Barrel o' monkeys...

Here are Eleanor and Ezra climbing about after our picnic last night...

Happy Birthday to Cameron!

Ezra has been super into birthdays lately. I think it's because we have been going to so many birthday parties.

He turns everything into a birthday cake with a candle...
-a ball of playdough with toothpicks in it
-a jar with a carrot peeler sticking out
-a book with a jar on top
-...you name it, this boy has birthday cakes on the brain!

And, he starts singing Happy Birthday, and at the end blows out the candles...it's a pretty fun game that he created.

Well, the other day it was Cameron's birthday so a little video was in order...

babies...

Baby Evelyn and Abby came over the other day.

I think Ezra might have a bit of a crush...

Happy Spring!!

Last Wednesday was the first official day of spring. And although winter here is usually quite mild, Tuesday was actually "really cold" (read: 50 degrees, which is really cold for Tucson). But, that made the start of Spring all the more exciting because it was in the 80's!

We pulled out Ezra's pool and gave it a good cleaning. Ezra was chomping at the bit to take off his clothes and get in. At first I tried suggesting he leave on his underwear...but that lasted all of about 5 seconds.





On Thursday we had Owen over for the official Grand Re-Opening of the pool! Ezra was feeling like he wanted to show off his bathing suit (and crack)...


Watching Ezra and Owen play together is one of my favorite things. They make each other soo giggly, and love to chase each other around. I feel like they are constantly setting "laugh bait" out for the other to take, and the other always does...we are going to miss them soo much when they move to Colorado next month!!!

Ren Fest Take 2

We headed back up to the Renaissance Festival last weekend! (It's a pricey ticket to get in, but friends of ours work there so they were able to get us a couple of comp tickets!)

The night before we were planning to go, Ezra was blowing on a wooden whistle we had gotten for him last time were at the Festival. Not expecting he'd know the answer, Ryan asked him, "Where did you get your whistle?" And to our amazement, Ezra said, "Festibal!" Then he started talking about everything else we did at the festival. "Mama and Ezra ride elephant", "Marcia and Dick" (our friends who work there), "Corn" (what he ate there)....I know it was only a month ago, but still that is 1/23 of his life ago!!...crazy how much kids remember!

Somehow it was mentioned that we were going to be going to the festival the following day. And, sadly this happened right before bedtime. Which meant we had a very excited little boy who was ready to go to the 'festibal' then, not in the morning. As we were cuddling in bed and talking about it, I told him that we had to wait until we woke up. To which he sat up and replied, "Awake! All done sleeping." Needless to say, he went to bed a little late and we had to wake him up the next day to get going.

Ezra, Ryan, and Joel watching "Three men and a bunch of drums" perform...


at the petting zoo..


enjoying every kernel of corn...


Ezra, Ryan, Estrella and Joel on the giant rocking horse (which is powered by a person pushing it--very cool!)


Ezra and Ryan playing a dice game with our friend Marcia...


And, the whole day was enjoyed with the company of good friends...

Family Date Night

The other night we decided to take Ezra out to ice cream for the first time. And for some reason I decided to phrase it, "We are going to an ice cream restaurant!"...Ezra was sooo excited that he ran into his bedroom to put his clothes on as fast as he could (remember, the boy prefers to be a nudist whenever we let him).


I think he suffered from a little brain freeze after taking a massive first bite because he asked if we could warm it a little. Instead we told him to just take small bites...which was awesome for us, because I think this is the first time ever that he didn't out eat us in ice cream!

Next stop, was the park...




Then back home for trains, popcorn...


...and jumping/rolling on the couch!




(I promise you this rolling game is not nearly as 'violent' as it looks...in case you can't hear him, he is requesting "more". :)

Trains!

We recently took out Ryan's old train set for Ezra to play with...and it's been a HUGE hit. I'm actually quite amazed by the amount of time he (Ezra that is) sits and peacefully plays with it! (Ryan has also been known to be found peacefully playing trains when Ezra is not around. :)

family back home...

When my mom mailed me my camera back (I had accidentally sent it home with her) she included on it some photos of my family...it was a fun gift to receive!

