2/17 - Love You Puppy says, "Rats!"

The twins and I have been renting pets from Sulphur Creek Nature Center.  This week, we have Beyonce the rat.  She is very inquisitive and makes really cute little sounds when she's exploring and really cute little snores when she's sleeping.  Here she is helping me take (eat) a note.

1/11 - A Woodland Birthday

Happy New Year!  Hope you all had great holidays and 2015 is bringing you love and other good things.  Would you believe that my little twins are almost nine?  It's true.

We celebrated with their friends this past weekend at the Sulphur Creek Nature Center, which is a great place.  The party deal offered the kids a chance to meet and feed the animal(s) of their choice, from a list of friendly residents, and do a project or go on a nature hike.  Our naturalist was super friendly and gave great customer service (but did not allow rides in the birthday cart).

You know me.  I had to bust out some decorations and goodies for the party, even if it was just in a rented space.  I leveraged heavily the woodland theme ideas from The Ellie Blog.  First of all, how cute are these printables?

Next up, some cupcakes.  I really like gel food coloring for tinting the frosting.  (Yes, I still had my Christmas tree up.)

  

I ordered some rainbow-colored goodie bags and the kids decorated them with the printable stickers.  We tossed in a camo-colored bracelet and owl stickers from the party store, some candy, and one of these little animal figures (except the ones the twins wanted to keep at home):

The kids and I trimmed down brown paper lunch sacks and used more stickers to pretty them up.  We offered popcorn, "twigs," (stick pretzels), crunchy carrots, and bear graham crackers.

We decorated the room with the super cute birthday banner and offered animal ears (fox, bear (or mouse), and bunny).  I wasn't sure if the kids were too old or cool for that sort of thing, and was delighted when they all put them on!

The kids enjoyed roaming around the center, checking out the animals in the displays and putting on puppet shows.  Then it was time to meet some animals!  Lil' Gal had selected a guinea pig, and Strawberry was a sweetie.

Lil' Guy wanted to meet a rabbit, and Scarlett was very nice, although not really into crowds.

Then it was time for the nature hike.  We howled at the coyotes that live at the center (our naturalist encouraged us to do it, and, while the coyotes didn't howl back, we were thrilled to see them scamper around and wag their tails just like dogs.  We also saw a family of wild turkey vultures and a deer family, including a mom deer with triplets.

After that, we needed some cupcakes and ice cream.  Poor Lil' Gal has never been a fan of the singing...

It was a really special day, and I was so happy the kids had a good time.

Happy birthday, my sweeties.  I hope this is a wonderful year for you -- the best yet, with many more to come.

Love, Mommy

---
Note:  Other neat woodland-themed ideas I found are on my Pinterest Board.

1/06 - Jake finds a car you can plug in

I knew they existed, but I hadn’t seen one being charged up!  How cool is that?

Jake also did a little table sailing while we waited for my lunch to be ready.  We didn't find any treasure but fresh air today.  Yo ho and we go!

10/05 - Inch the Inchworm finds a stripey friend

It was a ladder on a truck! (Yes, Inch looks a lot like Tigger’s tail.  He hears that all the time.  Inchworms can be stripey too!  Lil' Guy told me so.)  Lil' Guy was right!

We walked/inched around at lunchtime.  When we looked up, we saw redwoods and a beautiful California blue sky.

When we looked down, we saw a removable wall filled with construction project stuff.  I was hoping that store was going to be a restaurant, but the sign says it will be a 7-11.  Meh.

Cupcakes for my derby team's car wash/bake sale are ready.  Want one?

9/13 - Dolphin and Race Car #8 meet some interesting characters

We had lunch with Rebecca and Charlotte today.  It was a nice sunny day, and we ate on a rooftop garden. Charlotte and I rescued a worm that was wiggling on the hot cement and put him in some nice shady ivy. Hope he’s OK.

Some of the characters I saw at lunch were a little too interesting, so I didn’t take their photos. Dolphin and Race Car #8 liked these guys we found zooming around on the sides of trucks.

This one looked a little sad, but he wouldn't say why.

8/17 - Summer vacation: Camping edition

Um, hi.  I'm back.  I meant to announce that I'd be off for a bit, but things got super busy and then I was in the woods.  Let me explain...

So my friend and I had been talking about camping and thinking it would be great to take our collective kids on a camping adventure, and then we put our planning heads together and just like that, a camping trip was born.

First, we took a ferry ride into the city to have lunch with our friends.

Then, we packed up everything but the kitchen sink, and went off to the redwoods.

We met banana slugs, deer, raccoons, huge crows, and lots of mosquitoes.

The kids frolicked on fallen trees and made "dirt angels" in the dust.  (In their pajamas. Sigh.)

We played pirates, finding that fallen trees make excellent planks and pirate ships.  We found nuts and called them gold dubloons.

We went to the beach and ran wild with friendly dogs.

We ate camp stove nachos and made s'mores.

We camped with twin 6-year olds and a 3-year old and not only survived, but thrived.  Best vacation ever.

5/10 - Lady Green M&M and Charlotte like their greens

Charlotte and I caught up over Big Salads.  It was good to see her!  Lots of lunching ladies this week.  :)

Speaking of greens, Lady M&M appreciates nature. Look!  She found a butterfly!

5/02 - Princess Daisy and the giant ad arch

Remember the rolled up ad pieces from yesterday?  They ended up being a giant arch that wants us to visit Utah.  Pretty cool, huh?  (Sorry Daisy is blurry.)

We walked by this restaurant with sidewalk tables and pretty daisy centerpieces. They reminded Daisy of her super power, but I convinced her to wait until she was playing sports to use it.

4/25 - Field Trip!

I am sorry to say that today's post does not include any toys in quasi-adult situations.  What we have here is one adult (me) in a child situation -- with animals!  They count, right?  I volunteered to be a chaperone for the kindergarten field trip to the local nature center.  Here are Lil' Gal and Lil' Guy and their posse.

Here is Ashley, the blind possum.  (Did you know that a possum's "pocket" is vertical, not horizontal?)

We got to pet a nice gopher snake.

And meet the tiniest grown-up screech owl.

And then Lil' Guy lost a tooth to a taffy lollipop.  (Lil' Gal's wiggly tooth is still attached -- she is NOT happy.)

12/02 - Skull finds a friend (and a bunch of monkeys)

Damien got moved to another building, and it was nice to see him on our floor for a meeting.

Skull tried to do jumping jacks so he looked like a jolly roger too!

Leaf update:  Still not cleaned up at the BART station.  (Or at our house.)  I love the caution tape and safety cones.  Watch out! Leaves! Danger!

Derby update:  We're marching in the Pleasanton Holiday Parade tomorrow.  Come cheer us on!  I made duct star snowflakes for my helmet and everything!

12/01 - Trainee sings "Blow the Man Down"

I know, I’m mixing transportation with pirate songs, but if you consider train robbers as land pirates, it kinda works.  Or I need more sleep.  It was so windy today, I thought my hair was on backwards when I got to work! Things were blown over all around.  Here, a parking sign and a newspaper box were on their sides.

At lunch, Trainee found a Mexican doggie... And David!

Trainee heard Rachel say "Achoo!" and thought she was talking to him.  Poor Rachel is getting a cold and is all bundled up – inside at work!  Let’s send her get-well thoughts.

1.  How the heck is it December already?
2.  There are still way too many leaves at the BART station.  It looks like my front yard, minus the caution tape.  And steps. And BART-branded trash bags.