Feathering the Nest

My sweet Nana threw a darling baby shower for me and Baby Claire! We had a delicious brunch at her house and I was so blessed by all the love and sweet people in our lives! I am definitely feeling the "nesting" urge now, so the delicate bird theme was perfect! It was so much fun, and so not stressful! Thank you to everyone who helped make it such a special day!!

{Love my Nana}

{So blessed to have these women in my life! love every one of them!}

{My gorgeous Mom}

{the Favors}

{My sweet friends! love them!}

           I cannot wait to meet this baby girl!! One thing is for sure...she already has an amazing wardrobe :-) 

                                                         xo

A day at "Wiggle Bay"

Thank you Martin Luther King, Jr. 

It seems like Sean has to work on most of the smaller holidays. He even worked a full day on New Year's Eve. Boo. But not Monday! Thanks to Dr. King, even T.D. Ameritrade took day off, which meant we got to spend the day together in the beautiful, 85 degree, San Diego weather! We decided to go to Seaport Village and have a picnic. Jack decided it was actually "Wiggle Bay" instead of San Diego Bay. All of you who are Wiggles enthusiasts could probably guess we sang

 "We're on our way to Wiggle Bay....just a few waves, and we'll be on our way"

 more than once. We just enjoyed the weather, the family time {just the 3 of us...since those days are quickly fleeting} some sandwiches, and of course, no picnic is complete without the pink & white circus animal cookies. I can't believe I failed to capture that in the photos. I guess I was preoccupied with the two year old bundle of energy running all around! We had such a fun time!  

{My camera settings were not right, but it kind of looks cool}

 xo

It's a New Day, It's a New Dawn, It's a New Year.

Happy New Year! We had a very uneventful New Years Eve {and no, it wasn't because we have a 2 year old and another on the way}.  I was sick, so we spent the night enjoying Italian take-out, a Netflix movie, and well, thats pretty much it.

New Year's Day we went to my parent's house for brunch, which is one of my favorite traditions. It closes out the holiday season, and ushers in the New Year!! My pics ended up being mostly of the boys, but thats ok :-)

Matching Star Wars shirts :-) 

Watching football with Jon Jon- such sweet cuzzies

Football with the boys

 I didn't make any resolutions for 2011, but I know it will be a year filled with new joys, challenges and blessings. I'm so looking forward to welcoming our little baby Claire into our family next month, and I'm praying the Lord will provide the perfect house for us this year too! He is so faithful, so loving, and so good. May He be glorified in 2011.
                                                    xo

Golden 27

My birthday was December 27th- and I turned 27...so it was technically my "Golden Birthday."  I'm not going to lie, I had grand ideas in my mind about my golden birthday. For some strange reason, ever since I was probably 13, I have looked forward to it, and to being 27. I guess it just seemed like a good age to be. 

The day started out wonderfully with my sweet husband home from work for the day! We had a delicious breakfast of Carmel Apple Ebelskivers with apple filling- yum! 

{I got the pan for Christmas from Sean and the recipe book and William Sonoma batter from my parents! I was super excited because every weekend we do breakfast- just the three of us- but its our thing, so I love it. I've wanted the Ebelskiver pan forever, but the Nordic ware pans are pricey, and it never fell into the "need" category of purchases. But I love baking and I love trying new recipes too, so it was perfect!}

The rest of the day we just hung out and relaxed- much needed after all the Christmas festivities, and I was also starting to feel sick, so I wasn't up for much.

My loves

We did head out around 4ish to run a few post-Christmas errands before our 6:30 dinner reservation at Lotus Thai in Hillcrest. We had dinner with my family, and then went back to my parents house for Mocha Cheesecake- one of the best desserts of all time! The bummer was that by the end of dinner I was totally sick. And by the end of dessert, Jack was totally pale and sick too. We basically left right away to get him home and in bed. 

Thanks to the love of my life, I still felt very special and very loved!           I'm so thankful for Sean, Jack and baby Claire! Every day is a gift from God, and I prayerfully and excitedly look forward to what else He has in store for my life. 

Happy Birthday to Me! hehe. {and my baby sister too! we have the same birthday!!! Happy 19th Rayray! love u}

xo

The Mystery of "Gnocchi" on the Shelf

 "The first time I come to the place you call home you quickly must give me a name of my own."

                -from The Elf on the Shelf: A Christmas Tradition, 

                 by Carol V. Aebersold and Chanda A. Bell 

    

If you are a parent, you are probably familiar with the Elf on the Shelf.  Just in case you are not familiar with this recent addition to family-must-have traditions at Christmastime... the Elf on the Shelf is a cute little book that come with a little vintage-style knee hugger Elf.  The book calls him a "friendly scout elf" who helps Santa by keeping track of all of your naughty and nice behaviors.  Every night he flies magically back to Santa to give his report, and each morning he is back- but in a new spot. This is really the fun part about it. The kids have to find the Elf every morning. 

Sidenote on Santa: we are not doing the whole "Santa" thing.  Our theory is that the best approach is that Santa is a fun Christmas character and it is fun to imagine Santa and his elfs ect, but we will not be promoting the Santa as being real. You may disagree...but that's just what we decided....moving on.

So you may be wondering why I'm even posting this since Christmas is over, the decorations (mostly) put away, and now the New Year is underway... well we had an Elf on the Shelf mystery.  Part of the book tells you that you have to give your Elf a name of its own, but it wasn't like we sat down with Jack, read the story, and then made him pick a name for this little Elf.  He just started calling him "Gnocchi Shelf" (he kinda leaves out the "on the" part).  The first time I was kind of surprised, I even asked him, "Oh- is that his name" and Jack said, "Yes! Gnocchi Shelf!" and he excitedly showed me where he had found him.  From then on out he was "Gnocchi Shelf" and we were puzzled. Why would he call him Gnocchi?  

We could only think of two associations with Gnocchi:

1.) We do love Italian food, and gnocchi is one of our favorite dishes- Jack loves it too, so maybe that was where it came from? He does love his food. The thing was that we hadn't had gnocchi recently, so that was kind of a long shot. 

2.) There is a cat on Curious George named Gnocchi.  He (appropriately) belongs to the Italian chef on the show. Jack LOVES "Georgy Georgy," so we thought maybe he just picked up the name from the show and gave it to the Elf. 

We honestly didn't know, but we just went along with it, and chuckled about it all season long! 

Then on the 27th, we went to Fashion Valley for a few minutes around 5:30ish (worst decision ever...sooo crowded). We walked from Bloomingdales to Anthropologie, and after that we were so overwhelmed by the masses we were practically running back to Bloomingdales (where we parked) when all of a sudden we were passing Geppetto's Toy Store, and Jack looked up and saw the giant Pinnochhio over the doorway and said, 

"Gnocchi Shelf." 

 We were hurrying along and Sean and I both replied something like, "Yes, that's Pinocchio, he does kind of look like Gnocchi.." and we both stopped in our tracks.

Pinocchio. Gnocchi. That was it!!! He remembered Pinocchio and was subsequently calling the elf by the same name- but in his adorable 2 year old venacular, it was Gnocchi. 

So that was it! We just never made the connection because honestly, I'm not even sure when Jack heard about Pinocchio. He never ceases to amaze me; the things that he knows and remembers. Maybe I'm a little biased, but I kind of think he is a genius. I'm just saying. One thing is for sure- "Gnocchi" on the Shelf is officially the Bradford Elf, and I love it. I'm already looking forward to bringing him out again next year!! 

xo