Lil' Roger after his hockey game...


Nichole and Roger...


Alyssa...


Lydia...


Emma...


And, my personal favorites:
Lizzy...


And, my dad... :)

Haircut numero dos

Ezra had his 2nd hair cut! I know, I know, it doesn't look like it. But she cut off over an inch!

Good thing for Sports Illustrated magazine which kept little E very entertained for the whole haircut. (Have I mentioned that he LOVES looking at basketballs/footballs/soccerballs?!?





I am feeling very thankful that my mother-in-law owns a salon and we can go for frequent haircuts as opposed to having to cut it super short from the start. This mama just isn't willing to give up the curls yet.

E & E

We went to the zoo with Eleanor and Jessica last week. There are a couple of kids that Ezra loves to play with...one of which is Eleanor.

(side note: Ezra used to say "eleanor" so clearly, however recently her name has turned into "underwear"...sorry Eleanor, don't take it personally)

Ezra wooing Eleanor with his strong muscles...


Clearly it worked...


And, she seemed interested in Ezra's favorite animal, "big turtles"...


If only they weren't second cousins...

park!

I have found that one of the best ways to get together with friends for dinner is to have a potluck picnic at the park.

1.) Kids have lots of fun running around and playing

2.) "Adults" have lots of fun running around and playing

3.) No need to clean the house beforehand

4.) No need to clean the house afterward

It's a win-win-win-win.

Last weekend we had such a gathering and it was indeed a fun time. I wish I would have gotten more photos of the "playing" that happened as there was a lot of basketball, frisbee, and football action had...Ezra of course was right in the middle making sure no one forgot to pass it to him. :)

Cameron, Katherine, and Ryan Alfred


Ryan, Nadim, and Ezra


Carlos, Beth, and Savannah

napping late

Last Saturday we went to a birthday party at Peter Piper Pizza (the locally owned version of Chuck E Cheese). Ezra had a blast...I think he spent every token except one on playing basketball. Due to birthday party fun that had to be had, Ezra didn't go down for a nap until 2pm...at which point mama needed a nap too. And somehow, we both slept until almost 6pm (dada was at an afternoon gig so he wasn't home to wake us)! Oops! That meant our normal 7pm bedtime was not in the forecast.

So instead once dada got home from his gig we spent the evening playing outside.

We have used our chiminea more in the past 4 months than we have in the last 5 years. Ezra loves having fires. His job is to crumple the newspaper and hand it to us to put in the chiminea...he gets super excited when he stumbles upon the sports section and can point out every basketball/soccer ball/football.


Once the fire was going, we had a slam dunk competition...


Thank goodness for fresh air and a boy who needs lots of sleep...he was back in bed by 9pm. And, I think mama was in bed just shortly after that. :)

Spices...

You know those handy spice racks that you can put on your kitchen counter? If you do, you may also have realized that they come with lots of spices that never get used. Take for instance "crushed bay leaves". Now, if I'm not mistaken you are not supposed to eat bay leaves, so crushed bay leaves makes for a bad bad idea. Or, the ever popular "celery salt". Please please tell me what recipe you have used that calls for celery salt. You get my point...

So, we had the spice rack on the counter containing about 60% of spices that we never actually used, and an entire drawer devoted to spices that we use all the time. I decided to dump what we hardly/never use and re-fill the jars on the spice rack with frequently-used spices.

I even got super into it and washed the entire rack, all the spice jars, etc. It feels so shiny and new now.

We bought these round labels at Office Max and printed off the names of the spices that we wanted to have on the rack. And then I decided to print off more labels for the spices that needed to remain in the drawer so that we could stand the jars up (save space) and still be able to know what was inside.

Ta da...




I know, I know, I should have taken a "before" picture, but let's be honest...I was too excited to get going, that I didn't think of that until I was already into the project...

mornings...

Ezra has some serious bedhead in the morning.

And, he also insists on wearing a bib while eating, even if he is totally naked.

yogurt melts...

The other day I saw on Pinterest that you can make yogurt melts by freezing little dollops of regular yogurt. Score! We always have a stash of regular yogurt...and Ezra is always up for anything that is frozen and therefore called a "treat" (even plain yogurt when frozen is a treat in his books).

