Puppy Love

Meet our new additions!

Lupita

&

Banjo

We now have 18 chickens, 2 cats and 3 dogs. Rufus' days are numbered here on the ranch, sadly. We did find him a good home, no kids and lotsa room to run so he should be pretty happy. With his departure coming up we needed to get a replacement: a dog who can protect us from wild beasts out here, have fun with our kids but also understand his place BELOW them and be a good companion for Seth at work. We wanted to train up a puppy, not an older dog, so that we can really be sure they understand their place in our family from the very beginning. Our friends have cattle dogs/queenslands and we really like their personality so we decided to look for one and found them pretty quick. Went in to get one and came out with two. They are sooo sweet and adorable. Just like newborns, they just want to be held all the time right now-pretty sweet. So these are our new guardians. And like so many of our neighbors small animals, we are hoping they don't become coyotes next meal ;)

Cute videos

that family may only enjoy sitting through ;) My kid makes me laugh all day. He's seriously hilarious. He LOVES making these little videos with me and then watching them. (as you'll hear him say "watch, watch!") He's 18 months now and surprises us everyday with new words. More videos to come very soon, like later today. 

Untitled from Hock on Vimeo.

Untitled from Hock on Vimeo.

Happy belated Christmas!

I'm lagging a bit on this blog, for good reasons: i'm exhausted all the time. Totally contradictory to what all the "expecting" books prep you for: "You'll have SO MUCH ENERGY your 2nd trimester." Lie. For me at least. It may have something to do with mothering a very active 1.5 year old. 

Christmas was great-spent out here in California with good friends. Not the tradition for us-very non-climactic but a nice change. Kinda like any other day, except for the whole savior's birth thing we celebrated ;) 

The day started with River's favorite activity: a four wheeler ride with dad. They cruised the property for a bit and after many tears were shed, dad finally convinced River to get off the vehicle and come inside to eat and open gifts. 

Next we opened presents. He was more taken with sitting in the middle of his new train track than actually playing with it. Then he moved on to the box in which it came-that was much more fun.

We then went to our surrogate family's house to eat, chill, eat some more and open more gifts. Very relaxing and so fun to watch our friends' kids get all wide-eyed and hyper excited about their presents. 

In other news, River has taken to singing. He sings all over the house, outside and at the grocery store. I'm not sure what he sings but he certainly seems confident. He's also obsessed with balls. He has too many to count, all different shapes and sizes. It's the first thing he asks for most mornings and the one word I know I can say to get a huge smile out of him. Pretty cute. Hope this isn't how OCD starts, cause we really fuel the flame. We usually can't get out of any store without picking up another one. 

Holiday cards

Decided to make my own Christmas cards this year with a little help from the Stampin Up collection and inspiration from some very crafty friends. It's been pretty fun and giving me more to do than chase a toddler. So in telling my neighbor/friend about my endeavor, she asks if I could make her business some gift card holders for Thanksgiving. I say sure and start fiddling around with ideas for the construction of the cards-it turned out they are quite easy to design and produce-so I made 10 in about an 2 hours and she loved them. Anybody need gift card holders this season lemme know!

 

Halloween goofballs

I love dressing up - always have - so it's no wonder when October rolls around I start to get a little giddy about who I'm going to be come October 31. We decided to be the Scooby Doo trio of Scoob, Shag and Velma this year. River was never thrilled over this decision. I think he had his hopes set on being Charlie Brown but I nixed that once I found my incredible wig. 

When I was growing up, there were always mobs of kids all over town from about 6-8pm on Halloween night dressed up in all sorts of costumes. Quite the opposite in SLO town. We were one of two trt-ing groups we saw that night. I don't know what the story was but it was different. We still had fun and got lots of candy. I had forgotten how much I love tootsie rolls until that night. Good times!

River brushing teeth...well kinda from Hock on Vimeo.

TARGET

It's always meant a lot to me. (Yes the dept store) When they first started sprouting up everywhere, my sister and I always referred to them as "tar-jay", implying it was some upscale french boutique. I think we really bought into that too and when we entered it, we felt like we were entering Disneyworld or some utopia. Nowadays it's a quick stop I make every week for the essentials, and always some not so essentials. I still feel a little lighter when I walk through the doors though.

But not this time. This time I was on a mission. It had been over 1 week of wondering, guessing and being so sure my period was going to start any minute. You know, when you actually go to bed with a pad on anticipating it's arrival. I did that for 1 week and alas, nothing. I wasn't nervous because I knew I couldn't be pregnant. And we were too busy in July with River's birthday party plans and family flying in, who had time to think about being pregnant. Not me. So I didn't, until my mother flew home. 2 days after River's birthday we took her to the Santa Maria airport and she urged me to stop on the way home and pick up a test.

Ok I said.

So we casually stopped at Target to pick up a few things, including a test. But when I walked though those doors, I got panic stricken. I literally ran to embarrasing aisle, grabbed the first test I saw and smuggled in into the bathroom. Heart pounding, I shut the stall door and did the deed. I took about 2.2 seconds for two blue lines to register in the first screen. I looked at the control screen: 1 for not pregnant, 2 for pregnant.

Shit I thought. Shit shit shit.

Pulled up my pants, unlocked the stall door and walked out. Pregnant. I seriously could not believe it. Dear little old Seth was waiting for me outside, tinkering with some electronic he just bought, not really paying attention to me. He glanced up, saw me and the smirk I was wearing and smiled.

No way he said. No way, can't be. I don't believe you.

Oh really? Well I have proof. Get in the car.

We loaded River up and got in the front seats and just stared at the thing.

Wow he said. How did this happen?

Not sure I said.

Then he got on me about being gross for taking a test in the bathroom. Which it was but I seriously could not endure the 15 minute car ride home. I had to know now.

So the big bullseye means a little more to me even than it did back in it's glorious uprising days. Maybe this ones name will rhyme with "tar-jay"? Blue jay perhaps. (What? Bird names are in. Nicole Richie just named her son Sparrow) Honestly, Seth and I couldn't be happier. It just took us a few days (him a few moments) to get over the shock. We are getting pretty excited about the new addition but find ourselves wondering, could we possibly love this next one as much as River?