Amelia & Paul made the top 10!! VOTE PLEASE!

Amelia & Paul's super cute towel photo made the top 10 in the cutest multiples contest! Thanks so much to everyone who voted! Now it's time to vote again (one last time!) Voting ends May 11th so vote quick and tell your friends! We're lagging behind in the polls :)


http://multiplesandmore.blogspot.com/2009/05/cutest-multiples-photo-contest-top-ten.html

Voting is in the left hand sidebar column for those of you who had trouble finding it last time. The peanuts say thanks :)

day 76 : guest photographer

day 76: This one is courtesy of Ben... I was busy videotaping the babies with the screen pointing at them (which they found absolutely fascinating) Once again just kinda felt like going crazy with photoshop... not sure why. I think I'm bored :)

day 75 : grandma ann

day 75: Sunday afternoon Grandma Ann hopped back on a plane but not without me getting a couple of shots of her with the babies... this one is my favorite because it shows how feisty and fidgety Amelia's gotten lately. She really doesn't sit still for a second and she looks like she's making a break for it :) I also just felt like going crazy on the photoshop so here's your funky antiquey black and white for the day...

day 74 : 3 generations

day 74: This afternoon we took the babies on a walk around the grove and farmer's market in LA. It's our new favorite weekend afternoon activity to each put a baby in our ergos and walk them around a people watching place... they love being carried, the ergos are super comfortable, and they love people watching so we can walk around for hours... it's great! Here's Ben with his mom and Mr. P... 3 generations! Sorry Amelia, you don't get to be in the picture (because I was wearing you in a pouch)... next time you can be in the photo :)



ps have you voted yet? the peanuts aren't in the top 10 so far and we need more votes!! http://multiplesandmore.blogspot.com/ voting is in the left hand side column... click on the one for Amelia & Paul :)

day 73 : granpa & grandma come to town... but not as a set :)

day 73: On Friday afternoon the peanuts got visitors from two grandparents... but not a set. Grandpa Mark (aka dad to me) showed up after a business meeting and helped out with their 3 o'clock feeding and played with the babies for a while and then Grandma Ann (aka Ben's mom) showed up all the way from Kansas for the weekend. We went on a nice long walk in the afternoon before putting down the babies for bed. I didn't get pictures of any of the aforementioned grandparents with the peanuts (oops) so here's one of just Amelia being quite cute.

day 72 : craigslist

day 72: After the apartment hunting fiasco we're pretty sure we're going to stay in our current place for at least another 6 months. But as long as we're going to stay we're going to get rid of a lot of unused stuff and try to make it as uncluttered and baby friendly as possible. Which means I'm listing a lot of junk on craigslist. Like the laptop desk I used while on bedrest. Anyone want it? :)

VOTE please?! The peanuts say thanks!

The peanuts are finalists in another cutest multiples contest (I promise I'm not getting addicted, this is the last one... for now... haha) Please go an vote! Voting is on the left hand column sidebar thing... #8 Amelia & Paul (as if you didn't know)

http://multiplesandmore.blogspot.com/

Thanks!!

day 71 : the moral of the story

day 71: it's that time of year again... renew the lease on our current house or move? We've been here 3 years and it's been the same thing every year. We are kind of sort of ok with our current place. It has things that we like (we're ridiculously close to Ben's office, we're VERY settled in, it's cute(ish) ) and things we don't like (iffy plumbing, not so great dryer vent, settling foundation, broken front railing, scary floor heater, ok... a lot of things we don't like). So this afternoon we set out on an apartment hunting quest. We saw 3 different places all advertised to be around 1000 square feet. We were always under the impression (from the ad we saw when we rented our house originally) that our house was also 1000 square feet. Well stepping into each of these places you could tell IMMEDIATELY that they were not as big as our house. So much so that we couldn't imagine moving in without selling a lot of our furniture and maybe herbie (just kidding herbie, we wouldn't sell you). So when we got home we measured our own place (roughly) and decided that it is probably more like 1250 square feet. Moral of the story? 250 square feet make a very big difference. In case you don't feel like doing the math yourself that's the equivalent of a 25'x10' room... which is probably the size of our bedroom plus the babies' room put together, or our living room plus dining room, or our kitchen plus my office... you get the idea. Also, there are not many places in LA for rent at the price we pay for the size we have. So should we stay put? It's still up for debate. One thing is for sure. We are all exhausted. And we're not moving to any of the places we saw today.

