Las Vegas Zoo

The Las Vegas Zoo is the saddest zoo I have ever personally visited. It is also not very big at all but for the kids it doesn't really matter. Brock and Alyvia along with cousin Kaylee loved seeing all the different animals. Those three just went from one exhibit to the next all excited about what they would find. The snakes were huge and I think it was a python that really caught the attention of Brock because it was actually moving. The gorilla was restless and is smiling in my picture. He was my favorite! Now the lion looked so hot and tired but he did growl at James and I. Alyvia and Brock both fell in love with the Desert Tortoise's who were huge. At the end was a small petting zoo with goats. I was head butted by one which freaked me out and the kids each got to feed them. Overall it was fun little trip but next time we are in the mood for a zoo trip James and I will take the kids down to San Diego!

One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish

These two kids are so freaking cute I can hardly stand it! :) Every night the kids each pick out a book to read before bed time. And every night Alyvia brings me all THREE of her favorite book, One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish. And every night I read the same story for her. Thank goodness Brock picks a different book each night.

Tonight when Lyv brought me her three books I just couldn't help myself and had to take a picture. Brock and I laugh every night when she does it and she thinks she is so cute and funny.


My two favorite boys. Four nights a week James' is not home for bedtime, but on his three days off Brock looks forward to bed time just so dad can read to him. Im not even allowed in the room. Male bonding at its finest! :)
This time next year I expect our little book lover shall be reading to us instead.

Love

There is nothing cuter then Alyvia playing dress up and giving loves to her big brother.

Mets Spring 2010 T-Ball season

The season came to an end for us on May 15, 2010. YAY!!! LOL I'm personally excited to have a break from practices and games for a while. Brock on the other hand asks about twice a week when sign ups are already. I guess that means we will be playing again for fall ball. :)

This season went by relatively fast. He had 2 games almost every week and formed some great new friendships. The coaches did great for their first time around and I hope we will be with them again in the fall. Brock learned so much this season and he absolutely loves the game. I also want to say a special thank you to everyone who came to watch. He thrived on his "fans" and it made that much more special to him. At the end of the last game Brock got his much anticipated trophy. This is something that he has been asking since the very first day of practice. I believe the coach asked everyone to introduce themselves and say something about yourself. My wonderful son proceeded with "Hi my name is Brock and I am 4 years old. By the way when do we get our trophies?" So when the coaches started handing them out Brock was the first one called up because our coaches new how much he was looking forward to it. I am so very proud of him and I can't wait to watch all the seasons to come.

Saturday Family Outing

It's actually amazing how much there really is to do with your kids when you take the time to research. Or in my case when you have family who find the websites and I just follow their lead. My "Aunt" Sarah is always finding places to take her family for their "field trip Fridays" and she is kind enough to post them on her facebook, along with the website she found them on. Well, James and I have been giving each other a hard time about how we are always doing the same things each week. You get so used to a routine that sometimes it's hard to venture out and try new things. Well, we decided we will be copying them not so much on where they go but by venturing out of the house at least once a week and taking the kids on an adventure!

This past Saturday we headed out to the Silverton to see their small aquarium which has a mermaid and scuba diver in the tank. Brock and Alyvia loved it! I think next time we will be heading over to Caesars Palace to show them their huge aquarium and also back over to the Mandalay Bay. James pointed out most of the fish he knew and they both just absorbed the information. I love their ages because they are such sponges. Our second stop of the day was the Flamingo Hotel. What I found that was really interesting was for such an old hotel it was jammed packed. Anyways Alyvia was fascinated by the pink flamingos and Brock was more into the fish and turtles in the ponds. The web made the Flamingo out to seem like they had a variety of birds but from what we saw it wasn't really worth the trip out there. We did end up just running around though outside in the grass for a while. They needed to burn some much needed energy off!

Our last stop of the day was much anticipated for James and me. We took the kids to the top of the Stratosphere. James' friend Tim works there as a maintenance Engineer so for most of the visit James and him talked shop talk. BORING! LOL.... Brock thought being so high up was in his words "cool" where as Aly was so very scared. We picked a day where it was nice and windy with up to 30mph winds. I personally do not like being up there but I was fine until some idiot announced to no one in particular how he could feel the tower moving because of the wind. After hearing it I then became aware of the swaying and really wanted to head back down asap. I'm such a chicken. LOL It was an overall great experience for them. Alyvia and Brock did venture close to the glass and looked down. Nothing looks real from so high up. When it was finally time to go home we were frozen from being outside. Brock wants to go back but Aly said she is to scared. James and I are really thinking about doing the jump they are now offering too.

So our Saturday outing turned out better then we expected. I now have a list (poor James) of things that I want us to do as a family. I can't wait to start on the next thing!

Pork Chops

I have always had trouble finding a decent recipe for pork chops that the whole family likes. I finally came across two very different recipes that the kids devoured so thought I would share.

Tangy Barbecued Pork Chops
1 med. Onion
1/2 cup water
3 Tbsp. cider vinegar
2 Tbsp. sugar
1 Tbsp. prepared mustard
1 Tbsp. lemon juice
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1/2 cup ketchup
2 Tbsp. Worcestershire
4 - 6 pork chops

- In a small saucepan mix together the first 8 ingredients. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 15 to 20 minutes. Add the ketchup and Worcestershire sauce to sauce pan and heat through.

- In the mean time, brown all sides of the pork chops and then place in a 13x9 baking dish (pre coated with cooking spray).

- Pour sauce over pork chops and bake at 350 degrees for 25-35minutes. May need to be cooked longer depending on how thick your chops are.



