The Ambitious Mrs

November 4, 2013

Fall Fun

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Pumpkins, Seasons, Uncle Kyle
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We’ve had a lot of fun this fall. I mean April wore her Halloween costume on 5 different occasions, I think that really says it all! Here are a few photos of the fun.

Carving pumpkins

Lily had the day off of school so we stayed in our jammies all day and spent the whole morning carving pumpkins!

Lily’s pumpkin came from her class field trip to the Pumpkin Patch and part of the field trip included estimating things about your pumpkin, including how many seeds the pumpkin had. Always the overachiever, Lily had to count when it was time for the actual carving!

She came up with a great system of grouping by tens, then clearing her tray after each 100.

She had 437 seeds in all!

Bronco Game!

My parents bought tickets to a Bronco game at a charity auction and very kindly included our family in the fun!

The whole crew rode the train to the stadium and did some tail-gating with my parents friends. Then my Mom and April headed home while Colin, Lily, Papi-san and I went to the game. Lily was in heaven! It even happened to be a game against Lily’s second favorite team, the Redskins. Broncos won and it was a beautiful day, double bonus!

Track-or-Treat (aka Costume Opportunity #1)

Kyle’s unit at Ft. Carson had a “Track-or-Treat” event where they decorated their vehicles and tanks like haunted houses and had trick-or-treating. There was wayyyyy too much scary stuff for my girls, but seeing Kyle and Megan always makes it worth-while!

Inside one of the scary decorated vehicles.

Boo At the Zoo (Costume Opportunity #2)

Trick-or-treating at the Zoo! What could be better!

There were tons of sponsors including a soccer club, here is April claiming “I’ve never made a goal before!”

In case you were not clear on this yet, Lily was Leonardo of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (Bronco style.)

And April was Ariel from the Little Mermaid.

Class Parties (Costume Opportunities #3 and #4!)
April wore her costume to school Wednesday (not pictured). And then she wore it again for Lily’s school parade and party. Here is Lily and her best-friend Eddie, both being TMNT’s.

Here are Lily’s classmates “parading” around the neighborhood. For shame, very few neighbors came out to see the show.

In case you were feeling really good about your child’s home-made Halloween costume this year, just go ahead and hang it up now, because check out this home-made “Hot Air Balloonist” costume that Lily’s friend Elaine wore!

Me and every other Mom on Pinterest made these orange-to-look-like-pumpkins for their kids class Halloween party. But aren’t mine cute?

Speaking of things that are good-looking, look at these beautiful Grandma’s!

Trick-or-Treating, the real thing (Costume Opportunity #5!)
This photo is a stand-in for an actual trick-or-treating picture because I forgot my camera! Can you imagine!

This is Lily and April and Eddie. But it’s a great representation because we met up with Eddie as we began our trick-or-treating and Lily and Eddie proceeding to run through that neighborhood so fast we were done by 7pm! I guess Turtles can’t be wasting time collecting the candy when they could be eating it.

It was a great October! Happy belated Halloween, our costumes sure got a workout!

October 12, 2013

Mermaid Birthday Party

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Birthday Fun
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April requested a Mermaid Birthday Party and try as I might I just couldn’t think of a better idea then to find a pool to have the party, of course this meant I needed an indoor pool since October in Colorado is definitely not outdoor swimming weather!

I found a swim school called Mermaid Cove that offers birthday parties. What could be more perfect? We had to do it! This was my first experience booking an “all inclusive” birthday party rather then planning everything myself. I told myself I’d let them do all the work but that was just silly, I should have known myself better. It turned out I still planned lots of things. Including cute food like “sea-shell cucumbers” and “crab leg carrots” (Not pictured! I got too distracted and then it was all devoured!) And I made a pin the tail on the mermaid game.

I must say that “pin the tail on the…” games seem to be a sure winner for this age group! I highly recommend creating one for whatever your party theme might be!

Even though cake technically could have been included, I told them we wanted to skip their cake. Grandma CiCi said she was up to the challenge of making something special (as always) and boy was she ever!

She stayed up until 1am making that cake! I knew I got my crazy party planning gene from somewhere nearby!