day 70 : pj does pushups

day 70: Mo may be the rolling fanatic but Paul is practicing his pushups. He pretty much always straightens his arms out and lifts his head way off the ground when he's on his belly these days (probably because he can roll back to belly but then gets stuck so he has lots of time to practice). He's also drooling like a madman. Today was a pretty typical in the house kind of a day with just a walk to the store as our outing. Not exciting but a pretty nice way to spend an afternoon :)

day 69 : my new best friends

day 69: there are a lot of things wrong with the title of this post. First off these are not new shoes. They are almost 2 years old. Also they are not really my best friends. I have a lot of best friends... Ben, the babies, my siblings, my parents, my friends... ok you get it. But these shoes and I have been spending a lot of time together lately. I'm still carrying around 20 extra pounds (thanks Amelia & Paul) and I'm trying to get rid of it before Allison's wedding this summer so I've been working out every day (yay for me, I'm pretty proud). Today I not only did my daily exercise video but I went to yoga as well. Feeling pretty fit if I do say so myself :)

day 68 : 7 months old!

day 68: Today the peanuts turned 7 months old! I can't believe how big they're getting. Every day while I'm giving them a bath and toweling them off I think about how cute they are in their hooded towels and how they're going to get too big to put in them and then too big to want to be toweled off by us and well I just get sad that they're going to get big and I worry I'll forget what it was like right now.... so I decided to put them in the towels and take a few photos. This might be one of my all time favorites. Happy 7 months babies!

day 67 : daddy matchin' shirt

day 67: A while back I went shopping at a store that was going out of business and buying some clothes for the babies... I was getting stuff that was a little too big for them since we really only got small baby stuff as gifts and they're outgrowing all their clothes. When I saw this one I just absolutely had to buy it because it reminded me of a ringer tee that Ben wears all the time... and matching daddy = super cute (note to friends of Ben... no making fun of the matching shirt. It's cute. Deal with it. Also, he got a haircut Sunday just in case you were worried about that) Paul actually managed to drool this much on it in the first 5 minutes or so that we put it on but it's still cute. He's such a little man these days.



PS... on a more "what I did today" note.. since that's the other purpose of the blog.. Saturday I had a fabulous spa day thanks to Ben and his Christmas gift to me... I would post a photo but I didn't bring my camera. I just lounged and sipped tea and enjoyed a massage and felt fabulous. Thanks Ben :)

day 66 : another doctor day

day 66: The peanuts have what I've decided is an overly cautious pediatrician... which I think is better than a pediatrician that doesn't care... but they end up seeing a lot of specialists just to check out things that she is kind of sort of worried about maybe being a problem. On Friday I took Paul (and Amelia but she was just along for the ride) to the pediatric urologist. As we suspected everything is fine... but it was a long and stressful outing. Good thing Paul loves doctors. He gave him some of his finest grins :)

day 65 : more toy stealin'

day 65: I told you it was a crazy week... well I didn't do much in the way of picture taking. Thursday I actually walked with the babies to the grocery store in the afternoon but between the stroller, diaper bag, blankets and anticipated groceries for the way home I didn't think it was wise to try to bring the camera too... so I only took this one shot (well it was actually a series but anyhow) all day. More proof of Amelia's toy hogging :)

day 64 : date night!!

day 64: on Wednesday night Ben and I got to go out to dinner thanks to the help of two fabulous ladies... my mom (who stayed at home with the sleeping babies, thanks mom) and Kate (who provided us with a gift certificate to the tastiest restaurant on the planet... real food daily). We had a fantastic meal complete with vegan nachos, faux salisbury steak (I swear it's unbelievably tasty) some delicious beer, and finished off with a lemon poppy seed cake. I didn't bring my camera but did have my picture phone. Sorry for the bad snapshot.

