Austin's Birthday

My sweet little boy is now 4 years old. It's amazing how the time flies! Every day I love him more and more and feel so blessed to have been given the gift of being a parent. Austin is sweet and charming and smart and funny. He is everything a parent could dream for.

For his birthday this year I decided we would take a trip to San Diego to go to Sea World instead of a big party. On Austin's actual birthday we took some homemade Wall-E cupcakes to school to share with his friends. When he got to school they had a birthday crown waiting for him and he wore it all day. That night we ate at California Pizza Kitchen, one of Austin's favorite places. We enjoyed some pizza and shared a brownie sunday for dessert. Afterwards he played in the water fountain at Fashion Island.

On Saturday we had a dinner for him so that Gail and Natalie and Grandma Gayle could come and celebrate his birthday with him. We grilled some burgers and corn and had a yummy homemade Wall-E cake.

All in all it was a wonderful birthday celebration and next weekend we are off to Sea World!

P.S. I have posted all of the new pics on my flickr account.

Mom...

A few days ago Austin started calling me Mom, not mommy or momma, just Mom. Now I know this may not sound like a big deal to most, but it is a big deal to me. It just shows me more and more how my little baby is growing into a big boy. I miss his sweet little voice calling my name, mommy. Austin will be 4 yrs old in 5 days. One more year and he will be in Kindergarten. Austin is growing into such an amazingly wonderful little boy, but it is bittersweet. I love to watch him grow and see the independence he has, but at the same time I miss that little baby that always needed me.

Happy Birthday to me!!!

This past weekend was my birthday. I didn't have anything planned. I was just going to make a cake with Austin. Saturday morning when we got up we talked to Grandma and decided to ride the train down to San Diego. We had a great time. It was mine and Austin's first time riding a train. Austin was so excited. As soon as we got on the train his face lit up and he had a smile the entire time. The ride was about an hour and a half. We arrived in San Diego at this really cool old Santa Fe train station. We got a hotel for the night which was just a few blocks from the train station. The hotel was amazing. It was right in the middle of downtown. We were on the 11th floor and had an amazing view of the city and the ocean. When we arrived we checked into the hotel and then decided to go find a cool place to have lunch. We did a little shopping and rode the Trolley all around San Diego. Later in the day Austin and I went swimming in a pool out on a ledge on the 3rd floor of the hotel and then we walked to the grocery store to get a birthday cake. Austin and my mom sang to me and we had cake in our hotel room. On Sunday we went to Seaport Village and walked around. We found a really cool playground for Austin. We had some lunch got our stuff together and headed back home on the train. I was a little worried about not having a car while we were there but we had so much fun walking around and exploring downtown San Diego. It was a great way to spend my birthday. We all had a great time! I posted all the pics on my flickr account.

Fun Times & Family

Austin and I have been having a lot of fun here recently. Two weeks ago we went to Disneyland with Grandma. We always have fun at Disneyland with Grandma. Every time we go we get to do something new since Austin hasn't been on all of the rides yet. He rode the teacups and the paddle boat for the first time. He also saw his first parade. It was the Disney Pixar parade that had characters from a lot of his favorite movies. We saw Buzz, Woody, Nemo, the monsters from Monsters Inc, and the bugs from A Bugs Life. We ended up staying later than normal since we were having so much fun. The next weekend JoDee and Shelby came to visit us. We spent all day Sunday at the beach having a great time. Auntie Shelby buried Austin in the sand and he loved it. He enjoyed having Auntie Shelby there to make sand castles with. On Monday we went to Disneyland again. I won tickets to the sneak peak of the new Toy Story ride. We were able to go on the ride before it opens to the public. It is a great ride and was a lot of fun. Jodee and Shelby were able to use our tickets for the ride and they got to ride it too! We love when they come to visit us!

