Etsy fun!

I started a "store" on the Etsy site. As far as I can tell Etsy is like Ebay for crafters. Its pretty neat and if you have never been there and have a few hours you should go shopping there! There is some really great stuff there.

So my store only sells one thing (for now) and it is LED lights for paper lanterns. I made my first batch for my friend Katherine's wedding and it was fun and easy to make and they worked out perfectly! I checked around and didn't find any sites that sold LED lights like that so....I registered my store name and volia! FunForYou---made by me.

I have had one order already and I am ready for more! If you know anyone throwing any parties or getting hitched pass along my site!

FunForYou---Made by Me!

Thanks!

Ahhhh San Diego...

Thank goodness there is an oasis escape just hours from the bone drying heat here in good ol' AZ. San Diego! We went for a week and stayed at a beautiful bayside beach house in Mission Beach.

Grandad and the kids and I drove up on Monday. The drive went really well! Some whining here and there but no crying! We stopped halfway in Yuma, AZ for a little leg stretching and eats and arrived around 4pm in San Diego.

The house was perfect and after unloading we went for a bite to eat at Gringos Restaurant right off the main drag. The place was super kid friendly, had delicious food and bonus: Monday was half off margaritas!

With only a half hour catnap in the car behind them the kids were super tired and we popped up their baby tents and sent the kidlets to bed. Not long after that it was 9:50pm and time to head out to the balcony to watch the nightly fireworks at Sea World which were a mere 2 miles away.

Early the next morning we headed out to the bay and the kids went to work moving sand and collecting seashells. What fun! The bay is absolutely perfect for smaller kids. Its not super busy so the kids could wander free with out much restriction (an uncommon privilege which they love) and of course there are no waves and the water is perfect for toddler play.

Abuelita arrived on Tuesday night and we were off to Sea World on Wednesday. Sea World has a special on right now where you get two days for the price of one so we planned to have two days to explore the park. I loved seeing the kids at Sea World. I loved seeing them in awe and wonder and I loved indulging them in all sorts of specials like no nap, ice cream and other fun foods! They did really good but were pooped out by about 4pm so we headed back home.


Thursday Daddy and Uncle Bert arrived and we played at the bay and had a great day, then Friday was day two at Sea World and later Nini and Tio Richard arrived. Saturday was a day at the actual beach and the waves were huge! The sand is so nice and the kids enjoyed playing in the sand but did not enjoy the big ocean, only Faye would participate in wave jumping....



there's always next year for that!!

Imitation is the highest form of flattery.

Guess what we do a lot of around here....

!!!Potty Training!!!

We read the book (Pottywise), bought new big-girl panties and a ton of rewards! We were ready to go. The girls have been using the potty off and on for a few months now with pretty regular success. Jackaroo...not so much. He has spots of success between weeks of no interest. So we decided to move forward with the girls and wait on Jack.

We picked a day and had Nini and Uncle Bert come pick up Jackie for his special day out so we could concentrate on the girls and the potty. Jack had a good time out with Nini and Uncle Bert but the girls worried and asked about him the whole day. Poor Lily cried and cried when he left.



The girls were so excited to put on their big girl panties (they call them "pandies").

We had a great first day! Lily had no mistakes and Faye only had one! The next couple days after were up and down.

Seriously.... just between you and me...I thought three days tops and they would be fully potty trained. I did! Rookie mistake. Anyway, it has taken me some time to understand that this is a process that will entail good days and off days and may be months before we can truly declare potty trained.

The girls are still working on it; wearing their big girl pandies during the day and pullups for nap. Yea girls!!!

Summer Cuties!

Luckily our bushes are hearty and can withstand all the greedy toddler hands that are forever picking off all its flowers.


Darling Lily started the trend and was loving the camera!!


Cutie Faye-Faye had way too many questions for Mommy to pose for pictures.


Oh Jackie! He wanted in on the action but was not cooperating for the pictures!

The girls love edamame!

Was chatting with another mom about feeding toddlers and remembered that I had video of the girls enjoying edamame. So cute! Too bad Jackaroo isn't as enamored.

Want to see something ADORABLE?

Adorable Jackie

Adorable Lily

Adorable Faye

Bubbles, Bounce and Balloons Birthday Bash!

This birthday was brought to you by the letter B!

We had a super fun birthday! As noted we had lots of bubbles on hand including two bubble machines and an unplanned stiff wind to blow all the bubbles right out of the yard ...nice. We also had a HUGE castle bouncer that all the kids absolutely loved! The best part about the bouncer? It was free! Thanks to cousin Matt (you've been promoted Matty) for borrowing it from his brother. We also had about 40 dollars worth of balloons from the local party store that you might have missed due to the aforementioned wind.

