Dreamy Date Night

Most of our date nights consist of putting the kids to bed early, take out, a movie and treats. Relaxing, a little romantic, and easy.

Sometimes, however, we rock our date nights. Like on Friday. It all started when Allen surprised me tickets to Dashboard Confessional for Valentine's Day. I may have a little girl crush on Chris Carrabba and I have a big girl appreciation for their music. So basically, Allen is a stud.

I met the hubs in the city where we dined at Blue Fin in Times Square. Allen and I are both sushi lovers, but have been less than impressed with all the raw fish we have consumed while living on the East Coast. Until that night. Finally, we had sushi worth going back for!

Then we took some shots on the red stairs. Because Alicia Keyes and JayZ shot a music video there, because there were a billion people taking pictures there, because we are cool??

I know, somewhat disturbing angle there. Regardless, I am on the stairs. Freezing my butt off. Because it was like 40 degrees outside. And windy. And I may not have been dressed appropriately.

We are cuter when we aren't freezing. We use to be way cuter, regardless of the temperature. We ran into Starbucks to warm ourselves immediately after this picture. Because I am not tough, nor do I pretend to be.

So I suck at taking shots in the dark when people aren't holding still. I wasn't holding still either. Sorry.

The opener was the most torturous 30 minutes I have ever had to endure. But Dashboard was phenomenal. Rocked my socks off phenomenal.

I ended the night with two stale donuts at Penn Station. They were gross. But I ate every last bite. Making me gross.

Randomness

The Finale of FHE always ends in a dog pile in this household. This one started out as a makeshift pyramid.

The end result was the same...

This has nothing to do with FHE, but I can't resist.

 
The shorts lasted a couple days. Then it returned to rain and frigidness. What a joke.

Yes I Can See Her...

Cause every girl here wanna be her

Ohh She's a Diva

They feel the same and I wanna meet her

(skipping lyrics that don't apply to my sweet innocent little baby)

.....the baddest thing around town

Seriously, that song is impossible to get out of my head. Kind of like Tessa. Or not. That segue really didn't work. Regardless, this is my 9 month old chubster sitting pretty in 18-month old clothing.

Allen told me last night that all the pictures I post on the blog of Tess are of her looking like a bulldog. And that she no longer resembles a bulldog because she is always smiling, and thus, the pictures do not accurately portray his baby girl. Which was interesting to me, because while she does smile a lot, she looks like a bulldog a lot more. Then I realized, she is always smiling for her daddy. In fact, she has the strongest preference for her daddy as a baby than either of the big kids ever did. You should see this girl when Allen walks in the room. She starts grinning and giggling and bouncing up and down and shaking her little fists in excitement. It's kind of rude actually.

She is still a crappy night sleeper. Like really crappy. But we won't focus on that. One of her top teeth finally cut through today. Maybe that will help. Which we all know it won't, but maybe thinking that it will will cause me to sleep sounder the two hours of sleep I will get before she starts screaming (and surely it is inappropriate to use that many wills in a sentence).

She has also started clapping- spontaneously when daddy pops in, and on demand whenever someone says, "yay." It is pretty stinking adorable.

And here she is, fresh from her nap and at her most nibbable.

In other news, could these past two days have been more enjoyable? I feel less dead. Amazing what a little Vitamin D, after, how long was winter....10 months???, can do for a person.

And in final news, GO COUGARS!!! Does anyone else have enough faith to put them in their Final Four??? :)

Happiness Is...

...the wind blowing through your hair,

...toes exposed in seventy degree sunshine

...flying fancy free

I wish I could bottle up this perfect little day. Because let me tell you, yesterday was a doozy.

The Great Escape

Winter has epically sucked this year. We have had so many snow days, Ryder will be in school clear until July, which is a whole other bucket of suck. And thus, we escaped to the Poconos for another fun-filled, who-cares-that-there-is-a-foot-of-snow-outside, two-days of play at the Great Wolf Lodge. With friends. Which makes escaping and playing even more fun. Except that some of our friends that tried to escape got caught and had to stay. We missed you Ure's!!

This is Linley: far too good to to be bothered for a picture with her baby sister. Her eyes are screaming, "Seriously mom, can't I just go slide now??"

Tessa was a napless champ. That girl could not be more enjoyable. Well, unless she slept at night.

Going to waterslides when you are not 8 1/2 months pregnant is fun. Keep that in mind for future reference. So much fun that I was highly negligent in picture taking. Refer to last year's pictures to see my children on the slides. Thanks.

Lazying down the lazy river.

Let's talk about this shot which was a large learning experience for me. This is what I look like when I do not realize my picture is being taken and there is a fat man trying to get across on a lily pad. First, I have perfectly placed toes. This is odd (but maybe not so much since Brittany has perfectly placed toes as well). Second, I need to own  a tanning bed. Third, I should never, ever, ever make that laughing/straining/excited/highly constipated face. No wonder I have the crow's feet of an 80-year old. Sadly, this face is in 90% of the shots of me. Why has no one ever told me???

Booyah. I conquered that lily pad like I conquered my ice cream the night before.

My gal pal and I and that face.

I love that place. Our groupie group had 6 adults, 3 kids, a toddler, and 2 babies- and every single one of us were happy, and having fun, and making memories. Such a fabulous mini-cation. Thanks friends for playing with us!!!!