A Breakdancin' Family!

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Playdough is Fun!

The other night Kaylea, Eric and myself were playing with playdough. Kaylea wanted to make snowmen. We had a great time.... I think Eric and I were having more fun than she was! Here are the snowmen we made. The pink one is the one Kaylea made and the teal one is the one we made!

Can it be? NKOTB?!

You heard it right! NKOTB also known as New Kids on the Block are going back on tour! I had to share this because I was one of those crazy NKOTB fans! I had the scrapbook and everything. At night I used to go to sleep to with their cassette tape playing in my boom box and dream about marrying Joey! LOL In fact the very first concert I ever attended was to see New Kids on the Block and believe it or not my big brother Corey took me! Decked out in my vest and black hat I thought I was the coolest thing getting to go and being taken by my big brother! Even cooler I thought... my brother let me go with him to McDonald's to eat afterwards. That's one of my favorite memories I have of my brother and I growing up.

Well they are going on tour again so it seems and will be announcing it in the next few weeks. (Yes I totally want to go!) LOL its going to be hilarious seeing a bunch of 30-something women going crazy over a bunch of 40 year old men re-enacting their boy band moves! Hahaha Hahaha! Too funny!

For more info on this reunion:

http://www.people.com/people/news/category/0,,EntPeopleTax:NewKidsontheBlock,00.html

Obsessive Compulsive 2-Year-Old!

I've heard that all toddlers have some form of OCD (Obsessive Compulsive Disorder). I believe that to some extent but I think Kaylea might have it a little extreme. That doesn't come as a surprise to me as IMHO (in my humble opinion) my mother and brother are borderline OCD. See growing up as a child I took after my father... and like him I believe in keeping things in an "organized mess". When we were kids, my brother's room was always neat and tidy, so much so I think his closet was color coordinated and his hangers hung exactly 1 inch apart. (ok maybe I'm exaggerating a little). My room on the other hand was comparable to a war zone. Either that or a dumpster? It was like a bomb of clothes had exploded all over the floor. But, despite the mess, to me it was serenity at its best! Eric has a great saying that we've tried to teach Kaylea, "God Made Dirt, and Dirt Don't Hurt!" She's not buying it though!

She really is the funniest kid I know. She has to have everything a certain way. When we put her to bed her pillows have to be layed out a certain way and her stuffed animal fluffy has to be on her right side, teddy on her left with her water bottle both laying on her "rabbit pillow". Her and fluffy (or who Eric calls, "Big Fluff Dawg") lay on her pillow. If it is out of order in any way, she can't sleep. And when you sing to her she wants you to sing the right words... if you change them she corrects you!

Well last night was the funniest OCD experience of all! See she loves Cheetos, but she gets really frustrated eating them because her hands get "all Cheeto-ie". So as we do every dinner time we gave her a paper towel, so she could wipe her hands in between bites. I even gave her one wet paper towel and one dry one because Cheetos are extra messy. (She usually asks for the wet paper towel with extra messy food like chocolate.... yes I know... and yes she is only 2 and half!) Well it wasn't enough for her last night. She requested that I "feed" the Cheetos to her. I told her I was not going to do that and that she was a big girl. This frustrated her, but, being the smart little girl she is, she came up with her own plan. She used the paper towel to wrap around the Cheetos like a burrito or banana peel and held the napkin that was holding the Cheeto and took a bite. Not your "normal" 2 year old! LOL I had to take a picture!

Kaylea Sings "Itsy Bitsy Spider"

Here is a cute video clip of Kaylea singing Itsy Bitsy Spider in my office at work yesterday.

Itsy Bitsy Spider

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New Car! Less Gas! Whew!

For those of you who don't know, we bought a new car last weekend! We finally traded in the good 'ol 2000 Ford Ranger and we got a 2007 Dodge Caliber! Its basically Eric's car (as I have my brother's old "soccer mom van") but its great. We've been needing a new car for a while.... a carseat in the front seat of a truck is not the safest and the truck was getting old and needing repairs too often... not to mention it was a gas guzzler since Eric commutes 45 minutes to an hour to and from work every day. So, in the long run it will definitely save us money!

