Summer days

When I think about summers as a child, I recall many days spent playing at home, going to swim lessons and heading to the beach (thanks to my mom's love of tanning). We had simple summers. Rarely did we sign up for any camps--in fact, I only recall going to Zoo camp once. I've always looked back on my childhood summers as some of the best times of my childhood. I credit my mom for not over scheduling us. She let us be bored. She let us dig holes in the yard and play in the sprinklers. She let us read books upon books and (gasp!) watch tv if we wanted to. It was the best. 

Now with kids of my own, I strive to allow my kids the freedom to be bored. To invent new games. To dig holes in our yard. To run in the sprinkler (okay, maybe not that one because-drought). But you get it--I haven't scheduled them for every camp known to man (although at some point of each day I think of how nice it would be to have them out of my hair), nor have we gone on and elaborate trips or visited many pay-per-visit playgrounds or museums.

 We wake up in the morning and choose what we want to do. Sometimes this means we stay in pjs watching a Scooby Doo til ten, and others it means we throw on our tank tops and shorts  and head to the park at the beach. Sometimes we pack lunches, and others we stop for corn dogs at weinerschnitzel before heading home for naps. 

Our backyard has seen my kids playing in it from sun up til sun down. Our skateboards and scooters have had mileage put on them  (can't say the same for Sal's two wheeler- he's still not game for trying) as they race down the sidewalks looking for treasures aka bottle caps. The kids have assembled a balance beam out of unused 2x4's and they tiptoe down the beam so "alligators don't get them". 

We've gone through countless boxes of Popsicles and bandaids. We've done two sessions of swim lessons and finally have a child who's happy to submerge his face under water. We've got a sixteen month old who practices his climbing skills on our back wall, and a two year old who learned a "booty bounce" on their trampoline. 

All of this in thanks to our simple summer.   They've had the freedom to float from one thing to another as their little mind changes from one idea to another. 

They're just kids being kids...enjoying summer. 

2016 US gymnastics Olympic trials

Back in 2012, I had made a pact with a few of my former teammates to meet up at the 2012 Olympic trials which were to be held in San Jose, CA. We thought it would be a good place to have a mini reunion and catch some phenomenal gymnastics together. 

And wouldn't you know, after months of anticipation of meeting up with my girls, it was official, we'd be moving the first weekend in June to our new home in China. 

The same weekend as trials. 

I had to pass up the reunion-- while sad about not seeing some familiar old faces before I jetted cross the world, I was excited to get to China and find out what our new life had in store for us. 

When we moved back to California last year, I found out that the 2016 Olympic trials for women's gymnastics were going to be in San Jose again. 

Score!

I got to work wrangling up a few of my besties and we ordered tickets last summer....and then we waited and waited and waited for the next 10 months to pass. 

You guys, I had so much fun. I mean--more fun than I've had in a long long time. Nick manned the troops at home while I got away for the long weekend. 

Friday night was the preliminary round. I had an extra ticket in my purse and happened to run into one of my former competitors from when we were level 9's just trying to make it to a college team. Turned out she didn't have a ticket, so she bought my extra and we got to catch up sitting next to each other night one.  It was such a fun surprise to see her after twenty years!

       Friends since 10th grade- reunited!

Our seats were great! Right in front of bars with a great view of floor and vault. There were lots of nervous mistakes made by many (even Simone!!) but the level of difficulty coming from these teen girls is unbelievable. Simone's difficulty could outdo the men. For someone 4 foot nothing, she is amazing. Perhaps more than the top five televised girls ( Simone, gabby, aly, Laurie and ragan), I enjoyed watching the other seven phenoms that rounded out the competitor field. Here these girls were at the pinnacle of their elite career, having made Olympic trials, and most of America would never know their name. It's such a shame. 

        B   MyKayla Skinner- bars 

Saturday started at the crack of dawn, grabbing breakfast with my old teammate & trials roommate, Holly, before heading into the convention hall to put in a full day working at the GK elite wear booth. 

Working at the GK booth paid off! So many former Olympians and gymnastics-famous people came through. I don't tend to get star struck, but I did sweet talk Amanda Borden of the 1996 Mag 7 into a photo. 

Pics of her may or may not have covered my younger self's walls 

               My Jamie, love her. 

The day was a flutter of lots of little gymnasts running around in search of their idols to take a selfie with (how times have changed!) or have them sign a leotard. I remember those days (my coach took us to the 1991 world championships-a trip I will never forget) so vividly. It made me smile seeing another generation of girls so excited about the sport. 

