Random November Beginnings

Random post.

 

First, look how cute:)  I've been reading books to Raquel every day since the day we brought her home.  She loves playing with them, dumping them, and even turning the pages for me (board books ONLY).  I hope my kids adore books as much as I do!

Second, I have a question for you Utah girls - what is the most common date you found yourself on?  Miniature golfing?  Mine was, but that's okay because I love it!  Obviously, Luis wasn't a Utah guy because he didn't jump on the mini golf bandwagon.  In fact, our first time going together EVER was this weekend.  It was close to one of the worst golf courses I've seen, but still fun. 

Thanks to all my mini golf date nights, I schooled Luis.  Unfortunately, Raquel was the big winner, as usual.

Thirdly, our missy has become really cuddly.  It's the best!



Thankful Turkey 2012.  I have no comment about this.

Finally, my new haircut!!!  You might not believe me, but it has been 8 months since I've received a haircut.  Perhaps that's because my last cut was horrid ugly.  I miss my Julia!!!  Thankfully, this cut turned out much better.



Nueve Meses

Raquel's now been out of the womb as long as she was in it.  I sure do love this little doll.  It seems I do just about anything to see her cute smile or hear her delightful giggles.  What did I do all day before her??? 

Facts about our missy:

• 15 lbs 28 in.
• No crawling yet, but gets around by kicking off on her back.  She's also just barely starting this cute inchworm thing where she gets her little bum up in the air, but instead of sliding forward, it slides back down and she goes nowhere.
• She flaps her arms up and down - Luis calls her his little hummingbird.
• She claps all the time now.  The best is when she claps after I sing a song or when she's in her crib trying to fall asleep.
• She's moved up to baby jar chicken and turkey.
• When she picks up little pieces of food, she is very dainty and likes to use her thumb and index finger so her pinky can be extended into the air.
• Tub time is a favorite with her.
 
 



Spooky Ooky

What to wear, what to wear...for Halloween!  When my sister-in-law, Jennie, sent us this cute skirt, I decided instantly that Raquel would be Minnie Mouse for Halloween.  Not very original, but easy to put together and best of all, CHEAP!  It probably cost a total of

$5.  All I had to do is bake the ears, bow, and tail.  Everything else we had.  Nice!!!

Her face paint lasted 27.3 minutes, which was just long enough for us to take pictures, drive to the church, and say a few hello's.  After that, I was in the bathroom scrubbing it off since she had commenced crying and rubbing.  It was a smeary mess. 

My costume?  I was a boring cat, but CHEAP and EASY made me do it.

From now on I think I'm going to force Luis come up with ALL our costumes.  He is outrageously creative and always looks better than me.  Can you guess what he is?  I'll give you a hint...doesn't he look grrr-r-r-r-r-r-r-eat?  He did his whole costume INCLUDING the makeup.  (I think he secretly puts on my make-up when I'm away and that's why he's so good.)

 

On to the party.

 

I don't know what people were thinking, but someone put me in charge of the ward's Halloween decorations.  ME???  Oh yikes. Talk about a s-t-r-e-t-c-h for me!  Thankfully, I have some absolutely fabulous friends who pitched in and pretty much did everything for me:)  Thank goodness.  So here's a few pics of how it turned out.

 

The tables were supposed to be decorated with pumpkins that people carved for the annual pumpkin carving contest.  Yeah, a total of 3 people signed up to bring a pumpkin. 

 

Knowing the party would be pumpkin-lacking, Luis and I decided to copy our friend Jen by having a "pumpkin off," which meant we both carved a pumpkin and had a few siblings vote via phone.  Mine is the mickey pumpkin.  Lu made "chip."  After the votes came in, I decided it was a mistake to ask siblings to vote.  They have no taste.

 

 

Since we took them to the party, they were automatically put into the ward pumpkin carving contest.  Luis and I both won!  (I think I'll leave out the detail about there being 4 pumkins at the event and each of the 4 pumpkins winning a prize.)  In addition to our prize winning pumpkins, my man took home a prize for his hot and spicy chili. The Morenos pretty much stole the night:)



Birthday Bashing

Last Thursday was my birthday.  I LOVE birthdays!  As a kid, they were pretty awesome, as a teen they were pretty awesome, and I must say, even now they are pretty awesome. 