Its a really cool little car too! Check the pics out below (not our actual car pictured, but close enough!) It is actually considered an SUV, but its more like the cross between a hatchback and a station wagon. The good thing is it was only $36 to fill up on gas! We'd always stop at $40 on the truck so who knows how much it took to actually fill up. I know my van takes $50 to get it to 3/4 a tank! Ouch!

Some cool features:

- The back seats fold down so you can haul stuff.

- It has a little chill zone in the glove compartment for drinks

- The drink holders light up and glow

- Good on Gas!

A Self Portrait by Kaylea

I really believe Kaylea has the gift of being an artist... much like my mom and myself (as a graphic artist). She is always very observant and she notices the tiniest little details. Example, my mother had gotten a calndar from a chinese restaurant and hung it on the wall. Kayle acame over the next day and it was the first thing she noticed. But she didn't just notice the calendar. She also said, "Look, Pandas!" oh and wait for it.... "and bamboo trees!" What two year old notices stuff like that? Really? I don't think I knew what a bamboo tree was when I was two?

So my little Picasso came into the bathroom the other morning to show us the self-portrait she had drawn on her little Dora Magnetic Sketch toy. She said, "Look Daddy I draw Kaylea!" I kid you not there is two eyes a nose and a mouth! She's only two years old people! I think that is observant, amazing, and incredible! Once again she has me totally in awe!

You may want to start collecting some of her artwork now - I'm sure it will be worth more as she gets older! :-)

Kaylea is on Regis and Kelly's Website

OMG! I am totally freaking out here! I went to Regis and Kelly's website and looked at their baby gallery for the contest and Kaylea is there! I've entered her two years in a row and she never made the gallery! There are like over 150,000 pictures submitted so to make it even to the gallery is soooo cool! I am so excited! This doesn't mean she is a finalist, but it does mean her picture was at least noticed and looked at! Click below to see it! Everyone please pray that she can be one of the top ten finalist! (If its God's will of course!) .... and pray that its God's Will lol JK. This is the pic my mom liked best!

http://bventertainment.go.com/tv/buenavista/regisandkelly/contests/beautifulbabies2008/gallery.html

Kaylea Got her Leapster Back!

Just to give you an update... Kaylea did much better at school today, and first thing apologized to Emily. I think she learned her lesson. So... she got her leapster back and her "treats". :-)

My cute tempermental little red head!

It is amazing to me how red Kaylea's hair looks in different lights? Its not surprising as there are quite a few red heads on my mom's side of the family - Amber & Cody to name a few (Although Amber is now blonde - she was a bright red head as a child) She definitely fits the bill when it comes to the red head's temper. Lately she has gotten very tempermental and I think its the result of the terrible twos mixed with the red head temper... and she is spoiled. She gets upset when she doesn't get what she wants and she doesn't know how to express it except for crying or screaming or whining or recently biting!

On Thursday I had to pick her up from school because she had bitten the arm of a little girl in her class. So, I took off work and went to pick her up and this time she was going to realize she can't get away with it. So I brought her home and took her to her room. She didn't like that at all. Also, we took away all "sweet treats" like chocolate and candy as well as her new favorite toy - her leapster! She has been very apologetic ever since and every day tells me she will be good at school and she is sorry for biting Emily. (She is so sweet when she says this I feel like a big mean mama for punishing her, but I know its the right thing to do.) See lately she will say she is sorry and that she won't do it again, and then she turns around and does it again. So this is why we had to take stuff away.

So tomorrow is the real test. She goes back to school. I told her I was going to ask her teacher how she acted in class and if she tells me she was good, then Kaylea can have a chocolate cookie after school and get her leapster back. My fingers are crossed and I hope she's good but there is part of me that is worried we might get another dreaded call. Let's hope not... I think she has learned her lesson... like most women, she loves her chocolate way too much to keep it away for long!