 Met this one the 1st day of college practice and have been friends ever since 

Saturday night was dinner with another former roommate/ teammate, and a parade of Olympians. Over 100 former Olympic gymnasts dating back from 1950 were in attendance. Scotty McCreary, Kathrine McPhee and some Disney star put on a concert. I loved seeing my one time idols up on stage. 

Sunday gave me my first opportunity to sleep in sans kids since the birth of Sal!!!!! You better believe it enjoyed it. After a leisurely morning and hotel gym workout,

I met up with more teammates for a lunch gathering before finals. 

       Go Aggies! Gymnastics reunion. 

    Dawn, Jen & me- finals

While I had to leave finals early to make the drive home, what I saw was amazing.  Most of the nerves had been worked out, and Simone scored a near perfect vault score. A phone call from my girlfriend confirmed the team selected for me, and while the team selected didn't immediately make sense to me (Maggie Nichols wasn't even selected as an alternate despite the meet of her career), I get it now, and can not wait til August 7th and seeing the new fab 5 in Rio!

Anddddd, your 2016 Olympic team (+ Alts): Ashton, Aly, Madison, Gabby, Laurie, Mykayla, Simone and Ragan. 

Camping {in a tent}

I'm alive! 

We're alive!

We just completed our first camping trip with kids in tow. Before kids, NZ and I would camp at least once a year, but a move overseas and having babies have stalled camping trips up until now.

We joined a couple of Nick's cousins at Jalama beach last Sunday and stayed through late Thursday night. I admit, I was a buzzkill for a good portion of the trip. It wasn't dirty kids that got me stressing-it was the heat and long term exposure to the direct sun that we had overlooked when planning this trip. An easy fix for next time will to bring an easy up / canopy so that we can escape the sun without having to hunker down in our tent or search for shade trees on the camp ground. 

The older kids had so much fun galavanting around the campground with their cousin. They spent hours on the beach, digging for sand crabs, making drip castles and fishing with their dad. Gino spent a lot of time eating sand and battling yellow jackets (next time we will bring yellow jacket traps) but I think he still enjoyed getting dirty and following the big kids around. 

Naptimes were tough-I finally figured out that wearing Gino was the only way we could guarantee at least an hour of midday rest for the littlest guy. We brought our pack and play, which is later transfer him into if our tent wasn't too hot. Carla and Sal enjoyed snow cones and playground tag every afternoon with all the kids at the campground. 

We split dinner duties with the other two couples. It was nice to only have to prepare dinners a couple times! 

Now we're back and unpacked and trying to catch up on missed sleep. We've also got chapped, wind / sunburned faces, but a whole lot of memories to go along with it. 

Carla, lately.

Current age: 2 years, 5 months 

My sweet little sass is starting "school" this month! It's just one morning a week, for 90 minutes, but she can't wait! She's been asking to go since she turned two, but I used potty training as leverage, telling her she couldn't go until she wore skivvies. She took it to heart and has been day trained for the last month. She still poops outside, but that's another story. 

She wants to do everything Sal does, whether it be riding skateboards or building a Lego house. Her Lego houses are always horsey houses- built for her horse figurines she totes around in her backpack everywhere we go. 

Carla loves to sing " twinkle twinkle" and " you are my sunshine", which she just calls "sunshine song". She will tell me to be quiet when I sing in the car, and has no shame in telling us to "turn dat song ooooooff!" followed with her request that I play "widing duty" (riding dirty). 

While she still follows Sal around with admiring eyes, she's developing quite the mischievous relationship with Gino. They're my little Bonnie + Clyde. Double trouble, partners in crime. It's fun to watch how she balances the little sister and big sister roles. With Sal, she does the grunt work. Anything he tells her to do, she does. When she's with Gino she gets to test out her bossy voice and assert her place in the sibling chain.

She loves to wake G up in the morning, so earlier this week, she asked to wake him while I was still in bed. I told her she could go in and play with him while I got out of bed and dressed. A few minutes later I walked into a butt pasted crib and kids. Lesson learned. Never, ever trust a toddler.  

Especially when they're this cute!

Carla Denise, thanks for keeping us on our toes and adding some sweet sass to our household. You ARE my sunshine. 

School is out for summer

As of last Friday, Sal is officially on summer break and looking forward to beginning the preK program in fall. 

He may not have grown a lot this last year, size wise, but his speech has improved and he has a knack for puzzles and pattern making. He can write his name (but won't), and he recognizes most of the letters in the alphabet and can sound out the majority of them. 

He loves all things scientific--choosing to watch "How it's Made" and YouTube videos of wastewater treatment plants over cartoons these days. He's enamored with manhole covers and storm drains and nothing makes his day more than figuring out how things work. 

