ahhh, 26.

Today I turned 26- kudos to my mom and dad :) Here is a shout out to the people who have shaped who I am today (great job too, I might add... :) )

 

• Little Blake!!! He ended up in our bed last night just because and I was lucky enough to wake up to such a sweet creation of my own :) He woke up after a few kisses from mom and right then and there, I knew that he is my greatest accomplishment so far. He's the sweetest lil guy ever. We mooed at cows out the window on the ride to daycare this morning...perfect way to start chapter 26!
• Big Blake!! I am lucky enough to be married to my best friend... I couldn't imagine my life without him. He is the funniest, smartest, persistant, kindest, most handsome man I know... can you believe I get to call him all mine?? Lucky me! Not to mention, he is the best dad in the world!!! Lil b just adores his daaaaaaaaaaaaaadddddddddddd!

 

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  My Family... I wouldn't be where I am without my family. They have shaped my life in so many ways and I couldn't be more grateful for the positive and diverse enviornment I grew up in. It's everyday that I realize how much they have influenced my life and it's really shown up ever since I became a parent myself. All those "hard" lessons I had to learn really kicked in...and I can honestly say, I wish I would have listened to them sooner!! My mom is the biggest role model in my life- one of the strongest woman I know (alongside her mom as well :) ) Thanks for giving me life mutti!! Even my dad has shaped who I am...especially my sweet dance moves...haha. Sienna, my lil sis, always keeps me on my toes and makes sure I stay current... her sassy sense of humour keeps me young and I love being her sister!!

• My Grandmother aka DiDung- the strongest woman I know the best grandma in the world...the funny thing is, I grew up with my cousins and "Di" actually means Aunt in Vietanmese...so I have called my grandmother "Aunt" my whole life...just one of those quirky things. I can't say enough great things about her...but I think about her often and miss her tons..especially since I have little blake... I know she would "love" (aka spoil) her great grandson like crazy...luckily, my mom has inherited all my grandmother's traits :) I'm pretty sure I got a ton of her sassy traits too...hehe..poor Big B. I will have to dedicate a post to her one day- she was pretty awesome.

DiDung

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  His Family..aka the In-Laws.... ha! Not many people are fortunate enough to marry into such a great family, let alone, two great families! I love all of them and enjoy making memories with them often! What lucky kids we will have to have 3 sets of grandparents....there's no doubt that they will be loved (not spoiled!) haha. By marrying Blake, I've also tripled my cousin count...holy cow! And gained two more sisters and lil bro?! Don't even get me started on all the aunts and uncles I inherited.... haha... I have a new huge FAMILY and love it!

Lil b with his grandparents!!

Meet the Tarletons

Group Pic of the Legnards

A good representation of the Wiers but missing Uncle Joel!!

• Friends/Extended Fam- Okay, so I'm usually on my best behavior around my family...but these guys get to see me at my best (okay, and sometimes worst ;) ) But like family, they have to love me anyways! So thanks for always letting me be me!

my longtime soccer buddies...miss you girls! when the heck did we grow up??

bf and bffffff

future family vacation participants

bridesmaids = friends for life

charlotte couple friends <3

aunt and cuz...two of my faves

cousins can be friends too :)

all of our family and friends at our wedding!

Love you guys.

Easter Weekend Recap

We were lucky enough to stay in town for Easter this year! There's something great about not having to drive an hour or more to get anywhere on a special day. Unfortunately, I think lil b is still to little to enjoy Easter. Firstoff, he ignored the wonderful cupcakes I made, but really enjoyed the rice krispie carrots, so that was a plus. The Easter Bunny (aka momma) created a cute little basket full of goodies such as bubbles, a recorder, kinder eggs, sidewalk chalk, etc. and hid a bunch of eggs around the house filled with Lucky Charms marshmallows (yes, I handpicked them all out!), rasins, and mini m n ms. To give a sleepy lil b a hint, the bunny left a trail of marshmallows leading to his basket....but lil b just picked up the goodies, ate some, and walked away...the egg hunt was a headache because he would find the egg (after we pointed it out) and then he would shake it and freak out because it wouldn't open...I swear, chocolate is like crack for this kid :) oh well, maybe next year!

 We attended Aunt Tracy and Uncle Dave's church, which was a ton of fun, and we even got to see Uncle Dave sing (good job! woo hoo!). Lil blake really enjoyed all the singing...he was dancing and clapping the whole time, that is, until he passed out :)

 Easter lunch was also at Aunt Tracy's house in Charles Town, which is on a spacious lot that lil b enjoyed exploring. Poppy and Ducey brought lil b a bubble machine too!! What a lucky kid! He had a ton of fun running through the bubbles and even attempting to eat them (nom nom nom!) Lil b was also able to participate in his first Great Grand Poppy egg hunt this year! But as you can guess, he was uninterested and went straight for the swing instead...but his sweet cousins collected his eggs and he got $8 to put in his piggy bank :)

Enjoy the pics and vids!

Easter goodies...

finding eggs around the house :)

woo hoo! chocolate for breakfast....

need more chocolate!!

whoa! that's alot of bubbles!

catching bubbles!

This is kind of a long video...but still somewhat cute...when he gets sad, he covers his eyes...so cute!

Whoops...so I've been slacking on the blogging...sorry!

