Wednesday, October 31, 2007

What costumes? We don't need no stinkin' costumes!

I'm not entirely sure our kids understand or really even like Halloween. Granted, they aren't allowed the benefit of eating candy until their tummies ache, or even a piece of candy for that matter, so what really is the pay off? Seeing a bunch of strangers dressed up in wacky and sometimes scary outfits? Having ghosts, witches, and monsters light up and make noises along the sidewalk while you're being pushed to some stranger's door to collect something you're not allowed to eat? I think the repressed memories of Halloween 2006 came back in full force once they saw their costumes for this year because they immediately broke into hysterics and started screaming "No! No!". Was Halloween last year really that bad?

Oh yeah. I forgot.

Anyways, I was hoping for a little more pleasant experience, and I think we found it. Eventually.
We started the morning off at playgroup where all of the kids (well, almost all of the kids) were dressed in their Halloween finest.

It was absolutely adorable to see them all.

Sadie was a little scared at first, but I think she got over it as soon as she realized that there was a cat in the house! I don't think you heard me. There was a cat!

A cat that was talked about for most of the time we were there, while we were trying to leave, and the entire way home in the car. I guarantee that if it wasn't for Brian's allergies (or mine for that matter), and if our dogs didn't consider a cat an incredibly delicious appetizer, we would probably have one by now. At least if the kids had something to say about it. Oh, and we would definitely have a baby elephant since they talk about them at least 1000 times a day. Actually I'm pretty sure we're going to end up being one of those cuckoo families with a stinky house that has 47 different animals living inside just like Dr. Doolittle.

Anyways, despite not wearing a costume, it was a great time. Then after our nap we met up with Linsday, Jamie and the boys at Sea World for a little trick-or-treat precursor. Neither one was excited at first, but eventually they both got the hang of it, and I think Linus even enjoyed it a little by the end. Of course I didn't get any pictures of the actual trick-or-treating, but here is a fantastic shot of the kiddos with Shamu. (I'm not sure who we picked up on the end there).

After having dinner at Sea World, we moved on to the Adler's house for the night time trick-or-treating.

Seeing as this was our first time, it was Jessie's first time, and I think it was Fieldin's first time too, Jacob pulled rank and had to show everyone the ropes. Sadie and Linus were even excited enough to wear their costumes for almost an hour! (Well, Sadie wore half of her costume - the top half). Long enough for us to get a few pictures at least. (I look horrendous, but this is the only good one of the kids).

All in all it was a really fun-filled day. And for a complete slideshow of Halloween pictures:

Happy Halloween!

Tuesday, October 30, 2007

Air quality - good; House cleanliness - not so good

This morning after checking the air quality report and seeing that the air was GOOD, we excitedly left the house to go to playgroup. One of the moms was hosting at her house on the coast, so we let the kids play outside for the first time since the fires. And boy did they have a ball! This house rivaled Lindsay's in the Toys R' Us department, and there was 2 of everything which was terrific. (Translate into "very little fighting"). See for yourself:


There is a price for our happiness, however. And that price is a clean house.

We've only been out of the house for two days, and already the house is in disarray. So much so that today Sadie picked up a washcloth and started wiping down every surface she could reach. While we were in the middle of playing in our tunnel. Apparently it was so bad that she couldn't stand it anymore. And this wasn't just a passing desire, but one that lasted for almost a full 30 minutes. Because of this, I was able to get a few videos of her cleaning spree.



What was that? Where was Linus during all of this? Why swiffering, of course.

And despite their best efforts, our house still looks like this:

Nice try, kiddos. Now you know why I have officially given up.

Monday, October 29, 2007

...and we have left the building!

After obsessively checking the air quality reports online, Lindsay and I decided that the air was good enough to take a field trip to the aquarium with the kids this morning. Yeah! Out of the house!

So, after packing a lunch and getting Linus and Sadie into the car we headed towards the coast. The air is definitely better, but not great. I developed a low-grade headache but didn't have any trouble breathing, and I kept a very close eye on Linus who seemed to do fine. It was a hit. And to make a good thing even better, there are no field trips this week because of the fires. I have never been to the aquarium without at least 100 kids running around. And Linus loves to follow older kids, so it's really hard to keep them close by while trying to look at fish that aren't nearly as entertaining as a group of 2nd graders screaming and carrying on. But, no problems with that today as you can see.