The Museum

This past Sunday Austin and I went to the Discovery Science Center in Santa Ana. I had told him a few days before that after church we were going to go to the Museum. He was very excited about it. When church was over I walked back to his room to pick him up and when he saw me he started yelling, "Mommy, Mommy, can we go to the Museum now!?!" It is always so much more fun to take him somewhere that he is excited to go. The museum is about 10 min from our house but we had never been. It is nothing spectacular but it is a cool place to have nearby. Austin's favorite exhibit was the ball roller coaster. Someone had built this amazing "roller coaster" and the balls just kept riding over and over. It was pretty cool. They had an exhibit that shows how waves work, which was very intriguing to Austin because of an event the previous day. I am going to change the subject but only because it is significant to why Austin loved the wave exhibit. Saturday mornings Austin and I walk to the beach with Grandma. We stop at Starbucks and get a coffee and then stop by the donut store for breakfast (not the healthiest I know but we are making memories) and then we walk out on the pier. This past Saturday the waves must have been really good because there were a lot of surfers out. So we stopped to watch. There was a young girl out there probably 10 years old and she was catching a lot of the waves. While my mom and I watched the surfers Austin ate his donut. When he was done he wanted to get out of the stroller and have me hold him so he could watch the surfers too. When I picked him up out of the stroller his shoe fell off. It was like slow motion and it went ... bounce, bounce, gone. It fell right off the pier! It was just a old sandal so I figured it wasn't that big of a deal, but when Austin saw his shoe in the ocean he got upset. He cried and cried. We watched the shoe hoping it would catch a wave it but it stayed out there. Then we got lucky this young kid in the water saw Austin's shoe grabbed it and brought it in for us. Austin was very happy to have his shoe back. For the rest of the day all Austin could talk about was that his shoe was riding the waves. This would be why the wave exhibit was so fascinating to him. The museum had some really great things for little ones to do. Austin got to make a track and send some balls down, he got to pretend he owned a restaurant and cooked and served food, and outside there was a huge dinosaur exhibit. There is a large "long neck" (remember The Land before Time?) and they have turned him into a playground. You get to go inside the dinosaur and see his intestines. There were many fun things to do so all in all we had a great day. After the museum we went to In-N-Out for lunch which is always a nice treat. Grandma is going to take Austin back in a few weeks because Bob the Builder is going to be there.

I have a flickr account now. I am going to add the link to my blog so you can see the rest of the pictures from the museum.

Hide and Seek

Austin's new favorite game is hide and seek. He ALWAYS hides in the same spot and will tell you where he is going to hide when you start counting. The good thing is he has finally started really hiding. When we first started playing he would lay down on the floor hide his face in the carpet and had the idea that if I can't mommy then she can't see me. A typical conversation while playing hide and seek goes like this...

Mommy: Ok Austin. I will count first and you hide first.
Austin: Ok I'm going to hide under my covers Mommy: 1,2,3...10 I go looking and find him under the covers
Austin: You found me!!!Ok, I am going to count you go hide under my covers

Even though we hide in the same place over and over he gets so excited every time I find him and every time he finds me. It's wonderful how simple little things can bring such joy!


"Do one thing everyday that makes you happy!"

The Dreams of a 3 year old boy...

It never ceases to amaze me the wonderful, smart, funny and disgusting things that come out of a little boys mouth. Some days I get to hear the wonderful things like "i love you mama" and "you're my favorite" And then there are days I get to hear the disgusting things... I don't know why but my beautiful little boy loves to say the not so beautiful word "poopie" He will say it over and over and laugh at himself thinking it is hilarious. Of course I have tried to tell him that it is not a nice word, but he continues to use it. I continue to remind myself that he is a little boy and that is just what little boys do. Of course there are many days I get to hear the funny things... One of my recent favorites is when asked if aunt JoDee was a he or a she...he thought for a moment and then he said Aunt JoDee is sooo nice and sooo cute. Out of the blue he wanted to tell everyone that his Auntie JoDee was so cute. I think it is amazing how smart toddlers really are. They really do soak up everything around them. I try to have converstions with Austin at the end of our day when things are settled down and quiet just to get an idea of what is going on in that little head of his. He is a very smart little boy. Last night as we were talking a car insurance commercial come on the TV. It was about teenage drivers and I told Austin that when he grows up he needs to be a safe driver. In his sweet little voice he says "Ok Mama". He then tells me "momma, when you grow up you can be a driver!" I laugh at his sweet little thought and then ask him "what do you want to be when you grow up?" Immediately he answers "An Astronaut". I didn't even realize he knew what and Astronaut was. He goes on to tell me that he wants to fly in the sky to Pluto. Not only does he know what an Astronaut is, he knows about planets and the names of the planets. I was just in awe of the wonderful dream my little 3 year old has. From then on he decided he was going to be Buzz Lightyear(an astronaut) when he grows up (his words) and momma gets to be a race driver. Yes he has decided my career for me. =) I have been thinking to myself lately...What do I want to be when I grow up? At almost 26 years old I still don't know? One thing I have learned recently is that I am not the only one who has no idea? And while that may be true it doesn't make me feel any better. I wish there was just one thing I wanted to be, just one career that would fulfill me as a person. So my goal for now is to really think about what it is I might like to do, research my options and pray for some guidance. No matter what I do or where life takes me one of my main goals in life is to be the kind of person Austin can and will be proud of.

"The only way things are going to change for you...is when you change"

The Beginning...

Hello All. I have wanted to start a blog for awhile now. I really enjoy reading other people's blogs and being able to keep up with the ever day lives of my friends and family that I am unfortunately not able to talk to very often and I wanted my friends and family to be updated with what goes on with Austin and I. I also wanted to create a "journal" so that we can look back on all the memories and be reminded of some things that may be forgotten in the years to come.

Enjoy!!!