Slumber Party of Five.

Well, we did it.  Our first full family overnight away from home.  I suppose we kind of cheated (and it was more like a Slumber Party of Four) because we brought Rowdy to his favorite place ever, doggie daycare, buuuuuuut we still had to get everyone ready and out of the house, so we'll count it.  Besides the pack and play Angie brought, we brought food (for us and Myra), another pack and play, blanket, pillow, sound machine, baby monitor, diaper bag, diapers (cloth takes up more space), travel high chair, clothes/PJs, frozen breast milk+bottle, my pump, random overnight stuff (toothbrushes, face wash), beer, and of course the kids+car seats.

Last weekend we packed up and headed to our friend Dan's house.  Dan is actually my best friend's brother.  He and his roommate let us all move in for the night and the dudes held down the fort with the kiddos while Angie and I rocked out to Billy Joel at the Target Center.  It was SUCH a good concert.  Besides the surprise opening act of Gavin DeGraw, Billy Joel sounded awesome and he.was.hilarious.  Very entertaining, great music, played everything we hoped to hear, and a much needed night out with my pal.  Sorry for the junky concert photos, I'm too lazy to upload the actual videos.  Maybe someday when I'm bored (HA!).

From what I hear, bedtime could have been better (there was a barking dog/baby waking incident and Myra has been very independent with bedtime especially "Myra to do it!") but really the night went very well.  We all slept in one room which was confirmation that we should not be doing such a thing.  We have never bed shared with either kid and Myra has never even slept in our room.  Neither of us is a huge fan of having Niko in our room, but it makes the most sense for right now.  So, having all of us in one room is definitely new.  Luckily, we had a pack and play for each kid and spread them apart as much as possible.  Niko slept well, woke up to nurse twice but let us sleep in until after 8 (close to 9??).  Myra did fine, too, except when she did her usual tossing and turning at night (typically no big deal and she falls right back asleep on her own), she realized we were in the room and wanted to chit chat.  "Hi Mommy!  It's Niko!"

And, for funzies, some random photos from the last week:

Grandma brought this for the day and Myra LOVED it

Helping Daddy clean up the sand box

Our first semi-short-notice house showing and it's nap time? No problem

Warrior's Pride wrap (red, white, and blue + yellow for support our troops and teal for PTSD awareness)

Doing tummy time with her baby

Babywearing isn't just for babies, hard to see the black wrap on black shirt

And We Danced.

I fell in love with Macklemore and Ryan Lewis at this year's Soundset music festival.  I think Trevor was off meeting Prof (we love him, too) and didn't fall for them like I did...at first.

I kept listening to them and they kept coming out with more and more awesome music.  It wasn't long before Trevor was hooked, too.  Not only do they make insanely fun music, they write some downright meaningful stuff, too.  I mean it when I say I was hooked from the get go, but when they came out with Same Love there was no turning back.  It was the first song that brought me to tears at face value (not because it reminded me of a funeral or something else tear-worthy).  I love it so much I'm going to plop it right here into the blog:

My stand on marriage equality is no secret and I'm proud to live in a state that voted no on an unnecessary and downright hurtful marriage amendment this year.

Anyway, back to Macklemore and Ryan Lewis.  As soon as we found out they would be at First Ave. this fall we got tickets.  We met up with our friends Adam and Kelly when we got there.  Unfortunately, photos can't capture how awesome the show was, but here they are anyway:

My favorite photo of the night.  Good work, hubs.

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Macklemore came out wearing a poncho.  Dude is stylin.

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One of their totally fun songs is Thrift Shop, so many people came wearing thrift shop attire.  Macklemore spotted a couple stellar fur coats and borrowed them.

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Thrift Shop features Wanz.

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We got to meet him.

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I have no photos of the Same Love performance-I was too busy enjoying it and trying not to cry.  What Macklemore said leading up to the performance and the song itself was probably the most memorable live music moment I've ever witnessed.  He talked about how proud he was of MN for voting no and of WA (his home state) for voting to legalize gay marriage, both very recently in this year's election.  I said multiple times that night I feel like we're part of music history.  I can't wait to look back and tell our children the story of the marriage equality movement.  

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 And we'll get to tell our first born she was there, too.

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This is Macklemore's And We Danced get up. Just one of their super fun songs!

