Seven Dreamy Years

I simply cannot believe that Nate and I have been married for seven years! That sounds so long! I have lately been reflecting on the past seven years because we are sort of in limbo right now as we wait for our house (that's right- OUR HOUSE!) to go through escrow. We are living with Nate's parents until then, and it's been great! I knew it would be fine, but I have to say that I have enjoyed my time here more than any previous visit. It used to be a bit draining to just blow through town for special events or holidays. In this time of uncertainty while we crash on Tia Lina's old bed, it leads me to reflect on the many interesting/crazy places Nate and I have slept over the last 7+ years together. We had fun recounting them together during our anniversary date last night:

*At Knapp's Castle, Santa Barbara 2001 - on the ground in sleeping bags. This was the weekend of our friends Dave and Liza's wedding, and the first weekend we talked about getting married and about how we'd love to live in Santa Barbara. Done and done!

*In the dingiest hostel in Ireland, 2001. It was my first hostel experience, and I don't think I've seen one as bad as this since. The communal bathrooms were nasty. But this was 2 days before we got engaged, so it sticks out in my mind.

*At a park in Pamplona, Spain - for the bull fights and running of the bulls. We awoke to a guy with a knife trying to cut into Nate's backpack which he had wrapped around his legs while we slept. Nate made the brave/stupid move to chase the guy for several blocks, catch him and then talk it out.....maybe hug it out...I don't know, I was alone in the park in the dark.....great memory.

*On the beach in San Sebastian, Spain. Do you see a theme here? After the Pamplona debacle, we were a little more on edge this time. We often took night trains and buses which landed us in new cities in the wee hours of the morning ,where we'd try to find a safe place outdoors to crash for a few more hours.

*Then there was the infamous middle of the night bus ride in Bolivia where we TRIED to sleep while sitting in the very last row in the bus crammed with way too many people, on a trip that was supposed to be 5 hours and ended up being 11 because the driver kept pulling over and blowing up one of the tires with a bike pump (and we were pretty sure he was drinking). Somewhere going over the Andes in the snow, he swerved and the bus fell over (on the mountain side, thank God.) We all managed to heave it back to an upright position with a rope. Gotta love South America.

*In the back of our Jetta wagon in Cambria - when I was 6 months pregnant. We knew that this would probably be the last time we could just crash anywhere since kids change everything. We parked right up against the beach. It was beautiful to wake up to waves crashing loudly. We brushed our teeth while walking through tide pools.

*I'm happy to say that the craziest place we've slept now that we are a family of four is on red eye flight from Hawaii.. This one isn't that crazy, but it's not a piece of cake either. We're doing another one in a couple of weeks to Ohio for Dominic's wedding. I can't wait for that plane trip! (oozing with sarcasm).

Here's to many more years of sleeping in crazy places, or like our current situation - not much sleep at all! Happy Anniversary Nato! I love you to pieces.

A Very Merry Un-birthday to Finn!

July 9th is Finn's half-birthday! He is 3 1/2 now.

No, we don't really celebrate half birthdays in our family, but I thought I'd take this opportunity to talk about Finn and all his Finnisms. I do a monthly update about Selahbob because she changes right before our very eyes, but Finn's been changing too - he's so complex now it's sort of hard to know where to start....

*Finn sings ALL THE TIME. I love it. We have whole conversations in singing voices.
*Sometimes he just calls me from whatever room he's in to come over there and "get cozy" with him. It's hard to say no.
*He is always pretending to be a different animal or creature. Today he was a hermit slug. (a cross between a hermet crab and a slug I guess.) He also appoints the rest of the family to be creatures - depending on the type of creature he was channeling. When Finn's a hairy tarantula, then Nate's a daddy long legs, I'm a brown recluse and Selah's a tick. He switches animals on us quickly though. I can always tell which animal he is by how he greets me...."Good morning Mama banana slug."
*He still "plays mass" regularly and now correctly recites several parts of it. He truly does have a strong attraction to all things related to churches. If he sees a church he wants to know all about it. What is it called? Does it have a cross? Is it a "Catholic church, an Orthodox church, an Episcopal church or a Norman church?"
*His other great passion is gardening. I swear he's going to be a monk.


*He has unusually good rhythm for a 3 year old, in my non biased opinion. ;-)
*On the 5th of July, Finn asked me "so is today America's un-birthday now?" So cute.
*When he sees any man wearing a dark suit on television he asks "Is he a president?" "Are they presidents?"
*He loves to rhyme. Most of the time he rhymes real words with made up words.
"smarmage truck....garbage truck!"
*His fear of the water is getting better. We go swimming every other day or so now and is happy as a hermit-slug just frolicking on the steps.
*He still loves trains. We just bought a year pass to the train museum here, and Finn doesn't know what to do with himself!

I caved in and got Finn a Papa Tom haircut. He did a great job.

Selah's Big Day!

Selah turned one on June 30th. I've been meaning to post about it, but life has been a bit hectic this week, and then I got the flu. :-(

So without further adieu, here's our Selahbob at one year old...


Lately Selah's been exploding with personality.


She's talking all the time now.....in her own awesome language.


And she's getting toothy!


When we moved up here Selah could walk 5 or 6 steps at a time, and crawled whenever she really wanted to get somewhere fast. Then a couple of weeks ago, she gave up nursing and sleeping for one day (not fun) and just spent the whole day practicing her walk - determined to master the skill. She did, in that one day. Now she's cruisin' everywhere on foot and walks like a drunken sailor most of the time.


She still has plenty of falls.


For Selah's party, we had fun little pool party with family and a few friends. Selah got to do the traditional dive into her own little cupcake. She promptly devoured it.