PS - I'm adding on to this after I wrote the above. We've been working with her all weekend on how to play nice. Putting Kaylea to sleep we asked her, "Tomorrow at school if you want to play with a toy what do you do?" and she responded, "you ask". We followed up with, "And if they say no you can't play with it I'm playing with it, then what do you do?" To which she gave the right answer that we taught her, "You play with another toy!" Good girl, mommy has always lived by, "Some will, Some won't, So What, Next!" The same "sales pitch" applies to kids and sharing toys! LOL She then proceeded to say, "and then I get my chocolate cookie and my leapster back!"

She is also getting inspiration from Princess Jasmine from a movie that we bought her about princess stories. Princess Jasmine ended the movie saying, "Be Strong, and Never Give Up". As I layed her in her bed she was chanting to herself under her breath, "Be Stong, An' Neber Gib Up!" Told you she wanted that chocolate back!

¡Fantastico!

Last week Kaylea had a sore throat (actually I think it was hand-foot-mouth) and two days ago her ear turned out infected ... behind her ear where her piercing is... it was pretty bad. We took her to the doctor and they gave us some prescription antibiotic cream to put on it. Sixty dollars and two days later she is doing much better.... it is healing and will continue to heal as long as we can hold her down and keep her still long enough to put medicine on it!

Anyways, last night we were putting Kaylea to bed and like every night we said our prayer. Eric added onto our normal prayer and asked God to help her boo boos feel better. And Kaylea said, "Daddy I really want my boo boos to go away." And he said, "They are sweety they are getting all better!" Then she got a big smile on her face and said, "¡FANTASTICO!"

I love it! It really pays off to let your kids watch Dora! She is learning spanish and its so cute. Sometimes I will say, "Whats the magic word?" and she says, "Please, Por Favor!" And every day when Eric picks her up at my mom's house she calls me on the phone and says, "¿Que pasa, Chica?"

Kids pick Spanish up so easy... Ex. - me when I was a kid. Of course I was immersed into Spanish because we lived in South America. So I'm thinking as she gets a little older and into Elementary school I'd like to get her into a school that has a Spanish Immersion program so that she can learn spanish even more! What are your thoughts on teaching your kids another language? Have your kids been in a Language Immersion program? Any tips you have to share are welcome!

I'll Call You When I'm Thirteen!

So there are two things I learned yesterday.

1.) Never go to a restaurant when your two-year old has just woken up from a nap, and obviously had planned on sleeping a little longer.

2.) Men are men whether they are 4 years old, 25 years old or 40 years old. And Kaylea can't date till she is 30!

We did this last night. Kaylea woke up from her nap just as we arrived at Carraba's Italian Restaurant and was not in the happiest of moods. We thought it would pass but soon realized it would not....plus I think she just wasn't feeling very well. "I wanna go home!" she cried over and over and tears rolled down her face. So we took turns taking her for a walk around the restaurant. She calms down when you do this.... problem is as soon as she sees you are returning to the table, she starts crying again.

But last night, seated at the table next to us was a family with a little boy and a little girl. The boy was 4 years old and the girl was turning three in April... so just 1 month younger than Kaylea. They saw that Kaylea was upset and wanted to come over and say hi to her and cheer her up. It was very sweet.

Next thing you know, the little 4-year-old boy comes up to Kaylea and says, "I have a surprise for you! When I am 13 I'm gonna give you a call!" Well myself, Eric and the other two parents all burst out laughing. Kaylea didn't quite understand why we were laughing and probably thought we were laughing at her cause she kept crying. So I took her on another walk....

As we walked around the restaurant Kaylea stops and says, "Mommy I DON'T WANT to call that boy!" (Good girl!) I laughed at this too and then we returned inside. Kaylea calmed down for a minute in the arms of her daddy and with an ice cream sundae :-)

Then the little boy returned to our table and said, in a cute flirty shy manner, "My mommy says she has the most Bee-U-ti-ful lips she has ever seen!" Then he giggled and covered his face with his hands and ran back to his table.