Even though the fish were mildly entertaining, there are a ton of different exhibits there. And they all have buttons to push and levers to pull! What could be more thrilling?


I knew we missed getting out of the house, but I didn't realize just how much we missed it. Hopefully the air will keep improving so we can enjoy the rest of the week too.

Friday, October 26, 2007

Observations

Since we've been stuck inside for the past few days, I have made a few observations:

1. Thinking that Linus is starting to become potty trained because he has peed on the potty 3 times now is a bad assumption. One of those times happened right after he decided to poop in the bathtub.

2. Having the potty chairs in the bathroom is making life increasingly more complicated. Every time I have to go to the bathroom, the kids have to try too. Without a diaper. This means I have to disrobe them before I can pee. This isn't practical if I really have to pee.

3. Why is it that the kids are so excited to sit on the potty chairs because I am going to sit on my "potty chair", but then become bored the second my butt hits the seat, and then take off naked running around the house?

4. Because I am not leaving the door to the garage or the backyard open right now due to the poor air quality, the dogs literally need to either go to the bathroom or get a drink of water every 3 minutes.

5. The kids do not like the fact that I am shutting the doors after letting the dogs into the garage or out back because they can't watch them.

6. We do not have nearly enough toys to keep everyone occupied for 40 minutes, let alone the entire day.

7. Even though Jessica has sent me a bullet-point list of pretend play activities to do with the kids, I am still not creative enough to engage them for more than 3 minutes.

8. In all honesty, I think I am the one who is going the most stir-crazy in this house.

9. I definitely eat more if I can't leave the house in the mornings with the kids.

10. You would think an entire bag of Pirate Booty would be enough for one person in a single day, but it really isn't.

11. Since being stuck inside, I have napped in the afternoon with the kids because I am utterly exhausted by the middle of the day.

12. Since being stuck inside, the kids are not napping nearly long enough.

13. Even though I have list after list of things that I need to get done during the day, somehow I find myself less productive when I am stuck at home all day then when I spend half of the day out with our friends.

14. Despite being stuck inside and going insane, I can't help but love being home all day with these two. Most of the time.

********
Some of you have asked me about the Wild Animal Park and if it suffered any damage because of the fires. It seems like it did burn in certain areas, but that the exhibits are fine. Also, all but 2 animals survived the fires which is impressive considering the fires did make it onto the Animal Park grounds and that many of the animals were not evacuated. They are already open for business, and hopefully the air will clear up soon so we can check on the baby elephant who likes to roll in the dirt that Sadie is still talking about.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

House bound

We just got an email from the NICU staff saying that our kids need to stay indoors until all of the particulate matter is out of the air. This is especially true with Linus. Considering the fact that he has asthma, and that he had pneumonia-like symptoms which kept him in the ICU for 5 days, the last thing we need or want is to expose him to smoke and end up back in the hospital.

This means that we have just finished day 4 of staying indoors, but day 1 of doing it without anyone else to play with. Needless to say, the kids (and I) are going a little stir-crazy. We managed to play with every toy in the house, built a fort, knocked down a fort (and repeated 100 more times), colored on paper, colored on the table, colored on the walls, "helped" clean the house, watched me re-clean the house, "helped" put away the clothes we evacuated with, watched me put away the clothes we evacuated with as well as all of the other clothes that were pulled out of every drawer in our house and thrown around, but yet no one wanted to eat anything for lunch or dinner. I have also learned that the kids, especially Linus, actually like to watch Thomas the Train in short increments, but nothing else. And the highlight of their day today was watching Pres Bush and Gov Schwarzenegger on tv take off in a helicopter, followed by 5 other helicopters, and then see the entire helicopter convoy less than 2 minutes later fly directly above our house. The only problem is that both of them were screaming "Back! Back!" for them to come back and do it all again...for 20 minutes.

I write this half-kidding because now the news coverage is showing all of the people who have just returned to their houses which were destroyed. And the small towns that have to boil all of their water because the substations were burnt down and they can't determine if the water is safe to drink. And the many people who are without power. And the many people who are still evacuated because the fires have changed direction and they are now blowing back towards the towns they just went through which means if your house survived the first time, it might not survive the second time. And for all of the 10,000 people who have evacuated to Qualcomm stadium, and who are living outside in this polluted air and who still don't know if they will have a house to go home to.