I was able to reuse many of the party decorations from years past (when you have a kiddo like April who likes anything sparkly you can never go wrong with glitter is seems!)

Clearly, I was at the wrong angle to capture it but I hear that April’s face was precious at the moment my Mom cut into the cake. She truly didn’t know what to expect! (And I think she was a little worried about her Barbie!)

Don’t worry, all was well, Ariel Barbie was wearing a protective wrap!

But the real fun started when we all go to go swimming. What made this pool so special and perfect is that they keep dozens of “mermaid tails” around for guest to wear while swimming. Here I am as a mermaid!

Here is April with her tail on.

I’m a strong swimmer but even so, it was tough to get around in those things so it was pretty brief entertainment.

Hopefully it’s something April will remember forever, however. Happy Birthday to our own personal Little Mermaid!

October 6, 2013

Happy 4th Birthday April

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Baby Pictures and Videos, Birthday Fun
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I have been beyond a failure at blogging lately. But I can’t let a birthday pass without a picture montage (although I tried, I’m a day late!) Happy Birthday April. You were both a joy and a challenge as a three year old. As you told me this year “my super-power is tip-toeing!” It’s true, you prance and dance through life. And that also means we’re all just players in the elaborate show in your head and sometimes it can be hard to play the part just right, to make your imagination a reality! But we try, and we love you very much in the process.

Yesterday I think we got it just right with your Mermaid Birthday Party. More pictures coming on that soon (maybe?)

For now here is a montage of you, being three!

July 8, 2013

Snowmask+Cousins=Awesome!

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Vacay
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We just got back from a week in Snowmass (aka in April speak “Snowmask”) with two of Colin’s cousins and their children. 6 adults, 6 kids, all fun! The kids were 9, 7, 6, 3, 3, and 1. So, everyone got a playmate, plus or minus one! It was really one of the best vacations I’ve ever been on (except a few medical issues, Colin’s knee met an unfriendly rock on his bike ride, resulting in stitches. April got pink eye! But hey, I can now tell you that medical care in the Aspen Valley is top-notch!)

Much like Rehobeth last year, Lily and her cousin (they are actually second cousins) Stella were instant best-friends.

It was wonderful to see them together. I would not say these girls are the same (one tom-boy, one natural-born performer) and they don’t have a lot in their lives in common (one lives a very urban life in NYC, one lives in the ‘burbs). But we had plenty of activities to keep them entertained. And even when we didn’t, they were two peas in a pod, making up plays, watching cool news shows (new to Lily anyway), and just generally being co-conspirators.

Speaking of activities we did keep busy! We rode up the gondola in both Snowmass and Aspen (the Aspen gondola is insane! It’s like a really safe feeling roller-coaster!)

We went on nature hikes. Sometimes ice-cream-nature-hikes!

We did all the fun activities (ie- money-sucking activities, at the top of the mountains). Like the rock-wall.

And the Euro-bungy.

Even a little hula-hooping (that was free.)

The scenery was a-mazing!

There was also a lot of pool time.

Here I am getting my “hair-washed” in the hot tub.

April also found a friend, her cousin Lucy did a good job taking care of her.

“Okay Glass let’s have a dance party” (for anyone who does not recognize the device Robert is wearing, it’s a Google Glass. Pays to work for Google.)

Dance party!

We’re just getting into the era where the kids entertain themselves, and the adults have a chance to chat, or play cards. Pretty fantastic.

Can’t wait to get this crew back together soon!

Today’s Ambition: First half of summer is already over, including our only major vacation. We have a summer fun list and only a limited number of weekend left to complete it all! So much fun to be had!

June 10, 2013

TMNT Party

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Milestones
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For Lily’s birthday she decided to have a TMNT (that’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle) party. In case you were not aware, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle’s have recently made a come-back and have a new show on Nickelodeon. Amazingly, this is one of the few TV shows the kids can both agree on. This birthday party marked a few firsts. It was our FIRST pool party, our FIRST time inviting only friends from school and our FIRST time having kids dropped off by their parents.

