Just a day at the park!

Our favorite place to hang out is this cute little park a few blocks from our front door. Naomi is quite the brave one, and loves the slide, or the "sply!!" So far this mommy-full-time gig rocks.
My days are filled with everything hanging out with a 1 1/2 year old should be; peanut butter sandwiches, runs in a stoller to target, starbucks trips and cardboard books, baby songs, stacking blocks, dirty diapers and peak-a-boo...when does peak-a boo get old anyway?

"welcome to the rest of y(our) life"

Exactly what the card on the HUGE bouquet of flowers from my amazingly loving husband read, sitting on the table for me, as I walked home from the office for the last time! On August 8th, 2008 (8-8-08, cool eh?!) I was released into motherhood full time, and out of a life-sucking, uninspiring, beat-your-head-against-a-desk, past 6 years of my life wearing black and white, office job!
I worked for Avalon communities, an apartment rental company, as a leasing consultant since 2002...So much longer than I imagined when I took the job out of desperation back in my $8 an hour Starbucks California days...I totally know how people end up in jobs they hate simply because of a decent pay check and benefits. Is this really the way to live?
Here are some pictures of me at my office, during the final stretch at Avalon...when our studio was taking off, my child care was running out, and my days processing paperwork, mailing out post cards and following up with prospects were coming to an end...see that bright and uncontrollable smile!...and yes, that is me, escaping out the window...
Escaping into the beautiful world of full-time mother hood, involving things such as grocery shopping at 2pm on a week day, training clients and teaching classes, folding laundry fresh from the dryer (as opposed to it sitting in a clean but wrinkled heap until my next day off), eating dinner before 10pm...wait, this we still do, but now, at least, I can do the dishes tomorrow!

From January to June

Welcome back Nina!
Thanks, it feels good to be back.
I have my cup of decaf, so does my kid, my photos freshly down loaded from my iphone, and I am thinking it may be time to post a blog...or two or three.
I have MUCH to post about, so I will stick to bullet points with illustrations and promise to blog more than every 6 months. :)

Okay, where did we leave off? January.
January Christian and I started thinking about opening a personal training studio.
Christian was working full time at Golds as a trainer, and started thinking about how great it would be to do it on his own. We contacted my manager at the community we live at to see what the rent would be for the small retail spaces they have available on property. We were thinking we could start saving and planning and maybe just maybe this summer could be our target to open "Health and Wholeness Personal Training Studios".
Well, that door not only flew open, but we were practically pushed through it when we found out the space would be FREE for us! What? Forget this summer, lets do it!
The month of February and March found us on our knees scraping floor glue, painting base boards, installing mirrors, building shelves and assembling weight equipment. Christian and his Dad did all of the work, and did a fantastic job at that. We opened the studio in April and it is going very well!










March 2nd was Naomis birthday! I don't have any cake-smashing-in baby's face pictures. I am still holding out on giving my kid sugar until she is 12 and discovers she has been deprived all her life and wants to sneak out of the house on her bike for 711 slurpies and milk duds. For her first birthday she had a delicious dish of boiled and mashed prunes with a dash of cinnamon and apple. We had a lovely time at Dave and Busters playing arcade games, while Naomi slept in her stroller after munching on ticket stubs and teething biscuits.

As mentioned above, we opened our personal training studio in April, and I have hardly seen my husband since! He is so busy with clients, from 6am till 10 pm with windows of breaks in between. We did manage to get away for a "day" trip to New York for a conference held by one of the most brilliant men in alternitave medicine we know. This was my first visit to New York, and I was in awe of the tall buildings. For a brief moment, walking down the street with my latte in one hand, and my pink pea coat, I felt like Sarah Jessica Parker, only I was wearing much cheaper shoes.




Thanks for hanging with me. This "update on the happenings of "Elliotness" is almost current.
Just two months to go: In May we made the decision to move to the two bedroom town home that is directly above our studio space. Changing our 2 minute commute to 30 seconds has drastically improved the quality of our lives. The space is three times what we had in our little loft (we even have a garage!), and as much as we would miss tripping over a stroller, a purse and flip flops when we walk into our front door, we didn't want to pass it up.
I will be happily post pictures of our new home once we don't have our TV sitting on boxes, walls only halfway painted or pictures piled on the floors...maybe in 6 months.

Stay tuned for our glorious trip to Maine, and the celebration of our 5 year anniversary of marriage! I have been typing too long, and little Naomi is sticking her fingers in the paper shredder.

