BOGS

motley crew

Sometimes I send myself emails to remember amusing moments with los tres, but then of course never get around to recording them here for posterity.  Just a few recent ones until I get around to actually uploading some pictures here:

• Owen drawing a caricature of himself: "Ounce for ounce, it's as good as the professionals.  I'm going to bring this with me and show it to them if I ever get one done." 
• Brendan dazzled by the facilities of a public restroom: "Mamma Mia this thing flushes easily!  Wow this sink is curved!"
• Henry in the park making me sand cakes, after I requested a peanut butter cake: "Sorry, we're all sold out."  He then decided we were actually at Whole Foods buying cake.  Way to outsource production there, kid.
• Owen to Henry: "Henry, you really need to SYB - Smell Your Behind!"
• Brendan to Henry: "Henry, you know what you are?  A TWBP - The World's Best Pooper!" 
• Owen telling me about one of his basketball plays: "Mommy, that would definitely be an ESPN highlight" and then told me all about his "raw talent" and "pure athletic ability."
• During that same basketball game, Brendan kept telling Henry "put me under pressure, come on!" and then of course was mad when H in fact did so, possibly because Henry interpreted that request as an invitation to full-on tackle him.  
• Owen discussing his restaurant dessert after the fact: "I have regrets about my choices."

woe is hank

The following all caused Henry varying degrees of despair this morning. Someone really should inform the authorities about our cruel and callous treatment of our children:

• Being told that 6:30am was too early to play basketball.
• Having chapstick put on both his top and bottom lips instead of just the bottom.
• Not owning a #7 Knicks jersey (#7 is "Carmellllllloooooooo Anthonyyyyyyyyyyy!" as Hank likes to introduce himself before he takes the court.  Making this lament even more ridiculous, H has a truly insane amount of Knicks gear, including SEVERAL jerseys, courtesy of his brothers and their similarly sports-obsessed friends.  Happily, the batch of friend hand-me-downs I picked up this morning included a #7 Harrington jersey which should satisfy him for now, assuming of course that B&O don't "helpfully" tell him it's the wrong player.)
• Remembering yet again that I opened my mother's day present from him "tooooo earlllyyyyyy" instead of waiting until Sunday (this one caused him to collapse on the floor, overcome by the tragedy of it all).
• His brothers not immediately playing basketball with him once it was no longer "too early."
• His brothers having the audacity to actually play defense against him. 

Being three is rough. 

comedy central

Last night, I had the following exchange with Brendan at the dinner table:

B:  Mommy, what do you think salt tastes like?

Me:  Salty.

B, licking salt off his hand:  Hmmmm, tasty, buuut needs a little bit more salt.

Me, after high fiving B for hilarity:  You're quite a comedian.

B, pausing:  No, I'm not, I don't eat people!

Me:  Pretty sure you're thinking of cannibals there, kid.

My kids rule.

spring break (one month on)

Let's just pretend it's April and and enjoy this slew of spring break pictures, mmmkay?  

First stop leaving San Fran - Muir Woods:

Our home in Mendocino (well, Little River if you're being technical about it): Seal Rock #5.  After the boys finished running around and inspecting the premises, Owen's assessment was, "Not a bad day to be alive!"  We all heartily concurred.

The rocks did indeed live up to their name.  Seal city, baby. 

Nightly pre-dinner hot tubs don't suck, that's for sure.  

The Mendocino headlands were a little slice of boy paradise, what with all the rock scrambling and the vague sense of peril. 

We threw a lot of rocks into a lot of water on this trip.  

Hunting for glass at Sea Glass Beach (hilariously, this used to be the town dump into the 1960s, thus the abundance of sea glass).

Bowling Ball Beach was one of our favorite places to visit when my parents had a place in Mendocino.  Totally remote feeling and not a soul out there.  Possibly because there's zero signage and the path washed away years ago so you have to clamber down a rickety rope/log ladder to the beach.  What could be better?

Leaping over water is never not fun.

Ditto tough guy posing. 

Rope ladder excitement. 

Owen painstakingly drew his new superhero logo - Dragon Ninja - at yet another beach that, unlike the deserted Bowling Ball, was positively infested with hippies.  

Point Arena lighthouse with their buddies.  According to its website, it's one of the tallest Pacific Coast lighthouses at 115 feet.  The boys all climbed to the top, including Henry who refused to be carried.  

Like so many of our attempts at group pictures, things deteriorated rapidly. 

Preparing to hit the pool at Sea Ranch. 

Followed by a post-dinner hot tub back at Seal Rock.  My proudest parenting moment of the trip came when the boys all begged for vegetable crudite appetizers.  My second proudest came mere moments afterward when they all began clamoring for "cocktails" in the hot tub.   

