A moment...

Picking up Charlie from school.

'Ever running away' Max has a choice each day...ride in the stroller or hold Mommy's hand. It's pretty much 'hold Mommy's hand' every day but WHEW what a battle that is the whole time. The other day Max decided after we picked up Charlie and started our walk back to the car, that he wanted to hold Charlie's hand not Mommy's.

Most of you Moms may see this daily or even several times a day. It was a first for me. With my rough and tumble boys, I have never seen them calmly holding hands, walking together. They even had a little conversation about the toys they wanted to play with when they got home.

So simple but wow... I truly felt my heart expand in that short little walk:)... the mental photo keeps running through my head as one of my greatest blessings right now.

A great combination....

Max is particular about a few things.

His shoes. (Can we say just like Dad or what?)

And his love of RUNNING, not walking.

In the shoe department it has always been less is more for Max. He has pretty much lived in Crocs for his entire 3 years of life. In the winter, we just add socks on the coldest days. That is until Max discovered running shoes! A old pair of Charlie's hand me down Adidas shoes were put on Max's feet and it was like peanut butter & jelly....bread & butter....Love at first sight!

Two of his favorite things combined.....comfy shoes that can make him run even faster.

I'm having an even harder time keeping up now.

Grooming a romantic....

We put away Christmas at our house this weekend. And ushered in one of my favorite holidays....Valentine's. Since kids have arrived, this season of the year seems to be one of endless sickness, antibiotics, breathing treatments and interrupted sleep. So Valentine's Day has become such a fresh taste of something fun in my life. Little spots of new color, hearts and the hope of spring in our house.

This weekend, Charlie and I had fun making Valentine's to decorate our front window, we went shopping in search of 'hearts', and slowly began to transform some of the corners of our house. Charlie asked why it's one of my favorite holidays and I admitted "It's the one time of year I get to use as much PINK in our house as I want!" He thought that made perfect sense.

This morning, after a pretty sleepless night which I'll blame on the pregnancy:)...I hear extra morning noises, not so quiet whispers, doors opening and closing...all at a dark hour of 6am. Charlie had decided it was time for 'breakfast in bed' for Mommy. It's something that goes hand in hand in his mind with Valentine's Day. Jeff couldn't get him to wait the several weeks until the actual big morning.

So I got my tray of dry toast, old grapes, oranges and pineapple with orange juice. At the crack of 6:25am.

Excuse the closed eyes, dark early morning, flash on the camera:)

It was sweet and thoughtful. Even if Charlie ate the whole breakfast himself:)

Happy Halloween!

A fun night with our fireman and cheeseburger. Canvasing our new neighborhood and seeing how its done down here. We hit Steve Job's house...what a crazy show that was....the lines were literally out the door. Our first and last time going there. We hit a few of our other favorite houses that we've been admiring from a distance. Fun but again the crowds were a bit much for us. Next year we'll stick to the less popular houses and not get run over by the masses:)

One of the funny things about the evening was Charlie's monitoring of what candy Max was getting at each house. His line over and over through out the night. "OH MOM! Max got another candy with coconut!!" The horror!

The boys were in the full swing of yelling 'trick or treat...thank you!' But I had a tired little fireman after about an hour. I think the crowds got to him too....he said "Two more houses and let's find OUR house!" A few nibbles of candy and C&M were both sawing logs about 10 minutes after we got home.

Now onto November and enjoying another month of lovely fall weather.

The cobwebs, bats and jack o'lanterns are down already at our house.

I'm ready to head into a season of being thankful for all our many blessings in life.

Everything's about his Daddy...

sorry for the horrible quality of this photo...too cute to pass up though...

I've been noticing lately with Max when reading books, driving in the car, watching tv, at the park....He's always talking about Daddy's. If its a little boy who's sad at the park, he's missing his Daddy. If a dolphin is swimming in the water alone on tv, he's lost his Daddy and is sad. If there is a big dinosaur and a little dinosaur in the book, it's always the baby and his Daddy (NOT the Mommy). and again today while walking home from school, the little pumpkins on the porch are sad and missing their Daddy.

It's pretty sweet and I'm all for it...

a little boy and his Daddy.

Denver Girls Weekend....

These ladies are 4th on my list of life's greatest blessings.

(Jeff, my sons, my family are 1.2.3 in case you wondered)

To be ourselves together with flaws, outspoken minds, baby fat, and colon issues (We're getting old!) and yet still LOVE being together.

I feel the weight of being apart on a daily basis...wishing we could have that cup of coffee together more often than once or twice a year. And still we feel so loved, accepted and with Ann's never ending stories, LOTS of laughs around the edges whenever we are together.

19 years and counting....

Count your blessings...

As Jeff put it recently....
'your Grandma is the toughest (strongest) lady I know'....
that's the truth for sure...
and she has fought the good fight for 97 years.

And my Grandma, while being 'tough'...
spent most of her life in the background.
Cooking, sewing, nagging, cleaning, caring....

She was the Grandma of....
you must have a second helping...
let me rub your back...
you must sit down and rest for a while...
you've going to get a sunburn.

She was the Grandma of...
'honey & vinegar' solved the worlds troubles....
just 'count your blessings' and all would be fine....
She loved to hum her favorite tunes, in her own unique way...

I love my Grandma dearly.
We were the two red heads.
I was her only daughter's daughter.
It was a special thing we had.

She was always in the background
of my Grandpa's strong loving presence.
But she was always THERE.
and we all knew it and loved her so much for it.

She will be missed.
and very much welcomed tonight by Heaven's angels...

Max's Fishy....

