The Struzick Saga: February 2014

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Videos That Make Me Smile

Reading to Baby (almost 2 years old) from Lauren Struzick on Vimeo.

Sunday, February 23, 2014

2 year olds are quite entertaining.

It has been a while since I have blogged about life in the now. Everything I have been posting is catch up so now that I am up to date I will fill you in.

Bet you didn't know picking out granite could be this much fun!

We are still living at my sister's house. They are in NZ for a month so we are house sitting, not homeless. ;) The renovations are coming along. I can see the new floor plan which is progress.

This is one of those iphone panoramic pics so it looks a little funny. To the left behind the pink studs will be the playroom. The far left back room with the pink studs is my new closet. Center is the living room and right is the kitchen.

Molly is saying some hilarious things lately which I will post below for your enjoyment.

I was changing your diaper the other day and you didn't want me to so while you were flailing your legs you said "Mommy, mommy, no. Can you be nice?!?"
One day while driving on an overpass you said "We are going up on a fridge." Yes, we are going up on a bah, bah, bah bridge. So now every time we go on a bridge/overpass you said bah, bah, bah, fridge. As many times as I tell her a fridge is where your food goes we are driving on a fridge.
When you want cereal you say "cerealealealealeal". We don't stop at one eal.
I went to get you out of your bed from nap one day and you stood straight up and said "Mommy, I am a sassypants."

Miss sassypants ;)

Molly recently got a new baby because our other baby took a dip in the toilet when she was going potty so we went ahead and got a new one. Anyway. I asked if baby was a girl or boy and she said (very sure of herself) "Mommy she is a boy". I am still a little confused Molly....
My personal fav. We were eating dinner, pot pie to be exact, and she didn't want to eat it. We tried everything including the plane trying to land in her mouth. She just shook her head back and forth then stopped - looked Danny straight in the eye and said "I don't eat cat food." Luckily I picked it up from Fresh Market so I didn't take offense but goodness I didn't know we had such a food critic in the house.

Oh girlfriend....

So, let me just tell you Molly is one strong willed little girl. While she can be super sweet, she can turn just like that. I will definitely have my work cut out for me that is for sure. Just the other day we were leaving for one of my friends/her friends house and she was eating an applesauce. Well, she threw her trash on the floor and I asked her to pick it up. She looked at me and said "no" so I handed it to her and said "please go put this in the trash". She threw it on the floor and said "no". Ok......Molly, two can play this game. While she was one step ahead of me and said "I wanna go in timeout" I said "ok, you can go in timeout until you are ready to throw away your trash". This immediately ended up in an on the floor, body flailing, temper tantrum complete with alligator tears. "I don't want to throw away my trash Mommy!" This lasted 20 minutes people - 20 minutes. I sat in a chair and just watched while reminding her that she is in control all she has to do is walk 5 steps to the trash and throw the applesauce away. WOW. She finally did it when I went to go put the bags in the car. Rough :/

Love riding the carousel

While she has her own opinion about things she does obey for the most part. Although I do have to explain why she needs to obey sometimes. I can't just say don't run in the street. She needs to know why she can't run in the street. She definitely still has to do everything herself. Right now she is super cuddly and I can't get enough. When she wakes up in the morning and after nap she just want to sit in my lap and watch a little Mickey. I just sit there and hold her while memorizing all the details - is that weird??!! Oh well, call me creepy.

Snow day in our new neighborhood

Teaching her early

We got our first shiner. She fell down on a hula hoop at school.

Sweet little momma gave baby her pillow and her lovey.

Cherish this cuddle time

My little valentine

Romantic valentine dinner = Chucky Cheese

Helping Uncle Bobby blow out his candles

Sunday, February 16, 2014

M's 2nd Birthday Party

This post was written a month ago so take yourself back a couple weeks when reading. Thanks and gig'em.

This girl...... :)

We might have been a little crazy to throw Molly a birthday party with all the packing that needed to be done and the moving and the fact that we had 5 days after the party to get everything out of the house but I just had too. I can say that we got everything done and moved out and we are successfully living with my sister until our new house is done (which should be mid March). Anyway, we kept the party simple because of the above statement but we did get a bounce house because homegirl is obsessed with them. She loves them.....like really loves them. Since the party was in the afternoon we had snacks instead of a meal. My mom made the animal jello and fruit salad. My sister made the cupcakes and I provided the goldfish, chicken nuggets from Chick-fil-a (which by the way the party was on a Sunday and I picked up the nuggets Saturday night and they were still really good - I was nervous about that). It was nice to have helpers considering they did more work than I did. We had about 30 people come. I think all the kiddos had a good time. I know Molly did.

The bounce house.

"Come on baby emem, let me show you how to slide down."

Bet you didn't know sliding takes this much concentration.

