chocolate-y goodness

we waited quite a while before having Molly try her first chocolate. her father has a bit of a chocolate problem, it's his only vice really, so i think he was a little reluctant to start her on the habit. plus it's one of those high allergen foods...so we waited.

i was finally able to convince Zero that chocolate would not lead Molly down the road to ruin and we decided it was time. she was a year and a half, and we wanted her first chocolate to be really special, so we made her some homemade chocolate mouse (with a glass of milk of course). my mom was visiting at the time, and we kinda made it this big deal. the mouse was amazing, we thought, she'll LOVE it! but, it was a very so-so reaction (see to the left). so i figured well, she won't be that into chocolate, and that's not a bad thing....ha!

like her father, she LOVES the stuff now. actually, i blame my colleagues at work (you know who you are!) who like to take her out to ice cream every once and a while. the last time they went, she got chocolate, and it's been "chocolate, chocolate, chocolate!" ever since. here she is very much enjoying her ice cream cone (also see above). oh, and by the way ladies, it took her days to come down from that sugar high!

anything chocolate will do. chocolate bunny cookies, chocolate cupcakes (see below), ice cream...you name it, if it's chocolate (or as she sometimes calls it, "black") she'll try it. like father, like daughter!

the May's

yeesh, it's already been a month, but we went to visit the May's in early-September, and we actually stayed for more than just a weekend and it was so much fun. we got to spend some serious time with the family, and Molly loved every minute of it.

we spent our first day there at uncle John and auntie Laurie's place, which is beautiful! once Molly woke up from her nap (she fell asleep on the way over from the airport) we fed apples to the deer, we had a most delicious lunch, and we ran around the front yard with all the dogs. Molly loves her uncle John so much, and they played together lots. i didn't have older siblings growing up, but uncle John was like a big brother to me and watching he and Molly play reminded me again of all the great times i had playing with him growing up (and still do!). the times he would let me wrap my arms around his neck and he'd swim me across the pool under water. the times he would tickle me mercilessly. the time he caught me spraying whip cream into my mouth straight from the canister...uncle John is one the greatest guys out there, and Molly is very lucky to have him as her uncle too! here is a little slideshow of them playing together.


we also got to spend a day at Papa (Molly's great-grandfather) and Sharon's house in San Jose. once again, we showed up with Molly asleep but she didn't stay asleep for long and she woke up to more amazing food (the May's really can cook!). we went for rides in the golf cart and saw ducks and geese and horses. we played with our tricycle in the driveway. and we helped Papa feed the birds. it means so much to me that Molly knows her Papa, and my hope is that someday soon Papa, uncle John, Molly and i can all go camping together - and they can teach her the ropes - how to set up a tent, how to fish, and all that good stuff!!


we had a BBQ at my mom's for Labor Day and the whole family came. Grandma Nancy had decked the place out with a new play kitchen for Molly and a sandbox. Molly loved whipping up some food in her new kitchen (with real working faucet), and she loved getting sand everywhere while playing in the sandbox. so basically, we had "Molly TV" where we all watched her play and run around. Zero got right in the ol' sandbox with her, which was pretty cute. and after more scrumptious food, we had cake in an early celebration of both my and molly's birthdays.


the next day we went to the Monterrey Bay Aquarium and had such a good time! thankfully Grandma's cell phone takes a pretty decent picture, because we all forgot our cameras. we saw otters, and penguins, and sharks. we touched star fish. we stood under a crashing wave. what a fantastic place!


we also managed to squeeze in dinner with the LAHS (Los Altos High School) crew while we were there. below is a shot of us all hanging out at Sandra and Jason's place.


and Molly was an amazing traveler, once again. that girl is so flexible and ready to have fun. it's such a pleasure doing these things with her and that's saying something because i am a bit of a freak about traveling. so the fact that i can do it with a toddler in tow, and have fun! well, she is obviously someone very, very special!

hip, hip, hurray for the Mays!

