To Be 3

"Is my Birthday next?
"Is my Birthday today?"
"Are my friends coming now?"

We were asked these 3 questions every morning for nearly two month before Lily's 3rd Birthday.

She would whisper to willing checkers at the supermarket about her princess birthday party. She would share about her impending party plans with the child card helpers at our little church. She would inform new friends on the playground that it was her birthday ' next.' This kid knows how to party and in true Gulbrandsen fashion our not-so-little Lil had an entire weekend dedicated to her 3rd Birthday.

Cake Time at Party #1 with Cousin Forest and Auntie Tiff

 She begged for a Strawberry Cake.

 T Strong AKA Nona wore her wedding dress circa 1977 to the big party. That's what I call recycling.

 Don't mess with the Birthday Girl when she has a bat in her hand.

 Posing Cousins.

 Great-Grandparents. Grandma Cookie donned another gorgeous gown as the Queen Mother.

You would think that after months of dreaming about her Princess Birthday Party there would be significant let-down the day after the festivities cease. Not the case with our girl. She lay in her bed the night after her Princess Party and told me 'no more my birthday.' Then she grinned at me and said 'Mommy's birthday next.' Always the optimist. Always looking forward to the next big party.

Christmas in... January?

Yeah, I know that I am about a month too late. But everyone loves a little Christmas cheer, right?

We had the pleasure of spending some time up in Victoria with Ben's family this past Christmas. Ben and Lil braved the weather and drove the thousand miles (each way) along with the Booth cousins all the way to Canada. A little bit crazy with a 2 year old? Probably. But we will chalk it up to saving some serious cash and the ability to see new parts of the west coast. Our trip to Canada consisted of eating ( food that we did not have to cook), catching up on some Chick Lit (me), playing  XBox (Ben) and running up and down the hallways of the 'Big House' (Lil, maybe sometimes Ben too). While up north, we also gained a future brother-in-law! Ben's sister Heidi will be marrying her German prince charming this coming June. Lil is pumped to be a flower girl.

January has been... hectic. I think that we are all still feeling the growing pains of our new busier lifestyle, but we are blessed. Life is boring when you just stick to the norm, so we might as well make our brief hours count.

  Christmas time Sushi. Japanese Village is the best.

 Couple of cute Christmas Cousins.

 The Christmas 'Prom' Shot.

 Woo-hoo! The soon to be Mr. & Mrs. Weber

 Christmas Morning

Doing her hallway laps with her new ' princess running shoes.'

Fall Recap

Here is a big fat re-cap of all of the fun we had in October! Daily Princess Costumes, Multiple Pumpkin Patches, Cousins from Canada. Does it get better than that?

The Coast of Two Countries

It has been 6 months since we have been back in the land of the red, white and blue, and the following are a few of my musings when contemplating/celebrating the differences of two unique areas on the same coast.

Observations on Being Back in Nor Cal
1. There are a disproportionate number of the 'beautiful people' here. Whether 'they' be self-made (there is a silicone epidemic here) or genetically blessed, 'they' are everywhere.
2. I have missed heat for the past 10 years. Sorry Canadian friends, a sunny day of 12 degrees C is not warm.
3. I adore frozen yogurt. These places are on every city block. .
4. You can't beat being able to buy a t-shirt, pair of shoes and pair of pants all for $20 at Ross.
5. Green is the new Black. For the first time in my life I am making a conscious effort to conserve natural resources. This is mostly due to the exorbitant price of utilities in this state, but we can pretend that I have just connected with my inner tree-hugger.
6. Private health care is a new frontier (at least for us). Still undecided on my final verdict of the system.
7. The people here are very guarded. You get the sense that they are telling you 'I already have all of the friends I need, so back off.' Not crazy about this one.
 
Observations About BC
(Obviously missing people are at the top of my list, but I am not going to wax mushy on you).