A couple of days ago Lindsay and I were talking about how horrible this would be if it were happening a couple of years ago while we or the kids were in the hospital. At least one of the hospitals here was evacuated because of the fires, and I have no idea how they would successfully move a heavily medicated pregnant woman with severe pre-term labor,

or worse yet how they would move a critically ill preemie who weighs less than 3 lbs.

Both Lindsay and Brian know of women who are due any day and ended up leaving San Diego to stay closer to hospitals out of the fire zone just in case they went into labor. And I just read a news story about a woman who did go into labor while fleeing the fires and was separated from her family. Both mom and baby are fine, but could you imagine?

It sure makes something like staying inside with cranky kids in a comfortable house with plenty of food and toys seem like a luxury.

Wednesday, October 24, 2007

Evacuated

After posting the pictures we took on Sunday night, Brian and I turned on the tv to watch the update on the fires here in San Diego. By 7pm they didn't seem that threatening, and were pretty far east, but the hourly updates grew more and more ominous. I ended up watching the local news until 2am. (Linus and Sadie also decided that the fires were important, so they woke up at 12:30am to watch with me). I finally fell asleep, only to wake up again at 4am, turn on the news and in just 2 hours realized the fires were heading right in our direction. Worse than that, our house smelled of smoke, my eyes were burning and it was getting harder to breathe. And I'm not the one with asthma. To make matters worse, this was all happening as close as 20 miles from our house.

I woke Brian up at 6am, told him that we needed to start packing and we rushed to get all of our important stuff together. I grabbed our birth certificates, passports, insurance info, gas and electric bills in case we need proof of where we live, medicines, some clothes, toothbrushes, shampoo, deodorant, and a little bit of food. Of course, since the dogs were coming with us, we got their bowls, food, blankets, the crate and their ball ready to go too. The only things of value that we packed up were our pictures.

By 9am we were packed and ready to go. Lucky for us we had a few people offer to house us and the dogs, which is a more generous offer than I think anyone realizes. We took Lindsay and Jamie (Dylan and Tyler's parents) up on their offer, and all 6 of us headed to the beach and away from the terrible smokey air.

Even though all of the parents were glued to the tv to watch the progression of the fire, the kids had a ball. Dylan and Tyler got to hang out with the dogs, and Sadie and Linus got to play with a bunch of new toys. We thought we had evacuated to Toys R Us!

All day Monday we played indoors and also kept an eye on the fire. We were hearing that all of the fires (I think at that point there were 8 different ones in San Diego county) were burning out of control contributed by the lack of moisture, high Santa Ana winds and high temperatures. Apparently because of the wind gusts and amount of smoke, all of the fire fighting was done on the ground since they couldn't send up the water planes or helicopters. They also couldn't give us an accurate map of where the fires were and which way they were moving. All we knew was that the fires were burning towards the coast and that parts of the coast north of us were being evacuated too.

By Tuesday I thought we would hear some improvement, but it was more of the same. The only good news was that the winds were starting to change course and blow onshore instead of from the desert which was keeping the fire from spreading towards the coast. Here's a picture from space showing how prolific the fires are:
The only problem is that now all that smoke is blowing back onshore which means we get to deal with it all again.

By Wednesday morning, even though the air quality is at an all-time low, the fires were starting to change direction and head east towards the mountains. Knowing that our place wasn't in any danger, and knowing that the entire county now had the terrible air, we thanked Lindsay, Jamie, Dylan and Tyler for their incredibly generous hospitality (especially since Tyson managed to dig a 3 ft hole in their front yard), and headed back home.

But before we did, all of the kids had one last hilarious game of hide-and-seek.


So, here we are, back at home. We've been told that people with respiratory problems shouldn't leave the house even after the fires are extinguished because of the pollutants in the air, so we'll be here, cooped up indoors for awhile. Apparently the crazy scientists have made their way into town for a conference that is still going on, even though this place is a national disaster area. Brian is collaborating with one of these crazy scientists so he's heading back to work tomorrow. But if anyone else is crazy enough to come here, you'll know where to find us.

Sunday, October 21, 2007

A day of firsts

Today we went to our friend Jacob's 4th birthday party. And while we were there, the kids had their first opportunity to hit a pinata. (Sorry, can't figure out where the correct symbol is). And which they hit without a whole lot of enthusiasm.


The whole ride home, Sadie was disturbed by the fact that the pinata was broken. I don't think they really understood the concept.