best birthday EVER

we just got back from a wonderful trip to california to see the May side of the family, and i'm working on a post with lots of great pics and stories from that trip. but in the meantime it's my birthday, and yesterday Molly gave me the best birthday present ever!

it turns out that when my mom was here a while back taking care of Molly, they had some craft time and Molly made me the present you see above. she painted the little pot and Grandma helped with the picture holders and it's just totally awesome! thank you Molly!! and thank you Grandma!

also, Molly has taken the boring old "happy birthday" song you've all heard a million times before and added her own twist on it! here you go!

ya gotta admit, there's nothing better than an adorable, almost-two-year-old in Thomas the Train undies giving a birthday serenade! like i said, best birthday ever!

that girl's got talent!

Molly's both a visual and performance artist, really, and quite talented at both.

the picture above is taken of her with one of her many works of art. this one was created while visiting her friend Karen (who had the biggest pad o' paper you've ever seen!). i think i've mentioned before that Molly's not one to have her picture taken, but lately she's been getting into the "smile" thing. so i posed her with her masterpiece and said "smile" and after a while, she totally hammed it up, which is why i'm including a slideshow of the rest of the pictures, cuz they're just too cute. especially with her in her tres fashionable training pants - gotta love it!

and then there is the singing! first it was "Old MacDonald" and "Wheels on the Bus", then we moved into "Twinkle Twinkle" and "ABCs", and last week it was nothing by "Bah, Bah, Black Sheep" 24/7. she does her best work in the bath but we waited till she got in her jammies and then filmed.

honestly, i'm surprised she went for this at all. usually we pull out the camera and she totally clams up. or demands to see the camera. in fact we've got about 5 mini-videos before this one of her singing for about 5 seconds, and then demanding to see the camera. i love how in this particular video she starts off really strong (and loud!) - and you can see the shadow of Zero waving his arms around to her singing - then suddenly she realizes, what a second...i'm being filmed! with a little encouragement from dad she rallies, and adds in some dancing, but then quickly gets distracted by the vent in the door. it's all so Molly. enjoy!

keeping grandma on her toes!

after our trip to Minnesota, i was out of vacation time and Zero needed to stay behind to help with some things, so Molly and i returned sans Zero and Grandma Nancy came up to help us out for a week and really saved the day. my mom planned it perfectly and we all landed and met at the airport on Friday afternoon and headed home together.

i have to admit, i was a bit concerned that living that crazy toddler lifestyle for five days in a row might be a bit too much for grandma - i mean Molly is the cutest and most precious thing ever, but she's exhausting too! but i misjudged the power of The Grandma, and not only was my mom totally and completely up for it, she was totally and completely awesome too! Molly had the time of her life AND i got updates via text message and pictures (why can't Zero do that?!). it would make my day to get a little picture of Molly in front of the local coffee shop having her milk and muffin with Grandma (left), or eating her Mac & Cheese with hot dogs for lunch, or an her way to the park sporting an adorable ponytail...my favorite pic was the one of her sitting on the potty...did i tell you all how great she is doing on the potty? i don't want to jinx anything, but she's been using the potty for #2 consistently since Minnesota, boo-ya! (another blog comment she's gonna kill me for later in life)

so yes, they had a great time together playing, reading, singing and dancing! not to mention the fashion shows...Molly's never dressed so well as she did during her week with grandma. the poor girl is used to getting thrown into a t-shirt and sweats pretty consistently by her dad...but with grandma it was cute skirts, tops, and sometimes even hats!

but the best was how every morning, Molly would wake up and the first thing she would ask about was Grandma, and then she would run out to see her, and usually crawl under the covers with her. big smiles on both their faces!

on my day off, we all went to the zoo! we mostly went for the train - Molly came back from Minnesota totally into trains - but we also got to see some pretty birds, and feed them, and pray they didn't poop on our heads. and we saw a tiger, and some farm animals, and the elephants (including the new baby, Samudra!) from the train. but other than that, we stood around at exhibits looking for animals that weren't there...we couldn't find a monkey or ape to save our life! ah well. Molly did find a very cute squirrel to pet (right).

