Melissa’s Blog

Today was bring your kids to work day at Bret’s company. Nikki didn’t want to miss school as she is hoping for perfect attendance but she knows she won’t get it due to us going to Hawaii next month. The kids had a great day. It was very strange for me as they did something fun without me. I was a little sad but so happy to hear about their fun day. It was a little nice for me to as I didn’t need to go pick them up at a certain time, make lunch, etc..so less stress. This is what the day’s agenda looked like:

TAKE OUR DAUGHTERS & SONS TO WORK DAY
State Street IMS
April 25, 2013
AGENDA
Time Description Location
8:30-9:00am Registration & Breakfast
9:00-9:30am Ice Breaker
9:30-9:45am What does State Street do?
9:45-10:00am NOC Tour
10:00-11:15am Scavenger Hunt w/ Parents
11:15-12:00pm Lunch & Review Scavenger Hunt Answers
12:00-12:15pm Philanthropy Presentation
12:15-1:00pm Team Building Activity
1:00-2:30pm Work at Parents Desk
2:30pmEarly dismissal upon managers approval

I picked up the kiddos and they didn’t want to leave. They were headed to play fooseball and ping pong. It was great hearing about their adventures. They come home with a bag of goodies or junk. They loved telling me they had pizza and ice cream. Justin was so proud he put strawberry sauce on it and did the whip cream himself. Nikki did some of her homework at dad’s desk while Justin was busy playing. It was an awesome day for them that I hope they will always remember. Oh and they made money too. Here is a pic of their money:

Justin put Iceland as he just did a report on Iceland for school.

I took it easy and went shopping to buy some clothes for our Hawaii trip. I can’t wait, we are going to have so much fun.

Mine as well update this blog while I am here. The kiddos got reading medals and perfect attendance certificates at the last assembly:

Nikki lost another tooth on 4/9/13-she has now lost a total of 5. Justin still at 2.

The kids had a pretend wedding at home. It was so funny. They took paper and rolled it out in the foyer. Dad officiated and I was a flower girl. Nikki put on a dress that was a size 4 I believe and my veil. And Justin grabbed his robe as his outfit. As always they keep us laughing. Here are some pics:

They had their jog a thon at school and Nikki did 20 laps, Justin did 19. They both did so well. It was hard though as the kiddos had to remember to get a check mark after each lap-I am not sure that happened. Nikki got a medal for third place in the 1st grade for doing the most laps. Not the best pic as it was taken with my phone:

Bret is headed to NJ next week for work, ugh. But I am grateful he doesn’t have to go away too much.

And there goes another tooth!

My baby looks so different. She told her teacher she had to go to the bathroom but really she just wanted to look at her toothless grin!!! She is so cute!

3/13/13, Nikki lost her first upper tooth, LOOK:

And the kiddos are now blue belts, LOOK:

They worked so hard for the blue belt. It was a really hard form and we were so proud. The kids both did their form perfectly!

We are now the proud owners of a red jeep. We were able to sell the black one easily which was great. Bret has really been enjoying playing with the jeep, changing the fluids, etc. The kids are so funny sitting in the back with the top off. They were under a blanket the other day, heads and all, and Justin said his favorite art was being under there with Nikki. So cute! The kiddos really love each other and I hope they always have a wonderful relationship.

Happy New Year! The holidays went by so fast and I have a lot of catching up to do. The kids had twin day at school. It was so cool, I think 10 of their friends all wore the same Skylanders shirts:

We weren’t sure what to do for the kiddos birthday. We ended up taking the family to RocknSushi with the Teppan tables. It was cool and fun. The kids had a great time and liked the show. They were pretending to be like the chef at the grill next to us. It was so cute. At the last minute we decided to have a playdate/birthday party at our house. We did it on Monday, Veteran’s Day. It worked out really well doing it that day as everyone could come. We just got a bounce house and the kiddos played hand ball in the garage. I have a few pics but they are in the garage-ugh and the ones with their cake didn’t come out great. I have been having issues with my camera and it is now out for repair. First picture is the kiddos at school on their birthday and the other one is them playing with their birthday presents from us.

They had lots of fun at their holiday parties @ school. They went to each first grade class and did some craft and cookie decorating.

The kids are doing awesome. They had their yearly checkup yesterday. Here are the latest in height and weight:

Justin: height is 49 1/4 in and weight is 52lbs 70 % in height and 50% in weight

Nikki: height is 49 1/4 in and weight is 58.8lbs 70% in height and 75% in weight

They were actually so cute at the doctors. They were giggling and playing together. So all is well with the kiddos and their health. They are just growing up so fast.

The kiddos had their awards at school. Both received a certificate for star student of the month and received a gold medal in reading.

They are now purple belts in Tae Kwon Do.