Also, today at Jacob's party, we finally captured the kids on the trampoline for the first time. They had been on there a couple of times before, but this was the first time we got a pretty good shot of them in action.

Today we also officially had our first major fire(s) of the season. We tried to take a picture of the one to the south of us (no, that is not a real mountain, but a mountain of smoke),

and the one to the northeast of us (about 30-40 miles away). These are clear skies so everything that looks like a cloud is actually smoke.

The fire to the northeast of us is pretty close to the Animal Park (~10 miles) that we visit all of the time, which is really scary. It looks like we'll be spending the week indoors since we had ash raining down on us during the party and I don't think they'll be getting the fires under control anytime soon because of the Santa Anna winds. Luckily both fires are in much less populated areas than the huge firestorms from a few years ago, but it's still such a scary sight.

On a cheerier note, last night (OK, not technically today, but close enough), Linus went pee-pee in the potty chair for the first (and only) time. This happened while I was at the grocery store and Brian didn't seem to understand that this event needed to be memorialized on film, so unfortunately there are no pictures. So, instead we re-created the event today for your viewing pleasure. Enjoy!

Saturday, October 20, 2007

Weather

Call me crazy, but I don't ever remember it being this hot in the middle of October.

Not that any of us are complaining...


Thursday, October 18, 2007

It's starting...

I was going to write a post about how the kids are starting to do a lot better with drawing lately. They can actually draw circles...well, sort of, but they have the general idea. I was also going to write about how even though they still like to eat markers and crayons, they are doing much better with chalk and pens. (I prefer the chalk because it's easier to clean and they don't freak out as much when they get chalk on their hands as opposed to pen marks).


But that was before I went outside to get the mail, and found our new potty chairs sitting on the front porch.

Let the fun begin!

They were initially excited to see them. Then sat on them for about 0.5 seconds. (Which is why this is such a fuzzy picture - I just didn't get my camera out fast enough).

Then they got off, but Linus decided to sit back down on the step stool.

Ummm...not quite, big guy.

Sadie then didn't want to even be in the same room as the potty chairs, while Linus only wanted to remove the potty inserts and throw them around. (Luckily no one had gone in the inserts yet).

Seeing as I have absolutely no desire to start this whole potty training thing, I am perfectly fine to have both potty chairs sit in our guest bathroom and take up space. I figure the kids will get used to them over time and maybe even sit on them every once in awhile. Until then I am perfectly fine changing diapers. Actually, with as much as I am dreading this whole potty training thing, and seeing as there is very little I despise more than public restrooms, I am hoping Brian will get a big raise so we can afford to keep our kids in diapers for the next 3 years or so.

(Actually, it could always be worse. I think I have more fear of transitioning them into big kid beds than the whole potty training process. Good thing someone has already invented crib tents...and shackles).

Tuesday, October 16, 2007

Fun with words

Every day I am amazed at how well the kids are doing with their talking. I think they are probably still a little behind the curve, but their progress over the last few weeks is remarkable. What is even more amazing is my ability to glimpse into their little minds now that they can tell me what they are thinking (for the most part).

And what they are thinking changes about every 3.2 seconds.

And usually what they say is completely unrelated to what's going on in the real world.

I'll give you some examples of our conversations over the last few days:

1. The big one for Sadie is talking about the baby elephants at the Animal Park. There are 3 of them under a year, and one of those was born about 3 weeks ago. Since we've been going there about every other day these last few weeks, we have really gotten to know this adorable little 250 lb cutie. (I can also tell you all about the reproduction, health, and care of elephants since I chat it up with the zoo keepers when we are there, and who are on another pregnancy watch). Sadie always has to state out the fact that this littlest elephant likes to roll in the dirt. (The elephant did it once. Once, out of the 10 times we've seen them). Not only will she point this out on the way to and from the Animal Park, but she'll talk about it in the morning when she wakes up, during dinner, and right before bed as well as various random times during the day. Interestingly, she doesn't really care about the baby elephant once we're there looking at her. Overall, Linus doesn't seem nearly as interested in the dirty baby elephant as Sadie is.
(Brian did take out our pictures from Thailand to show the kids this morning, and apparently they were a huge hit. If you would have told me then that the pictures we were taking would be hugely entertaining to our toddler twins 3 years later, I would have had a heart attack).