Just thought I would post a few pictures of Christmas, and Naomi's first celebration outside of the womb. We spent almost three days straight at the in laws, playing games, eating, watching movies, eating, ice skating, and eating. Aaaahhh, Christmas.

One thing I love about my in laws, is how competitive Christians family is...in a fun playful way. Every year we have a "best wrapped gift" competition. We spent one evening devising ways to get all our gifts into one big delivery, and with the help of a box of plaster of Paris, a Santa suite, a trash can and some paint, Santa clause himself came to grace us with his presence and presents on Christmas day...oh yea, we won.

Thanksgiving

Novembers big news.

Naomi and I flew to Washington State to visit my family for a week and one day. What a fantastic trip! The flight went perfect, and I couldn't have asked for a sweeter, more relaxed and pleasant baby.

My grandma from Alaska flew down to meet Naomi for the first time, and we had such wonderful times visiting coffee shops (See my child lunging for the coffee cup...yep, that's my girl!) out to lunch, holiday shopping, and even treating my mama to a nice salon for a fancy hair cut :). For the first time in my life, I felt like an adult. Really, a true grown up, like I arrived somewhere that I have been travling toward for the past 27 years, and it is nice to be here... Interesting to me, as I stare at these photos reflecting, that feeling "grown up" is the first thought that comes to mind...and it is not just because I get to sit at the grown up table for dinner, although that is part of it.
The trip was a time of 'catching up' on life outside my immediate own. The second my Grandma arrived with handmade knit gifts, hand carved jewelry and warm joyful eyes, I found myself craving to know details about my mom's family and her mothers heart. Hearing stories, thirsty for the wisdom from the woman who raised my own mother, just drinking it in, gaining new perspective of women I have known my entire life, but on a level I have never yet realized. The stories of when I was the age of the very person I held in my arms nursing under a blanket in the corner of Starbucks, gave me such a sense of self, in a non-newagie sort of way. This is the best way I can describe this feeling of 'grown-up'.
As for my siblings, I was blown away by their maturity, as in my mind they will always be 8, 10 and 13, calling each other names in the back seat of a mini-van... are now practically adults themselves! My sister is almost engaged, fresh from the air forces survival training, with experiences and skills beyond my comprehension. Overhearing a conversation between my two brothers involving instruction on what to do about college and saving money, left me asking myself "when did my rebel brother start dishing advice on education and savings accounts?" It is like feeling very proud, and very left out at the same time, as if I woke up from being asleep for 10 years, and sad, because I wasn't asleep, just absorbed in my day-to day, on an opposite coast.
And like all trips, the time flew by. Thanks giving meal was delicious (see photo) and my flight home was long (again, baby was perfect, sleeping sweetly in my lap most the way home).
Thank you Lord for all your blessings, for safe travels, and precious memories. For making me a mommy, and giving me mine, and my Mommy's Mommy...

Halloween at Chipotle

Free burritos if we dress up like a burrito? Well that is better than artificially flavored cherry Tootsie rolls, and pixy-stix in a plastic pumpkin for sure! Happy Halloween to us!

Naomi was the best "bite sized" burrito ever! (She was wearing a tin foil hat, but she would take it off and put it in her mouth, and now, I never read this in any parenting book, but my hunch is that you shouldn't give aluminum foil to babies.)

Good times and extra guac was had by all!

Swim diapers and grandmas swimsuit

Does anyone else understand the idea of a "Swim diaper"? How it really keeps the 'wet" in, and the "wet" out, so the two types of wet arn't mingeling...? Eitherway, Naomi didn't get to try it out on her first debut at a water park. I have a hard time washing her hands with tap water, much less subjecting her to the one part water, three parts bleach in a kiddy-pool (I know, I must get over it, for the sake of my kids childhood...) We big kids all had a blast in the wave pool, shooting down the slides, while Naomi did her share of napping in the shade, gettting the occational dose of Vitamen D in between naps...aahhh savoring the moments of summertime.

Oh, and I found out that my last years bikini wasn't going to cut it on this post-baby body...not with family around, not in the daylight, and not while walking or moving or breathing. My mother in law came through with her 'figure-forming-high-necked-low-legged-butt-boosting-tummy tucking" turquoise-gold flower suite...which, besides looking like I was 50, felt pretty great! (one can use a bit of butt-boosting tummy tucking action every once and a while...It was like wearing a rubber garden hose around my midsection) I happened to be the only one in water park history able to ride down the power slide with out having to dig upon dismount.