 

I like the presents, I like pizza for dinner, I like blowing out candles on my cake, and most of all, I like being told over and over again "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" all day long from the people I love best.

 

I was lucky enough this year to get an early birthday celebration from the sweet sisters I serve with in church.  (Left to right: Ming-Chui, Shaunna, & Marie)  Technically, we were having a meeting, but what better way to start a meeting with Olive Garden salad/breadsticks, red velvet cake, and ice cream???  Okay, so a juggling platypus would've been a titch better, but it was still a pretty good start.



To start off my actual birthday, Lu arose early and made me a scrummy yummy breakfast...blueberry cream cheese pancakes!

After Luis got home from school he and Raquel started in on my cake.

Raquel gets quite concerned when we use loud electrical appliances (blender, beaters, vacuum) and holds really still whilst she stares.

Nothing says Happy Birthday like a hot, greasy pizza, and this year we got a tip from a local to try a nearby pizza joint called Stuft Pizza.  It was pretty good.  And as always, Lu waits until I put on my pajamas to shoot any pictures of me.  Thanks dear.

We had to wait next to the bar while they prepared our pizza, and though I could've gone my entire day without listening to the general conversations, I thought it was really sweet when one of the guys asked a waitress to get Raquel a balloon.  She could've cared less about it, but it was still sweet.

 

After dinner we put Raquel to bed.  I kept asking Luis if he needed to get anything from the bedroom before she fell asleep (knowing my presents were still stacked against the bed where I put them after we bought them together).  It took me asking this question 3 different times before he finally realized that yes, he did need to get something from the bedroom.  Imagine my surprise when he brought out the very gifts we bought together:)  Just kidding, it really was thoughtful of him to take time out of his busy study-schedule to go shopping at the mall with me.  These are my collective gifts from Luis, Raquel, Mom, Shaunna, and Marie.

My birthday cake request was anything simple so Luis didn't spend all night baking.  He made me a double layer strawberry/banana shortcake.  It was delish.

As usual, Raquel woke up to join us.

 

The next day I also received a package in the mail (I LOVE packages in the mail!!!) from my twinster Amber.  She sent me some darling black shoes that I adore!  The best part is...I can walk in them!  (Yes I'm looking at YOU my pointy-toe, glamorous, but too high heel shoes.)

 

The day after THAT, my two buddies Brandi and Jen took me out to Applebees for more celebration.

They obviously think they're very funny because for a gift they gave me Ziploc bags so I won't have to wash/reuse my bags and a pack of tissue paper so I won't have to carefully fold, store, and reuse old tissue paper.  HAR HAR.



Little do they know, now I just have more bags I can wash, extra tissue paper to fold PLUS...

...an entire gift bag and MORE tissue paper to store away.  So much for their intervention.

 

Oh, and they also gave me one of my favorite books ever, Goose Girl, and some divine Ghiradelli squares!  And guess who tipped them off about the book?  Skip to my LU!  

 

Overall, my birthday was celebrated Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, & Saturday.  Plus, Raquel has been singing happy birthday to me every day since, so I feel like my birthday is still ongoing.  If any of you have gifts you'd like to send my way, feel free.  This party's just getting started!

 

Getting Lost on Purpose

Is it just me, or does anyone else feel stressed about starting family traditions?  Maybe I'm overthinking it all, but with all the traditions we had as children, plus all the cool traditions we hear about, PLUS all the traditions we think up on our own, I feel overwhelmed with deciding which to keep and which to kick!  I think I need to just calm down, actually, but anways...

 

One tradition we do love, is trippin' to the local pumpkin patch.  Luis took me there for my first birthday here in California to make it extra special since I was missing my family so much.  It was one of my favorite birthday memories (other than standing in line at my sisters wedding greeting all sorts of people I didn't know...hee haw, just kidding Charisee!) and we've gone back every year.