As usual, I got ridiculous with my DIY party planning, thanks to (or should I say no thanks to) inspirations from Pinterest. I made over 20 foam masks, which I sewed elastic onto so that they would be the perfect fit.

The masks were a big hit even with the lifeguards!

Funny story about the masks, as TMNT buffs will know there are four Turtles, who each have their own signature color. Lily has taken a liking to Leonardo (because he’s the boss) and thus I was only allowed to make ONE blue mask. There could be NO OTHER LEONARDO’S at this party, period! Sadly, the one and only Leonardo mask broke shortly after the party started!

I also made favor “poppers,” which were toilet paper tubes that had homemade flubber “ooze” (aka – the stuff that turned the Ninja Turtles into mutants!) and other prizes inside. I wrapped them in tissue paper and put on (more) masks!

Decorations included ballons with (even more) mask!

The crowing glory came from my Mom (as usual). Leonardo cupcakes that were almost too cool to eat!

I did say almost….

Although the weather tried to throw us a curve-ball (high was only in the 60’s that day!) As did April, who woke up that morning having a litle, ahem, tummy trouble. But all’s well that end’s well. And I think it ended well! Here are more photos.

Lily (in the scuba goggles) swimming with her buddies.

The kiddos shivering away trying to eat their pizza.

Daddy had to light the candles repeatedly during the birthday song.

It worked, candles were extinguished.

Lily and some of her gang of boys (upon my insistence she did invite a few girls to the party too).

Getting spoiled totally rotten with way too many gifts (can you say LEGO-MANIA!)

A guest of honor trying to stay warm.

Giving Uncle Kyle a high-five goodbye as he left the party, heading out that night for a month long Army training trip.

And finally, showing the love to one buddy pretty hard!

Miss Lily, your excitement and happiness at these over-the-top birthday celebrations make it all worth it! And you sure to help me flex my creative party planning muscles with your crazy theme choices! Happy Birthday LP!

Today’s Ambition: April is busy planning her next party and has suggested such themes as a “hiking party,” “sunflower party,” or “dragon party” so I guess I better keep the creative juices flowing!

June 1, 2013

Six!

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Baby Pictures and Videos, Milestones
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Tomorrow Lily will be six. It’s been a whirlwind last month or so. There have been several big life events for Lily that have gone un-noted here. Like her BIG haircut.

A few months ago she began telling me she wanted a “boy haircut.” You know, to go along with her boy clothes and boy friends (not to be mixed up with boyfriends). I didn’t think much of it but the next time we went to get her hair cut she whispered to me that she wanted that BOY haircut. Being a girl who likes short hair myself, I thought, what the heck? I talked with my hairstylist and we decided to give her a “pixie cut.” Well turns out when you have hair so thick and straight it looks like a helmet, and you wear the aforementioned boy clothes most of the time, that “boy” haircut really does make you look like a boy. She has been getting mistaken for a boy all over the the place (I can always tell when it’s happening because strangers call her “buddy.”) I want her to have to opportunity to express herself, but I also don’t like how this haircut has caused me to feel that I have to make excuses for her. So, we’re growing it, a little. I’m hoping we can compromise on a short bob. At least this is a good opportunity to grow out those heavy bangs that I used to hate trimming!

Next up, Lily lost her first tooth!

I had to keep this one under wraps because she wanted to be sure she got to surprise all the relatives in person with her missing tooth! She lost it at school and came home with it proudly in a “treasure box” they gave her. She already has another loose one. It’s going to be a goofy grin around here for a while I’m afraid! And in case you were wondering, the Tooth Fairy did not forget!

The school year ended with a bang with Field Day, followed by the Marathon Day (her school runs a marathon one mile at a time, twice a week for the last 13 weeks of school.) These activities were right up her alley!

Though I must say the girl is a sprinter, not a cross country runner. She did some sprinting, and some walking, and then some more sprinting!

And then came Kindergarten Graduation. It was really very precious. Lily did a fantastic job singing the songs they had prepared and following the directions when they got their diplomas. I’ll have to share the video’s another time.