He and Carla have a special friendship, that is somewhat love/hate but mostly love. They play for hours on our upper terrace, digging dirt and playing make believe. 

Four is a fine balance of emotional meltdowns and quirky conversations. We talk about life, friends, sewers, cats, when he was a baby, and everything else under the sun. I love listening to his chatter. The flip side is dealing with meltdowns and his emerging sense of embarrassment following said meltdown. If we are in public and he realizes people may see him (say, we are on our way to school drop off), he tries to suck his quivering lip up and get himself together because "I don't want them to see me cry, mama." A few deep breaths and a knock knock joke later, he usually redeems himself and we get on with our day. At home though-it's no holds barred. Tantrums go on and on and on.  That's tough. It's the only part of four I'd like to fast forward through. The rest of it is so much fun. 

He's still working on riding a two wheel bike (he realllly doesn't want to-but we keep trying), and he has been more tolerant and receptive to swim lessons this summer. He put his whole face in the water today--that's HUGE for a kid who spends all morning on swim lesson days lamenting over having to go to swim lessons later. 

I'm looking forward into soaking up summer with him and joining our local library's summer reading program. While it's nice to have him busy three mornings a week during the school year, I am happy to have a break from school drop offs and having to get out the door on time. 

Here's to summertime!

Gus

Meet Gus. 

Our new kitty joined the family last week. His mama was a rescued feral (pregnant at time of rescue), and I called dibs on a kitten before they were even born. 

We scored well with our first feral rescue, Earl, and as you can see, our kids can't get enough of him. We thought adding one more might give Earl a break from the endless pats, scruff carrying, tail pulling and chasing our kids seem to put him through on the daily. 

Welcome to the family, Gus! 

The one before

I've long pondered how much I wanted to/ should tell my kids about the one that came before them. I've read my fellow baby loss mom's blogs and realized that we all have our own level of comfort in talking about our losses to our children. 

I've always released balloons for Denise on her birthday (which is coming up quick). Sal has always been a part of it, and Carla was present, but not a participant last year. With another balloon release on the horizon, I wondered if they would ask questions this time, since they are older (and Sal is very inquisitive). 

Sal and I have had discussions in passing about Heaven (which he actually thinks is someone named Kevin's house in the clouds), but being that we aren't religious at all, I kind of just stopped at ,"Heaven is a place we like to think that good people go when they die." He seems okay with that, and actually named some of our deceased relatives and told me they're at Kevin's. 

Perfect. 

I have talked about Denise here and there over the years. We have a few " D" ornaments for our Christmas tree, and there's a few keepsake pieces of jewelry in my jewelry box with her initials that he's asked about. 

He knows his mom and dad had a baby before him, and that the baby wasn't healthy enough to stay alive and come home. He knows we let balloons go on her birthday in hopes that they reach her in Heaven and let her know we love her always. But that's it. He's never seen any tangible evidence of this said "big sister". 

Until last night. 

I keep baby books for my kids. They're up in our linen closet, stored just a bit higher than my fingers can reach. Last night Sal asked to see his baby book as we scrolled through my Instagram feed reminiscing on all the good times we've caught on camera...I could just barely get my fingers on the book, and as I pulled it out, all of my albums fell down at our feet. Sal helped me pick them up and put them back away, and asked me about each book as he handed them to me (yes, before the era of iPhones, we actually took pictures, developed them and arranged them in albums...I've got scrapbooks upon scrapbooks of mama 'fore she was mama). He came across one with a Z in the little square frame on front and opened it. 

He saw little footprints and asked if they were Gino's. 

" No, honey. Those are Denise's footprints."

"Mama, they're so small!"

"Mama, what's this? (Pointing at her ultrasound pictures)...is this Denise in your belly?"

"Yes, that is a picture of her in my belly."

"When she was alive,mama?"

"Yes, when she was alive."

"But then she died because she was sick, right mama?"

"Yes, baby. She was sick"

" But not me, right mama? I'm healthy. That's why I'm alive."

"Yes, honey." 

"Good. Cause I don't want to go to Kevin's without you."

***conversation over because I couldn't contain my laughter at his mention of Kevin, yet again ***

So yeah, we're getting through life after loss, and I suppose this is what it looks like while explaining it to a four year old, seven years later.

 I'm not sure if I'm doing it right, or if there really even is a right way to teach kids about life and loss. I'm just letting my kids lead and I will follow. While there are many people who would try to protect their kids from the ugliness of life, I feel like age appropriate discussions will keep conversation going as they get older and have more questions--at least that's my hope!

And on this Mother's Day, where I feel more than lucky to have my three healthy babies here on earth, I miss the one that made me a mother first.