 

It has been 147 degrees here for the past 99 days but finally, FINALLY we got a bit of a break and saw some cooler temps and rainshowers.  We went to the pumpkin patch the next day, so it was a bit soggy, very fall-ish, and purely wonderful!  We had the best time ever!  I mean ever!!!  In fact, think about all of your best times, and then multiply that by 17 1/2.  Yeah, we pretty much blew your best times out the front door.

 

Okay, so maybe it wasn't that good, but it was still pretty spectacular.

 

We started out with a picnic and photo op.

Then this year for the first time, we tried their corn maze.  It was different than any corn maze I've tried before.  First, you wander around getting lost...

 

...then you have to find these four posts with numbers on them to get a code...

...the code is your key to get out of maze part 1...

...and then you repeat the process until you complete part 2 and end the maze.  We found out from the corn maze staff that the record time was 22 min.  Our time was better than that by 12 minutes (plus or minus one hour).

 

After the corn maze, we picked this cute little pink pumpkin found in the patch.  Have you ever seen such a cute pumpkin?  Not I.

 

Finally, on our way out the door, we noticed our new-only-been-used-once picnic tablecloth spread out on our previously used picnic table.  I had to sheepishly pull it out from behind a nursing mother and her three wee ones, but at least we got it back.

 

(Have I mentioned that every year Luis and I accidentally throw away our car registration after putting the stickers on the car?  Sometimes we're not very "mart.")

 

After this experience, I realized that my missy needs a winter hat.  Mother dear guilted me into making one so I produced the following cap.  She laughs at herself in the mirror everytime I put it on her head.  So either she likes it or she doesn't like it.  One of the two.

 

 

((Just in case you're wondering, YES, my older sister really did get married on my birthday and YES I really did have to stand in line all night and YES I did grumble and complain about it and YES I cried when my mom brought in our store-bought birthday cake instead of the usual home-made one and YES I should've been more happy to spend my birthday on temple grounds and YES I've given Charisse a hard time about getting hitched on my birthday for years now and YES I probably always will.  I love you Charisse))

Mormon Battalian, Old Town, and Sea World

We were once again San Diego bound last weekend and got to cross one more "to do" off our SoCal "to do" list.

 

This time...Mormon Battalian Museum!

We spent half an hour taking pictures outside the museum before actually going in.  I have a feeling that's not going to fly when missy gets older.

The museum is run by sister and couple missionaries.  They took us on the interactive tour where we moved from room to room learning about the Mormon Battalion.

At this point in our tour, the sister missionaries asked if we wanted to just look at the equipment the men had to wear or if we wanted to put it on.  Without a thought, I said, "Oh yes, Luis wants to wear it."  I'm not sure if he was as eager as me, but was a good sport about it.

Concluding the tour, Raquel and Luis panned for gold.  I told Raquel that it was about time she started earning her keep at our house, and that I expected some real profit from her gold-diggin'.  She didn't disappoint.

 

 

Since the museum is right in Old Town San Diego, we decided to be leisurely and stroll around for a bit.  This is the first schoolhouse in San Diego

Raquel always seems to have such a great time when she's with Mommy & Daddy.  (We must be one egg short of a dozen, because we can't figure out how to tighten her strap so they hold her up straight.  She always ends up tipped over to one side.)

This is the backside of the Whaley house, one of the "most haunted houses in North America."  We didn't go in, but other than that ghost floating around by the tree, I didn't think it looked too haunted.

We topped off our Old Town San Diego stroll by dining at our FIRST MEXICAN RESTAURANT as a married couple and family.  I was even brave enough to try calamari.  It tasted like a fish stick.

 

Of course, every time we visit San Diego we HAVE to take advantage of our Sea World season pass.  These are their ghetto fabulous Halloween decorations.  Are they fish dressed like pumpkins or pumpkins dressed like fish? 

It was an incredible day to be at Sea World because the park was e.m.p.t.y. with a capital E (so I guess I should've said it was E.m.p.t.y).  Even during the middle of the day, there was a zero minute wait for the water rides.

We actually didn't go visit many animals, but we did stop by the shark tank.  Raquel was so inspired by the sharks that she grew another tooth the next day.

This is the Garcia family from Lu's mission who let us stay with them.  Raquel wouldn't let them hold her much, but there was one brief moment she graciously smiled in their arms.