And now she is six! I chose the Taylor Swift song, Trouble, for this photo montage. I picked it because both kids love it, it’s a very “it” song right now. But the truth is that this year Lily really was not a lot of “trouble.” She did fantastic with Kindergarten, learned to read, is getting much better at being a leader and mentor to her little sister, and is expressing herself with words and pictures (yes, if she gets upset she likes to draw you a picture to show how she feels about it.) She now has kids that she truly calls “friends” (you’ll see her in the video with her gang of boys!)

Being a summer baby is the best, we get to have the whole summer to explore being six together. Love you my Lily-bug!

Today’s Ambition: Tomorrow we’re having a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle Pool Party to celebrate. Too bad the weather is only supposed to be in the 60’s. Come on June, you can do better!

May 6, 2013

A Little Song and Dance

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Baby Pictures and Videos, My Girls, Sports
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Last week the girl’s had their last dance class for the session. This time the younger girls from the dance studio did not get to participate in the big “recital” but did do an “in studio” performance. This was quite a disappointment for Lily, and frankly if I had realized this I might not have put Lily in this class. But so be it, in studio performance was what we got!

Here is April’s “performance.”

She was almost side-tracked by her prop once again! But this time she did a little better (probably because she was next to the teacher!)

Here is the whole class watching another group perform.

After the “show” the studio served cookies, that was popular!

Grandma Libby came to watch the “show,” what a good sport!

After the last recital I brought April flowers and it was all she talked about for months afterwards so I had to bring her one this time too (and one for her teacher.)

A few days later it was Lily’s turn. Here is her dance.

How much do you love how Lily has to stick her tongue out when she is concentrating!

The performance was very quick as you can see so then the teacher asked all the girls to show us their “grand jete” leaps. Here is Lily in flight.

It’s still hard to believe Lily wanted to do this. That girl is always full of surprises. I am trying to interest her in taking karate but she says she would rather take gymnastics instead?!?

Both girls have the same teacher (their classes were at different times) and they adore their “Miss Ashley.” She is very adorable, and only a few inches taller than them! I got her phone number for a little summer babysitting I hope!

I’m proud of my girls, especially Lily for seeing this class through. Can’t say for sure we’ll be back in the fall but it was fun to see Lily in pink once a week, if only for an hour!

Today’s Ambition: Summer plans? Soccer camp… lego camp… karate/gymnastics. So many choices!

April 30, 2013

Chi-Town

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Uncategorized
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Last weekend we jetted off for a long weekend in Chicago. My Dad is living there part-time for work (he comes home most weekends.) He was anxious to show us his new part-time home. We started the trip by checking out his rooftop view (27 stories doesn’t even look high here, but it’s about 17 stories higher than anything where we live!)

We spent our first day at the Shedd Aquarium after a public transportation adventure to get there! (The bus, it sure stops a lot!) The had an exhibit on Jellies that was pretty darn amazing.

They girls were pretty into it.

There were some good interactive exhibits.

But you know what April and Lily do NOT like interacting with? Their movies! We saw the 4D movie at the Aquarium and both kids were not pleased. It wasn’t the noise, or the visuals, it was the moment when a dinosaur supposedly sneezed on you that got them! Do NOT put your dinosaur snot on us!

Next we walked (and walked and walked) over to “The Bean” at Millennium Park. I thought that April would LOVE this thing. That kid can spend a loooong time sassing with herself in the mirror. But it was pretty crowded, so I guess she didn’t get into the spirit as much as I imagined.

Have I mentioned that I think this is the most brilliant piece of public artwork ever!?

Speaking of walking, check out our sweet ride. My Dad rented this double stroller and the kids thoroughly enjoyed it.

It was one of those things were I bet they wouldn’t have cared to ride in OUR double stroller at all. But the novelty of a new stroller lasted just along enough to get us all over the city.

The next day we visited the Museum of Science and Industry. This place is incredibly immense. They have a full-sized train and submarine inside, and that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

Immense also describes this tractor tire.

Which makes such a cozy bed!

Then we hit up Navy Pier and rode the big BIG Ferris Wheel.

