Well Visit Update

Today was our well visit check-ups with our new dr for both Edwin and Lyla.

I have a very brave 4-year-old who escaped shot free from the dr today!!!! and he's growing - he is now in the 7th percentile for height (50th for weight)!!! YAY EDWIN!!!! Lyla escaped shot free as well and is in the 45th percentile for height (95th for weight).

I really like our new dr, which is great...guess she'll have another little man to check out in just a few weeks!!!

:>)

Lyla's (actual) Birthday

 We had a small celebration on Lyla's actual birthday - June 22...to celebrate our new 2-year-old. She enjoyed her chocolate cupcake for dessert, helped us sing happy birthday and opened her gift from Edwin. He looked very carefully at EVERY SINGLE GIRL TOY at Target and picked twin baby dolls...told the cashier that they were "perfect for his little sister" and I think she agrees. She is really growing up too fast.

can't get enough...

I can't get enough of our June photoshoot pics from Jackie. Here is a link to all 24 images...I think you'll agree that she is AMAZING!!!

https://plus.google.com/photos/100183270549068815454/albums/5758139008739766049

Making the decision harder...

 Jackie posted more pics today and my decision about which ones to print is getting harder and harder...

And then there were 4...

 June 22, 2010 - HAPPY 2nd BIRTHDAY LYLA BETTY!!!

Prehistoric Birthday Bash

So, the A/C might have been broken - but the prehistoric birthday bash was a complete success! The facepainter was amazing, the cakes were perfect and Edwin's breakdancing debut was worth the heat!!! Thanks to everyone who helped make this birthday party AWESOME for Edwin and Lyla! So many gifts...so many helpers...we are blessed to have such wonderful family and friends!!!

Just In Time...

 A few photos from our family photo shoot with Jackie Baughman...isn't she awesome! Everytime I'm so completely overjoyed by what she produces...she is AMAZING!!!!! And she got them to me just in time to share with our family and friends on this celebration weekend!!!!!! So happy!!!!!

weeks in review....oops!!!

Ok, ok, ok, I know I have been a lazy, blogger :)  It has been quite busy around the house these days. So last night, I sit down to enter my long lost blog and ... NOTHING WORKS! Of all times for the cable service NOT to work.  See, I wasn't meant to update quite yet.  Well, come to find that our underground cable wire is not functioning. Soooo, we got an above ground cable running across our already torn up lawn.  It will eventually be buried in the grass which means we will have another lovely grassless tunnel system to deal with. :(

In reference to Dave's previous blog, it was my request for Dave to hand over his Oasis CDs.  I love Oasis and somehow don't own a single CD of theirs.  Hello!  I have been fine tuning my iPod that I listen to and from work.  Finally deleted all that rap crap, I mean Matt's music off it.  YAY!  I can't wait to see DAVE this weekend to let me "steal" his music :)

Here is a group shot of the cousins during the Loveland Rosses' visit to Canfield with Sarah.

So what have you missed?  Meredith did an awesome job at her Nursery Rhyme Program .  She proclaimed Mary Had A Little Lamb excellently!!  See her little prop??  Her mommy did a TERRIBLE job of taping it.  She did not check her camera's battery which affected her ability to video focus.  :(  I got the audio, but nauseating footage attached with it. I will spare you.

Next up, Memorial Day Weekend!  Our neighbor's picnic was just so exciting for the girls.  The rented a Superhero Bounce A Round!!!  (which ended up being the hottest green house effect sweat box EVER!....the kids LOVED it..drippingly!!)

Then we were off for 2 days to Papa and Deb's house for a sleepover/bday party/Memorial Day picnic.  The men-folk got all lathered up with sunscreen on Sunday and headed off to the golf course for 18 holes of friendly competition.  Reality= the "threat" of severe weather kept them off the already paid for course after golfing only 2 holes.  Icing on this cake? NO RAIN CHECKS!

 While the males were standing and hoping that the golf course gods changed their minds (for HOURS!!!), the girls stayed behind to make Papa his requested cupcake bday dessert.  The girls selected a strawberry cupcake with a strawberry preserve and greek yogurt filling. Yum Yum!! .............did I mention it never did rain??

The picnic/bday party for Papa the next day had delicious food as usual!! And great company as usual!! I thought these two photos were my best of the weekend :)

Madeline had an interesting birthday party that she attended.  I think these Canfield parents keep raising the bar higher and higher each year.  This was so far the most impressive.  To start it was on a school night until 8 pm at a fancy Hair Salon Training School.  All the girls had their own hair stylist, nail polisher, massager, etc.  They actually got "blowouts"!!! Can you believe they got her hair to curl? And it lasted for 36 hours!

Finally, we celebrated the girls last soccer games with Grandma, Papa and Deb attending them.  Papa and Deb even had a sleepover with us.  Madeline put a welcome post-it note on her bedroom door along with fresh sheets :)

 Like Papa, Deb requested some cupcakes from the girls.  We really stretched our creativity this time creating dragonfly cupcakes out of pretzels.  What a success!!

I thought I would end this blog with a leggy picture of Madeline looking all dorko in her swimsuit, tennis shoes, and bike helmet. HAHA. She needs to keep safe riding her bike no matter how it hurts her fashion style. :)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY EDWIN!!!

 Took the kids downtown to meet Dave for lunch for Edwin's birthday. So glad that we can make special time to celebrate our family...The kids love going downtown to meet Dave and I do too!!!!

