Gonna miss it

Our last week of living in Camarillo has sadly come to an end. As anxious as I am to have our own place again, I wish we could have stayed and played a little bit longer.

This week we went to the beach, hung out with Corinne and Morgan, played with their pet snake (which the girls completely loved- pics will be posted later), went to the zoo, hung out in Santa Barbara, and enjoyed a huge breakfast this morning out in the gazebo.

Man I'm gonna miss it here. All of it- the beach, the sand, the palm trees, the perfect weather, great Mexican food, and both sets of grandparents close by.

Madi got to go to work with Boppi on Thursday. She felt like such a big girl!

And Elle's been busy practicing her "surfer" moves!!

As hard as it is to leave California, we're super excited for the fun and adventure that lies in store for us. I can hardly wait to find a place to live, get settled, and see all our friends again! But before all that can happen, we've got 14 days of fun ahead of us! We set off tomorrow morning on our cross country road trip! It's my first one ever, so I'm actually pretty excited. Well, I'm mostly just excited about all the friends and family we get to see and stay with along the way! I'll be updating from the road (so not to get too behind in my blogging)- so check back later to hear of our travel adventures! Ta ta for now.

News of the day

We're moving back to DC!!! It all happened really fast. The firm Spencer worked for in DC, Hausfeld LLP, called with an offer this morning!!

We're super excited about it. We love the DC area and are looking forward to returning to our nation's capitol. But with good news there's always bound to be some disappointment. We're very (very) sad about leaving California. I'd pretty much had it set in my mind that we'd get a job out here, live near family, close to the beach, and be able to enjoy beautiful weather year round. I guess those dreams will have to be put on hold for awhile.

So, now our relaxing week has been put on fast forward. We've only got a couple weeks before Spencer has to be back in the office. Our TX trip is going to have to be moved up (hoping to leave Sunday morning now) and turned into a cross-country trip (adding an additional stop off in Kansas). And then of course, looking into housing. Yikes! So much to think about and do- places to visit, friends to see, and a house to look for, find, and move into- all in just a couple weeks. Our goal is to be moved in to our new place by Sept 14th! That's 3 weeks from today. Wow! I didn't realize it would happen all this fast. Wish us luck!

Real life

This week was a more normal one- more like "real life" and not "vacation with Daddy". I prefer the later. Ya, I want Spencer to find a job and of course I want a place to move our stuff to and call home, but I do miss our afternoons spent at the beach and outings all together. Instead, Spencer applied to jobs all week. My instructions (given by Spencer) were to pretend like he's at work. So that's what I did (or at least tried to do). It's a little hard when he's sitting right there at the dining room table for all to see. Instead of beach trips I got a smog check, visited the DMV, and made 2 trips to the library. We did buy year passes to the Santa Barbara Zoo though- it was our one outing for the week. Sweet deal though- it'll have paid itself off by our next visit.

It was Elle's very first zoo experience. She loved every bit of it!

The Scarlet Macaws (behind us) were a favorite.

Something about having season passes to a local zoo makes me feel more settled, like we might me here for awhile. Spencer did apply to a firm in Santa Barbara as well as several in the Ventura and LA area. I'm really trying to stay patient, but dang it's hard. I just want to know when and where- then I can be patient. It's the not knowing that kills me!

It's always good to have things to look forward to, so here's my most recent list:

1) Corinne and Morgan's visit (this whole next week).

2) Sample Sale in LA on Friday (I know you're so jealous Tisha)!

3) Trip to Texas (Sept 1st)!!!

Oh, and Spencer and I managed to sneak away tonight to climb the "giant sand dune" and watch the sun set. It was gorgeous- a great way to end a rather uneventful week.

Rollers

Madi and I were out and about yesterday (at Target to be exact) when we came across pink foam rollers- the ones I grew up wearing to bed almost every Saturday night as a kid. I've been wanting some for awhile now, so I was thrilled with my find. I bought em and told Madi she could try them out sometime. It was right around bedtime when Madi started begging for me to put the curlers in her hair. After a quick bath and hair wash, in they went. I was totally shocked about Madi's excitement towards something like this. She's not one to volunteer to get her hair done- let alone wrapped in foam rollers, but dang was she excited!!

Maybe it's the fact that the rollers are pink, but it's probably because at Target I told her all about how I used to wear them as a kid. It's amazing what Madi will do to be just like her mama!! Love it!

Back view- they stayed in super well, even with all the playing and trampoline jumping Madi did afterwards.

While Madi jumped on the tramp,I stuck Elle in the bath and then decided to try out the rollers on her too.

Success!

Amazing- both girls with no hesitation towards putting them in, keeping them in, and sleeping with them in!

Then for the best part . . . the next morning!!

Unfortunately, all of Elle's rollers fell out during the night- so nothing special with her hair, but Madi's sure turned out great! It was super curly and of course I had NO clue what to do with it. So I grabbed a flower clip and stuck it in her hair.

Her hair relaxed throughout the day and by bedtime I was totally loving it!

