FLINSTONE'S CHEWABLE VALIUM ANYONE?

I have to confess. . .lately my two youngest are driving me (and the entire household) CRAZY!! They have no sense of "when to quit"! It doesn't help that Parker is a reactor and Chandler is the world's best button pusher. Bedtime does not seem to come soon enough for the two of them. They fight non stop (playing and/or the real deal) they both have more endurance than I have patience. Sadly, if they came with an owners manual I lost it, and right now I REALLY need it! Is this a phase? Am I a bad parent? Does anyone else feel like this? Solutions? The hopeful thing is that I had a darling lady approach me at church RAVING about how charming Parker was at the senior dinner he helped host. She went so far as to say she wanted to adopt him!! Hmmmm....

Sun Found!!!

Yes, believe it or not the sun has been found here in Northern Cal. And I am not talking about these smile inducing yellow shoes that Nordstrom's so kindly shipped to my home after my Dallas shopping trip. The true sun and has coaxed out blossoms everywhere! We found it today after traveling through heavy fog to San Francisco to watch Hannah win a race in on Lake Merced! She did a fabulous job and was excited to win! The PERFECT sunny day for a fun competition! After the race we hit up Subway and it happened to be by the beach, so what could we do but take our lunch and enjoy sun, sand and crashing waves? AHHH! Of course the boys could not help themselves from jumping in the Pacific and were both soaking wet and sandy by the time we called it a day (of course this was not planned so no change of clothes for 2 very dirty boys traveling home!)

This is my smiling and sunburned face post beautiful day!

Long time no blog. . .

Shawn the cookie maker, multi tasking here as he is so very good at it and the only one in the family who has the patience to deal with sugar cookies! YUM!

Martha Stewart has nothing on my man!! (OK, maybe a lot more money, but he is generally much more genuine and down to earth than Martha!)

I spent a DELIGHTFUL long weekend visiting my childhood friend Amy in Dallas. I can see why she loves it, the people are truly friendly and nice, the shopping fabulous (she had to mail packages home, we did an obscene amount of shopping!) She is terrible, as we were shopping she would say "Do not leave this store without buying _______!" The devils advocate she is!

I got the grand tour of Dallas and Fort Worth, including watching the longhorns parade down the street at the historic stock yards. Of course I did not even think to bring a camera, sorry me! I did not have time for pictures anyway, as we were too busy eating, laughing, shopping, catching up and planning our next girlfriends get away! I highly recommend it, it does the soul good!!

A delightful surprise for Christmas from Shawn was a weekend WITHOUT children in Marin county. We stayed and a charming Bed and Breakfast in San Rafael. We really enjoyed scenic drives to the coast and exploring Point Reyes without children fighting, whining or asking if we were there yet! A perfectly pleasant weekend get away!