BFF

Yes, that's right. Shelby and I will be best friends forever! It was so fun to have her out here for a short visit. I love being able to say that I have had the same best friend since I was a baby. I cannot believe we have been friends for 26 years! The coolest part is that no matter how long it has been between visits/calls/online chats, we can pick up our conversation like it's been only a day or two.
We had a lot of fun while she was here. She came last Sunday night for dinner. On Monday she and I did an excellent workout video that Shelby brought. My buns are still sore. Sorry, no pictures of that event!
That night we went for a short visit to the beach just as the sun was setting. That was a beautiful site! Shelby even got to touch one of the dead jellyfish we find on the beach every so often. Connor was absolutely in love with Shelby and wanted to hold her hand everywhere we went.
The only way we could get the boys to leave the beach was to tell them we were getting pizza on the way home. This is Bradley's "excited about pizza" picture.
This is one of Shelby and Halley just before bedtime. Shelby had fun changing Halley's diaper and getting her jammies on. Shelby is going to be such a good mommy!

San Francisco

Shelby flew out of Oakland on Tuesday afternoon so we decided to take a little trip over to San Francisco to see a couple sites.
First we decided to go see the Golden Gate Bridge. It was quite a sight. Shelby kept mentioning how it brought back all sorts of memories of watching Full House back in the day. We were trying to remember the theme song, "Everywhere you look, there's a heart . . . a hand to hold on to . . ." That was fun.This is the boys and Shelby in the van just as we drove onto the bridge. The boys didn't understand why it wasn't golden. Ha ha ha . . .
We parked on the other side and decided to venture out on the bridge. I didn't realize it would be SO loud and windy. This is how Halley felt about it. She was so good though.We all had fun looking down from the top of the bridge and out over the ocean towards San Francisco. That little island out in the middle is Alcatraz. I think we'll venture out that way next time we go up north.
After the bridge we drove around San Francisco trying to find a family friendly restaurant where we could eat lunch. We found a cool little place, and they even had a high chair. The boys had pancakes, and us adults enjoyed delicious burgers and sandwiches. It was really fun! Halley enjoyed her baby food too.
After lunch we wove our way through the crazy streets of San Francisco and finally found China Town. I think we probably could have spent hours there, but we didn't have much time left. It is such a crazy place with hundreds of little shops and restaurants and so many different kinds of people. There was a little park right in the middle of everything, and of course, the boys had to go play on it. I didn't get any good pictures of the boys playing on it, but it's in the background of this picture of Halley and me. There were tons of people around that area.
We also stopped and bought a couple souvenirs before we were on our way. Here's another picture of Connor holding tight to Shelby's hand!
I always have a hard time when our visitors leave, and this time was no exception. I am just so glad that Shelby was willing to take the trip out and got to spend some time with the fam and me. It was fun to be able to sit around and talk and catch up on everything. I love Shelby so much, and she always helps me to feel better about everything! HOORAY FOR BEST FRIENDS!!! I LOVE YOU SHELBY!

Excuse my Experiments!

My friend told me how all of you make your blogs so cute, and I am attempting to try out some new stuff. So, you may see my blog changing a bit in the next few weeks or so. Just bear with me, and hey, if you see anything you like or absolutely hate, let me know. I am new at this whole fancy blogging stuff!
Look for pictures of my best friend Shelby's visit coming up soon! I have to sort through and pick and choose which ones to use.

The Big 30

Yes, it's true, my husband is officially old. Ha ha ha . . . just kidding. He did turn 30 last Saturday though. Can you tell he's excited? My mom told him before she left that he has to tell everyone from now on that he is 29. So, in a few years, we'll both be 29 - forever! Awesome!
We kept Wes' birthday pretty low key. We're trying to save money, and Wes just wanted to relax with the fam. We did get a bunch of good pictures though - mostly of Wes - which is as it should be, of course!
So, this is a post for my handsome and wonderful 29 year old husband!

Breakfast candles!
Gifts from the boys - blue and green - their favorite colors.
Gifts from Wes' wonderful parents. They sent some cool party stuff, some fun toys, Wes' favorite gum and one of those one size fits all checks! :)

This is Wes in his new birthday shirt (regular $50 , I got it for $6 at Kohl's, yay me!) and Halley in her new onesie that she got for Daddy's birthday.
And the grand finale - he huffed and he puffed and . . . he blew out two candles!
Happy Birthday my love!

A Saturday Swim

While my mom was here visiting we decided to visit the pool that is available to military families. It is actually a really cool setup. There's a little kiddie pool that has gates you can lock so the kids can't go to the other pool. They are both indoors and pretty warm too.All three of the kids loved it. Halley was totally calm and enjoyed every minute of it. She especially enjoyed getting kisses from her wet and crazy brothers and getting warm in the shower with my mom afterwards. She loves Grandma!Connor was as crazy as ever and spent most of his time with Wes in the bigger and colder pool swimming all over the place.
Bradley was more comfortable in the small pool. He did surprise us though. He decided he wanted to swim with his face under water, and he did it back and forth across that little pool quite a few times. He was so brave! I know it took me a long time to be comfortable with my face under the water.
This last picture is from the same day and is just so dang cute I had to post it. My sister-in-law, Kira, always makes fun of my other sisters and me because we do this head tilt thing for almost every picture. Apparently it's genetic because Halley does it too. :) Ha ha ha . . .

Bradley's Got the Moves

Wes' parents sent him some fun little toys for his birthday. One of them is this toy saxophone that the boys can't get enough of. They love to play it and dance. Bradley is so funny because he totally gets into it. We call his little bum wiggle, "The Waggle." It is so funny in person, but this is a pretty good video. Don't you love his outfit?

Halloween Fun

I finally sat down to look at all the pictures from my family's visit and Halloween and Wes' birthday last night. Let's see . . . I have about 30 pictures I want to post! Ha ha ha . . . I will yet again start with these Halloween ones and see how it goes.
Halloween was a fun day for us. We got to go to a little party at Bradley's preschool. Here is a picture of him with some of his other super hero friends. His friend, Diana, decided there needed to be a feminine presence in the picture. :)
That night we kind of waited around to see if anyone would trick-or-treat around our neighborhood, but no one came.
So, we drove over to the new houses and found hundreds of little kids out getting candy. Don't ask me why everyone was in that neighborhood. I guess maybe people felt safer. Or maybe it's because the houses are closer together. Who knows! At any rate, the boys had fun and were so good. Every house they would say, "Trick-or-treat," and then after getting the candy, "Thank you, Happy Halloween." It was cute.
Superman got a little scared at one of the houses. This is him trying to recover. You can see that Halley was a little surprised too! I think it was the strobe light. Those scare me a little too. We didn't actually dress Halley up because I was too lazy, but she fit perfectly in a Halloween outfit my mother-in-law got at a second hand store for Bradley when he was a baby.
Here's a cute video of Halley's newest form of communication. She started this while my mom was still here, and in this video she actually sounds a little more feminine than usual. Most of the time when she does it she sounds like she's trying to growl just like the boys do.