It moves like a slug but I was still a nervous wreck with my wiggly little monkeys in there!

We also snuck in a few things that didn’t get immortalized in photos like a visit to the Lego Store for Lily (heaven) and a visit to the American Girl Doll Store for April (also heaven.) My parents took Colin and I out for one of the best dinners I’ve ever had at the Pump Room and then Colin and I acted like youg’ens and stayed out until 2am at a comedy show at the Second City! I feel like if life had gone a different direction, I could have lived in this city. And who knows, I guess it still could some day.

It was a great visit, thanks so much Papi-San and CiCi for making it happen!

Today’s Ambition: Just looked at the calendar for the month of May, holy busy! Need to get my running shoes on because it’s going to be a mad dash to summer!

April 7, 2013

Easter Babies

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Baby Love, Seasons
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Last weekend we had the true pleasure of a visit from my childhood best friend, Janet and her 5 month old twin boys! Lily and April have been in high anticipation of this visit. Since they were born, I have been giving the girls frequent updates on Janet’s boys, Holden and Teddy. I jokingly told the girls they could each pick a baby to take care of and they took me seriously. Lily picked Teddy and April picked Holden. I fully expected April to be the one who was interested in playing Mommy to these babies. After all, she is the one who spends a lot of time playing with baby dolls (I can’t count how many times I have “swaddled” a baby doll in the last year). But to everyone’s surprise it was LILY who took a real interest in taking care of “her” baby.

She gave him every bottle he needed while he was here, at least if she was awake anyway.

She was really patient and careful. I was so impressed.

April was also interested but her attention span was just way too short.

Sweet little Holden got dumped for a much hotter commodity, the old baby toys I had pulled out!

Here is Teddy napping our old bouncy chair!

Janet and her son’s stayed to celebrate Easter with us! The girls did leave the babies alone long enough to hunt for their Easter eggs.

This is the first year I can remember in my kids lives that they have gotten to hunt for Easter eggs outside in Colorado. It’s always been too cold before. However, with all the wildlife in our area the “Easter Bunny” (Daddy) had to do his work on the fly right before the hunt. Here are the girls enjoying their treats on the swing-set.

Total aside, how much does my beautiful Mom look like Jackie-O in this picture!?

Another aside, this piece of sassiness.

It was so special for me to have these precious boys in my own house. (Me and Holden.)

And of course to have some time with Janet. No matter how far we live from each other and how long it’s been since we’ve seen each other I always feel like we step right back into our friendship. That’s special! Here we are with all of our children! My how things have changed!

After Janet and the boys left Lily was truly sad. She came out of her room after bedtime to ask me, on the verge of tears, when we could go and visit them. And then she wrote them this note.

In case you can’t read it, it says:
I love you Teddy, I will really miss you Teddy, and miss Holden. But I know in my heart that they will miss me too. (Punctuation and spelling corrected by me.) Can you say precious!

Today’s Ambition: Guess we need to plan a trip to DC!

April 1, 2013

Snow-Mask

Posted by The Ambitious Mrs under Sports, Vacay
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We headed to Snowmass (or Snow-Mask as April calls it) for Spring Break last week. I was a little bent out of shape about spending SPRING break there, I was just feeling a little OVER the snow. I wanted to be on a beach for Spring Break, but we’ll have to save that for another year. It didn’t help that the drive up took longer then the already long 5.5 hours we expected, clocking in at 7 hours after being stuck on Vail pass when it was closed for an hour due to an accident. But we finally made it (the girls did great) and headed right out to ski on our first full day.

Colin and Lily on the bus to the slopes.

For the first time, we put Lily in a ski lesson and I think it was well worth it. It helped get her off on the right foot without lame old Mom and Dad telling her what to do. Here is Lily going down the bunny slope on the first day.

She got the hang of it in a hurry and made some amazing progress! She proceeded to ski all four days we were there, the remaining three days all with Dad and Grandpa. She was skiing greens and riding the real lifts! No surprise, she was an animal and could have kept skiing for days!

April was another story. We let her try skiing for the first time and she was very excited about it. It was all smiles on the way up the magic carpet.