the following Friday afternoon, Daddy came back. we all went to the airport to meet him and as soon as he rounded the corner and was within sight, Molly took off like a flash and ran to greet him. i wish i had gotten a little video of it, so fantastic. she so loves her daddy! and he so loves her (it was breaking his heart to be away from her for so long).

and look at the two of them, with their silly faces. this isn't the best quality picture, but you can see how they are two little peas from the very same pod. my family!

minny-sota

molly LOVES minnesota. she loves the water, she loves the boat, she loves the John Deere riding mower, she loves the old school Fisher-Price toys, she loves her aunts and uncle and grandma, and she especially loves, and worships, and copies in every way, her cousins! so lucky for her, she gets to go every summer (and hopefully some occasional winters) for the rest of her life.

we were the last group to make it up this year and just in time to see most of the family before they headed back to their individual necks of the wood. she had so much fun with her cousins. there was lots of legos, trains, pirates and sharks (along with a lot of "no! that's mine!" which ended up being one of Molly's favorite phrases, sigh). Molly has always had this eery ability to balance things on top of each other (except for herself that is, she falls all the time, even when standing on her own two feet on solid ground...ah, like mother like daughter), but she spent some quality time with the blocks and legos making super tall towers.

and there was much dancing and playing of music. her uncle Sean plays guitar which Molly thought was the coolest thing ever, and grandma Mike bought Guitar Hero for the Wii (yes, they have a Wii in the woods) and here is a picture of Molly on drums, cousins Declan on guitar and Ryan on vocals. what a band!

Molly also went a bit more classical and played piano with cousin Sinead (yes, there is also a piano in the woods...i'm telling ya, this place is posh!).


this summer for Molly was all about the hand-me-downs, being the youngest of the grandkids means we pretty much didn't have to bring any clothes for Molly. and her after-shower attire (on the left) was no exception. the Pooh robe has been passed down through the kids from the very first Feeney grandchild (Sara, now 15) and Molly kept the tradition going this year by sporting the cuteness after taking her showers. the cabin has an outdoor shower, which Molly thought was pretty much the best thing since sliced bread, and she asked for a shower almost every day. i got some great pics of her in the shower, but perhaps not appropriate for the blog. but i tell ya, that girl's got a fantastic physique!

the only thing that got more requests then the showers were "boat rides" and "jumping in the lake". we took a boat ride pretty much every other night. we would get suited up, to the right is one of the best nightly boat ensembles, with molly in her "boat coat" (aka life preserver), dinasour pjs (more hand-me-downs), skeleton hoodie (again from cousin Ryan) and pink sneakers - oh yeah! this year i got to do a lot of the driving, which was fun, and of course Molly helped. check out what a good boat driver she is!


regarding the "jumping in the lake", this was the coldest July on record in those parts, and the temperature of the lake water proved it! so we only got into the water a couple times, not that Molly didn't try. every time we walked outside she'd start beelining it for the lake, exclaiming "run and jump in the lake!" like all the other clothes she wore while there, her bathing suit was another hand-me-down and it was one of those awesome ones with the flotation device built in, which made her look like super man (picture on the left). look at how happy she is at the prospect of getting in the lake...and it was freezing!

the best day of swimming happened on our very last morning there (of course) and it was also the day my camera ran out of batteries, so we only got a few pictures, but here they are. i especially love the shot of Molly standing by the steps at the end of the dock. i swear that girl has no fear! Molly really loved watching both Zero and i run and jump into the lake. she would even count it down for us, "1, 2, 3, GO!" and off we went, splashing into the cold, cold water! but hey, the view is great!


speaking of great views, here is another slideshow of some of the fantastic scenery there in Minnesota - we took most of these on our boat rides. if you look closely, you'll notice a family of ducks in one of the shots.


and since i'm on a slideshow kick, how about our blueberry hike. first off, molly is a pretty darn good hiker, of course she'd do anything for the promise of blueberries. there are many wild blueberries growing on the island and here's some shots of Molly enjoying the bounty!


i mentioned at the beginning Molly's affection for the John Deere riding mower. well come on, who wouldn't love that?! i myself got to take her for a spin this year and mow the lawn. for those of you who knew him, Tee Feeney, Molly's grandpa, was a man who loved his lawn. i can remember many a time looking out, off the deck, to see him watering away, almost in a zen-like state. and i would wake early to the sound of the riding mower starting up. so i consider it an honor to mow the lawn in Minnesota, and i hope i do him proud. Molly, being the go-getter she is, not only tried her hand at the riding mower, she went old school as well!