1. White Spot Burgers are hands-down one of the tastiest things ever. Enough said.
2. Public walk-in clinics rock, especially when you have a sick child on a Friday night at 8pm.
3. Girls in Canada wear their hair shorter. This is definitely a hasty generalization (and not true of most of my friends) but as a whole the female Canadian population seems to favor cropped locks more than their neighbors to the south.
4. Canadians are more patriotic (at least more than the average population in Nor Cal, I cannot account for the folk from Texas). Canadians are more willing to stick a Canadian flag or Maple Leaf on their bags, clothing and in their decor.
5. People in Canada (at least in BC) are not trying to keep up with the Joneses. They are OK with where they are at and generally do not give a lot of thought as to whether or not their 5 year old will one day get into an Ivy League school.

I feel blessed that I have been able to experience living in two different countries in my short lifetime. They say that once you have lived in more than one country you start to think of yourself as a global citizen. You don't ever feel 100% at 'home' wherever you live because a piece of you is still in those other places. Just look at my husband! 3 different countries in 30 years, completely a global citizen. As we grow together as a couple and now as a family we have learned that we can be joyful wherever we live as long as we are together. I am not saying that there are not certain perks about living in a particular place (hello warm sunshine!) but it is nice to know that it really does not matter where we store our 'stuff' because that is not what gives us our contentment.

Life of Lil

It has been a while since Lil made an appearance on the blog. This is what she has been up to!

Snacking on apples off the tree in our yard.

Lil has been busy growing her hair out too. Check out her first 'real' ponytail above.

Hanging out with some friends. Not only is sand fun to throw but recently it has proved to be a tasty treat. Yum.

Camping?!

I am not naturally bent towards things that are rugged and outdoorsy. But you know, I am willing to give the great outdoors a shot once in a while. We figured that camping is something you are supposed to do with kids. Kids are often covered in dirt- camping is really dirty. Kids can act like wild animals and wild animals belong in the forest (or jungle but we don't have one of those nearby). So we decided to pack up The Lil, the family tent trailer and a load of warm blankets and head for the trees. We also convinced our friends, the Driebergen Family, to join us in our woodsy revelry. The Driebergens are practically professional campers and even have a propane powered 'camping coffeemaker' that they bring along with them. A couple of the highlights of our one night camping adventure included:

1. Meeting a local Raccoon.
2. Meeting several local mice friends.
3. Being randomly checked on by two sets of parents. This really did happen, I guess they did not trust us all with small children in the wilderness?
4. In no specific order...Eating Schezuan chips, s'mores, hot dogs (with melted cheese), twizzlers, steak, chicken, strawberries, eggs, sausage, chewy chips ahoy, Tim Horton's coffee, hot chocolate and Timbits, hash browns, smokin' stampede chips, caesar salad and various other beverages that I will not divulge on the world wide web. Umm.. apparently you just gorge yourself when camping? This all took place in a 15 hour window which included a few hours of sleep too.
5. Learning the hard way that my husband snores in the great outdoors.
6. Realizing that the Sesame Street DVD and our portable DVD player are some of the most precious items that we own (see pic below for example).

I am still not totally convinced that being smelly, cold and surrounded by small vermin is the be all and end all. Give me a beach resort any day but I suppose it can be nice to be in touch with our inner nature enthusiast once in a while.

Dinner Time. Who says you can't eat a strawberry stem?

The whole camp site. Yes, that is our daughter trying to eat rocks.

Drive-In Movie Theater.

Ben of the Forest. The children flock to him.
Click to get a closer look at our friendly neighbor.

Flashback

In celebration of my 28 years on this planet I thought that I would share with the world a little montage of '99 vs. '09. Some of my readers are going to be featured in this montage, but no hating allowed. Just face up to the truth and recognize that most of us are like a fine glass of wine- we just keep getting better with age!

Party Like it's 1999....

Like Fine Wine.. 2009...

Heart Breaker

Lily is especially fond of hugging and kissing her three-year-old friend, Colby. She squeals with delight when he comes near. I know this video might make some of her other boyfriends (Coley) jealous, but they need to know exactly what type of woman she really is.

Hot Fun in The Summertime

This past weekend officially kick-started the pool party season. A few friends, family & tons of babies congregated at the Gulbrandsen homestead for an afternoon of sunburns, food & a couple of mixed drinks.

Eric, Bev & Trisha Keeping Cool

Ander's the 'Bikini Inspector'

Swimming Cousins Sienna & Hunter

The always suave guys kickin' back enjoying the rays