 Lyla got Edwin Batman shoes for his birthday and...

 we got him an Imaginext Dinosaur...he seemed happy with both!

Lyla was just excited to eat! LOL

and then there were 3...

June 12, 2008...and then there were three. No we didn't have the baby...this is Edwin's newborn photo from 4 years ago when we became Ross Family of 3...

Happy 4th Birthday to Edwin Randall Ross...

And the Birthday Madness Begins...

A very special package arrived today...early birthday gifts from Australia thanks to Hadley Bloomer and family...the kids were so excited!

 what could be better? a platypus stuffed animal puppet, charades game, tattoos and Australian dinosaur stickers - Hadley, Joel and Drew are the best!!! and the birthday madness has begun!

PS: They also sent Louie the cutest outfit...can't wait for this little man to get here and get spoiled as much as Edwin and Lyla by all of our family and friends!!! SO FUN!!!!

Future Movie Star

Summer nostalgia

Friday afternoon. Got home from work a little early--in time to help out with dinner for a change. Decide to grill out. Put on some tunes.

(I only barely tolerate expending any of my precious energy on food preparation. And listening to music while I do so is the source of said toleration. Sans music, my toleration devolves into outright contempt.)

Put on the Robyn station on Pandora. Good background music--never disappoints. Well, the content, that is. Sometimes Pandora loads songs a little sluggishly.

Tonight was one of those sometimes. Figure maybe I should put on some music on that doesn't depend on the intermittent strength of the Ross Family Wi-Fi signal.

For some reason(*) I settle on putting my Oasis collection on shuffle. There was a time(**) that pretty much all I listened to was Oasis and things of that ilk(***). But that time is long gone. Nowadays, my tastes are different (****).

(*) Maybe it was my brother's text asking me if he could borrow some of my Oasis CDs to rip to iTunes. Matt, what's the deal? I'm all for it though. The request was just out of the blue.

(**) 1998

(***) e.g. Pulp, Travis, Stereophonics, Doves

(****) This.

But Oasis was a nice change of pace of this cool summer evening. Reds on TV. Pirates on the DirecTV ScoreGuide. Oberon. Life is good.

Then "Slide Away" comes on. Really takes me back. About 12 years ago, I remember it like it was yesterday. Driving home from my co-op job downtown back to Clifton via O-T-R, this song pumping in the S-10, and pow, slammed into by your everyday uninsured motorist.

Yeah, that exact moment sucked (pre-cellphone era, mind you), but it brought me back to a simpler time in my life (namely, college.)

Thanks, Mom, for covering the deductible. You never did get paid back for that did you? I wonder what happened to that guy. Speaking of that guy, I still love telling the story of him furiously jumping out of his car after slamming into mine:

Him: That was a left turn there!
Me: Yeah, but you have to yield to oncoming traffic, you realize, right?

Anyway, back to that great Oasis song...

We really needed the rain

Yesterday Mindy calls me at work. Says she's taking the kids out for National Doughnut Day. Happens to mention that it's still raining (it had rained most of the night). I respond that, yeah, it's good that we got so much rain because we really needed it.

On the surface this banal exchange between two people could happen on pretty much any rainy day across the country. (Except, I guess, for the bit about the holiday honoring the women who served doughnuts to soldiers in World War I.)

However, we just planted some hydrangeas a few weeks back, one of which isn't exactly thriving, so we've been watering the plants at every opportunity we get. And we are hosting our big annual summer party celebrating the kids' birthdays later this month, thus we want our landscaping to look as nice as possible. So the exchange I referenced may be banal to most, but between Mindy and me, it was particularly relevant to subjects in the fronts of our minds recently.

Then it hits me. One of my biggest pet peeves used to be this: after getting caught unprepared(*) in the rain on the walk from the parking garage to my office building, I'd make the obligatory complaint to a coworker suffering from a similar fate, and they'd respond, "well, at least we really needed the rain".

(*) Nowadays, I'm never unprepared. It's called the two-umbrella system, and anyone that parks in a garage in a central business district and walks more than a couple blocks to the office is (or should be) well aware of it. One umbrella in the car and another at the office at all times. No exceptions. This is easy except the occasional occurrence when it rains for one leg of the commute and not the other. Since it's not natural to carry an umbrella with you when it's not raining. If you're not careful, you'll end with two umbrellas in the office and none in the car, or vice versa. Incidentally, it seems to be easier to remember to grab the umbrella on the way out when it rained in the morning but not in the evening then vice versa. Probably because in the morning, I'm carrying a banana, maybe an apple or pear, and will be stopping for coffee, so the last thing on my mind is to grab an umbrella if it's not raining. Unless, of course, in the instance of happy hour, where I never seem to remember to return the car umbrella to its rightful place when an after work drink four after work drinks has supplanted the infamous two-umbrella system in the front of my mind.

This would set me off every time. Needed the rain? I didn't need it. I'm not a farmer. I don't care if all the (crab) grass in my ten square foot yard is yellow and all of the plants in hanging baskets were shriveled. And oh by the way, I don't care about your yard either.

But that was the then, and this is the suburbs. Now I care what my lawn looks like (not great, by the way... apparently we need do some cross-seeding have some cross-seeding done in the fall, and maybe by the spring of 2014, it'll look OK). Now I care how the flowerbeds look.

Now I say things like "we really needed the rain" out of genuine concern for a hydrangea.