Maple Glazed Pork Chops
4 boneless pork chops
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 egg
1/4 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 cup bread crumbs
3 tbsp. butter

sauce
1/2 cup maple syrup
1 tbsp. Dijon mustard
2 tsp. cider vinegar
1/8 tsp ground ginger

-Sprinkle pork with salt and pepper. In shallow bowl beat egg and ginger. Put bread crumbs in another bowl. Dip pork chops in egg mix then coat with bread crumbs.

-In a large skillet, cook pork in butter for 7 minutes. Remove when cooked through.

- Add the sauce ingredients to the same skillet and heat through. Pour over pork and serve!

Tripod

Do you know what the best presents are? The ones that come from a family that are hand me downs. I am a picture freak and hardly leave home without my camera. Well "Aunt" Sarah brought over her "old" tripod because she doesn't use it and thought I could use it since I don't have one. It was love at first sight LOL! No more setting the camera somewhere (counter, table, boxes) and then trying to adjust it so I can take a family portrait and hoping we are all in the frame together. The guys probably though I was a wacko because I was overly excited but they just don't understand. Haha it was priceless when I actually took a picture of it they thought I had lost my mind. :) So, thank you so much Aunt Sarah for the tripod, it is one of the best presents ever and I know you will believe me once you read it! LOL I have the best family ever!

Ring around the Rosie

I finally got my camera back from Canon and took these pictures last night. Brock and Alyvia love singing "Ring around the Rosie" while of course running in circles holding each others hands. It is so cute how they play together but these two pick the most inappropriate time to play there games. This particular time happened as I was trying to get them upstairs for a bath before bed. Some how some way they got there second wind and did this for over 10 minutes. Reminds me of the energizer bunny, they just keep going and going till finally laughing so hard Brock yells he has to stop because he is to dizzy as Alyvia tries desperately to get up just to topple over again. I have to admit it was hilarious but I know it was yet another one of their ploys to put off the bath since bedtime immediately follows. I wonder what it will be tomorrow night??

Bachelorette Party

My best friend Alicia is FINALLY getting married. Only took 6 years but its finally happening. So excited and happy for her that I can hardly stand it. The big day isn't until June but this last weekend was her Bachelorette Party. Her sister Samantha did such an amazing job at putting everything together. You look at there relationship and I envy them that they have each other. I won't go into all the main details but the night was definitely one to remember.

The night started out with a stripper in the hotel room. This was my first and I so hope last experience. I believe the correct term for me when around all the girls would be the prude of the group. lol Anyways at one point Reanna and I hid in the bathroom to get away from the stripper dude. Glad I had a getaway partner for that. Once Mr. Stripper dude left we all headed down stairs to the Foundation Room. Well things most definitely didn't go as planned as we were in no uncertain terms kicked out. Again another first for me! After that we headed to a lounge called Eye Candy and finished off the night there. By the time we ended up there only five of us girls remained. There was a dance floor and all the girls minus me danced there big butts off! Im not a huge fan of dancing I think that goes back to my self-conscious issues but I still had a blast and we all sat around talking and laughing. I even got propositioned that night!! Yet again another first for me! LOL

The overall night I think was a huge success. I for one am very proud of myself as I actually wore a dress and a short one at that! Alicia, I hope you enjoyed your "last night of freedom" and Samantha you did such an awesome job and thank you for including me!

Mother's Day

Mother's Day has never really been a huge event for us, mainly due to the fact that James always works! This year was no different. Funny thing is two weeks ago he was off Sat, Sun, and Mon, and then they promoted him to supervisor and he is back on the old days off of Thurs, Fri, Sat off. Stinks but we did have him with us for majority of the day.

We celebrated the day by going over to my sister-in-laws house where her boyfriend cooked us all breakfast. All of us consisted of James' mom Laurie, great Nana, his dad, brother, and nephews. It was so nice of Terry (sis in law Amy's bf) to cook for us! We ended up just hanging out for the majority of the day while the kids attempted to swim (pool was rather cold). It was nice to just be around family. I sat around and did nothing for the most part. I love those days.

We ended our day by being dropped off at my mom's house for dinner. James left for work and mom cooked dinner. Ending my day with my mom and kids was a perfect ending to Mother's Day. I think I will request that next year James have the day off!!

Oh and I almost forgot my presents. I got beautiful flowers, a card, a bag of chocolate, and a book! This has become somewhat of a tradition for him. Last year I got the same thing and I really hope he keeps it going for the years to come! Flowers I love regardless of what time of year it is and the chocolate is perfect because I rarely have cravings for it but when I do we never have any in the house. And for anyone who knows me I am a book freak and i absolutely love to read. It was so perfect! Happy Mother's to all Moms and I hope every one's day was as special as mine!

Lunch with the family

I have been waiting for the day when James and I could actually take the kids out to eat at an actual restaurant and not a fast food place and truly enjoy ourselves. Usually Alyvia is a huge handful and will not sit still at a public table. Main reason why we always eat at home. Brock was the exact same way at her age. I love his age now because he doesn't mind sitting at the table coloring pictures, and just enjoying our company. Alyvia on the other hand used to try to escape of run wild at the restaurants.

We decided to risk our sanity and take the kids out to eat for lunch one day while running errands. Luckily it was a Friday and early afternoon so there was no crowd. The kids actually sat together on one side of the table and James and I sat on the other side. That was a first for us also, as usually one kid wants to sit with me and the other with James. They both colored on their own paper and stayed seated for the entire time, except of course for the many bathroom breaks Alyvia insisted on taking. I think the waiter is what really helped us as he put a rush on the kids food so it came out super fast, so the kids were busy eating instead of getting bored waiting for their food.

It was a really lovely lunch without any stress! Couldn't have asked for a nicer day.