I get so mad at myself when I don’t update this as someday I know I will love to look back at this. The kids are so into Ninjago and Skylanders right now. Justin is still a cuddle bug and Nikki can’t sit still, she is always doing something. Couple crazy funny things that I will definitely have to use as blackmail later on in life…Justin takes his private and holds it and says flying squirrel. There is no one that sits next to Nikki at school so Nikki and her friends call this empty spot blank. Nikki’s 3rd tooth is ready to come up (one on the left of the top 2 teeth). Can’t wait to see the holey smile! And I can’t believe I forgot to mention Bret bought a jeep. However it is not his dream jeep so another one may be in our near future. This is the so called “practice jeep”.

Bret has been enjoying working on the jeep, installing a new stereo, sway bar releases, playing with all the tops, and a lot of other stuff. We have gone off roading a few times now. The first time Nikki and I were sick, ugh. But the next time Bret aired down the tires and sway bar thing and it was better. Apparently I bought Bret an air compressor for Christmas-but it made putting air in the tires faster. We took the jeep off roading them hiked to a waterfall-Oh I mean a trickle of water. Bret has since put the soft top on. Yesterday was a beautiful day we took the jeep to Huntington Beach. Bret took the back windows out and the kids loved it. We had an awesome day at the beach. The kids played in the water a little bit (water was freezing) and we dug a big hole. We ended up being there was longer than I thought. I have to say I hate the jeep as Bret takes the day off to be with me but then does jeep stuff (being so sarcastic) plus the jeep and it’s stuff has taken over the garage. I also have to say I have enjoyed the little family adventures with it and look forward to a lot more.

And finally here are pictures of our awesome bunny:

I am looking back at pictures trying to figure out what I missed. Halloween was so much fun. And there He/She is Driving Me Batty Shirts still fit. The kids dressed up as Ghostbusters. When they saw kids dressed as ghosts they tried to get them. Bret put the Ghostbusters song and their music player and we brought that trick or treating. I didn’t get great pics as I waited until after trick or treating. But here is one with their buddies Mason, Matthew, and Mia:

Weekend before Halloween we went to the YMCA family camp again in Julian. It was great. Lots of friends joined us as well. This year the big thing the kids loved was ga ga ball. Kind of like handball/dodgeball in a hexagon shape. That is all the kids wanted to do. We still did archery, bb guns, pumpkin carving but it all led back to ga ga ball. Nikki carved a pumpkin and called it Mr. Floppy Head 2. The year before she did one that was Mr. Floppy Head 1. Kids went trick  or treating from cabin to cabin. Here are some pics from the weekend:

We are heading into the 3rd week of school. We are getting used to our routines but next week the homework begins. School is going well. Nikki is in a K/1 combo class with the teacher Justin had last year. This was a definite surprise. I was so happy about the teacher that I didn’t give the combo much thought. Mrs. Cook is on maternity leave so Nikki has Mrs. Harlan and she is as sweet as can be. Justin has Mrs. Ortego and she seems great. He seems to really like her and the class. Mrs. Ortego is a think out of the box kind of teacher and very easy going-I think this will be great for Justin. There has been little hang ups with the combo but that is to be expected. Nikki was really upset when she saw Justin’s classroom and he had desks and she didn’t. She does have bigger tables and chairs then the kinders. The cool part though is when the kindergarteners go home @ 11:30 there are only 11 kids in the class until 2:10. It is like a private school and I think it is then that Nikki is very happy. I think the kids were a little disappointed not to have their best buddies in their same classes but they do see them at recess. Handball has become a craze again. The kids want to play it all the time. The kids are getting so big. I have too much time-I miss the kiddos. I am enjoying it but it seems like they are in school a long time. I have been able to get a lot of stuff done thought. Here are some back to school-1st day of school photos:

On top of school starting soccer has begun as well. Justin’s team is now red thunder and he has the same team/coach from last season which is pretty cool. Therefore, I was unable to coach his team. I am coaching the girls again-the Tigers. We have a bunch of girls who have never played soccer so it is not going as smooth as I had hoped but it will be great to see them improve over the season. By being Nikki’s coach I am unable to get pics but she is probably happy about that. Here are some of Justin and team:

Luckily someone captured a few pics from Nikki’s last game:

And the kiddos are now greenbelts:

They did great doing their form in front of everyone. Love the genuine smiles!

And we had back to school night. Bret and I loved being in the classrooms and listening to what they were going to do, meeting and talking to their teachers, etc. I had to take a picture of the picture Nikki drew-she even included Scooters the bunny, too cute!

Justin brought home a lot of work the other day and there were loads of compliments on it from good coloring to good printing. Justin has really nice hand writing.