day 63 : bumbo babies

day 63: The peanuts have not been the best nappers in the last week (another reason I've been wiped out) Instead of fighting to get them back to sleep after their morning nap on Tuesday I decided to do a baby photo shoot instead. Amelia just tried to steal all of Paul's toys. More on that subject (and more toy-hog photos) on the baby blog :)

day 62 : wow i'm behind

day 62: Wow I can't believe I'm almost a whole week behind on the blog... sorry!! This week has been a crazy doctor-full one and it's been hard to catch a second to blog. Monday we were supposed to have a woman come out to evaluate the babies to see if they are on track developmentally. It's apparently a free state sponsored thing for premature babies. Well I cleaned the house and got all ready and she never showed. Great. It's rescheduled for next week. I was wiped out at the end of the day so only took this one picture..

we interrupt this blog...

to bring you a special message. Please vote for the peanuts and help us win an awesome stroller. You can vote once per day per computer :)

http://www.babygizmo.com/vote/index.php

day 61 : auntie & uncle... awww :)

day 61: Before Kate & Jon left this afternoon we took a few super ridiculously quick pictures of them with the peanuts... this is just how they'll look a few months from now with their own family. Except there will only be one baby. And it will be smaller... but you get the idea :) Did I mention I'm ridiculously excited for the babies to have a cousin?!

day 60 : wedding! wedding!

day 60: For some reason I seem to have gotten in the habit of always posting a photo of the bride when I go shoot a wedding... oh well. I really like this one. It was quite a rockin' fiesta which went late into the night (well late for me) so I was exhausted when I got home... but look how fab the bride looked!

day 59 : kate & jon come to town!

day 59: On Friday Kate & Jon got in from Kansas City and we got to hang out with them all afternoon and evening once the babies went to bed. We had some tasty burritos and of course Kate being pregnant was a great excuse to get banana shakes as well.... mmmm. I drank quite a few of those in my pregnant days! Check out the belly... sooo cute! I can't wait to meet the new baby cousin for the peanuts!

day 58 : another baby picture

day 58: Sorry this week is a little heavy on the baby pictures. Day 1 of Amelia crib nap transition turned into day 1 of really bad night sleeping for the babies so I was pretty wiped out on Thursday and didn't actually leave the house all day (first time in a long time actually). PJ didn't mind :)

day 57 : mo loves grandma

day 57: Wednesday was day 1 of Amelia's crib nap transition. She used to nap in her swing but is getting a little big and old for that so we started making her nap in her crib. She woke up early and wouldn't go back to sleep so she got to play with grandma instead. Lucky lady :)

day 56 : we are not chickens

day 56: The babies LOVE their chicken rattle (the one featured in the chicken chuckin' Mo shot) but unfortunately they also like to throw it. Paul actually threw one half of one of them overboard while riding in the stroller and I didn't notice. So now it's gone. Today I took them to Ikea in the afternoon (secretly the best place EVER to buy baby things) and got some more rattles. The same as the chicken rattle... two pieces.... but not chickens. Meet the new rattles.

day 55 : flashback time

day 55: These pictures are kind of cheating. I didn't take them... and they certainly aren't from today. But I just got them today so I'm going to use them anyways. It's my blog so I get to make the rules :) I got emailed a few days (weeks?) ago by someone who found some old photos of us from our wedding and decided we might want to have them (um, yes please!) and we just got the disc in the mail today. I really like this first one of dad making his toast and us watching



And I think this is probably the only photo I've ever seen that's a) us at our after party (we only went very briefly) and b) a picture of me not smiling in my wedding dress. I smiled all day. I'm pretty sure I was just dead tired by this point. And that's a water I'm drinking in case you're wondering :) I think the most I had to drink all day was our champagne toast.

day 54 : happy easter!

day 54: Today was Easter. We spent the day with family in Encinitas and of course I took a couple of photos of the babies in their ridiculously cute get ups... here's one of my favorites :)

day 53 : date night!!

day 53: On Saturday night Ben and I cashed in our Christmas present from Chris Tara Allison and Mark, which was a date night where they were babysitters and we got the whole evening free. It was the first ever night that someone other than us put the babies down for bed (we left about 45 minutes before they went to sleep) and it was a pretty huge step for us! We had dinner, saw a movie (a big deal for us since the last movie we saw was LAST SUMMER!!) and got ice cream. Yum! I didn't bring my camera so here are a few ridiculously low quality camera phone snaps :) Thanks for the date night guys (and thanks mom for helping with the babysitting!)