2. Linus' big interests are trucks and jeeps. This makes for very animated conversation whenever we drive anywhere. And since we are always in the car, and there are always huge trucks on the road as well as road construction just a few hundred yards away from our house, Linus has been in heaven. But, he and Sadie never point out a jeep without referencing Daddy's jeep and the fact that it is green. They seem to ignore the fact that they have never seen it driven and that it's just sitting in the garage collecting all of the junk we have, but I guess that's not the point.

3. Whenever Sadie gets on the phone to talk to grandma, the only thing she says is "shopping". Shopping for what? Your guess is as good as mine. She did, however, bring up shopping out of the blue in the car yesterday. When I asked her what she wanted to shop for, she said "food". When I asked her what kind of food, she said "chicken, hummus, grapes and milk". OK then.

4. Apparently, our new favorite color is yellow. Sadie will only wear yellow socks, and since we only have 2 pairs, this requires either a lot of laundry or she just wears dirty socks. This obsession with yellow has carried over into our new favorite topic of conversation:

5. The potty chair. Yes, I have decided that we should probably have a couple in the house. No, I am definitely not starting the potty training thing with them, but they (OK, mostly Sadie) have a huge interest in anything dealing with the GI tract these days so I thought we might as well experiment. I ordered them online since I just wanted a basic model and couldn't find anything around here that didn't have lights or sing songs, and I let the kids pick out the color that they wanted. So we have 2 yellow potty chairs arriving next week - you'd think they won the lottery they are so excited about them. We'll see how they feel after they try to sit on one. I mean, Linus was excited about the prospect of a bubble bath and we all know how that played out.

6. Also related to all things yellow, is that teaching the kids about colors has been fun but really confusing at the same time. This is because Linus calls Sadie, "Blue". It's very cute and I'm starting to think that maybe she actually will be a Blue when she gets older (which is what I imagined when we named her in the first place, but it didn't really work out that way. What do you think? Sadie or Blue?).

Anyways, this definitely creates confusion. Just last night we were talking about toothbrushes while we were getting ready for bed, and the fact that Linus has a blue one and Sadie has a yellow one. But, Linus doesn't like to mention the noun in which is he referring to (in most situations), he just skips right ahead to the adjectives. So he kept saying: Blue, yellow (aka Sadie Blue's toothbrush is yellow). I thought he was saying his was blue and hers was yellow, but his frustration and anger showed me that I was grossly misinformed. We finally got it straightened out and all was well with the world. For now.

7. The latest funny one happened at the Animal Park today. We were sitting eating our lunch and watching a hummingbird right beside us. Apparently it wasn't a hummingbird, but a "hummus"-bird. Anything to the contrary was just wrong. At least they could point out an Okapi a mile away.

And I'm sure there will be plenty more to come...

Monday, October 15, 2007

The new trick

And here I thought Sadie was really enjoying her honeydew.

Oh no. Instead, she was just stuffing it down her shirt when I wasn't looking.

Sneaky girl.

Sunday, October 14, 2007

Perspective (my version)

There are a few blogs out there that I read religiously and that have/do help me try to be a better person. Today, one of these linked to a different blog posting about "perspective" which I found very poignant:

http://micropreemietwins.blogspot.com/2007/10/perspective.html

It made me realize that I am often the person who sticks their foot in their mouth and says something stupid without thinking. I like to think of myself as open-minded, considerate, sympathetic, etc., but all too often I say something to the contrary when I really don't mean to. For example, many times at playgroup when a mom brings up a conversation about their kids (eating, sleeping, tantrums, etc.) I always have to throw in my 2 cents. It's automatic. Afterwards I ask myself why do I have to do that? Why can't I just listen or ask more questions instead of always turning it around to be about my kids?

Many times I think that my guys have had it the hardest because of their prematurity, and related to that, all of Sadie's surgeries, or Linus' asthma problems. But, Sadie had her surgeries and now she's absolutely fine. Linus takes asthma medicine and he is absolutely fine. Both of them are doing fantastic compared to many, many, many other kids, both preemies and full-term.

Once again I have had another wake-up call to count my blessings and stop dwelling on what "could have been".

I am so appreciative that we were able to conceive twins when just getting pregnant was a hard road. I am so thankful that I was able to carry them to 27 weeks instead of just 24 when I first went into pre-term labor and was about to have an emergency c-section. I am so grateful that we had them in San Diego, at UCSD where they received fabulous care and continued to improve for the 10 weeks and 14 weeks they were there. And I can't be any more grateful for our family and friends who have helped us along the way and who have all contributed to the wonderful kids that Sadie and Linus are today. Sure, we'll have bumps in the road, and I will continue to post about our triumphs and struggles, but more importantly I need to remember everything we have to be thankful for.