My favorite excursion was to Montgomery Woods.  It's a redwood forest seemingly in the middle of nowhere, completely deserted, and amazingly beautiful.  In other words, basically the exact opposite experience of Muir Woods with its paved pathway and busloads of tourists.  We all ran around like crazy people, climbing on fallen giants, turning massive tree stumps into rocket ships, and branches into assorted weapons.  Who needs Disney World? 

Saying a sad goodbye to Seal Rock.  Trading in views of the Pacific for views of my neighbors across the street was not easy.    

making memories

Sometimes, I wish I could bottle up a typical evening with the bogs so I could take it out and relive it twenty years from now when they've all (sniff) abandoned us.  It's just impossible to even remotely capture the sheer amount of commotion in our house these days.  The other night, for example, I got home from work and they proceeded to jump all over me, falling over themselves to tell me about science club - "we picked poisonous mushrooms, with TWEEZERS!" - while H tried to get in on the discussion by excitedly suggesting "hey what about soccer club?"  B&O then demonstrated the choreography to one of their "Newsies" song and dance numbers from drama while H insisted "check out this CRAZY DANCE mommy!" This was followed by the snack portion of our evening accompanied by more excited discussion about their respective days, and then they dug out my yoga mat to practice handstands (somersaults in H's case) and attempt walkovers.  Many high fives were exchanged throughout, naturally.  

This seamlessly segued into wrapping each other up in the yoga mat - B wore it as a toga, while H and O wrapped themselves up in a burrito.  H then burst into tears because they unwrapped themselves before I'd had a chance to eat them up, so we did it all again and I chomped on their heads and declared it the best burrito I'd ever tasted.  Then of course we had to play H's favorite "my body is food and drink!" game - "your elbow is full of ... broccoli! nomnomnom, your belly is made of ice cream!" while he giggled like mad.  During H's storytime, B and O waged an "air battle" which consisted of chasing each other around the apartment armed with bike pumps shooting compressed air at each other.  Things started to calm down a bit after that, and O got to work designing signage and membership cards(?) for his new personal training program.   

At bedtime, they of course came out multiple times.  H is invariably the worst offender, and came out with pretext upon pretext, once because his pjs didn't cover his pullup, crying "why is my light weiiiirddd?" shortly after, and then a few minutes later singing "bippity boppity boo!" loudly enough to require stern parental intervention.  When Kevin went in to tell H and O to zip it because B was asleep, O casually denounced him as faking it, and sure enough, B burst into laughter.  Total circus, per usual.  I wouldn't have it any other way though.  

cousins

Because I am woefully behind (currently the finger of blame points squarely at West Elm and its horrible, defective, no-good Parsons desk, meaning that our computer with its massive repository of photos is in a not-particularly-user-friendly spot on the floor), I haven't posted yet about the biggest recent news of all.  The bogs finally have a cousin (oh, and Shannon and Ben are proud new parents, which I suppose is also sort of a big deal)!  Teddy was born March 23rd, weighing in at a respectable 8lb, 8oz (some underachieving babies might consider that gigantic) and he is absolutely, positively scrumptious.  

Seriously, the cuteness of this just might kill me dead.

The boys were quite intrigued to meet him, although they might have been ever so slightly more intrigued by his video monitor, his wee crib, and all the tasty breakfast pastries on offer during our visit.  They referred to him throughout as "doll baby" and kept asking when he would be able to crawl/walk/talk/play/basically be fun.  

Gawking:

The crowd was slightly disappointed he didn't pee on his own face:

Hovering/tentative patting:

Things starting to break down:

The first of many team photos to come, hopefully baby doll Teddy won't look quite so skeptical in all of them.  But you can't blame a wee babe for being a tad concerned about having these three (by comparison) hulking brutes crowding around him (and I think, in Brendan's case, giving him rabbit ears) before he's even able to support his own head, let alone defend himself.  

spring breakers

Well!  Where were we in this gripping spring break saga?  Exotic ski destination behind them, Hank and I rendezvoused with the rest of the crew in San Francisco.  After, I might add, suffering through interminable delays on the runway, only to be turned back at the absolute last moment because of a malfunctioning door light, which the pilot cheerily announced with a breezy "Oh, and since we've been taxiing so long, we'll also have to top up the fuel back at the gate."  Wheeeee!  Happily, once we were finally wheels up and H's cherished "little red ipad" was back in play, it was pretty much smooth sailing from there.    

Possibly the best part of the vacation from Hank's perspective?

San Fran was lovely - we ran them daily in the park behind our hotel, where we also went for our daily croissant and brioche fix.  As a result, B&O are now convinced that either London or San Fran has the best croissants in the world, so I guess Paris can just suck it as far as they're concerned.  Our first day in town was ridiculously gorgeous and spring-like for our breakfast with friends, saunter through Golden Gate Park and the Academy of Sciences, and trek out to Alcatraz (with their NYC bestie, as luck and advance planning would have it).  Naturally, Hank couldn't handle Alcatraz, and I had to bust him out of there early (if only I could say it was for good behavior) for emergency playground and giant waffle cone time.  