About a month ago at one of Charlie's swimming lessons, Max found this little fishy on the ground. They have been inseparable since.

Every day Max had to wear 'pockets' so fishy could travel along with Max throughout his day.

This Cubs hat is where fishy slept at night.

Thank goodness I documented fishy when I did. Literally the day after these photos, fishy went to his demise. Bit in half....by Max! Survival of the fittest!

First Day....He's a Kinder...

Beach Bum

So one of the sure things about when Grammie Merkel visits us is our trips to the beach. She is a true at heart beach bum. I'm sure its where the boys get their love of the sand and ocean.

Jeff and I tend to slide into that lazy "let's have a relaxing weekend'...every weekend we can. And a trip to the beach (especially now from Palo Alto) is a little bit of a trek. ...really its only like a 45 minute drive....but still...its enough to keep us from going very often.

So we took Grammie Merkel for her beach fix...and of course had a great time!

and for these Merkel boys...a trip to the beach is ALL about the digging and throwing of sand!

Check out Max's fistfuls of sand...NOT AT MOMMY please:)



Grammie Merkel's back to visit in September...so we'll be sure to hit the beach again!

We've been 'scootering it' lately...

Max got a new scooter...So it's now the only thing the boys want to do. Since we need wide open spaces for Max as he's still learning about stopping at streets and stop signs... We've been hitting some of the local trails and running paths. I LOVE enjoying the CA landscape this way.

We headed over to The Oval on Stanford Campus one afternoon. It even inspired a little brotherly love...

I love this photo of the boys scootering down the hallways of Stanford...I did think..."Won't it be fun to show them this photo someday when/if they are walking these hallways with backpacks heading to class? Side note...I wonder if college kids will even HAVE backpacks in 2022?

Ride em Cowboy Max!

For everyone who thinks that Max looks more like his Mama than his Daddy....here's some proof otherwise...

Guess who this cute little cowboy is?
.

It's UNCLE ALEX...Jeff's 16 year old brother when he was Max's age..

Googler!

this is our 'pipe dream' come true.

three years ago, moving to California for Jeff to work at a start up.

we 'dreamed' of it someday becoming Google.

and it did.

What a thrill to see...

'Host Jeff Merkel'

Eating lunch in the infamous 'free' cafe's..yummm

the Google bikes you pick up and ride around the campus...

Jeff's new office

with welcome balloons and all.

we don't take this happy day lightly.

we are blessed.

Bringing a little California to Ohio

With the Thomas cousins being 'older and wiser',

they tend to pave the way for the Merkel boys.

We like this, it works pretty well.

The tide turned a bit this last visit in May

when the California boys brought their Apple products to Ohio.

It was very cute to see Charlie & Max with their Apple itouch's

showing their 'older and wiser' cousins the way they work:)

Cody & Max

Jaedon & Max

Daddy & Max...

even Daddy has a thing or two to learn apparantly...

Charlie is also quite the pro at his itouch,

I just didn't get it documented in photo.

I should say as a disclaimer.

We would never buy a 5 year old and 2 year old their OWN itouches...

but with Jeff's company Admob doing most of their business with Apple

both itouches have been gifts from the company.

And we LOVE them for their simple, light design.

Great for traveling and taking on the go.

Much cheaper than any game boy or DVD player you can buy

in that you just download new games and videos from itunes.

Okay, enough of a plug for Apple.

IKEA!!

It has always been a fun destination for us.

With the play area for Charlie

and the very kid friendly eating area for both boys...

it's a big hit on those...

'what in the world do we do today' days.

Best part we now live one mile from Ikea:)

View from my iphone...

life is very busy these days. with very good things and very daily things.

here are some photos of our life. from my phone...which seems to be the way of capturing my two 'yahoos' these days...

In & Out Burger!

One of the first things we located when we moved to Palo Alto...

Taking 'Leo' for a walk....

poor Leo, he must be dizzy being upside down and all.

The boys sitting in (and smushing)

our new strawberry patch in our backyard...

Max's first real haircut....

Charlie had to go 'first' to show Max that it didn't hurt.

Love big brothers for stuff like this!

Cutting off the curls.

Brave boy.

Brave Mama.

Sweet Max with a big boy haircut.

Charlie's birthday cupcake with his speech therpist Amy...

or as Charlie says...Amy who teaches me my 'L's".

We love Amy!

Charlie stopping to smell the tulips on our walk.

A run around at the Stanford Oval.

So fun to be so close to campus to pop over to play!

New bike helmet for Max!

World Cup...England vs US!

Max checking out the score on the iphone.

We're starting them young:)

You two are what made me a mother....

photo from Thanksgiving Day on the beach

It's what went through my head most of the day on Mother's Day. And it made our rainy, windy, 'no huge special plans' kind of Mother's Day very meaningful for me. I enjoyed the craziness a little more, enjoyed Charlie's endless, running hugs & kisses (that can be a little painful at times) and just savored in the feeling of being a mom to my two boys.

No photos to show for the day.

But I did get breakfast in bed (dry toast, fruit and coffee, accompanied by cute cards from Jeff & Charlie)

A nap uninterrupted

A solo trip to Target

A new hummingbird feeder to enjoy with the boys.

It was a nice, relaxing day.

Happy 5th Birthday to Charlie!

You hold such a special place in my heart.

You are more like me than anyone I know.

And that works to our benefit and detriment every day of our lives.

You made me a Mom.

It has been my best and hardest journey of my life.

You are a lovely little big boy with a sweet sweet spirit.

I can't wait to spend the next 5 years with you..

and beyond.

Happy 5th Birthday Charlie!