Don't worry pretty much every adult jumped like a kid :)

Moms and their babes

I think I look a little worn out....yikes

The best shot when wrangling most of the babes.
R to L: William, Molly, Liam, Maddie, Graham, Nathan

The delish "cake" made by Aunt Nenna

No throwing up on our cake this year = success!

"OMG, what is that?????!!!!!"

"It's my very own giraffe!"

You worn out yet Molly?!?

We also went to her two year old appointment and she weighs 30lbs and is 34 inches tall, of course both of those being in the 90th percentile. The doc said she would be around 5'8" when she is all grown up. Sounds good to me. I love being tall so I assume she will too.

Saturday, February 15, 2014

Hawaii Part III - Post Wedding

After the wedding we relaxed one more day in Maui then headed off to Honolulu. Totally two different places. Oahu is much more urban and Maui is much more serene. Now, I am a huge people watcher. Put me in a little cafe in Italy and I am the happiest camper around, just watching people wondering where they are going, what they are doing, their life stories, etc. As long as there is a gelato stand nearby that is my kind of vacation! Honolulu didn't have any gelato but the people watching was glorious and I mean glorious. So many people from all over the world. Anyway, once we arrived at our hotel, right across from the beach I might add, we put on our swimsuits and went to the beach. While there wasn't any snorkeling it was much better for swimming. I wasn't scared the waves would eat Molly alive. But, I didn't really need to worry about that because she stayed in for .2 seconds and then she was done and just wanted to chase the pigeons around. Pigeon chasing was a bit of a theme the whole time we were in HI.

Bye Bye Maui

A little people watching

Bring on the beach (and more people watching)

The next day we headed out to Pearl Harbor. It was great. Completely different experience with a toddler I am sure but it was still moving. I am very interested in WW2 and everything about it because, well, it was such a huge event but also both my grandfathers were heroes in the war.

Where the USS Arizona was laid to rest.

All the heroes that lost their lives

"Mom, what in the world do you think you are doing?"

Yeah.....pigeons - see what I mean, different experience for us with a little one

After that we napped then walked around the city.

The tree is this big!

Like HUGE!

Mom, I just wanna lay in the sand.

Little father daughter talk

Having a serious conversation with Papa.

The next day it was time to leave but we had the whole day until our plane left so naturally we headed to the zoo because M LOVES animals.

Cool cats

CHEESE!

Pat pat the goat Mommy?!?!

Sad to see our last sunset in Hawaii.....until next time.

Saturday, February 8, 2014

Hawaii Part II - The Wedding

Looking through these pics makes me want to go back so badly and also makes me rethink why we decided to live in Houston.

Let's start with the rehearsal dinner. It just so happened to be on Halloween which was weird and nice because 1. the whole day I completely forgot that it was Halloween and 2. I didn't have to worry about a costume this year. The rehearsal was quick and painless. We all met at the golf course, ran through the itinerary and then hightailed it out of there to get to the dinner which just so happened to be a traditional luau. Before everything got started they had various stations where you could learn to hula, play the instruments, watch the pig being cooked under the sand, etc. It was nice. It gave Molly time to run around and explore before having to be contained during the show. Once the huge buffet was ready everyone got their food and settled in for the show. It was really neat and I couldn't believe the girls actually wore coconuts, if you know what I mean. It was a lot of fun and here are the pics.

The soon to be newlyweds

And the pig

She loved this

Brothers

Dancers

Molly, I see you looking at that. You will NEVER wear that outfit.

Various ways to keep her entertained during the performance

Friday, November 1st was the special day. We woke up headed to the bridal breakfast at a delicious cafe right on the beach. The food was so good. I am salivating just thinking about it. After that we headed to Jenna's condo to start getting dolled up. Then before I knew it, it was time to head to the Plantation House for the wedding. She got married on a golf course over looking the beach...swoon....why did I decide to get married in Houston again?!? Oh and to top it off the most beautiful rainbow showed up that afternoon. Molly was one of the 5 flower girls and she was the only one that didn't want to walk down the isle (granted she was the youngest) so I carried her down with me. I can't even begin to tell you how wonderful/beautiful the wedding was. Jenna was stunning - seriously stunning. I am crying typing this because I was such an emotional mess watching my baby sister getting married. I cried the entire ceremony. They wrote their own vows which was just too much for me = hot mess. The reception was fantastic and a blast. M was a dancing queen until she hit her wall which was about 8:30pm. Luckily my in laws took her home early so we could enjoy the rest of the party, and party it was. The personal touches were crazy from the sunglasses to ear during the ceremony to the map at the sign in table showing where all the various guest were coming from (seriously all over the world) to handmade origami swans as the ceremony backdrop. They also had professional dancers teaching people how to fancy dance and a DJ of course for the rest of the night. My dad and sister nailed their dance (even if you could read what count my dad was on ;)). The whole evening was exhausting, exciting, fun, happy and thebestnightever all at the same time. I highly recommend getting married in HI.