Dodgers fan

It's been two months since I've posted and so much has happened that I feel overwhelmed to write it all. But here's one thing: we went to lots of Dodgers games, and Lauren has become quite the fan. She invented her own little cheers and decided to call Matt Kemp "Uncle Matt" as in, "Come on Uncle Matt, hit the ball! You can DO IT, Uncle Matt!". She can also recognize Russell Martin from photos, and recognizes Manny Ramirez but calls him "Manny Marirez". She calls where Manny will hit the ball, and points- "left field, Manny, hit it over there!" and if someone hits a foul ball into the stands, "hey, wrong way, hit it over THERE!"

As I type this, the Dodgers are playing the Phillies and she fell asleep watching the game. I thought of waking her up when Matt Kemp was at bat, but I resisted. She's had a rough week this week and really needs her rest. Okay, *I* need to her to get rest. So here's some other stuff, while the Phillies are at bat, that we have been up to:

Two weeks ago we were on vacation in The Outer Banks. My Uncle Fred and Aunt Marguerite rented a beach house and invited the three of us, along with my parents, and their children, who would be my cousins but to Lauren, "Uncle Charlie" and "Aunt Andrea" and Paul, Andrea's boyfriend. (Charlie ended up not being able to go.) We all had a great time, Lauren especially so, being the center of attention from lots of her favorite people at once. They took turns being her best friend, as in "best friend, look at me, best friend!". We were right on the beach and there was also a pool and hottub at the house. We saw Kitty Hawk and one day, I rented a bike & trailer and biked around the little down of Duck, NC, with Lauren in tow.

Anyway, it's been tough coming back. Lauren and Ryan got sick on the plane, then I caught it the next day. Not entirely, just fought it off all week. We've all been jet lagged, Lauren still is going to bed at around 7:00 and waking up at 6:00 a.m. Some days later. When Lauren went to the doctor, the day after we got back, she said it was just a cold. BTW, she weighed 43 pounds!

This week I'm sick again with a cough and no voice left. No fever though. Lauren also has a cough again tonight. But we're not terribly ill, no swine flu or anything. Just tired and coughy and cranky. Anyway, this blog post is not a carefully well-thought piece, more of a "there Mom, I wrote something, see!"

Anna, my granddoll

 
 

The Garden

 
 

Summer babe

 

Lauren after the Kitten room graduation

 

What Lauren wants for Christmas

Whale of a good time

We saw the whale in Marina del Rey last night. If you missed the news story, there's a whale hanging out in the harbor. He doesn't appear to be injured (last time I checked) but he is just resting and on vacation before he swims elsewhere. Lauren, Ryan and I packed a picnic dinner and went last night at sunset. The whale was cavorting around and I got some half-assed photos of him, which are not good enough to post. If we go back and see him again, I will attempt better ones.

The funny thing? Lauren was actually disappointed because she thought all whales were like Shamu and would do flips in the air. Still fun, though, for the rest of us.

Oh, here's how we got there: We went down Washington, made a left on Pacific to where it curved around and there was metered parking. Then we parked and walked to the end of the bike path. Along the way, people were encouraging us, "the whale is out! We just saw him!" and when we got to the end, he was off to the left.

Some important, some trivial

Some important life or death stuff is going on right now, but I don't feel like writing about it. (Other than to say, things are looking ok, not bad as could have been.) So on to the trivial: I'm irritated with Discover Card. They keep calling me whenever I do anything remotely interesting with my card. They then freeze the account until I contact them. Last night my big "suspicious activity" was that I went to Vons AND Albertsons in the same night. And big spender that I am, there was one charge for something like $65 and another for $15. They knew I cheated on Ralphs and Trader Joe's ?

Anyway, for this, I had to call them and give them all of my life story, and my alibi, and finally they released my card power back into my hands. Another time they got upset about the card when I dared to travel outside of West Los Angeles, and got a snack at O'Hare airport. The funny thing is, I'd been on a trip and none of the trip spending triggered it, only the O'Hare ice cream on the way home.

/end rant.