The Girls

Photos fresh off of Lauren Bavin's camera, down in New Zealand!

Almost all of the crop attendees: The lovely ladies I work with:
We rarely see each other in person, yet we instantly connect and hilarity ensues. Such a strange thing, this Internet community. We know so many intimate details about virtual strangers. It makes it so easy to gather and work incredibly well together, as if it were a daily occurrence. Thank you, ladies (both Team members and DSP community), for a FABULOUS weekend! I can't wait for the next one!

Wild Times in California

After a long nine hour drive, I started my weekend with a delightful visit to see these two adorable red-heads. Oh, and their equally adorable parents, too! Not at all long enough, but luckily, they'll be heading up to Oregon in a couple of weeks, so we'll have more time to play together. This morning, the doors opened and nearly 100 digital scrapbookers swarmed the Adobe building with their laptops, cameras, and chocolate!
We've had some great focus groups with Adobe product designers, a presentation from a Wacom project manager, and tutorials from DSP designers. Oh, and did I mention there was dancing?

I have heard a rumor about a video showing up on the DSP blog later. That's a trifle frightening.

More later, I'm sure!

Edit to add: Nope, it's on YouTube, yipee! http://www.youtube.com/user/NicoleYoung01

Happy Birthday, Baby Boy!

My baby is five today.
My BABY is five today.

My BABY is FIVE today!!!!!!

How the heck did that happen?

Putting the "Ro" in Romantic!

Jason came home Wednesday afternoon for a couple of days off before leaving early this morning for a month-long school in California. Wednesday evening, we all went to our weekly swim night, had a great time. Wednesday night, Emma came in our room with a stomach ache.

And then proceeded to vomit for the rest of the night.

Oh, and did I mention that I decided to join in on the excitement? Yup. A good twelve hours of vomiting, followed by another 24 or so of mostly unconsciousness, equals quality family time! Emma's doctor diagnosed probable Rotavirus, a thrilling blend of nausea and exhaustion. So, Jason's two and a half days off were filled with keeping [ahem] buckets emptied & clean, keeping George occupied, and keeping food smells away from Emma & me. Fun times!

I've felt better since yesterday afternoon, but Emma is just now (Saturday afternoon) emerging voluntarily from the bedroom to eat a bite or two. (Literally, just a bite or two. She ate NOTHING yesterday and maybe three grapes the day before. She weighs less than 40 pounds. Need I mention that I've been a bit stressed about her blood sugar levels?)

So, Jason is gone for a month after caring for (and possibly being infected by) two very sick girls. But, oh, am I grateful he was here!

As I start to reclaim the house, catch up on chores, and, oh yeah, prepare for my trip next week, I thought I'd leave you with a wonderful time waster. Enjoy!

Later in the day

Due to the fact that George did, indeed, let me back into the house with a minimum of cajoling, I have removed the Ebay listing. HOWEVER, I reserve the right to put it back up at any time!

While George is at school in the mornings these days, Emma has been taking swimming lessons. She's the type of child that wants badly to succeed and, if she thinks she won't, she'd rather not try. Last summer she didn't enjoy lessons and was in with a too big a group for their abilities. More time was spent sitting on the side of the pool than actually in the water. So she didn't do so well. I left it up to her whether we'd try again this year. She nervously voted yes and off we went Monday for the first lesson.

She has a GREAT teacher, a small class, and only four days into it, she's already doing so much better than before. (And really, she's a fish, loves the water, just needed to learn actual techniques to get her to the next step.) Best of all are the smiles I see all the way through the class and the excited chatter I hear afterward.

Maybe having a little too much fun?
Her class, the little red-head next to her is her new buddy. He has a ever-present wide grin and reminds me so much of my nephew. They giggle through the entire class while his mom and I chat. They'll be going to VBS together later in the summer, a happy coincidence!
Trying to coordinate kicking, using "big arms", and coming up for air every third stroke. Not easy, but she's still smiling!

Online sales

George and I just had a delightful conversation. It went something like this:

scene: Me, outside pulling swimsuits and towels off the clothesline. George, standing in the doorway, watching and playing with the door.

George: Bye, Mommy!

Me: George, if you lock me out, so help me, I'll sell you on Ebay!

George: click

The end.

Obligatory Fireworks Photos

Well, sparkler photos anyway! This was George's first 4th of July where we allowed him to handle sparklers and he had a great time. Nearly set his hair on fire at one point, but all was good. Poor guy was kind of confused though. We pulled a bunch of confetti poppers, did a lot of cheering, and afterward he asked for cake. Huh? Well, he thought we were celebrating a birthday (which, yes, we were, in a way), and a birthday to George means CAKE! Luckily, there was one cupcake left from my birthday the week before, so it was an easy way to get him inside and off to bed before the sun completely set and the loud celebrations began.

Most of the photos from that point on are pretty dark and blurry, but I got a couple that I liked:

We did some fun spinning, jumping, colorful, noisy fireworks, too, but my hands were too busy being held over Emma's ears to get any pictures. (By the way, fireworks are legal in Oregon, no laws were broken in the making of this blog post.)

After we were done, we all went upstairs to watch fireworks from our living room window that looks over the city. A spectacular evening for all of us.

We won't mention the tantrums due to a-severe-change-in-routine-and-lack-of-sleep we dealt with the next morning. Nope, not one word.

Happy 4th!!!

It doesn't get dark here until 10 pm, so the kids won't see too many fireworks, but we have sparklers ready to go as soon as the sun starts to set! Hope you all are having a wonderful holiday! (Or a wonderful Friday, for you non-American types!)

Yay for holidays!

Daddy gets to come home early this week! We're all looking forward to seeing him tonight.

So far, it's a bit rough, but I think that the lack of schedule is most to blame. Yesterday saw all of us crying at some point (yes, including me) and a lot of screaming, pouting, whining, and fighting. (Really, just the crying and a bit of shouting from me, I promise!) But that's okay. I learned a lot from yesterday. And this morning, I signed Emma up for swimming lessons that start next week. And made sure everything was in order for George's summer school that starts up next week. And planned lots of activities to get us through today.

Busy. We will stay busy.

Other than scheduling, the other difficulties we're encountering are George's reactions to stress and change, and our eating habits. George reverts back to his old habits of physical violence when he's stressed. Lots of hitting and pulling Emma's hair. No fun, but we're working on it. And the kids' eating habits haven't changed all that much, but I'm finding myself eating a lot of cereal or cheese & crackers. It's so not worth it to cook a full meal for only me. Going to have to plan on making double batches of everything when Jason's home, so that I'll have leftovers available during the week. I'm really looking forward to the full spaghetti dinner with salad I have planned for tonight. Yum!

Sorry there aren't any pretty pictures to share today. My camera has been dead since last week, just got new batteries today. Plus, my hands have been pretty full keeping kids separated!

New Pages

From the July DSP Newsletter (sign up to receive it and read my monthly articles!):