Lilypie Fourth Birthday tickers
Tuesday, January 27, 2009

We Are Kind of a Big Deal


As many of you have noticed, we have gone global. The people of England and Canada enjoy the hilarity that is our lives the most, with the rest of the world well represented. I invite all of our global visitors to join in on the fun. For quite some time I thought it was just our aunts reading this blog, but we had 49 unique hits yesterday. We will keep the good times coming for all of our worldwide readers. And to those of you with a diarrhea fetish I am sorry google has wronged you by sending you in my direction.
Saturday, January 24, 2009

What is Worse?

I feel this one warranted a post as opposed to a poll. Here I present two examples of awfulness: first is Sanna playing the piano. She is slapping it with angry blows and lacking any rhythm. Second is Bermes really abusing the use of a sweater vest in public. I think each is horrible in so many ways. My opinion is that this was Sanna's first attempt at playing a piano, Bermes has had 29 years to figure out clothing.







Tuesday, January 20, 2009

WARNING! May Not Be That Cute/Interesting/Exciting if Youre Not Us



In this first video, you see Riley sitting up for a minute straight without help. She even starts up her toy, which plays the same 30 second song over an over again. This was the first time she started it herself, so it hasnt gotten annoying yet. She cant get to this position on her own, but she has stabilization skills she didnt have before.



In this second video, we see Sanna showing her future as a close talker. She also apparently hasnt figured out which end of the dog to talk to. She had a fifty-fifty shot and blew it. I swear she is smart. When we picked her up, her face was covered with Owen's hair, which was kind of gross.

*As a quick side note, I think it is pretty much the most interesting thing ever to watch the two of them develop differently. We have our own little nature vs. nurture experiment going on under our roof. That assumes we treat them both exactly the same. I would say our treatment of them is commensurate with their attitude, so how do you judge our effect on them? Anyway, it appears that Riley is the queen of sitting up (Sanna isnt even close). Sanna is the queen of rolling over (Riley has lost interest after being first to it). They both talk a lot, but Sanna talks constantly. Apparently Riley is more masculine, and beefy. I cant wait to see them when they can walk, talk, and dish out attitude. Its gonna be crazy.
Sunday, January 18, 2009

Our Beautiful Son?


So, we understand that due to their lack of hair and massive size it is often difficult to determine if Sanna and Riley are boys or girls.  But, if we dress them in solid pick sleepers and a pink hat you would thing people would have sufficient reasons to guess they were girls.  Today at church, a guy was introduced to Riley and referred to her as 'he' soon after.  Apparently he assumed she was a boy because he assumed Riley was a boys name.  I dont really know any boy Rileys, but I understand that it is a name used for both genders.  Are our girls going to require solid pick dresses and bows in their hair throughout their lives to be recognize as women?  I wasnt able to take a picture of Riley in her super-girly outfit, but this will do as a representative picture of similar garb.

Am I a Miracle Worker?

So, while I was gone in frigid Minneapolis for a few days, Laurin didnt have such a fun time with the babies. There was a cold circulating through the Smith women (mostly Laurin and Sanna), and Riley was practicing for her upcoming role on 'Bad Girls Club'. After hearing Laurin threaten all kinds of violence on herself and the babies (mostly Riley), I was afraid to come home. Much to my surprise, when I returned home the ladies were perfect angels. Both ladies slept 12 hours the first night I was home. Laurin had stated while I was gone that they would never sleep through the night again. Riley magically remebered how to bounce again. We had been worried about her after 3 weeks sans bouncy chair she didnt seem interested in her favorite pastime. Also, the tantrums stopped. We had nothing but happy babies. Could it have been my calming, inspiring presence that caused all of these positive changes? I am going to look into what needs to be happen to officially be recognized as a saint. I am sure I performed at least three miracles. Anyway, see this video of Sanna's newest love, the bounce chair. She had previously been unable/disinterested in bouncing. She is friggin crazy now.

*Laurin's recollection of the above events may differ slightly from mine.
Friday, January 16, 2009

Highlights from Florida





My apologies

To all the loyal Verbal Diarrhea readers (Ive nicknamed you the diarrhea divas), I must apologize. It has been way too long since my last post. I have been on business travel which was preceded by vacation. I spent most of the week in sunny Minneapolis, enjoying the -30F weather. Id never thought I would be excited for 0F. Anyway, to get us started, here is a video of Riley's newest pastime, which is watching Frankie. There will be more to come soon, I promise.