Minnesota is a magical place that's all about family. and Molly had a wonderful time with hers!


hopefully everyone got a chance to spend some time in a beautiful place with their loved ones this summer. next up, our week with Grandma Nancy!

i'm so behind...

...and in less than 7 hours we'll be on our way to Northern Minnesota, where there is no Blogger, no Gmail, no Facebook...just a beautiful lake, family and lots of relaxing...not to mention we're getting out right before the triple-digit weather...aaah! but in the meantime, i'm throwing up some pix of Miss Moo from the past few weeks...
this is from when Grandma came to visit 4th of July weekend.
above is a picture of Molly and her friends at our 3rd of July BBQ.

on the 4th, Molly, Grandma and i all went to the Children's Museum and had a blast. here are some pix of that...be sure to check out her super cute 4th of July dress!


and last week our niece Sara came to stay with us for a few days, we all had a great time - Molly really loved having her cousin Sara around! and Sara made her the lovely fairy crown you see in the picture below.
i don't know exactly when these last two pictures were taken, but they are so Molly! here she is jumping and jiving on the slab!


hope everyone finds some time to relax (or jump around if that's their thing) and beat the heat. all our love!

fun in the sun!

our weekend totally rocked! where to begin...

on friday, we started off the day with storytime at the library and picking up our first Summer Reading prize for this year. we got a new book to add to our library!

then in the afternoon, our neighbor friends invited us to join them at the St. Johns Park for some fun time playing in the fountain! so we got Molly in her bathing suit ensemble (see above), we grabbed baby doll (who was naked except for the hat Molly insisted she wear) and we headed out! we met up with our friends (to the right of zero it's Beau, Rachel and Amelia) and had some serious fun! here is a slideshow of the good times!


after the fountain we played on the jungle-gym and at one point Molly and Beau gave each other a big hug, which is of course very sweet, but also hysterically funny - check out the looks on their faces, they're so serious!

so a really fun afternoon! i've said it before and i'll say it again (and probably even a couple more times in this post), i can't believe how lucky we got when we bought our house. we moved into the best block ever! there are five young families living on our block alone with kids aged 9 months to 10 years, most of them being under the age of 2. Molly and Beau get to play together several times a week and it's just so nice! note to neighbors, you can never move!

after we got home from all the fun and frolic, Molly got her hands on the camera and was taking some pictures, mostly of her bangs, and some of her feet. you'll remember from an earlier post that Molly is quite the photographer, and to prove it, she somehow managed to get this shot of herself here on the left! again with the serious face (and kind of caked in snack), but isn't she an absolute beauty! we have titled it "self-portrait".

we woke up saturday and after breakfast we played a bit in the backyard. Molly has a tent we got at Ikea that is super fun to play in, and especially to open and close. here is a slideshow of that, and note the last picture of her and harley pooch. Molly is attempting to give her a smooch. it's so sad, Molly has so much love for harley, and harley wants nothing to do with her. luckily, Molly doesn't seem to notice!


and in St. Johns on Saturday they had the second annual No.Fest bringing music and art to our neighborhood, all day long. so remember how i said we were lucky about our house and our neighbors? well we are also lucky to live in such a kick-butt part of town! every year we have things like the St. Johns Parade, the Cathedral Park Jazz Festival, the Pirate Festival, and No.Fest - all right down the street from us! does it get any better? i think not! (see neighbors, you really don't want to move!)