Last night, 8/31/12 Justin was playing with his wiggly tooth. It was so wiggly. He decided he wanted to pull it. I gave him a paper towel to grab hold of it and he pulled it! It was so exciting! All happened right before bedtime. Here is a pic:

He looks even more grown up and even cuter with his whole. He wrote a note to the tooth fairy asking to keep his tooth since it was his first one. Can’t wait until he wakes up and find the $5.00 under his pillow.

This summer has just flown by. We are trying to complete our bucket list. We have been busy but have also spent lots of time at home playing the big thing which is Ninjago. We have been bowling, swimming, to the beach and lagoon, the San Diego Safari Park, Goofy’s Kitchen, the movies, Chuck E Cheese, Disney, park days and play dates, etc….The kids had a blast at Boomers and wanted to go again and again. Mini golf was the highlight. Here are some pics:

We were at Disney from 11:00AM until about 9:30PM. We did see the fireworks from the parking lot. We were pretty exhausted but the minute we heard the big booms from the fireworks we all found some energy again. The Cars Land was amazing; Disney did a great job with it. We spent a long time at CA Adventure. It looked just like Radiator Springs. It was so cute to hear the kids get so excited to see the town and name off the places, like the Cozy Cone Motel, etc. The Cars ride was awesome and luckily Ms Tanya knew the tricks so we didn’t have to wait too long. We went in the single rider line. It meant two of us rode in the same car but behind one another. No big deal-it was well worth it rather than waiting in the 2-3 hour line. Nikki was a little nervous but she was brave and was glad she did it! The ride was awesome. We had an amazing day at both parks-lots of smiles, parades, rides, etc. The kids rode the rockets all by themselves and they were so proud!!! And the three of us barely fit in the Autopia cars-last time we went we had plenty of room. I think Justin’s new favorite ride is the Cars land one. Here are a few pics:

Started to think about back to school…..Justin picked out a Skylanders lunch box and a Skylanders cup. Nikki picked out a Scooby lunch box and a Skylanders cup. Can’t believe how fast summer went by. Here are a few back to school pics I have started taking:

Soccer has just started up again. I was hoping to coach Justin’s team but his team has stayed intact and his coach is coaching again. So it looks as though I am coaching the girls again.

Last night right before bed Nikki’s 2nd tooth fell out. Bret helped it a little bit. The tooth had been loose for a really long time. I am sure it is a relief it is out so now she doesn’t have to worry about it while eating.

Justin was a little sad that none of his have come out yet but he was really happy for his sister, what a sweet little boy.

Summer is just flying by. The kids are so into Lego Ninjago these days and have almost wanted to stay home just to play it. Overall the kiddos have been playing really well together.

We recently went on an RV trip. We went to Acton, Northridge, and Malibu. The beach was the best part of the trip. The kids loved the RV. I read so much about Acton but it turned out to be disappointing so we moved to Northridge. Too funny as this is something I would do….Bret got the dates wrong and he thought we were going to Malibu first instead of last. Oops we had to drive another 120 miles to Acton. Luckily the kids were happy playing on all the electronics, ipad, Nintendo DS’s, etc. The Acton campground was just ok. The kids used pedal tractor things but they were too hard to petal for long. We went on a hike and found firewood for our campfire in Malibu, plus tried to figure out why there were a few old rusty trailers parked in the hiking area. We hiked to the train tracks which was no fun hearing in the middle of the night. The campground showed the movie Finding Nemo on the outdoor screen but the kiddos weren’t too into the movie so we didn’t watch it that long. The next day we ended up moving to Northridge rather than staying in Acton. The campground at Northridge was very simple but we had a much better time there. We did end up walking over to the mall though and getting Red Robin for dinner. The campground had a pool so we had fun swimming together. Then it was off to Malibu. We had a great time just hanging out and playing. The kids used bowls and spoons in the sand where they were pretending to be chefs and taking our orders. It was really cute. We roasted hot dogs and marshmallows that night-definitely what camping is all about. All in all it was a nice trip and great to be together as a family. Here are the pics:

We went to the next door neighbor’s, Sophia’s 2nd birthday party. They had a bounce house and an  awesome water slide-the kids had so much fun on it as you can see from the pictures:

And Nikki loses a tooth.

It all started a week ago. I was brushing Nikki’s teeth and she said one hurt. I felt it and was surprised to feel a wiggly tooth. She was so excited-it was so cute. All week she has been wiggling it and obsessing over it. When I first felt her wiggly tooth I was worried how Justin would feel. No problem there as he has a wiggly tooth too, maybe a week or two more. So tonight Nikki put the chinese jump rope in her mouth and came into the kitchen to tell us something….and all of a sudden she is like where is my tooth. Thankfully we found it! She was scared at first but then was all happy. She looks so grown up, it is so strange to look at her with a missing tooth. It is in a bag with a note to the tooth fairy. She wrote: Dear tooth fairy, this is my first tooth and I would like to keep it. I love it!