So basically, I couldn't be happier about my purchase. I now have the solution for what to do with my girls hair when I don't know what to do!

Just Playin

Today's our 12th day in Camarillo. Crazy! It really feels like we just got here. Probably cause we've kept ourselves pretty busy- with trips to the beach (5 so far), kayaking, canoeing in the Channel Islands Harbor, the Ventura County Fair, swimming, regular library visits (the Camarillo public library is the best), hanging out with friends, dinners in the gazebo, and backyard bonfires.

It's been super fun just playing all day everyday together as a family. As much as I'm dying to see our "stuff", and get settled in a new home and new area, I realize that times like this might not happen again- at least for awhile. So instead of stressing out over the uncertainty of when Spencer is going to find work, where we are going to live, and when we are going to get all of our stuff back, I've decided I need to relax and just enjoy every minute of the "not knowing". We couldn't have asked for a more perfect time to be in the situation that we are. So here's to living the life- free of obligations and full of family, fun, and freedom!!

Elle would have followed this seagull straight into the water if I had let her.

Love LOvE LOVE!!

I love that Madi loves playing school! Truly a daughter after her mother's heart! She likes for me to be the teacher and for her to "ring" the "bell" signaling a change of class. But even more, I love that on our "days off" Madi wants to be the teacher and play school with her babies (well, Elle's baby in this case). And I love how when she plays she gets totally lost in her own little world.

She's having reading time in this video- it's a little long, the first 40 seconds are my favorite. I just couldn't bring myself to cut the rest of it!

As for Elle, I LOVE how hard she makes me laugh every. single. day.

Cousins

Even though this is so last week, an update of our final week in Brentwood needed to be documented- mostly because of it's complete craziness. Tisha and her three kids got into town on Sat, July 24th. As excited as we were about having cousins to play with, reality set in fast. . . five kids, 4 and under, is a LOT of work and a LOT of drama (especially with 2 of them being 3 year old girls)!

Trying to get a pic of all five kids happy, smiling, and looking wasn't the easiest task!

Watching Madi and Ani during our 10 days of togetherness gave me flashbacks of childhood days with my "favorite" cousin Eliza. We were the exact same ages as Ani and Madi (almost exact same birthdays even). I longed for our trips to Portland, OR and/or their trips to Goldendale, WA- just to hang out with Liza. My fondest childhood memories have her in them. But as much as we loved being together, boy did we fight a lot. I'd get angry when she played with Tisha, I'd get annoyed when all the parents thought she was such a "perfect child", and I'd get especially jealous when she wanted to hold my baby brother or sister. I vividly remember yelling at Liza, informing her that she wasn't supposed to touch Bobby because he was MY brother! Of course these memories now make me laugh and realize what a silly little girl I was. Liza went on to be my roommate in college and one of my closest friends. I just say all this to remind myself that Ani and Madi too are going to grow up being the bestest of cousins- even if we did have to break up some type of fight and/or argument every single day!

A sample argument- just cause it always made me laugh:

Ani: "Call me Anzzy."

Madi: "Hi Anzzy"

Ani: "Don't call me Anzzy!!"

Madi: "Hi Anzzy" (starting to laugh)

Ani: "DON'T call me Anzzy!"

Madi: "Ok Anzzy" (now thinking this was the funniest thing ever)

Ani: (seriously ticked) "DON'T CALL ME ANZZY!!!!!"

Along with the teasing, they were also into poking, touching (and then yelling, "STOP touching me), pushing, tattling about the pushing, not sharing, etc. etc. But then the most amusing part about all of it was that if they weren't sitting next to get other, they'd whine until they did get to sit together.

All in all, it was a fun week. Even though the noise was sometimes too much for me to bear, with messes that seriously stressed me out, and constantly worrying that my parents were about to loose their minds, such great memories were made and I'm now confident that we have a good collection of stories for our kids to look back on and laugh at when they get older.

Update

It's hard finding the time (and motivation) to blog now that Spencer's done with the bar and in vacation mode. It's been quite the treat hanging out as a family all day every day. He finished last Thursday and we had quite the celebration weekend- we went to the movies (saw Inception), went shopping, took the girls on a couple different outings, and had a big celebration dinner (thanks mom)! Then on Tuesday morning, Spencer flew out to UT, picked up our car (that had been driven across the country by our brother-in-laws parents), and then drove the 10 1/2 hours back to Brentwood, arriving at 9:30 p.m. Long day!! The next morning we got up, crammed all our stuff into our car (felt like moving all over again), and headed over to Half Moon Bay to see GG and then continued on South to Camarillo.

We're now living it up in Camarillo- LOVING the weather (don't think there's a better climate than here), LOVING having the beach so close, and LOVING our newest discovery of a Cafe Rio just a 10 minute drive away (hit it up for lunch yesterday)!

I haven't taken a whole lot of pictures, but I love the pure joy on Madi's face in this one.

Nothing beats 70 degree summer weather, walks on the pier, and parks at the beach!

More coming about our last week in Brentwood . . . .