for this adventure, we grabbed "Shani" doll, who happened to be dressed only in a t-shirt and diaper, and stuck her in our backpack. you should hear Molly say "backpack", it's so cute! and a note about "Shani" doll, she is my doll from when i was a little girl, and i named her Amy. but when Amy passed on to Molly, she renamed her Shani - after her auntie Shani. all on her own and also very cute!

we grabbed our shades and some snacks of course, and put them in our new snack cup (these things are brilliant, and i can't believe we went so long without one) and headed out the door. we went to the St. Johns Booksellers who had a great band called Jelly Jar Productions playing and they were awesome. the music was creative and fun and they included puppets! and we were there for a good hour and Molly was totally enthralled the entire time. it was nap time so we headed home, but got to hear some more great music on the way by a group called the Hemispheric Chamber Orchestra. next year we hope to spend more time at No.Fest!

after nap we got ready to go to our friend Nate's 2nd Birthday party!! we had such a nice time. Molly and Nate are only 5 months apart and played really well together. well, there were a couple tense moments over the animal crackers and Nate's cool cash register he got for a present, but all in all, well done for two toddlers! the sand box was especially fun, and it was very sweet when Nate pushed Molly around on his bicycle. plus the spread was delicious! Nate's mom and dad really know how to host a party! here are some pix...


seriously, this marathon post is almost done! couple things. first, back to the awesome neighbors! on Saturday night the monthly CMG (Charleston Mom's Group) met at a local pub to chat it up a bit. i mentioned the five young families on our block, well here is a picture of the fabulous moms of those families. they are (from left to right) Cosette (mother of Adriana, almost 15 months), Ingrid (mother of Vincent, almost 9 months), me (mother of the amazing Molly, 20 months), Diana (mother of Mishya, 7 and Keeton, 10) and Rachel (mother of Amelia, 6 and Beau, 20 months). i hope i got everyone's ages right! they are a spectacular bunch of ladies!

and then i just had to share this picture of Molly. she's imitating people all the time now, and in some cases, we're not sure where she really gets it from. for instance, lately she likes to sit down, very purposefully, and cross her legs and arms. then, she proceeds to kiss her bicep. what?! where does she get that from? i dunno, but it's pretty funny!




and lastly, here is a little picture of all of us playing around before bed one night! happy family!!

i want to ride my bicycle, i want to ride my bike!

so, you may remember a post i did a long, long time ago on the fact that we blew part of our economic stimulus check on a Burley bike trailer - with the hopes of me getting into shape and biking molly to-and-fro (ha!). well, it only took me a year (and a few days) but i finally managed to take the 10 minutes i needed to get the Burley hitch hooked up to zero's bike and ready to rock-n-roll! molly even helped me (she's quite the handywoman). and on June 13 we strapped on our helmets and went for our maiden voyage! [if you haven't already, check out that first posting of molly in the Burley - scroll to the picture at the bottom - and then check out the picture above, she's getting so big!]

where did we go? we biked around our lovely neighborhood and specifically went to look at a house for sale nearby that i want my mom to buy. i'm trying desperately to convince my mom to leave her family and friends in the lovely, sunny Bay Area where she has lived for 39+ years and move to Portland. a girl can dream, can't she?! :) so here is a slideshow of our trip to see "grandma's house" (you can see it behind zero in the pic with him waving).


this past weekend i took Sunday off (Happy Father's Day to all you guys out there) and the family went to the City of Portland's Sunday Parkways event in North Portland. what a blast! they close off streets to car traffic in between three parks here in NoPo and people can bike, walk, anything but drive between the parks. and at the parks they have music, food, and booths with fun things like, get a free bike tune-up and helmet check (we took advantage of that to get molly's checked out). they even have bike valet parking! it was so much fun - this will definitely be a family tradition!

molly even got a balloon, her current obsession. i myself am not a big fan (too many childhood "traumatic events" around the popping of balloons i think) but while i was down the way getting a delicious mango-on-a-stick (covered in chili powder and lime - it was amazing!), daddy got her a blue balloon. you can see it attached to the Burley on the left. i have to say, getting to ride around on the closed streets was pretty awesome!

