Crazy Week

I don't know if you've heard but we have had a crazy week here on the east coast. First, I've had these two little turkeys all week. Of course I had Asher, but we had cousin as well. The boys have a pretty good time together. Of course there has been a little bit of toy stealing, but that is to be expected, no? Sharing the red firetruck is so hard.
This picture might refresh your memory, here they are together at the ripe old age of 4 months (Asher) and 6 weeks (Cousin). They were so tiny. I like them!
They didn't share a crib, but Asher feels like his crib is so fun and bouncy, so Cousin had to give it a try too. And try out Asher's binki, in case it tastes better than his own.Anyway, these two boys kept me busy. Applause to all you mom's of twins or more.
So like I said, we were full of excitement around here. On Tuesday, we had a nice little earthquake. It was scary. Bill, the native Californian, didn't blink and eye. Although he did say it was the longest earthquake he has ever been in.
Here is the breakdown (if you care to know):
Boys are down for a nap. I'm brushing the cat in the kitchen. I feel a little rumble and walk over the balcony because I think it is just wind. Low and behold, the trees aren't moving. Then the real quake starts and I start running to the bedrooms where the boys are. I could see the walls moving, the book shelves swaying and things are falling off the shelves as I run by. I even managed to catch a vase. I am thinking to myself, "get to the bath tub".
(I'm a native Midwesterner. We grew up with tornado drills and you run to bathtub, I was only acting on my natural instinct, too bad it was the wrong natural disaster). Anyway, I make it to the bathroom door by the time the rumbling stops. The boys are awake and crying. Cousin had a baseball land in his crib, but no harm. Asher was fine.
Point is, it was scary. Cell phone lines were jammed. Only form of communication is email and facebook. Dang that social media, it really is handy. And I will say, it is nice to have a data plan on my cell phone.
The end, all family was fine and accounted for.We did have a tornado of little boys. They can make quite the mess...really fast.
And now, as I type this, we are experiencing tropical storm Irene, I'm glad we don't have the full hurricane to deal with. So fun. I'm just praying we don't lose power, or water.
So there you have it, a week of excitement with 3 natural disasters.

Weavers in Real Life

Us in real life
My sister was kind enough to take this picture mid-sitting down. Looks like we are, well you can guess what I was going to say.

So I've been told that my blog doesn't really give an accurate picture of what our life is really like. Since you asked, I'll tell you.

• Up until 2 days ago, my side of the bedroom was covered in dirty clothes. Much of which were sweaty crusty running clothes. Bill's side on the other hand was nice and tidy, as always.
• I wanted to sign Asher up for a music class, but they are really expensive, especially for a 16 month old. So instead, we are doing our own music class. I'm enriching my son with the likes of Bob Dylan and Brandon Flowers. He'll thank me later. I'm still thanking my brother for a music education consisting of Pink Floyd, The Cure, and R.E.M.
  
• We are in freak out mode around here, Bill resumes firm life in 2.5 weeks and counting. I'm probably freaking out more than he is. Okay, it's all me. I'm scared.
• My car trunk is a storage unit for strollers. We currently have 3 in there. Usually just two, but a third has been added while we babysit our nephew next week.
• I LOVE to eat out side, Bill hates eating outside.
• My house is a disaster until 5 minutes before I go pick up Bill from the Metro. Then I rush around and pick up every duplo, dvd, stray cheerio and car and make the house look like we live in a museum. I try really hard anyway.
• I miss being able to go to the bathroom with the door closed. Or by myself. Is 2 minutes really too much to ask?
• I want to buy these shoes (in chocolate) for Asher. But alas, he will grow out of them before he ever wears them enough to justify the price.
• I get weirded out when old people come over and "pet" Asher when we are out and about. I just pray that they don't want to hold him because this little pumpkin is big enough to take home a blue ribbon at the county fair. He is definitely a healthy little boy.
• The drama between Asher and Cass never ends. I'm always having to protect the cat.
• According to Asher, we have a At named Ass. He can say car, I don't know why he can't say cat or Cass. Maybe he is calling Cass what he thinks he really is.
• I had to kill a giant spider the other night while Bill was out of town. I dry heaved 4 times by the time I killed it and cleaned up the guts that had squirted out. It was sick. I prefer to save those jobs for the man of the house.
• Lastly, I hate sweeping. Our apartment has all "wood" floors. Keeping the floors nice is not something I excel at. Give me carpet any day (except in the kitchen and dining room).

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Another less than perfect picture, no one is looking at the camera. Playing with sand is apparently really interesting.

Bill Returns to Brentwood

Bill here. I returned to Brentwood, California last weekend for my high school reunion. Brentwood looked exactly the same, except that the population had doubled and all empty fields had been replaced by chains and houses, making the city (now a city!) totally unrecognizable. I had planned on taking pictures at the reunion, but other people were taking pictures so often that I can just get them off Facebook. But I did get a tour of the city (city!) and stopped at my old stomping grounds to take some pictures.

Ron Nunn Elementary

Bristow Middle School

Liberty High School

Old Home (Pontiac not included; saplings now trees; in a city!)

For those of you pondering whether to go to your reunions, I highly recommend it. I had a blast. Everyone was excited to be there and see one another. It was a really great time. Thanks to the Britton Olson home and the Jeff Olson home for hosting me.

July

It has been a relatively busy month. Our dear friend Britton has been in town this week for a gathering of nerds at a conference (he is a smarty pants at Stanford) and for a wedding of a past roommate. We have been lucky enough to have him stay with us and we had to get a picture of Asher with his namesake since he was named after Britton.

Asher thinks he is so tricky and uses his cart as his new mode of transportation.
I ran a 5k on the 4th of July and placed top ten in the women's division.
We took a trip to Great Falls, the Virginia side this time. Thought it was time to try out the baby carrier for real.


Asher is rather mischievous. Of course when it gets quiet, he is getting into trouble. So we have been busy baby proofing Weaver style...with duct tape. It is pretty effective.
Bill has taped down all the dvd's. It gets rather trying picking up a million dvd's 4x's a day. We've also had to rig it so that Asher can't slide open the doors of the entertainment center. The buttons on the the play station are just too tempting to resist. As is the volume knob on the stereo system. So we jam a toy into the drawers so that he can't close them thus he can't open the doors. Mean parents...
As with the dvd's, removing the billion pens and office supplies we have from these drawers is a daily occurrence. It gets old really quick. Consequence, drawers taped shut.
And last but not least, Asher and I have utilized our pass to Mount Vernon and met up with good ol Thomas Jefferson. Bill doubts the authenticity of this TJ as he would probably make a better Benjamin Franklin, no? But alas he counts, therefore I have pictures with 3 different presidents of the US, I've got a lot more to go.

Asher Walking

Double click on the video to watch in full-screen.

More NYC/OBX Pictures

OBX

We kind of just got back from a week long vacation to the Outerbanks, NC. I say kind of because we have been home for over a week now. But it was a welcome break from daily life and all of my family flew in for the week. We took about a bazillion pictures, so here are just a few...very few. It was a week full of cannon ball contests, the beach, eating seafood, kites, a light house, the Wright Memorial, sand castles in the sand*, otterpops, and so on an so forth. Why is coming home from vacation so hard?

We picked the most windy day for family pictures