"M is for Emma!"

I think Miah has a thing for the letter M. It's always the first letter he picks out from a picture of the alphabet. Anyway, tonight the kids were hanging out in our room (by "our" I mean all 4 of us! haha. Em's crib is by our bed & Miah still sleeps w/ us...which is TOTALLY fine by me! I like how we end up looking like a human "H" in the morning. haha) and I pointed out a picture of a snail on his pajamas and so he started sounding out an "s". After that he started saying "m. m. m" then this comes out of his mouth..."M is for Emma!" Jenner & I just laughed and corrected him, but I thought that was pretty clever for a 2yo. haha. Anyway, after that I tell him, "D is for Daddy!" and he repeats me. Then I say, "M is for Mommy!" and he says, "M is for ...DAD!" ya, he calls me dad. He calls Jenner, daddy. gotta love him!

btw, Happy 6th Birthday to my niece, Keilani!!! Love you! -Auntie Jen

Happy Birthday Mikaela!

today's my niece Mikaela's 13th birthday! i can't believe she's 13 already! it seems like only yesterday i got to witness my sister give birth to her! that was one of the greatest experiences of my life! back then my mom and i used to live with my sister, Donna, and her husband, Rex, in a house we rented by the two story McDonalds on paradise valley rd (if you're from east side you definitely know the area i'm talking about! haha). i think it was on mesa vista way or something like that. anyway, i had class that morning at southwestern college and when i got home my mom told me that my sister went into labor and Rex's friend, Jojo took her to the hospital. i remember Rex coming home from his job at the Catamaran all calm- mom was laughing at how calm he was and tried to hurry him up to go to the hospital. haha.

i'm not sure how i got to the hospital, but it seemed like we were waiting for mikaela to make her debut for a loooonnnggg time, so rex and i walked to a fast food restaurant across the street from the hospital to get some food. i secretly didn't wanna go cause i was afraid we were gonna miss something, but at the same time i was really hungry! :)

when we came back, my sisters back was really hurting bad and she had this tennis ball to massage her back. she had me pushing that tennis ball against her lower back so hard i was sweating! haha
anyway, when it was finally go time, we got in position-rex on my sisters right side, me on her left side with a camera and stine up by her head with the video camera! oh ya, and jojo was behind the curtain. lol
then we saw the top of mik's head! oh boy, did i lose it! tears kept filling my eyes and i couldn't wipe them with my hands so i had to blink so fast to get them out! it was amazing! i finished the whole roll of film just taking pictures of her when they moved her under the heater; i forgot to leave some for a family picture! luckily there was extra film.

later that day everyone came to the hospital. mg lynne saw me and asked me how it went and i just started crying! i couldn't even describe how awesome it was to see her birth! i can't believe that was 13 years ago! and now she's a teen! how time flies!

Happy Birthday Mik! I love you! -Auntie/Ninang Jen

cousin bonding

This past weekend the kids and I went to visit my sister and her family up in Corona. The four of us had gone up for a couple hours last weekend and since then Jeremiah's had been asking for "Kai's house" everyday. Jenner worked that weekend and had to stay home, so I packed up the kids and drove up during naptime. I think Jeremiah was too excited cause we were already past Temecula when he finally fell asleep. Our cousin Stine and her family came up as well. It turned out to be a great family bonding weekend!

Everyone got there on Friday afternoon and we decided to stay in for dinner. I cooked some fish tacos and my sis made some turkey lettuce wraps (yummy!) Saturday the mom's went out to get a haircut (thanks to my sis for treating Stine & I) then we sneaked over to Berrysweet (thanks Mg Stine) for some yummy yogurt (don't tell Kiana cause she sooo wanted some Berrysweet that weekend). Anyway, that night we ALL went bowling! It was the first time for Jeremiah and luckily I got to capture his excitement with a photo. I guess we were having so much fun bowling and playing in the arcade that we didn't leave till almost 11pm! Luckily Mg. Lynne got to come by the house that night to partake in Mg. Stine's de-li-cious graham cracker/brownie/marshmallow dessert! It was so yummy that we made her make it again on Sunday! haha.