grand pappy frog

ok, we finally got a picture of the grand pappy frog...can you beleive how big he is?!?!?!? look back at the pic of the one xavier is holding and then look at this sucka! later that day xavier saw another one that was even bigger than this one...whoa! i wonder what they are eating that makes them this big?!

here's marcella and PAPA!!! she loves him A LOT! when she's sees his picture she knows exactly who it is and says "papa" with love in her voice :)

papa and grandma came over to celebrate my birthday with me...they even brought me a yummy cake!

Happy birthday to me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

happy birthday to me! today i turned 35...kinda crazy really, when it seems to me when i look in the mirror i still see a young teenager...where did the time go???? brian was out of town for work so it was solo for me during the day...well. not REALLY solo, i still had the kiddletts to attend to. the weather was CRAZY hot today so xay spent the day outside with the neighborhood kids in the pool and playing with squirt guns and catching frogs. in the afternoon my super good friends came by to hang out. you can see jade, her boyfriend edan and their new puppy 'pier' (yeah, i didn't spell that right), tamera (which i did have a picture of, however, she made a crazy face and the pics turned out weird), and then dayle and my mom came to grill out. brian, being the sweetie that he is, called ahead to Coldstone and ordered a cake for me and had dayle pick it up. that's my man, he knows what i like ;). so all in all it was a good day. i don't feel any older...maybe more tired, but i think that's the kids takn' all i got!

fashion

at a young age xavier started being concerned with fashion and what was "cool". he asked for his first suit when he was 3, and he wore it to school and felt fabulous in it. on the first day of kindergarten his ensemble was a total package all the way to his cool camo hat. when we were at target he really thought out what he wanted to look like on his first day and he thought the red track pants were the ticket. this year when it was time for school pictures when i asked him what he wanted to wear he replied "mom, my suit...dugh!" so off he went with his "justin timberlake" look of, his suit coat, shirt and tie, with jeans and his chuck taylors. he looked HOT! he's since turned to anything with skulls or guitars on the shirt, he says that's what rock stars wear so that's what he wants to wear. which brings me to this morning. while he was racing around getting ready so that he could go outside to play he came out of his room with some shorts in his hands and asked if i could cut them up to make them looked ripped. the first thing that came to mind was "i am not going to rip up a perfectly good pair of shorts so that you can look cool" then i thought "oh my god I'm old!! i can't believe i just thought that...that's so "mom" of me to think" so i told him that his shorts were cool even if they weren't ripped because he was wearing them. then while tying his shoes i noticed the toe of them was starting to come off a little bit. i muttered to myself "we've got to get you some new shoes these ones are falling apart" he replied with "mom, ripped shoes are cool, i like them that way" when did i stop knowing what was cool??? i haven't fallen to the "mom jeans yet" but it seems as though I'm loosing touch with what's "in" these days. he's been my fashion icon of the last 3 years, and continues to teach me what's "cool".

BBQ at Papa's house

saturday was Papa's 65th birthday...so we packed up the whole family, filled the suburban and made our way to their house to celebrate. as always the music was playing, the bbq was cookn' and people were talkn' and havn' fun! marcella wore her prettiest dress and had her hair done up in piggy tails for papa. xavier played and quincy hung out in everyone's arms. we hope papa had as good a time as we did. it's always fun to hang out with brian's family to talk, laugh and dance with ;)

ties

this is marcella's morning thing...she sneaks into brian's closet and takes his ties and puts them on. she then comes around the corner making her "don't i look pretty" sound and face. of course after she's done ransacking the closet it looks like a hurricane whipped through it...in a way i guess it did, hurricane marcella!

frog blog

those of you who have been to our house know that we have a pond. along with our pond we have fish and frogs. these frogs as you can see are quite small, however, they make THE LOUDEST CROAKING sounds. it's ridiculous...at 3:00 am you can hear them and they sounds like they would be GIGANTIC, but no, they are tiny little frog. xavier and the neighborhood kids love catching them and looking at them. the other night xavier went outside to check and see if he could catch one. he came running into the house rambling about having found a huge frog. now, i've seen the frogs, i'm thinking it can't be that big. well, my friends, xavier found the Grand Pappy of all frogs. he was the size of my two hands put together...HUGE! i now know who in the heck was making all the croaking sounds, Grand Pappy frog. i wish i could have gotten a picture of him, but by the time i got back he was gone, like the loch ness monster, never to be documented only stories told about.

straws

this is aunty (tia) nicky teaching marcella to drink out of a straw. this has now become marcella's newest obsession.

bubbles

marcella's favorite thing to do on a sunny day is to sit outside and blow bubbles. the last time i was at target i found these bubble blowing guns. this is extreemly helpfull to an impatient toddler, mommy never seemed to get them out fast enough or have the right quantity for her. this one blows 300 bubbles a minute...wow! when i get a good flow of them going they land in her hair and she gets a bubble crown! so cute.