All you do is spoon the yogurt into a ziplock bag, cut a little corner of the bag, and squeeze onto a wax paper lined cookie sheet.


This can also become a fun finger painting project...


They don't quite "melt in your mouth" like the commercially made yogurt melts, and they also have to stay in the freezer until you are ready to eat them, but that said...they still make for a great treat and a happy ezrito!

Our weekend...

This past weekend was Owen's birthday party! Turns out Ezra still has the same feelings regarding pinatas that he did 6 months ago: total fear. Although, I will say that he tried very hard to be brave.

He took one swing at the dinosaur pinata, and had a mild freak out. I'm not sure if it was the fact that he was swinging at something, or that it caused the dinosaur to move, or what exactly it was, but it was scary nonetheless. Later though he wanted to try again, but insisted I hold him while he did it.

Here is birthday boy Owen taking his turn at the pinata...


We had Will and Anja over for brunch on Sunday, and they took pity on the fact that Ezra would try so hard to dribble his basketball, but the flat (cactus ruined) basketball just wouldn't bounce...so on Monday morning we found this brand new ball on our doorstep!


I took part in Markets On The Move this weekend. So, for just $10 I received 60 pounds of produce. It was not a huge variety, but still it was a smokin' deal. We got summer squash, zucchini, roma tomatoes, organic heirloom tomatoes, grape tomatoes, sweet corn, green bell peppers and cucumbers. And since I'm the only one in the family that eats tomatoes, I decided I better find a way to use up sooo many, so this afternoon I made marinara sauce Instead of truly canning it (I don't have a pot large enough to do that), I am going to freeze it once it cools.

In the kitchen...

For the record, I'm still a huge fan of the learning tower, as is Ezra.

Here he is making a gluten free pizza.




The other night he swiped the broccoli out of my hands while I was getting dinner ready and just started going to town eating the whole bunch.


That night instead of his normal stalling technique of needing water while I was tucking him in, he said he needed broccoli...I assured him that he could have as much broccoli as he wanted the next day. :)

rhythm...

A friend of mine talks a lot about having a rhythm chart for her kids to visually see during the day that lists all of the main things that are happening in their day. She said that the days she makes the rhythm charts, the day goes much more smoothly.

So, I decided to give it a shot today to see if it could help us with the little things that are so difficult: getting dressed and getting in the car seat.

In the end, I found that the rhythm chart was really nice for me to have to visually see how our day was going to go. ...I think Ezra liked it too, but the verdict isn't totally in yet. :)



*The pink drawing at the bottom of the chalkboard is Ezra's picture of the baby in my belly. This morning he asked if we could go to the doctor again to see the 'baby in mama's belly'.

Tea for Ezra

Ezra is a bit of a tea-hog. Lately he has been drinking about 3/4 of my cup of morning tea. Which isn't too big of a deal, but it's my tea, and I really look forward to it in the morning!

So, the other day I decided to start making him his own cup of chamomile tea and adding some milk and local raw honey (we are trying everything to help these season allergies of his).

Having his own cup of tea at breakfast was a BIG hit! It didn't quite have the calming chamomile effect I was hoping for, but I think I was mom-of-the-day for about 30 minutes! That all ended of course when I told him it was time to get dressed...oh, if only he lived on a nudist colony, life would be so much easier for him.

Ezra do it

"Ezra do it" is a very common phrase we hear around these parts these days. From picking out his clothes, to putting on his clothes, dumping the contents of his potty, and getting in the car seat, our boy of ours is very excited by his autonomy.

Most of the time this is fun and exciting, although I'm not going to lie...it also leads to very loooong times of waiting for him to start getting dressed, or from moving to being in the car to actually sitting in his car seat. Oh virtue of patience, don't leave me now.

I do love seeing the outfits he picks out. This was the other day. And no, this was not for bedtime, this outfit was picked out specifically for going to the park.

That would be "dinosaur on skateboard shirt", "basketball hoop (pajama) pants", and "snow boots" (because after all you always need to be prepared for a snowstorm in Tucson).