Lucky To Be In-Love With My Best-Friend

Jake find a computer with internet and watch this video. How do you and I end up in countless opposite situations? Me on one side of the country celebrating life, you at home grieving death, me on one side of the world playing hard, you on the opposite of the world working hard...I was driving today and this song came on and I just smiled and thought of you. Lyrics are below. You know Jason Mraz isn't my favorite, but this song just captures how I feel for you! Enjoy my love.

Do you hear me,
I'm talking to you
Across the water across the deep blue ocean
Under the open sky, oh my, baby I'm trying
Boy I hear you in my dreams
I feel your whisper across the sea
I keep you with me in my heart
You make it easier when life gets hard

I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
Ooohh ooooh oooh oooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

They don't know how long it takes
Waiting for a love like this
Every time we say goodbye
I wish we had one more kiss
I'll wait for you I promise you, I will

I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
Lucky we're in love in every way
Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed
Lucky to be coming home someday

And so I'm sailing through the sea
To an island where we'll meet
You'll hear the music fill the air
I'll put a flower in your hair
Though the breezes through trees
Move so pretty you're all I see
As the world keeps spinning round
You hold me right here right now

I'm lucky I'm in love with my best friend
Lucky to have been where I have been
Lucky to be coming home again
I'm lucky we're in love in every way
Lucky to have stayed where we have stayed
Lucky to be coming home someday

Ooohh ooooh oooh oooh ooh ooh ooh ooh
Ooooh ooooh oooh oooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

Day 3: Tide Pools, In N' Out and More

Today Sam for the most part spent his day crying, thinking about crying or trying to cry. Yep it was just one of those days which is why you will find there are basically no pictures of him. BUT beyond a sad boy, the highlights included heading to the tide pools and ocean preserve and exploring all the natural sea life. I love tide pools for the very fact that it is a very "hands on" experience. We found some sea cucumber type things that the kids loved touching squishing, little villages of crabs inside seashells, brightly colored starfish that Jack was convinced were octopus and more. Then above in the sky you would have thought there was a winged migration going on because droves of pelicans that kept making their way north. Just when I thought there couldn't be more, there would be dozens upon dozens. At the end of the day we had some shadow fun.
The kids also experience In N' Out for the first time. Forgot my camera for that one but just imagine the biggest burgers and fries coupled with hungry bellies and big smiles. Always good food and a great time.







From left to right: Syd, Addie, Krissie, Avery

Jack's Big Muscles

Sun Baked and Southern Fried--Day 2 Cont.

For dinner we had indulged ourselves in a Southern Shrimp Boil. You cook up corn, shrimp, red potatoes, onion, in a southern spice mix. When it's all ready to go you simply pour the food on the plastic and paper lined table and eat with your hands. For the clean up just wrap up the paper and throw away.




Can you believe how cute this little girl is?




So much beaching going on that come days end we had plenty of sun kissed and tired faces.

Beach House: Day 2

This is the look of a boy who is so beyond "done"--

Sam and his cousin Coopie Joe Joe enjoying a little swim with Addy on the watch


Cheeeeeeze!

I should be taking pictures of all of our cleaning, meal making, child corralling but that wouldn't be much fun now would it. I had no idea this is what the "adults" did when I was a kid on vacations. Do you think the kids would switch all of us adults places?

Rub a Dub Dub

Sam took a little dip in the baby pool at the beach house . After he splashed for a while, he got really focused on trying to get the plug from the bottom of the pool. He definitely has his Dad's intensity :)

(Aren't little bums the best?)

Easter

We had a really great Easter and true to Hodson style making is memorable and exciting by throwing in a trip to the ER. Sam looked so sharp in his little Easter outfit.


Made these little Easter Bunnies for Sam, Cooper and Elsie. It was actually a fun little project that ended up consuming ALL of my time for 3 straight days. I still have 2 more bunnies to make for Peter and Claire.

Six Months and SAMtastic!

He's gone and done it. Sam has officially made the six month mark and he did it with style and flare. Last night knowing it was his 6 month birthday he knew he could cry if he wanted to (it's his birthday) and boy did he ever. BUT he knew he had a trick up his sleeve and was just trying to throw us off because he didn't wake up until 8am this morning! With such a great way to start six months, I'll share some other 6 month majors:

@ He's starting to become a true Hodson and is moving into the small catagory: Weight 19 lbs and in the 70th percentile and 27 inches 60th percentile. (He was in the 97th percentile for both)

@ Sitting up for short periods of time all by himself

@ Bathing in 2 inches of water in the BIG people bath

@ Solids including: Avocado, Sweet Potatoes, Bananas, Mixed Veggies which make him gag but he still opens his mouth up for more, pears, peaches, apples and introducing the latest and greatest Sam food: Brown Rice...welcome brown rice, we're so happy you're here.