this weekend

this past weekend was father's day and it was packed full of family and fun. now, normally i would post pics of the beloved people who attended...however, the pics i took of my dad, mindy and my mom turned out awful, so, because i love them and won't post a yucky pic of them for the world to view there's just one of me and marcella. which i have to say is nice, since i'm the one usually taking the pictures there are very few of me in them. (thank you nicky) the weather was fabulous and so was the company. brian BBQ'd again on saturday and got stellar reviews from our patrons. dad and mindy came to celebrate father's day and his birthday combined. we sat out on the deck and talked and laughed, blew bubbles for marcella and just had an all around great time. the flower pictured is from my dad and mindy's garden...isn't it beautiful?! sunday my mom and dayle came over and it was more of the same fun times on the deck. have i told you how much i love my backyard???? when it's sunny that's where i live. watching birds and butterflys add to the beauty. marcella LOVES it back there. she loves to sit at her table with some juice and just be. it's really nice. thank you to all that came by this weekend, it was so much fun!!

first and last

the first picture is of xavier on his first day of school. i felt so many emotions that day. i was handing over my precious gift that i had been in charge of for the last 5 years and giving it to someone in hope that they don't break it. the recipient of my gift was mrs. williams, and as a mother i couldn't have asked for a better first teacher. she "got" xavier and understood him and how to bring out the best in him. she knew how to respectfully reprimand when needed. she made learning fun for him and not intimidating. everyday she empowered him to take on another challenge. on the first day of school he couldn't read and could only really write his name, today he can read a whole book and write sentences with punctuation. it is truly amazing to see the "light bulb" actually turn on in front of your eyes.
today is xavier's last day of school. it's really hard to believe that the whole nine months has gone by this quickly. i wish mrs. williams could be his teacher his whole educational career to insure that his mind and spirit were well cared for. i'm excited for what next year will bring for the learning floodgates have been opened and we want to keep the knowledge flowing through them. thank you mrs. williams for on the day i handed you my gift, one was given back to me and xavier...you!

PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) flashback

Although these pictures look like they are having a good time together it was just moments later that the high pitched scream was unleashed after xavier started bugging marcella...i found myself having a PTSD flashback to my childhood and my brother. xavier is CONSTANTLY bugging marcella, from poking her in the stomach, to teasing her with his toys and then taking them away, to taking her babies or blanket from her and not giving it back, which just sends her over the edge. now don't get me wrong, he ADORES her, as she does him, but he just loves getting that rise out of her. which brings me to my flashback...my brother was a tormentor...mentally mostly, he really knew how to "get my goat" as my mom would say. she actually banned the word "DON'TTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT" which i would whine, yell...whatever it would take to get him to stop. Marcella can't say "don't" but she's got the high pitched whine down to a science. all day yesterday i had to keep telling him to leave her alone, she finally cold clocked him in between the eyes to get him to stop and he had the NERVE to be mad at her. thankfully for her she's got me and my PTSD on her side so xavier got in trouble. what is it with siblings and bugging each other for the sake of bugging?! i LOVE my bro to death but i still tell him if i ever became a serial killer it would be all his fault!

sibling love

yes, so posting everyday like i had hoped has proven to be a challenge ;)...not much goes on in the tacker household. with gas prices being more than $4.00 freakn' dollars a gallon and i drive a BEAST that eats all the gas, we don't go much of anywhere these days.

here's what's been happening here lately...

xavier has only two days left of school and then it's summer vacation, man oh man did that zip by. he's going to be a first grader, yikes!

quincy is two months old already...ok, again where did the time go? last night he blessed me with 8 hours straight of sleeping, from 8:00 pm-5:30 am he slept. of course at 5 i woke up panicked that he was dead, so i snuck in there to see if he was still breathing...and he was!

miss marcella is still as cute as she can be, loving her baby Einstein videos that feature babies and kids...she LOVES them, and is learning sign language at the same time. as for me, well it's groundhogs day here, same thing everyday...but i wouldn't trade it for the world!

the dogs are hoping for nicer weather so i will keep the backdoor open so they can hang out outside...doesn't the backyard look so inviting...i can't wait for SUN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

hope all is well, and for those that live in the pacific nw...enjoy the weather this weekend, they tell us it's supposed to sunny and 70...we'll see ;)

everybody loves to kiss quincy

Quincy was getting lots of kisses this morning. the dogs are just so gental with him and carful, it's really sweet. marcella's favorite thing to do is kiss him, and then she says "awwwwwwwww" just a normal morning for us...the tacker "zoo" is in full effect :)

good times with family

Yesterday we had mindy and dad over for a bbq to celebrate her birthday. wow wow wow brian was ON IT last night, his ribs were TO DIE FOR!!! dad and mindy brought kai over so we had all three grandkids on the deck haning out (quincy was asleep, he misses out on a lot) they had fun. marcella and grandpa hung out and she played with her shape sorter with grandma. we're all looking forward to the trip to bend to hang out even more!