The trips had a bundle of fun. Not surprisingly they shunned presents and even showed poor interest in the Ice Cream Cone Cupcakes I made for them and instead devoted all their attention to the bouncey castle!

Here are some fun birthday action pictures:





So here are the cupcakes I made. They were ice cream cones filled with cake, ice cream, icing then sprinkles! It was a fun treat, though personally I liked the ice cream cupcakes better (sans cone).


The party was fun. Thank you everyone for coming out and for all the fun presents. I will close with Faye's request to add one more B word to the birthday bash....

But you love bananas!?

Ever seen Bee Movie? Where Jerry Seinfeld is the voice of the main character bee. Anyway, there is a scene where Barry (the bee) is trying to get out of a NYC apartment and goes to fly out the window but bonks on the window. He then repeats this several time while saying "this time, this time, this time". So funny.

So, this is how I feel feeding three toddlers. It seems there is a magical window that I continue to bonk my head on all the while thinking this time I have figured it out. Feeding toddlers is a task! Toddlers are big time food critics and for me, that is a panel review on each and every morsel I serve.

Last night I made chicken tacos but I knew the kids weren't going to be into the chicken so I made them mini-black bean tostadas, on tostidos scoop chips, hoping that the chip would entice them enough to eat the black beans. Voila! The were adorable and the kids ate them up! Yea! Great success! Why hadn't I thought of mini-tostadas before?? Its brillant! I could probably get them to eat all kinds of things if I put it on a scoop chip! So the next day for lunch guess what I made? Mini-tostadas!!! Yeaaaaa.....nooooooooooo. They hated them and smeared them all over the plates.

Two days ago the kids were hungry and calling "cheerio?" from the gated playroom while I made breakfast for them. Happy that they were hungry I made them one of thier favorites: soaked mini-wheats, cut strawberries, grapes and bananas, an english muffin half and some yogurt to dip fruit in. Lily was most vocal with her dire requests for cherrios which we have always interpreted them to mean food in general as that is most times the case.

Not---this---time. I happily set the kids in their chairs for breakfast and Lily began to wail "noooooooooo" as soon as eyes became table level. She turned her face in the most unhappy upside down smile you have ever seen with instant tears and wailed!!! (I mean can you imagine how insane it would be for you to react this way to dinner at a resturant or your mother-in-laws?!) She was mortified and wanted nothing to do with breakfast.

Until I poured some cheerios on her plate. So what? I caved...sue me.

Christmas!

Christmas with three almost two year olds...magic. I started decorating the house right after Thanksgiving and continued adding until the week before Christmas. I knew it was time to stop when Steve pointed out there wasn't a room in the house that did not have a Christmas tree (slight exaggeration). I was just so excited to make the holidays magical for my kids and my exuberance showed in glitter and miniature synthetic pine trees.

We had company for the holidays. My Grandpa Cluer came down from Idaho, Uncle Michael from NYC whom the kidlets called Un-Mite for Uncle Michael, and Nana and Papa from Nevada! Everyone arrived a couple days before Christmas and stayed through New Years and we all enjoyed many joyous and festive outings over the holidays.

Arrival night family dinner

Christmas Eve: Steve and the kids and I went to Steve's cousin Frank's house in north Phoenix for dinner and a visit from Santa. We missed Santa's visit but had a blast showing off the kiddos and visiting with family. My sister and brother in-law hosted Nana, Papa, Great Grandpa and Un-Mite over for dinner and wine at their place.

Late Christmas Eve I had a moment that I will treasure forever. The kids were tucked in bed Steve and I were exhausted but so looking forward to Christmas morning and I was looking around taking in the scene and felt overcome with happiness. I may have had children just for Christmas mornings.

Christmas day! Santa was good to the kids, they made out with lots and lots of loot. We enjoyed opening presents and a nice champagne brunch, then packed up the kiddos and headed over to Abuelita and Grandads where we did Christmas all over again with Tio Richard. Then back to our house to cook up a lovely dinner and Steve's parents and sister's family came over and we feasted and feasted and opened more presents. WOW what a day.
Christmas morning


Kids new playhouse, Faye and Lil got tutus!

Sheesh!

Okay here it is. The things people say....oh boy. This is nothing about them personally, because I definitely have my fair share of saying idiotic things (basically all my "fighting words" are nonsense), but sheesh! Out of the mouths of strangers:

• Triplets? Wow! Two girls and a boy...are they all identical?
• Are those threes?
• Triplets? But he is so much bigger than them. (like we are lying to them?)
  
• Triplets! Oh, I would shoot myself!
• Are they all twins?
  
• Are they natural? (referring to the kids I guess...)

And my current reining favorite that occurred in a Barnes & Noble by a lady with an unusually loud speaking voice:

• A threesome! Oh, I have never seen a threesome in person before!

Me neither lady.

Sh*t Shenanigans!!