day 52 : a weekend at home

day 52: On Friday we drove down to Encinitas to spend Easter weekend with family. Friday night after the babies went to bed we all played some wii fit. My wii fit age is something ridiculous like 45. Yes. I am out of shape. I promise I'm working on it... anyways here's a picture... Tara was quite good at the zen game :)

day 51 : big paul comes to town

day 51: On Wednesday evening "big Paul" aka Ben's old high school friend and the original PJ came to visit and stayed with us at our place. It was really fun to hang out and catch up... and we even spent Thursday evening playing scrabble which was very olden days of us (we used to play games together a lot). I was doing ok at the beginning but ended up coming in last place. Which is probably why I don't like scrabble. It's too bad that boggle is not a baby sleep friendly game :(

day 50 : paul hates avocado

day 50: We thought that Paul liked avocado. It was one of his first foods and he gobbled it up when we fed it to him a few months ago. Today however we tried to feed it to him again and he hated it. He made a horrified and disgusted face every time it hit his tongue. We decided to feed him sweet potato instead. How a son of mine ended up hating avocado I'll never know. Maybe it wasn't ripe. We'll have to try again sometime soon.

day 49 : so fit

day 49: Allison and Mark have a wii fit... I played it this weekend and really wanted one. I just happened to have lots of gift certificates so we got one FREE...woohoo! Unfortunately the wii fit thinks I'm overweight. But we're working on it :)

day 48 : all caught up (phew)

day 48: I stayed in Encinitas one extra day (Ben went back to LA) so that I could have breakfast on Monday morning with some of my favorite girls. Bridget was in town from New Zealand for her sister's wedding and it's not often that we're all in town at once so we thought we'd better take advantage of the situation :) It was an extra happy get together since Valena and John found out that Olive is supposed to be coming home on Wednesday. Hooray!

day 47 : cute babies

day 47: Some super cute baby-tures. I took the first one (he's wearing the bib because he's about to eat lunch) and Ben took the second. How cute is it?!

day 46 : oh so fabulous

day 46: Erin & Darrin's wedding was fabulous! More pictures on my other blog. You will love them. I promise.

day 45 : more album goodness

day 45: Friday Ben took a half day and we finished packing up and headed out of town for the weekend. Even in the baby packing madness I managed to take a few more photos of my sample albums for the blog.

day 44 : yipes... so behind!

day 44: Sorry for the slow-down. I didn't realize it'd been so long since I posted. I have been keeping up with the photo taking but behind on the blogging. I was in San Diego for the weekend for Erin's wedding and I guess I forgot to post :) Thursday night was super stress packing night trying to make sure I didn't forget anything... we also had some deeee-lish pizza since our house is totally without food in the pantry these days. Note to self: go to grocery store!

day 43 : how cute is this mo?

day 43: Today was actually pretty action-packed. My mom came to visit and we took Herbie to get his nails cut (yes, dog manicure, go ahead and laugh) and went to Target to get the peanuts some new jammies since they outgrew all of their old ones. I did throw my camera in the car hoping to be able to take some pictures while we were out but between wrangling the stroller, diaper bag AND Herbie it just wasn't in the cards. Lucky for me Amelia was looking extra cute when we got home AND hamming it up for the camera. Maybe she figured out what it was for after all.

day 42 : so you ARE reading?

day 42: After such a ridiculously long time of not posting I was pretty sure that no one was reading this blog anymore and I was just kind of writing it for myself. One post of Ben carrying a Starbucks cup and pushing a stroller and all the sudden I have comments :) I should post those pictures more often. This one isn't very interesting. Except for the fact that seeing it made me realize why the babies don't smile for my camera. It covers my entire face. They probably think their mom was eaten by a big black monster. Hmn. I need to work on a solution for that problem.