It was really funny and really cute...even though I ended up getting my meal to go, and Eric woofed down his lasagna faster than Garfield! But I think we are gonna be in for it when she is thirteen!

My favs for the Regis & Kelly Beautiful Baby Search

These are my favs.... tell me what you think! She should win right? :-) I've entered her every year and so far no luck, and next year is the last year she is eligible. I wish it was a personality contest too because she would win hands down.... not to mention she's the smartest two year old I've ever met! Now of course they receive over 100,000 entries each year so I'm sure the chances of getting picked are slim, but either way to me Kaylea is the most beautiful baby! And by the way - I think her blue eyes are turning brown and green (hazel like her mommy's!)

Happy New Year!

A year has passed and time has flown
We've gotten older and Kaylea has grown!

Kaylea began preschool this year as you know,
She's learned ABC's, Colors and Numbers to show.

Her vocabulary has grown by leaps and bounds,
She talks more than her mother! (Can you imagine that sound!)

She is becoming a comic just like her dad,
Two peas in a pod, Twiddle Dee and Twiddle Dad.

While Kaylea has been hard at work in school,
Learning her manners and playing it cool,

Mommy has been working hard at the Bee,
And writing this blog, and keeping up Snowbirdy.

Daddy has started a new job this year,
And his days are now filled with Flip Flops and gear.

So 2007's been busy and we've done quite alot,
We're hoping this year will slow down, probably not!

So we rang in the new year and I ate black eyed peas,
And nobody else would try them even though I said "PLEASE!"

It is now a new year, yes 2008,
And I'm sitting at work trying to procrastinate.

So to all of our family and friends we hold dear,
We hope you have a fun and prosperous new year!

Orlando Magic and the Hard Rock Hotel!

We are back from Orlando and we had a blast! Kaylea had a "sleepover party" at Mimi and Gada's house, and we had a "sleepover party" at the Seminole Hard Rock Hotel & Casino! Not sure how Kaylea's went (we pick her up after work today) but ours was super fun!

We got to the hotel and dropped off our luggage and then headed to the game. I have to say the Hard Rock hotel is sooo nice and its actually not as expensive as you would think. The room was awesome... And I'm just mad I didn't think to take a picture of it for the blog! But it was a nice with a big comfy down bed! :-) They give you a CD when you go there and you have a CD Player in the room. It was decked out very modern and the tub in the bathroom was so big that Eric could lay down in it with his legs and knees flat.... (but it went to waste cause there was not time to take a bath in it). When we got back to our room that night they had the bed set out all fancy like a cruise ship with two choclate guitars on our pillows! How cool is that!

So off to the game we went - Floor Seats! It was so awesome... Just flash your floor seats ticket and you get treated like royalty! The view was great and I must say now that I have seen the players up close I have a crush on a few of them! Dwight Howard and Carlos Arroyo are my two favorites. I call Arroyo - Arroz con Pollo - has a better ring to it! I got plenty of game pictures but they moved so fast I didn't know how to work my new camera well enough to keep some of them from blurring. But plenty of good pics and "Magic Dancer" pics as well. And - WE WON! Seems like every game we've been to in the past we haven't won, but we had floor seats to a winning game! It was great!

After the game we headed back to Tampa to the Hard Rock Hotel and ended up eating at their upscale version of Denny's... Not so good. I had wanted to eat at "Council of Oaks" but it is entirely too expensive and it was a bit late for that. Maybe another day. We did hit the casino for a short time, and I actually had won about $200 - which Eric said, walk away.... Lets go. And I didn't listen (which I guess is why casinos make their money) but I left at $75... I started to get the point. But it was just so surreal being there. One of our favorite TV shows is Las Vegas, and while I know we weren't there, it felt like our own little version of it. I was looking all around for Danny from Security and Eric was looking for Sam Marques the Casino host LOL. If you watch the show you will know who we are talking about.

Needless to say we had a great time, and we definitely want to stay at that hotel sometime again. Now we are both back in reality and at work today. Bah humbug!

