kelly lynn creations

dinosaurs are not extinct!

Last week, my son announced that "dinosaurs are not extinct"! At bedtime, the kiddo will often beg his Dad to tell him a story about when he was a kid. Hubby is very good at this - I'm beginning to think he should write children's books. The kid is completely enthralled when he is storytelling.

At some point, hubby explained that he and his sister had dug a big hole in their backyard and they found dinosaurs. When the kid made his announcement to me, I followed right along.

The kid is roaring in laughter as the hubby spins yet another tale...

swimming

We are looking forward to some more lessons from Dad. 

the mouse

A few weeks ago, I grabbed a bag of sunflower seeds out of our pantry in the garage. After I poured what I needed into my recipe, I realized that there was a strange hole in the bag. I quickly realized that a mouse had gotten into it. Bummer, I had to throw out my batch of energy bars.

My husband set out a couple of traps and then noticed that the little stinker was managing to eat the bait without getting caught. Hubby then went out and bought another brand of traps and kept meaning to set them out. After the little bugger chewed the foam in the kids car seat, it was war. I set all four of our traps and put peanut butter in all of them. I was quite hopeful that the mouse would be caught by the time hubby came home. No such luck.

Apparently, hubby saw the mouse again this morning and he is convinced that the little bugger not only looked right at him, but that he is bigger then he was the last time he saw him. I'm just happy I haven't seen him yet, I would scream like a little girl for sure!

I added cubed cheddar cheese to all of the traps and I'm hopeful we will catch him soon. If you have any tips, please leave me a comment. I'm running out of room in my kitchen pantry...

a lovely evening

We really enjoyed spending time at the winery and especially at the B&B with the owners. They gave as a tour of where they create their own wine and we even were able to share a few glasses of their creation - it was excellent. If only we had an extra $1.65 million to buy their B&B and their property (They are growers for several local wineries in the area).

10 years ago...

     
That's right, we are celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary today. Can you believe it!

We are going to celebrate by visiting the winery where hubby proposed and stopping by the Bed and Breakfast where we spent the weekend after we got engaged. We will top off the evening at our our favorite Italian restaurant. where we celebrated our engagement and our 5th wedding anniversary (which coincidentally was the day we found out that our son was on his way).

I had every intention of finishing a scrapbook album, covering the last 10 years of our marriage. It has been quite a process getting photos from every year in a digital format so I could do a 'simple' digital album. I'm hoping to get it completed within the next few weeks...

wine bar + gelato = date night

We went to a local wine bar for our date night and had a nice evening sipping wine and nibbling on a cheese platter. It was a nice change of scenery for both of us. We each selected their "Take Flight" wine sampling. Hubby had a sampling of three local Pinot Noirs and I sampled three Sangioveses from Tuscany. I started with the Montevertine Pian del Ciampolo 05, then had Rocca di Montegrossi Chianti Classico 04 and ended with La Spinetta II Nero de Casanova 05.

The Montevertine Pian del Ciampolo 05 was my favorite. By the time I got to the third glass, it tasted pretty good too! Apparently they split a normal glass of wine across three glasses to give you a sampling. I thought they were fairly good portions, but definitely not 3 full glasses of wine. For $15, I thought it was pretty reasonable.

We ended the evening at my favorite gelato spot for a quick dessert before heading home. I couldn't resist their italian hot chocolate, too - it's like drinking chocolate. By the time we got home, the kiddo was fast asleep. Gotta love that!

date night

Over the past few years we have solely relied on family members or close friends to watch our son. Whenever the opportunity presented itself, we would go out for a date night.

In looking for a babysitter we really wanted someone that was in college. We also wanted to have a referral from someone that personally knew the babysitter. After having an initial meet and greet last week at the house we officially 'booked' the sitter for last night.

Hubby picked out a great restaurant which neither of us had been to before and we both enjoyed an evening out. It was a nice bonus that we were able to complete our thoughts during dinner without our son interrupting us. It has become nearly impossible to do this at home any more.

We didn't get any phone calls while we were out and everything was under control when we got home. When we asked our son if he would like to have the babysitter come back he said "Yep". Well, initially he said Mommy and Daddy have to stay home next time. Hmm, that isn't part of the plan buddy...

a day in the city

We spent black Friday in San Francisco. My husband made a huge sacrifice and decided he could forgo his annual trip to Ameoba records. (Actually, no one else wanted to go.) Over the years he would go into the city with my Dad, Uncle, brother and cousin and they would spend up to 3 hours at Amoeba. Yikes! It was no wonder I would stay at Granny's...

We started off at the Ferry Building and then met up with some friends to meet their new baby girl. She was adorable and we had a great time catching up. I did manage to have some time to browse around the Ferry Building. I could have spent all day there.

We ended up having lunch at Sens with my brother and his wife and it was delicious. When I asked for gluten free items, the waitress actually handed me the marked up menu that gluten-free girl had ordered from a few weeks earlier. It made me realize how careful people have to be when they have to avoid gluten. The hot chocolate with a homemade honey marshmellow was by far my favorite. It was an added bonus being able to spend some quality time with my big brother and his lovely wife.

boys will be boys...

Last Christmas, Santa gave our son a drum set. The kid has played it almost daily. It is usually the first thing he does when he wakes up. Not only is he interested, but the dude has rhythm. I can remember him banging on drums when he was just a little over a year old. We have no idea where he gets his musical talent. It's clearly not from his parents.

Apparently, he has outgrown his current "toy" drum set. He has been asking for more drums and cymbals to play. (I can only imagine where he gets these ideas.) My husband has been doing a lot of research on this topic and was convinced we needed to take a family outing to the Guitar Center. My husband was told he could probably put the system together in about an hour. I think he easily has 3 hours into the project and I haven't heard anything yet. I'm really glad we didn't save this for Christmas Eve, it would have been a long night...

I will post pics of the boys with their new drums soon. Normally this kind of purchase would set me over the edge. But, I have to admit it is pretty adorable how the two of them "jam" together. With the new system we will be able to control the volume and that will be worth every penny. Oh, did I mention that hubby said "This set will last him for 10 years." I am going to have him put that in writing...

gotta love Oktoberfest

We have some great local Oktoberfest festivities around town. Our son loves music, so I figured it would be a great way to entertain him and do something a little different. It doesn't hurt that I have always loved a great Oktoberfest. It's always fun to see people all dressed up in their lederhosen!

Both of the bands we saw had drummer's, which was the highlight from my son. They also had a tuba, accordions, trumpet, keyboard and a violin. When I asked our son what was his favorite instrument he quickly replied, "All of them."

The first band did polka songs and at one point my son actually asked me to dance with him on the dance floor. That didn't last long, but I did appreciate the invite. Then the had the Tyrolean Dancers perform several tradition dances. Before each dance they would explain what the dance was about, it was a lot of fun to watch.