day 41 : the monitor

day 41 : Yesterday was Ben's birthday, but it wasn't very much fun. Paul is still sick and at his morning doctor's appointment she decided he needed a bunch of tests done so we spent the whole afternoon shuttling him to different lab/doctor places. When it was time to put them to bed Paul didn't want to sleep. When we finally did get them down I was sitting and staring at the monitor and realizing that I have a love/hate relationship with it. I like that I can leave the room and bring it and know that the babies are safe and I will be able to help them if they are hurt or scared. But I hate that we can't even have a birthday dinner without the constant wooshing sound of their white noise machine filtering through the speaker. We never really get to stop and sit back and enjoy the evening because the monitor is that constant nagging reminder in the background... the babies might wake up. I will be very happy when they are old enough that we don't need it anymore.

day 40 : stroller pushin' dad

day 40: Sunday was a pretty laid back day. We did our usual thing around the house and I got a bit of work done... in the afternoon we went on a long long walk with the babies in the BOB. Until Paul decided he was done with the walk and insisted (by crying) that he be carried the rest of the way home. We traded off but still ended up with sore arms and backs. That baby is getting big!

day 39 : happy early birthday!

day 39: Monday is Ben's birthday and we were invited to a potluck (unrelated to the birthday) today so I decided that as our contribution to the meal I'd bake a cake. It's been a VERY long time since I baked a cake and it was fun to revisit my old hobby. It was even more delicious than I remember although I'm glad it was... because it took me pretty much the entire day to make it :) The poorly piped lemon on top is to show that it was a lemon cake. Mmmm lemon buttercream :)

day 38 : babies love their veggies

day 38: These were too cute to pass up... even though I just posted a baby photo. The babies each decided to spend the afternoon chewing on stuffed baby toy vegetables. Yum.

day 37 : 6 months old

day 37: my two favorite babies turned 6 months old today. I may have a slight bias but I'm pretty sure they have the cutest faces I've ever seen. Happy half birthday peanuts!

day 36 : dryer scare

day 36: We've always had problems with our dryer. It is very very poorly vented (from where it connects to the house to the outside) and it's not our fault... it's an old house and it probably needs to be redone. We had our landlord try to get the vent cleared out a few weeks ago because our laundry was taking AGES to dry. Well it seemed to be better but this morning I threw in a load to the dryer and noticed a funny smell. I turned off the dryer and unplugged it and tried to air out the room. We had a repair guy come out today and there was BURNT LINT in the inside of the dryer. There was so much stuff stuck in there that it started burning. YIKES!! Talk about scary! So we paid him to clear it all out and he recommended that we talk to our landlord again so we can get it actually taken care of. Um... yes. Will do. Immediately. Good thing I noticed the funky smell... and thank goodness for same day dryer repair people. We wouldn't survive a single day without being able to do baby laundry :)

day 35 : chicken chuckin' mo

day 35: Today was sort of like most days. Lots of being in the house. A little more fussiness than usual thanks to what might be Paul being sick (he's running a temperature but with little else in the way of symptoms) and a few new tricks from the babies. Today's new trick from Amelia? Throwing toys. Check out baby-rific for the whole story

day 34 : hair zoo

day 34: Because I didn't take any photos earlier today and I think Ben and I were both a little loopy from lack of sleep (the babies are slightly sick and so not sleeping well) I present to you: Hair Zoo. The sun rises over bouncy seat zebra in the Ben hair savanna.

day 33 : sad to see it go...

day 33: I do so love the 24 1.4 and I am sad to have to return it tomorrow... but I only had it for the weekend. Sigh. Maybe soon I can buy one. If anyone is looking for a ridiculously expensive birthday present idea for me (that maybe you want to give me a few months early) I won't object... hehe... Today was sort of back to business as usual after Ben's big day (and night) of being super-dad and watching the babies on his own. I was too tired after the wedding yesterday to drive all the way back to LA so he spent the night with them solo and was even in great spirits when I came home this morning. What a pro! I am so glad that the peanuts have such an amazing daddy (and I have a pretty swell hubby myself!)

day 32 : wedding! wedding!

day 32: Yesterday was my first wedding of the season (woohoo!) and I was so excited to not only get to shoot a wedding (which I love) but to also get to shoot it with some ridiculously awesome lenses. Check out this shot with the 50 1.2. Pretty much the only thing in focus is ONE of her eyes, the depth of field is that shallow. I really shouldn't rent things I can't afford because now I want both of them :)