There is no other way to describe this week in history that I now refer to as the week of "Sh*t Shenanigans". The week started with Lily pooping in the tub when Nini (Auntie Liela) was giving the kids a bath. If you have never experienced the after effects of a child pooping in the tub it is no fun, no fun at all. Add to that there are two other kiddos in the tub that now also have to be dealt with. Here's how you do it:

1. Quick, get everyone out of the tub, but keep all three toddlers on the bath mat, don't let them touch each other, don't let them put their hands in their mouth.
2. Take all wet, gross babies to another bathroom across the house and put in the shower one at a time (keep your eyes on the other two!) and rinse/wash babies off (PS-everyone is crying now).
3. Then diaper and dress babies as usual.
4. Then take everyone downstairs where they will cry for you at the top of their lungs till you get back to them after dealing with the original bath water and ...ahem.. other stuff.

So the next day Faye finds a lone dog poo in the yard steps in it and starts to cry looking at her dirty shoe. I see her crying and looking at her shoe from across the yard, quickly I see what happened and feel relief that she doesn't like it and is frozen in place....until I start to run to her. Dang it! "Poo-poo??" she said as she reached down for her shoe. "DON'T TOUCH, FAYE-FAYE, DON'T TOUCH!!" me -running at warp speed now. Too late. I pick her up holding the offending arm and leg far away from me to head inside. At this point she is probably thinking she is in the worst trouble because she starts to do some sort of double-gainer pike flip to get out of my arms and when she goes to no-bones-jelly baby I lose grip just a little, but just enough. Now my arm has dog poo on it. It may have taken a full hour to get everything cleaned up properly.

THAT SAME DAY. I am so ready for nap time and happy that it is here. Everyone up to their cribs, storytime, and night-night. I hear a lot of playing but I am tired and now I want to shower. Jump in the shower, get out and still hear playing. Okay put some clothes on and go in and check. As I am walking down the hall I hear Faye "Poo-Poo? Poo-Poo?" I think (hope against all hope) that she is just thinking about what happened earlier. I open the door and look at Faye, she is naked from the waist down. Uh oh. I get to her crib and see her diaper. Empty. Hmm, she looks pretty clean...but I do smell poop. Cue Lily next door crib: "Poo-Poo?" I turn my head and see my lovely daughter holding something out to me. I don't need to say it do I? Yes, apparently Faye took off her diaper, took out the ...ahem...contents and handed them to Lily over the crib rails...who of course accepted the gift!

Later that week Jack had a blow out and some other poo-related event occurred but I cannot really remember it as I just started blacking things out from the week known as "Sh*t Shenanigans". Thankfully, the weeks since have been far less eventful. So far anyway.

NO pictures for this post.

The Kids Just Started College!

That is how long it has been since I updated this blog... lazy, lazy Mommy. So they may not be in college yet, but lots has happened since we last met.

Halloween! The kids LOVED it. Since their costumes from last year still fit (barely) the kids were three ducklings in a row. Well, it started out in a row but even 1 year olds get that being tied together with one of Maddie's long leashes isn't as cool in person as it is on paper. So after forty feet or so we ditched the "line" and just went Trick-or-Treat on the regular. The first house was scary, the second was kind of interesting and after the third house the kids pulled us from house to house for about 20 houses!

We took the kids to Schnepf Farms right before Halloween to pick out some pumpkins, ogle some Pygmy goats and various other livestock and of course to consume some farm fare. We dressed the kiddos in cute outfits and, despite Steve's repeated "are we really those people" comments, Steve and I dressed in complimentary outfits (note: I did not say matching!) and set out for a fun fall day. As if this were our first time to the rodeo we were surprised at the immense warmth radiating from the orb in the sky as we trekked across the huge, dry, dusty, dirt parking lot. Steve- "It' pretty warm already, huh?" Me-"Ummm, yea, it seems warm...". Warm!? It was 96 degrees! Ninety-six degrees at the end of October! It-was-HOT! The poor kids were on fire. So we did the "fun fall day at the farm" in about 1 hour. They did have some fun walking in the completely unshaded, dirt pumpkin patch. For some reason the girls wanted to kiss every pumpkin they saw--adorable! Jack said there is no way he is kissing a vegetable.




Thanksgiving! Holidays with kids are just that much more fun. We had a very nice dinner at Grandad and Abuelita's house. We set up baby base camp and stayed the night for a couple nights. Good food and fun family times. That next weekend we went to the bi-annual Tempe Arts Fair. Love it! We try to go at least once a year. The kids enjoyed the sights and tasty treats and we enjoyed some time in the wine tasting tent. Nice! Then we took some pics with the famed big-metal-rabbits.

(Abuelita, Faye, Lily, Grandad)


(Lily, Jack, Faye)


Christmas! Who are we kidding that needs it's own post!