Fancy Lad.

I got the proofs for Adam's school photos back yesterday, and found myself doubled over with laughter in the courtyard.

Perfect, right? He's looking, he's smiling, his hair looks okay (he had some serious bed head that particular morning.) They actually got the shot, nice work preschool photogs.

Oh look, a little jazzy with the arm. Maybe ready for a fireside chat, or a call with his investors.

THIS is what sent me over the edge. Don't get me wrong, he's absolutely darling, but also, I love that they're trying to make a three year old look thoughtful. I cannot believe they actually got him to pose like this and smile.

Because THIS is what happened when we tried to snap a quick picture of four generations of Thiels. The little stink. Good thing he's cute!

Various and Sundries.

And so, a photo catch up.

The kids have been enjoying having Grandma Rosie around - Ellie got to read her a book the other day as part of her homework. The night before she'd put up a HUGE fuss about how she was too embarrassed to read out loud to her dad, but when we mentioned that Grandma Rosie knows all about teaching kids to read, she was into it. Adam mostly enjoys having someone else to show off his trucks to.

In my Rocky memorial, I was remiss in not including this gem:

Ellie held a cat party one Friday afternoon, and her sign says "Dear Cats, this is the Cat Day for you." As you can see, well attended by Gigi and Grizz's animals.

Lulu LOVES sleeping in Ellie's room, and so she's been allowed to take part in more nap times lately. Ellie probably only sleeps a quarter of the days now, but when she does nap, she makes it cute.

Meanwhile, Adam only has lamby.

And now, a series of Grizz and the children, entitled "this looks like it will end well."

Friday afternoon Grandma and I headed up to LA to see Gustavo Dudamel conduct the LA Phil at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. Grams has mentioned wanting to see Dudamel since he first took over in 2009, and lo, this visit he was actually in town and conducting selections from Romeo and Juliet, so we went!

It was such a fun night. The Walt Disney Concert Hall is such a cool venue, inside and out, and the music was absolutely incredible. Plus it's always fun to take Grandma on a date, considering she spent my entire childhood taking me to whatever Laura Ingalls Wilder site I wanted to see.

Yesterday we took the kids down to the park and worked with Ellie on riding a two wheeler. It went about as well as you'd expect, considering that her bike is still a bit big for her, and if she's not great at something to begin with, she sobs like she's being murdered. Plus she's got me as her mom, so Tim basically stands back and hopes we'll knock heads hard enough to be concussed and leave him alone. But lo, by the end of it she was gliding a few feet along at a time (as long as she didn't realize I'd let go of the seat.) Everyone's got to start somewhere! Look for video of her actually riding in six months, ugh. In the meanwhile, maybe we can have some tearful high lights. Thank goodness I brought a hankie yesterday, because she was crying pretty hard over every injustice. Like her pedals, or her shoes not staying on.

In closing, here is a nature video, narrated by Adam.

Rock Star.

Rocky Raccoon, one of the sweetest cats we've ever had, the best Fancy Pigface of all, went to kitty heaven today.

He's going to be very dearly missed.

Climb Ev'ry Mountain

Grandma Rosie is in town, hooray, hooray! The kids are really loving having her around, and it makes me incredibly happy to see my babies loving on my grandma.

Yesterday Grams came with me to Ellie's dance practice, and we got to peek through the window and watch her dance and prance. Her class will be doing their performance to Do Ray Me (though once again, Ellie will be sitting on the curb in Ellison Bay, watching the parade pass her by, but this year I didn't pay for a costume!) and so afterwards, I was telling Ellie that we should really watch the Sound of Music, because it has these amazing songs, and it's Grandma Rosie and my favorite movie. She initially gave some push back, but I insisted that we do family movie night and check it out.

AND LO, SHE LOVED IT.

A funny story - a few years ago we were watching the Sound of Music, I think around Christmas, and the consensus in the room was that Climb Ev'ry Mountain is the worst song in the movie, until Grizz piped up and told us that it was actually the only meaningful song in the movie because it had a good message, and the other songs were quote "bullshit."

The kids, as you can see, were not as enthralled by singing nuns as their Grizz would like.

The only bummer was that the movie clocks in at a solid three hours,and bedtime was fast approaching, so we turned it off after Maria and the Captain got married. We'll address the Nazi portion on a later date.

This is What Democracy Looks Like.

TEAM Ford had a really wonderful, inspiring morning. If you read this blog, you know that Tim and I are total hippie liberal borderline socialists, and so we are not real excited about having a rapey, racist commander in chief. We decided that we wanted to go as a family to the Orange County Women's March on Washington, because in a post-election world, one of the ways we feel like we can have a large impact is by raising our children to be decent human beings who care about others. We wanted them to see that sometimes you take to your feet for things you believe in, in addition to using your words, or sending your money to go where your mouth is via supporting nonprofits.