Breakfast cheers:

Undoubtedly maiming butterflies at Academy of Sciences:

Jet lag is no joke - this was at noon:

Waiting in line for the Alcatraz ferry:

Rallying on board the ferry:

Scaring them straight:

Adorableness + audio guides:

My lord, Fisherman's Wharf is tacky, but someone didn't seem to mind:

We took the boys to fancy(ish) dinners every night, which we survived with books, our trusty little red iPad, and naturally, cocktails.  This was at the Slanted Door, which was delicious, the considerable risk of vicious chopstick attacks notwithstanding.

Ahhhhhh:

Of course, the next day was so cold I seriously feared frostbite.  Ah, SF, always so charmingly capricious in your weather.  I took the bigs on the cable car - hanging on the outside of course - back down to the pier where we checked out the big ships before retreating to Ghiardelli Square for an emergency hot chocolate infusion.  Kevin and Henry went to Kev's SF office to swap out his work laptop (so glamorous) and the children's museum before naptime.   

The "cool kid" face was definitely a theme of this vacation:

Waiting in the truly enormous line for cable cars back to the hotel in the freezing cold before my brilliant, city kids suggested we just hop in a cab. 

Drinking it in:

That afternoon, Owen and I ventured back to Golden Gate Park to go biking.  The kid's bike he tried lacked the foot brakes he's used to, so after he wiped out several times within two minutes, we opted to trade it in for a tandem.  After I huffed and puffed through the park for a bit, internally bemoaning my lack of biking "shape," we finally realized that his chain wasn't actually on.  We managed to fix it but it kept falling off so it wasn't exactly the best bike ride ever and we never made it far enough out to see the fabled bison, but we chatted and enjoyed ourselves all the same, before meeting the rest of the crew at the (awesome) children's playground, followed by dinner at our friends' (equally awesome) townhouse overlooking the bay with a HOT TUB ON THEIR ROOF.  Damn but I have made some bad life choices resulting in a bleak hot-tub-less existence.      

En route to breakfast at Plow our last morning in town, in the aptly named Potrero Hill part of town:

Next up, Mendocino!  Hopefully I'll manage to finish spring break before summer arrives.

wily coyote

Coping with the masses of spring break pictures continues to exhaust me, so for now our California adventures must remain a cliffhanger.  But!  In the meantime, let me share just a few of Henry's pretexts for leaving his room at bedtime.  

• My finger hurts.
• I hurt my nose.
• I need to poop.
• Owen needs to poop.
• Mommy, I'm scared.
• Mommy, Brendan is scared.
• I want my light on.
• It's too bright in my room.
• I want the closet light on.
• The closet door is too open.
• I need the closet door open moooore.
• Tuck me in. 
• Mommy, it's too hot.  
• [running out, coming to a screeching halt in front of me with a gleeful grin] Oh!  Hi Mommy! 
• I need a nighttime pullup.  This is not a nighttime pullup!! 
• [solemnly handing me two tiny bad guy toys] These villains can't be in my room.  My room is only for superheroes.
• Mommy, I have a question.  PEANUT BUTTER AND JELLY!  

Sadly, the kid apparently needs to be sick and feverish to have sleep this tranquil.

random

me: "Owen, come on, get your hands off your junk."

Owen: "It's not my junk mommy, it's my penis. Aka my weenie! It's also known as a hot dog. New fact!"

B: "You can't blame an innocent child!"

H: "You are the ultimate mommy!"

me: "So the more germs you get exposed to the less likely you are to be what?"

O: "Umm, living?

H, attempting to climb the jungle gym at the park: "Brendan said this was a bad idea, daddy." Pause. "Brendan's right.  This is a bad idea.  Help!"

And of course, Owen's new project, the "adventurers club."  He aparently had me in mind when adding the snack helper exception:

catching up

When last we left our heroes, they were "shredding" in Tahoe and having a grand old time, see exhibits a and b below.  I know I'm related to him, but how cool is that picture of Owen catching air on the slopes?!?  The boys also insisted on using the hotel treadmill and Brendan actually ran so hard that he puked.  Of course, he ran for a whopping 45 seconds before hitting the wall, so he may be more of an endurance runner than a sprinter.  Other than the puking, the only real hiccup was Owen's truly terrible attempts at applying his own sunscreen, which resulted in what just might be the world's all-time greatest case of raccoon eyes.  

Hank and I were having a somewhat less glamorous time on the UWS, watching a show where he excitedly declared "I REALLY REALLY WANT THAT!" about an ad for purple toilet bowl cleaner, hitting the Children's Museum, getting blood drawn (much to my amazement, he didn't even cry, although I think the iphone deserves all the credit), and of course, enjoying a farewell dinner a deux at Gabrielas.  

Next up - my solo flight cross country with Hank!