warmer temperatures, we still had a good time. we started out with a train ride and then moved on to feed the deer, sheep, llamas and goats. we wandered around and saw the tigers and lions, monkeys, turtles, pigs and birds. the zoo is small and mostly houses rescued animals. we'll check it out again when the weather cools off.