Wednesday, January 7, 2009

Funny


Saturday, January 3, 2009

Look at Me Having Fun w/ Babies







To all you party poopers who told us our lives would be over now that we have babies, take a look at this. I have found a way to integrate babies into all my normal activities so that I can have all the fun I would have had pre-babies. Today, for instance, I played shuffleboard, pinochle, ate a sweet meal,had a dance party, and took a sweet family portrait (four generations), all while directly caring for a baby. I want to thank the wonderful people at Baby Bjorn for making this all possible.  
Friday, January 2, 2009

Where Have All the Happy Babies Gone?


Teething=No Fun
Thursday, January 1, 2009

Ringin in the New Year Out-of-Towner Style





We were offered the chance to break free of the chains of parenthood to celebrate New Year's Eve.  Apparently, as young adults, we should still want to go out and get crazy on New Year's Eve.  So, off we went.  Since we are here in Indian Rocks Beach, we dont really know anyone or any place to go.  Our options consisted of what we could see.   Oddly enough, the Holiday Inn on the water is somewhat of a compound that included multiple outdoor bars and live music.  We started there around 9.  We were seated in the farthest corner of the outdoor seating, away from everyone.  That was ok, since most of the attendees were middle-aged dorks in town for the bowl games.  They were all super excited to hear the cover band rock out with 'margaritaville', 'american pie', and other classics.  We had a few drinks (Katie had a Big Bamboo, which consisted of 14 kinds of rum, a piece of sugarcane, cocoa, and a partridge and a pear tree).   I also ordered a pound of shrimp, which made everyone's (mostly mine) hands smell lovely, even after wipes.   Luckily we had an entertaining waiter, who tried to give us suggestions on where we should really be that night.  We left the Holiday Inn, thinking we were heading towards some of his suggestions.  It turned out we were heading back towards our condo, which was fine for me.  I hate walking and the unknown.  We ended up stumbling upon Crabby Bill's, which is a landmark seafood restaurant in Florida.  It is a big restaurant with indoor and outdoor seating, and an open air bar.   We remember that their sign boasted of a big NYE party, so we went in.  It was quite the mixed crowd.  Some clear locals in varying states of dress (from total white trash to girls all dressed up with clothes you would normally wear to far more formal occasions).  I couldnt believe some of these women were wearing full-length black dresses, makeup, with their hair done up.  If you were going to go through that much effort, couldnt you find a better destination that a tacky tourist destination?  Anyway, we were about the middle of the road as far as dress, which was fine with me.  Drinks were cheap, which was great.  We eventually scored a booth, and proceeded to criticize the clientele.  As we got more intoxicated, the conversation got livelier.  Katie thought it would be hilarious to play 'truth or dare', but noone would do any dares, so it became 'truth'.  We tried to get Katie to ask this woman of questionable morals if she was either wearing underwear or pregnant , both equally amusing questions, but she declined.  We moved on to the truth game, and it was Nick's turn to ask Laurin a question.  Apparently Nick (Katie's boyfriend) is not familiar with this game.  His question to Laurin was "Which baby was born first?  Sanna or Riley?".  We all broke out laughing at that question and the game kind of ended at that point.  Soon after the bartender alerted us to the fact that there would soon be a breakfast buffet.   I found that odd seeing as how this was a seafood restaurant that I didnt think served breafast.  He said it would be $6 and would come out soon.    We were intrigued, but not that hungry.  About 10 minutes later, we found out the buffet was now free, and coming soon.  We were more interested at this point, especially since the food coming out smelled quite good.  We were amazed to see that they spread included smoked salmon and asparagus on bagels. biscuits and gravy, breakfast burritos that were quite good, pancakes, sausage, eggs, potatoes, some kind of potato-filled empanada, and much more.  My mild intoxication caused me to eat way more than I needed.  See the picture of some of the carnage.  Soon after, it became midnight, we watched the ball drop, finished our drinks and went home.    I couldnt have asked for much more in a New Year's Eve.