We spent a great weekend at Blake's mom's house in Severna Park, MD last weekend. It's nice to go from your home to another home where you feel just as comfortable...mainly because it's not your home- so you don't have to worry about all the chores that are usually sitting in the back of your mind (vaccuuming, dishes, laundry, etc). Well last weekend, it meant that I got a nap...What a rare occurence! On top of that, I napped with lil blake :) Big B was laid out all weekend with a head cold- something that I was dealing with earlier this week. I did not want to experience what Big B was going through so I broke out the Neti Pot and Zicam! So rather than being lifeless in bed during the workweek, I used the Neti Pot twice a day and popped the zinc therapy and I was only 1/2 as bad as Big B for 3 days! I am now a firm believer in both methods. The reason for our visit was to celebrate the March/April birthdays (Blake, Julee, Paul, and Krystal). We enjoyed great company with the Legnards and great food!

We were also able to watch Blake's lil bro, Luke, play lacrosse...and I must say, he is quite the stud on the field. He scored 5 or 6 goals (we lost count) and it was just so great to finally see him play. One might think that if an 11 yr old kid is scoring that many goals then the competition may not be so good...this is not the case if you are playing lacrosse in Anne Arundel County, Maryland! We look forward to many more of Luke's games, especially if he continues to be passionate about the sport- it would be great to see him play in college! On the way back to Charles Town, we were lucky enough to drop in on one of our favorite fams, the Posts. Their son Jack is getting so big and the family is adapting well to the new schedule!

Besides being sick, nothing really exciting was going on this week...Two weekends ago we went to Busch Gardens with the Pyles and had a blast... we attmepted to go to the beach that weekend but it was way too chilly!...lil b got bit on the arm at daycare..scraped his knee twice which warranted bandaids for 4-5 days...lil b is also pushing a molar through on the bottom rack....Big B and I are still trying to eat healthy in order to be "hot" by our vacation in Las Vegas over Memorial Day- but we live it up on the weekends :)...That's about it.

The guys right before being splashed by a mini tsunami from Escape From Pompeii...lil b was not happy...

Poor lil b....just wanted to get swinging! And poor g-pappy dealing with a sassy lil b!

Sienna (sister), Courtney (cousin), and Me trying to take a nice pic..with Big B photo bombing!

Me and my Mutti...yes, I am auditioning for Twilight.

Today was AWESOME. Nothing crazy was going on- we finally got to spend a whole weekend at home. We had some Spring cleaning to do, which was refreshing- if cleaning can be that...those who know me know that I HATE CLEANING! There, I said  it. And I am not even ashamed :) There are just a million other things I'd rather be doing! Big B played golf this afternoon which let lil b and I have the entire day to ourselves!!! We (lil b and I) ran errands at Super Walmart (woo hoo!) and CVS in the morning- when we got back, he was ready to take a nap. He woke up a little before 7 this a.m. (barf)...so I knew this was coming...meanwhile, I swept, mopped, vacuummed, wash dishes, etc- I hope you didn't pass out! Haha. Then lil b woke up and downed a bowl of spaghetti (his fave), oranges, and garlic toast. And because it was such a GORGEOUS day, we spent 2 hours at the park just farting around. It was perfect. The most perfect day I've had with lil b in a long time. One of those days that I hate that I'm a working mom.

A grandmother at the playground asked me if I was doing the mommy groups with the other women in the neighborhood...and I wish I was! Full-time mommy-group member? Where do I sign up? Ha- I wish. Oh well- no pity parties here. I continued to enjoy my perfect afternoon with my little boy. He loves to swing. Whenever we go to the park, I can count on at least 45 minutes of swinging. Today, since we stayed outside for so long, he showed me his skills on the slides! I forgot my camera (shame on me!), but it was the cutest stuff ever...he is such a blast. I'll brag more about his slide skills when I have a pic and video to share.

Lil b started showing signs of a meltdown, so we packed up and headed home to start our next activity of the day....baking desserts for Easter! I'm not gonna lie, I've been researching bunny cupcakes and other various desserts for kids the last two weeks just so we could do this together...and I know that he's not big enough to care, but I did. He was just a lil guy last year, so at least this year, he can lick the spoon or something : p Here's what we did today for Easter baking...just a lil preview for tomorrow!

Rice Krispie Treat carrots for the Easter Bunny and plenty of cupcakes for him too!

lil b before we ran our morning errands :) such a cutie!

lil b noshing on some spaghetti

he must get this trait from his dad... :)

such a good lil helper in the kitchen!

"don't mind if I do...."

Big B being a goober while dyeing eggs....

Me being a goober...looks like we were meant for each other!

The final products...please note how you can tell Big B and I have been together for too long... (check out the bright blue "DUKE Sucks" egg I made to impress him...haha)

After writing this post, I noticed a bad habit of mine. No, it's not the all the periods I use when writing... that's how I talk! I noticed that all I do is talk about the time I spend or don't spend with lil b... when I do spend a lot of time with Big B! I will try to be better about this...he deserves some spots in the blog. We had a great weekend so far! On Friday, we made amazing shrimp tacos and Corona Light (btw mutti, it gives me a headache too! weird!)... we l-o-v-e cooking together... we're a pretty good team in the kitchen, you should come over for dinner sometime ;) Alright, that's enough for now- I'll try to get an Easter post up ASAP...but until then, Happy Easter! Yay Jesus!