And I am.

**ETA: This post is definitely NOT geared towards any one in particular. In fact, I wrote this purely about me and my need to change my perspective every once in awhile. However, if you are 32 weeks pregnant and tell me that it's terrible to be pregnant and want to have your kid RIGHT NOW, I might be a tad offended. Other than that, I think I'm a pretty receptive person.

Thursday, October 11, 2007

My, what pretty twin girls you have

When you're a mom of twins, you get stopped. A lot. People are always wanting to tell you about their twins.

Or their friend's twins.

Or their uncle's cousin's roommate's dog trainer's hair dresser's daughter's twins.

I've even had people stop so they could show me pictures of their twin grandchildren on their cell phone. Who does something like that?

(Definitely not Grandma. She doesn't have a cell phone with picture-taking capability. Instead she pulls out the wad of 200 pictures from her purse. I'm not sure if Gish does it, but I know she shows off the video of the kids to anyone who will watch it. You really can't blame them when they have grandchildren as cute as theirs).

The comment I get most often is, "Your girls are adorable". Hmmm.

Now for the life of me, I can't understand why they would think I have two girls.

OK, OK. They don't always go out in public dressed like that. Sometimes they do look more like this:

But, after hearing it enough times, you start to question if Linus' surfer hair is starting to become a little too feminine. Actually, the tipping point was the fact that his hair is really getting into his eyes. So, it was time for him to get a hair cut.

I took him to a place that had been recommended by a few moms in playgroup. The set-up was amazing and couldn't be any better suited for kids. Linus got to pick whether he wanted to sit in a race car or a jeep. Then, while steering, he could watch Thomas the Train on a flat screen tv right beside him. (I'm thinking the next time I need a haircut I might just go there). Add that to the fact that it was a salon/toy store, there was so much for him to process that he basically sat there like a deer in headlights. This made for a very fast and easy haircut.

Afterwards, we sat outside and watched the road construction, which might have been an even bigger hit. (Pretty much anything involving large trucks with scoops is a highlight). But, the best part of the kids' day was meeting daddy at work for lunch and to show off the new 'do.

What was the best part of mommy and daddy's day? Finding out that Brian has an interview at Northwestern Medical School (in downtown Chicago). Already! We weren't expecting anything until the beginning of the year, but the fact that calls are already coming in is very, very exciting. I'll keep a running tab on the side so you, and we, can follow the process along and see where in the world we will actually end up this time next year!

Wednesday, October 10, 2007

Happy Birthday, Grandpa M.

Wishing you a fantastic 70th birthday, with many more to come.




We love you!

Condiments

As most of you know, I feel there are very few things in the world than can compare to a good condiment. If you've seen our fridge, you would notice the plethora of condiments ranging from 6 different types of salad dressing (which is not a lot for us), to 3 different types of mustard, to 3 different kinds of cream cheese.

And it doesn't stop with American condiments. Oh no-sir-ree.

We have a huge variety of Asian condiments as well. From chili garlic sauce to sweet chili sauce and chili garlic paste, 2 different kinds of soy sauce, and a giant bottle of hoisin sauce.

As for Mexican, I'm not sure I can even count the variety of salsas that we have.

And yes, we do use every single one of them at least a few times a month. I like variety, people.

Don't believe me? Take a look at this:

I'm pretty sure we should take out an insurance plan on our condiments. If our fridge was to break, how would we afford to replace everything?

I have discovered something else as well.

While at Sea World (which is the worst place to be if you are hungry, by the way. They just pump the smell of BBQ into every corner of that place), we had our lunch at a table near the BBQ restaurant. Lucky for me there are huge vats of BBQ sauce outside near the tables which are conveniently accessible to those of use who bring chicken for lunch but don't have anything to dip it in. There was one time that I did let the kids try my BBQ sauce and they didn't like it at all. But, times have changed. This time, they both asked to dip their chicken into the sauce, and they both liked it a lot.

Sadie more than Linus.

A lot more than Linus.

It seems like Sadie and I have yet another thing in common. Good thing I'm still bigger than her so it's not too hard to fight her for the last of the BBQ sauce. But, I guess when she gets older we'll have to buy another fridge to hold all of her condiments too.