Cousin Jealousy is Normal

Big news in Handmade Beauty Box land: I filmed a segment on Fox News about Handmade Beauty Box and how we launched on Kickstarter. The segment hasn't come out yet but I'm hopeful that we did justice to our awesome brand.

My Mastermind Group met last week and had a hilariously wonderful time coming up with 100 things we want to do (ah, the bucket list!) before we die. It is surprisingly hard to come up with a list of 100 things, unless you just open up a travel magazine and list all the great places to visit that they list. Some of the notables on my list include visiting Greece, doing a family trip to the Galapogos Islands, Disneyland with the family, and learning to cook Thai food. In Thailand. And, duh, meeting the President of the United States.

Visiting the Starbucks Roastery with my Renegade Business Forum was amazing. Every detail was perfect and so much had been thought about in terms of  'the experience'. It's very much the Disneyland of Coffee.

Jamisen and I made meatballs - FROM SCRATCH - the other day. It was super exciting. He decided to put bath fizzies in his meatball recipe. And water. And baking soda. Soooooo ..... that was fun.

Jamisen and I also had a hilarious conversation yesterday. It went like this: "Mommy, I don't like it when I get a new toy and you make me pay for it." It was such a funny perspective. Here I thought we were really making a connection for him and really, all he gets is: whenever I get a new toy, I'll have to pay for it.

We've had Baby Alise over for a visit to give Erik and Cheriss a date night. Baby Lily was VERY concerned that Alise had her pacifier at all times; it was almost like she was like: "Look lady, they give you this thing ALL THE TIME and you are WASTING your opportunity! Use it! Use it! Because, one day, you will only get it at night. And then look at Jamisen, he never gets one. Do not waste a moment, not a moment!"

More binky help ...

Do you see the look that baby Lily is shooting baby Alise? It's clearly a "Hey girlfriend, don't get too comfortable here. Notice who is IN the lap and who is on the floor? That's right, Chickee. And I'm here to stay. Also, bigger. I am bigger."

Money! We have discovered MONEY!

Hooooooh boy, Jamisen has discovered that MONEY can buy things. Yes, things. Things that he wants. He just bought his first toy with money he had "earned" himself. Jamisen has no idea what a quarter is versus a penny but he'll learn quickly.

Behold a very sick little Lily wearing a fever monitoring sticker on her head. She had a fever for a full ten days. It was quite a mystery until this happened:

call it Mother's Intuition but I had this crazy flash of inspiration that Lily had a Urinary Tract Infection. She had been fighting off a cold but it didn't explain a full 10 days in fevers ranging from 99 to 103.6. While our awesome bag trick did not collect the final clean urine specimen because Lily really was not a fan of wearing it (Chris had to go to Urgent Care to get an actual infant urine specimen kit), we did confirm she had a UTI. Poor baby. We're just waiting on the results of the latest culture to confirm the antibiotics got rid of it all.

Jamisen has been a HUGE help in the kitchen. He's helped with salad, meatballs (organic, grass fed meat, of course) and pizza (flax seed crust) in the last week. He's a superstar with helping to unload the dishwasher too - and cleaning his own plate after meals. Our little 3 year old is growing up (sniff sniff).

Little Lily is still learning how to use utensils. She knows how to but prefers to use her hands. She also likes to play with her food much more than Jamisen ever did (scooping out yogurt with her hands etc).  We do sit down meals at least 2X a week now, instead of family meal time in the "stand-up thingies" around the island. The kids are learning table manners and it's working well.

Jamisen and his best friend (girlfriend?) Ava did a day of science fun at the local museum where they painted rocks, made hummingbird feeders and learned more about the life cycle of birds.

Lily is learning the "little to big" concept right now and we have several toys to encourage the concept. Her favorite, by far, are the Russian (or in this case, Mexican) nesting dolls.

We did afternoon date outing to a sophisticated Superbowl party filled with great girlfriends, good food and lots of cheering. While our lovely Seahawks did not prevail, we did have a great time and enjoyed the company.