on our way to grandma's house, we saw...

california was calling our name and we answered with a trip out there. and you gotta know that ANY trip is gonna be good when you start off getting what we dubbed "the green dinosaur" as a rental car!

i can't believe we didn't get our own picture of it! but imagine it more like this:

we started off our weekend with a day in san francisco where we rode trolleys,

took q-baby on her first tuk tuk ride,

and even got foot massages in china town.

turns out the boy has incredibly ticklish feet. i thought he was going to kick the foot massage guy (do they get the title of "masseur"?) right in the face. our guys kept talking in chinese to each other and i'm pretty sure they were saying, "man - this guy's a wimp with baby feet! i bet his own baby's not even so ticklish!" ...and it's true.

quincy's perfected the art of flirting and she pulled out all the stops for the foot massage guys. i think she thought it'd get us a discount or something. it didn't

she's crazy about opening her mouth all wide like that these days and i couldn't figure out what that's all about... then i looked through our pictures and the proof was in the pudding (how great and underused is that phrase??)

like parents like daughter??

our green dinosaur then took us to visit my grandparents (q baby's GREAT grandparents) and the boy's cousins and uncle/aunt. quincy knew she was surrounded by her peeps and hammed it up good for everyone (i think everyone hammed it up good for her too...) ushy gushy love oozed around the entire weekend. it was great.

next, we went to the maker faire, which is a giant geek fest where people make random gizmos and gadgets then show them off... think life-size mouse-trap games, giant cupcake cars, a mechanical tongue that licks a lollipop down to the stick...aka, complete entertainment.

and what's a trip to california without a stop at in & out burger with aunt wendi and uncle karl. mmmmm milkshake

have you ever realized that mexico is spelled ocixem backwards?

 good: look how much fun we had in sayulita!

great: look how much ammunition we gave people around us to make fun of us

good: the house we rented looked like something straight out of the flinstones and had incredible views overlooking the entire town

great: the incredible views were replaced by the incredible night sounds, including the blind roosters who didn't know the difference between midnight and dawn and what i'm pretty sure was a marching band that started practicing on the town square at 3am...what in the??

good: having the bug with us!!!

great: one word - babysitter!

good: coconut milk straight from the source

great: coconut milk straight from a curly straw

good: all the time in the world to contemplate the meaning of life

great: even more time to play on the beach and in the sunshine!

lessons i learned in idaho (long but worth it for points # 4 and 13)

so, imagine your brand new spouse says to you, "there are two back-to-back family reunions going on over the course of a week...wanna go?" while 99.9997% of people would say something to the effect of "umm...no," my brave and adventurous new spouse was actually EXCITED for such a trip.

so off to the eagle ridge dude ranch in yellowstone we flew* to spend a few days with my mom's side of the fam. here are some lessons i learned:

1. whenever possible, fly into an airport that's 50'x50'. you wont' be disappointed. maybe a little bored waiting for your ride, but not disappointed.


2. per aunt wendi's teachings, you should always take yoda along for the ride. because what adventure can't you find with yoda on your back??


3. some hot pots might look pretty and inviting and green...


...but stepping on them could cause lots of pointing and gasping from the people around you. also you might lose your cap


4. pickles with faces are the best



5. bring along a photographer who's not afraid of zooming in on the animals (nice work, the boy!)



6. always be sure to bring along puzzles to entertain the introverts of the family

i'd rather not talk about how long it took us to get that dumb yellowstone-map puzzle done... on the plus side, we sure knew our way around yellowstone after that!

7. only trust personal watermelon. even if you have no idea what that means


8. don't, however, trust any sort of stuffed animal bear that has a see through belly with other animals inside of it


9. don't try to take a picture that looks like old faithful is coming out of your mouth because it will just turn out looking like you're licking the guy's ear next to you


then off to idaho falls we went to spend the rest of the weekend with my dad's side of the family, where we learned

10. make it a point to take a spin in your uncle's "mid-life crisis"


11. take more pictures in idaho falls....

12. you CAN take raspberry and rhubarb plants on an airplane as a carryon. who knew?

13. families are fun, so we've decided to start one!


secret...and belly... is out!! we're due at the end of december and my favorite comment so far has been from my very own husband who said, "i sure hope you bake babies better than you bake other stuff!" thanks, sweetie ;)




* we were planning on driving up until the night before when we realized that it was a 10-hour drive instead of the measly 6 hour drive i made it out to be...i have a feeling that'll be the last time the boy listens to me when it comes to driving distances...

salt lake - where they camouflage their port-o-potties

even though it's a little bit premature, i surprised meghan with a birthday weekend extravaganza! she knew we were going "somewhere" but didn't know the "where" part. and when it comes right down to it, who really ever knows the "some" part?

here's the bug excited to tears (in the form of her tongue) when she found out we were off to slc for the weekend!

i think she was expecting a surprise trip to seattle, but for obvious reasons, that couldn't happen.

my favorite part about the bug is that you can take her anywhere and you know it's destined to be a good time. and to prove that point, we went to the world's freakiest bakery.



who eats daffodils?? i guess the same person who would eat this (cue mysteriously evil "dun dun dun" music)

ummm hello... that's the most frightening thing i've ever seen. ever

so then we moved on to happier things

oh wait...that's creepy too... who in their right mind would use the slogan "we're everywhere" and expect people to be okay with that? especially when it's posted right outside of the freakiest bakery. check out my cute butterfly shirt though.

so, i gave meghan 3 envelopes, each with a birthday surprise in it. the first one was our plane tickets to salt lake. that one was easy because she was able to open it right away. as for the other two....giving them to her right upfront was a mistake. everywhere we went that first night, she'd pull them out and just look at them. we sit down for dinner. she pulls the envelopes out and sets them next to her plate, for example.

the second envelope was her registration to walk in the ms walk, which is something she loves doing (walking AND helping the ms society). so we marched down to the front desk of our hotel and asked for markers. on one hand, i kind of feel bad for the front desk of our hotel, but on the other hand i feel like we truly graced them with our presence. the first night we were there, we marched down in various combinations of swimsuits, hoodies and dress(me)/skater(megs) shoes at 10pm asking where the closest place to get gummies was. so, i feel like they kind-of rolled their eyes when we asked for markers the next morning.

hopefully they didn't mind that we got skin oil all over their markers by tatooing ourselves for the ms walk. they didn't say anything, so maybe they didn't mind.


and then, because we have a strong history of random easter celebrations (2007, 2008), meghan came up with a brilliant idea. why don't we hardboil some eggs in our hotel room coffee pot?!? this is what happens when you reach a quarter of a century. your intelligence sky rockets. i do feel kind of bad for the next people who stay in room 603 and want coffee. and i do feel kind of bad for the front desk when said people call down yelling about how their coffee tastes like eggs...


then we dyed the eggs, of course



and then i put the carton in my purse so we could eat them all around town when we got hungry. kinda like a ziploc full of cheerios only slightly different.


and finally, the third envelope was the greatest of all the birthday gifts:


now i don't mean to sound like a broken record. well, i guess i don't since i've never said it before...but OTHER people have said it and i don't mean to sound like everybody else, but this show is incredible! we may have talked about it the entire rest of the trip. and then i may have listened to the soundtrack 3 (maybe 4, but who's counting?) times yesterday alone. i know tickets are hard to come by for this production, but it's worth it. if you have to sell your firstborn child or a kidney, it's worth it.

love you megs!!