and here is molly and daddy playing at the Kenton Park while listening to live music!


a really wonderful Father's Day was had by all!

the further adventures

it's been a while since i posted, and of course, a lot has happened in the ongoing adventures of miss molly moo.

we had a really nice memorial day weekend where we got out in the garden and played around. i am (not so successfully) trying to grow some fruits and veggies while molly is trying to get into the garden beds with them (she likes to get in there and say "night, night"). so, there's a lot of dirt flying around and puddles played in. we'll see if we actually grow anything, but i figure that molly seeing us try and watching plants grow even a bit, is good for her. and fun for us all! we also belong to a farm share and hope to make it to the farm soon so molly can see how food really grows! it's just right down the street (more like down the river) on Sauvie Island, and is called Sauvie Island Organics. gotta love Portland!


and we've had some warm days lately - too warm really - but that paired with the fact that miss moo loooooves water meant we got some good playtime out of our new water table. you can see from these pictures how fun it is to get wet! and speaking of wet, last night we went to our first "pool party" right down the street at our friends house. the pool is inflatable, with a slide, and some water fountain action. too cool! i forgot the camera but next time i'm all over it. pool parties rock! [note, when i first typed out that last line i by accident typed poop parties rock - ah motherhood, poop is always on the brain]




our budding artist continues to bloom. she loves drawing - on anything! and you've got to watch her...one moment all is fine, the next she has somehow managed to get into a cupboard, find a pen (that you didn't know was even in there), and start drawing on the bookshelves - all without you knowing (and literally in a matter of seconds). i swear there is a super-power in that somewhere. Pen Girl! She also seems to prefer to draw on very tiny slips of paper, as you can see in these pictures.





weekend before last we had a nice breakfast in the backyard...the whole family! delicious pancakes! and zero rigged up a booster seat for molly (a very comfy one in fact). it was really the perfect way to start the day. and look at how good miss molly is with her fork! yay!







last weekend molly and i drove to Eugene for a birthday part for our friends Paige and Skylar - they turned two! we had a wonderful time visiting with old friends and meeting new ones. and Paige and Skylar have such fun toys! swings, slides, and play houses! oh my! and let us not forget the bubbles, which molly LOVED! here are some shots, and the girls at the table with her blowing bubbles are Paige and Skylar!

last but not least, some video. but first, the disclaimer! these were all taken last thursday evening. it was just molly and i - zero had the play - we were both tired, and dirty, and the house was a mess. why i thought it was the best time to capture us on video, i couldn't tell you. but it's done. and getting to hear molly's perfect little voice makes it all worthwhile! the first was when i tried to get her to say hi to some of her friends (because i love hearing her say her friends' names) but she just wanted to say was "hi"...


take 2 was when i would say some of her friends names and she would repeat them. i have to say, the way she says Jasper and Ava just kill me!

so a note on the video above...i wanted to do this because every night for the past few weeks molly has gone through her list of friends, all on her own with no prompting from me, and says "Beau" and i say "Beau is at home going night-night" and she moves on to "Amelia" and i say "Amelia is at home going night-night" and so on until she is satisfied that everyone else is going night-night, so she can too. and this all came from molly, she started this little tradition all on her own. it actually heralded in the no-more-nursing-to-go-to-bed...which she decided on all on her own too. she's growing up so fast! another new thing at bedtime is that she likes you to sing to her. her favorite is "old macdonald" which i was kind of against at first, because it's not really a bedtime song, but turns out you can make anything into a lullaby if you sing it right. and she loves it! speaking of singing, the next videos coming will be of molly singing along to the ABCs and eensy, weensy spider. get ready for some serious cuteness!

ok, now that i'm all verklempt, one more video...for 3 we expanded out to other fun words! every day she's added a handful more to her repertoire, just last night she pointed to a sun in one of her books and very clearly said "sunshine!" this morning she said "thank you" (she's been signing thank you for some time, but this was the first time i'd hear the words). i may have trouble with the constant climbing and falling, but boy do i love the talking part! here you go...


"bye, bye" says bunny girl!