So, this morning we got ourselves locked and loaded, picked up some donuts and were on our way to Santa Ana. We got to the corner by the old courthouse just as the march began, and I stood there holding Ellie's hands and crying openly. It was so beautiful to see so many people coming together to show that Love Trumps Hate. It was wonderful so many women (and men too) vocally angry about the injustices that women, and people of color, and people who identify as LGBT or have disabilities suffer on the regular. People asking to be seen and asking to be heard. The organizers had said there were 10,000 registered marchers, but the police have since reported that it was closer to 20,000. Don and Eileen had been marching in the middle of the crowd, and it actually took them a solid twenty minutes to make it to where we'd been waiting.

It was amazingly heartening to be in the midst of it all with my little girl. She made a sign that said "we love you" and drew Obama, and when I asked her if she remembered why we were marching, she said "because we want to show everyone that we love them, and we want to teach Donald Trump to be kind."

It was also amazing to hear her chanting "this is what democracy looks like!" because it is. She has parents who proudly voted and talked to her about it, and today she learned what it's like to exercise your freedom of speech and your freedom to peaceably assemble (apparently, there were nearly three million people marching across the world, and in the US there were only a handful of arrests. Way to get in formation, ladies.) She got to stand up for kindness, and march toward progress (the little one mostly rode in the stroller and ate snacks. But he proudly dances to Who Run the World (Girls!) so he's also well on his way.) It was an inspiring day, and a wonderful way to spend the morning as a family. Takes everyone to smash the patriarchy!

Weekend Warriors.

Wow, I am not really the best blogger of 2017. We haven't honestly had a ton of stuff going on, but it's nice to be back at school and work. It poured rain most of last week, so not many out door activities, but the grass seed is taking root in the bare patches of our back yard!

Saturday night was a big one around here. The boys went to MONSTER JAM at Angels Stadium, where there were hopes that Adam would go totally bananas nuts with the thrill of watching monster trucks tear around.

As you can see, he was thrilled. Tim and Grizz reported that he was well behaved, but not too jazzed. I guess there's a lot more waiting around than actual monster trucking, but Adam reported that he had a good time, so not a total waste.

Meanwhile, Ellie elected for us to go to Fired Up and do some ceramics painting, which I think was the better choice. The owner, who is a sweet hippie, totally remembered us and Ellie was thrilled to tell Miss Sarah that she's SIX now. We all painted and chatted and made plans to come back with Olivia and Co. for Gigi's birthday.

Then we took our darling girl to a dive bar for a delicious dinner of bar snacks and kiddie cocktails.

I mean, what more could a little lady want? She got to eat chicken fingers and fries and help pick songs on the jukebox. Plus it's nice for Sara and I to take our mom out for an evening on the town. Look at her with two adult daughters!

Happy New Year!

Only a few days late, here's the NYE recap. We once again went over to our friend Nicole and Mike's house where they had a great playroom set up for the kids and two teenaged babysitters who could keep the kids out of our hair until 9pm (when we celebrated the ball drop on live TV.) Last year, my kids came out every ten minutes to cry about something, but this year, they were able to stay with their friends and act like human beings, allowing Tim and I to actually talk to adults and have a good time. It's a good thing all of the kids are cute.

Yes, Ellie and Lexi ARE wearing matching outfits.

This picture cracks me up because I feel like in fifteen years, they'll still have those solo cups, except it'll be beer instead of sparking cider (friend Olivia on the left)

The moms got hooch in their cups, because we're grown up ladies.

New Years Day we ended up back at Nicole's house, this time with a smaller group, to have the second annual chili cook off. I lost my crown, but hey, lots of good chili and the Packers won!

Then we spent our Monday New Years Day mostly laying around like turds. We had people over to watch the Rose Bowl, where I begrudgingly rooted for USC over Penn State, because their cheating does not involve covering up child abuse, and when we told Adam to get a sweater if he wanted to go ride his bike, he found a 12-18 month sweater at the bottom of a drawer and insisted on wearing it.

That kid is a beefcake.

It's been a good week with everyone back to school. I think they've missed the routine, and I know I certainly have. A quiet house after two weeks of togetherness is a beautiful, beautiful thing.

Though I will say, Ellie made good use of her time, writing and illustrating her first novel, The Little Sea.

I find the author photo particularly lovely.

Lastly, last night we went to Tim's office to check out the new cafeteria. Please enjoy how they made a sweater for the Orc.