@ The discovery of his toes which is also a discovery of his flexibility because he can put his toes in his mouth...just like his mom? (I know, it's gross and a disgusting habit)

@ Realizing he has a hat on his head and that he actually has a CHOICE to wear it which means no hat

@ His favorite show is The Backyardigans on Noggin

@ His first shot: Tetanus

@ Consistently rolling over and back and over and back

@ He is Mr. Ticklish

@ He likes playing with a soccer ball sitting up

@ Still as social as ever

@ He loves his Dad SOOO much.

@ His hair is actually starting to grow off of his head

29

I'm 29 today. If you asked my 3 year, 8 year old, 15 year old or 22 year old self if I'd ever be 29 they'd all say, "No!...that's old." And now my 29 year old self to those selves can say, "Here I am and I still feel 3, 8, 15 and 22." A friend of mine wrote his thoughts about birthday's that I think sums it all up.

See, what they don't understand about birthdays and what they never tell you is that when you're eleven, you're also ten, and nine, and eight, and seven, and six, and five, and four, and three, and two, and one. And when you wake up on your twenty-fourth birthday you expect to feel twenty-four but you don't. You open your eyes and everything's just like yesterday, only it's today. And you don't feel twenty-four at all. You feel like you're still twenty-three, and twenty-two, and twenty-one, and twenty and so on and so on. And you are - underneath the year that makes you twenty-four anyway.

Some days for instance, you might say something bratty and that's the part of you that's still thirteen. Or maybe some days you might just ride your bike all day in the mud and get nothing done and that's the part of you thats six. Sometimes you need to call your mom and dad because you're scared and don't know what to do and that's the part of you that's eight. Other days you will wake up next to your spouse and hear your baby playing in the crib and you feel like you're thirty. But there are always those days when even after you are all grown up and really are thirty, you will still need to cry and you feel like you're three. That's what I tell people when they're sad and need to cry... maybe you're feeling three.

This year is such a different year and not necessarily in a bad way. Different in the sense that this is the first year I have ever felt a sense of indifference toward my birthday. Typically I LOVE my birthday, I love YOUR birthday, I love ALL birthdays and you'd know my birthday was coming up at least 4 weeks prior to the actual day. But this year I have actually had to remember my birthday was actually coming up, and quick. It's the last year of my 20's and I have loved my twenties, definitely one of my favorite decade out of my three (actually I have loved them all.) I guess it's just that there is so much more going on in this world than just the birth of me. My universe has broadened to a much larger scope.

I sit here and look at the irony of where I am in my journey of self. My 19-year-old self, the one with gauged ears, new tattoos and pink funky hair could have never conceptualized a more conservative, spiritually-religious, one color of hair (and it's a natural color) me. But she's just taking it all in and reminds me to not take myself so seriously. My three year old self is LOVING it because she is playing real live house day-in-and day-out. My big little 8 year old is so glad I haven't hung up the cleats. My 16 year laughs reminding me that I am NOT invincible to the police and can still get a ticket just for speeding. My 20 year old self reminds me that I can do hard things and can and will get through tough times. My 23 year old keeps my social life alive wanting to keep meeting new people in hopes of gaining new friends. And 29, so far so good...no complaints.

29 potentially has a lot in store. Every year has a lot in store but this year of all years could be very different in very different ways. I am always up for the adventure. Always up for change. I am excited to meet another self and see how she adds to the pot of me. It's wonderful to have all of my years right there along with me giving me permission to be 3 and cry, to be 18 and dream the unthinkable and have the gusto to make it come true, to be 25 and spontaneously adaptable.

So Happy birthday to me and all of my little selves...thanks for joining me through our so called life :)

Bath Time

Little Sam has graduated from his mini-bath to the BIG PEOPLE bath. This boy splashes and rolls all around making him want to never get out.

Our Little Elf

Sam's cousin Madeleine (She's 9) made Sam this cute, cute little beanie. When we put it on him this morning, Jake put it on in such a way he looked like a little Easter elf. Thanks for the beanie Madels!