To view all of our pictures from the trip click below!

http://picasaweb.google.com/kayleasmom/OrlandoMagicGame

Kaylea's Deep Thought of the Day

Lately Kaylea has been talking a lot about how she was once in my belly. This morning Eric called me from his cell phone to share with me what Kaylea had just asked him.

"Daddy, do you think I just jumped out of mommy's belly and started playing with toys?"

The Magical Reindeer Food Worked!

Sorry I have slacked on the blog writing! I've been working overtime at work and we have all been under the weather here in our house. Kaylea and Eric seem to be doing much better and I am on the road to recovery now that I have a Z-Pack in my system. Anyways, through it all we still managed to have a great Christmas! God has really blessed us this year and we actually will have enough money with bonuses and gifts to get our central heating & air redone! (A much long needed expense.) I can't wait because in the summer time our electric bills were $475/month for our little 890 sq. foot home! Ugh I know!

Well on Christmas Eve we took Kaylea outside and sprinkled some magical reindeer food all over our yard and driveway to help guide the reindeer to our house. (Looked more like oatmeal to me.) Then we set out cookies and milk for Santa Claus and Mrs. Claus and it was off to sleep. We all slept in believe it or not...guess that's the being sick part. Normally Kaylea wakes up at 7am on the dot but on Christmas it was 8am and we had to go wake her up! We told her she had to wake up cause Santa came and she said, "I can't believe the magical reindeer food worked!"



Santa had set up a play tent for her with a tunnel that was going down the hallway, so first thing she said was, "A TENT!!!" So she crawled through the tunnel and through the tent and then saw her big girl bed. So she ran over to her big girl bed and said, "A bed, a bed! Its just what I always wanted!" Haha! She is so sincere with everything she says its adorable! Then it becomes a blur of opening one present after another one. Unfortunately I didn't take that many pictures (I think 3?) because I was holding the video camera and Eric was doing the fun part of helping her unwrap. Mommy always gets stuck with the technical stuff like hooking up the VCR and holding the video camera! I think I need to learn how to play dumb...

After opening a bunch of presents and playing with them all, we headed down to St. Pete to spend some time with Eric's family and shared more presents. Then we met my parents back at our house later that afternoon and had more present opening then! We also shared a chocolate birthday cake we got for Baby Jesus (a new tradition we are starting this year).

Our plan was to cook Stuffed Cornish Game Hen's, but being sick and miserable we settled on picking up Chinese food for our Christmas dinner lol. But we made the Cornish hens the next night and they were yummy! So how did you spend your Christmas dinner?

(P.S. - Here are the UK slippers Eric got me for Christmas!)

Regis and Kelly's Beautiful Baby Search is On!

OK! They announced it early and I'm soooo not prepared! Every year I enter Kaylea in Regis and Kelly's Beautiful Baby Search. (Winner gets on the front of Parenting Magazine and $125K towards their college education!) We have this year and next year and then she is too old! But I think they just must not look at all the pictures because Kaylea is so beautiful how could they pass her up! Arghh! Anyways we hardly have any pictures taken that are good enough to enter! I need to take some pictures tomorrow, but this is where I ask for your help. Every year I ask people to vote on which picture they like the best. Over the next few days I will post even more pictures. So far I have three. Keep in mind they have to be candid photos and cannot be taken by a professional photographer. Take a look at the two pics below and let me know what you think. Which is your favorite? I am taking more pics over the next few days and will need your opinion on them as well... so check back cause I will be posting them on here. So which should I send? PLEASE RESPOND!

Picture #1

Picture #2

How tall will Kaylea be?

I'm taking bets now on how tall you think Kaylea will be when she is 18 years old. My guess is 6'0". Look at the picture above (you can click on it to make it big) and see how tall she is standing next to the other kids in her class. Her class is the group of kids on the very first row. She is almost a full head taller than everyone in her class (and keep in mind she is one of the youngest in her class... many of them are already 3 years old. Crazy!

Pictures from Kaylea's Musical