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Aside from the headliners, the rest of the music was pretty darn good, too.  And, again, this is hip hop with a message.  First up was Xperience then Dee-1.  I especially liked Dee-1 because he took a moment to point out that just two years ago he graduated from college and spent time as a middle school math teacher.  He stressed that he hasn't always been making money off the microphone and there's absolutely nothing wrong with working hard at a "real job."  Better yet, his minor was Sociology.  I did go meet him and tell him I thought it was cool he took time to say all that, and that my major was Sociology, too-very nice dude.

-A

Yeah Buddy!

A couple weeks ago was our good friend Adam's birthday.  Trevor and I and a group of other friends got together with Adam's parents for food and drinks at Whistle Binkies in Rochester.  It's a pub with hundreds of tap and bottled beer choices (beer menu is longer than food menu) from all over the world, and it's one of Trevor's favorite places.  We had some good food and lots of laughs before heading to the Prof concert at Whiskey Bones in Rochester.  Prof is one of our favorite hip-hop artists and he's from Minnesota which makes him even more awesome.  His music can get a bit outrageous, but if you can see past that he's a riot.  

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We had some more laughs with our group while waiting for Prof to come on stage.  Music was to start at 9:30, so we were anticipating Prof starting at about 10:30, but he didn't go on stage until shortly after midnight.  In the mean time, Trevor spotted Ant (one half of another favorite local hip-hop group, Atmosphere) and went to talk to him for a while.

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I was stoked to see Prof perform, especially in such a small venue (I've seen him before at Soundset but that's at Canterbury Park).  However, it was getting to be a very late night for someone who is 30 weeks pregnant and has to work the next day.  All the people bumping into me (and I wasn't even near the stage, unfortunately) didn't help, but I tried to keep on my happy face while waiting!

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Prof performed.  It was awesome.  I would have loved to be down on the floor right in front of the stage, but with as tired as I was, and pregnant, I didn't think that'd be a good idea.  It was still a great show with great people!

(Yeah Buddy is one of Prof's songs, a fun one of course.)

-A

Soundset.

Soundset is our favorite annual music festival put on by Rhymesayers Entertainment at Canterbury Park.  They put together an awesome set list of underground hip hop artists, many of them local talent.  It's 8+ hours of awesome music, outdoors, in good ole Minnesota.  And, bonus, there's a car show, B-Boy/Girl competition and more.  Plus, excellent company.  We went with Rhya and Danny and met up with some deployment pals and even Angie for a while.

We got there with a little time to spare before one of our favorites, Prof, took the stage.  We love his music and he puts on a great show.  Rhya and Danny were hooked after seeing him perform.  Trevor had been emailing Prof and his booking agent during his latest deployment because Prof really wanted to come perform for them.  Unfortunately, it takes a lot of planning and, quite frankly, time to make that happen so it didn't work out.  But, Prof sure remembered Trevor when they met!

Prof and DJ Fundo

There were new performers every half-hour, so we got to see so much good music.  It was a hot day (my least favorite kind of day) but I survived thanks to the good entertainment and company.  And some really awesome, refreshing lemonade.

Grieves and Budo

Oh yeah, Trevor met them, too.

Mackelmore and Ryan Lewis were one of my two new favorites.  Loved the music, loved the show and loved the shirt.  I think it's awesome when people with any kind of power (celebrities, politicians, musicians, anyone) use that power for good-like his shirt.  No subtlety there and I loved it.  My other new favorite was Danny Brown.  He had an awesome sound and even more awesome hair.  Unfortunately, I didn't get a photo of him-I must have been too busy enjoying the show.

Aesop Rock with Rob Sonic and DJ Big Wiz.

Lupe Fiasco

There were many other awesome performers there, too, like I Self Devine, Big K.R.I.T., P.O.S., Ghostface Killah & Raekwon (of the Wu-Tang Clan), Evidence and more.  SO.MUCH.AWESOME.MUSIC.

...until Lupe Fiasco was almost done...and they made an announcement about the weather.  Trevor and I had gone down to get food quickly before Atmosphere's set when they stopped the show to briefly update us on the weather.  We could see dark clouds but were just expecting rain.  

The announcement gave us a heads up to a severe weather warning involving very strong winds, rain and hail.  Briefly, the intention was that the show would go on, but it wasn't long before everyone was headed outta there and they were closing up shop.  Rhya was sitting with our stuff (including my phone) so we waited for her to come our way.  When she didn't we started going back to our spot to find her, but she wasn't there.  Then the sirens started.  I convinced Trevor Rhya was probably at the car so we sprinted...in rain and hail and tornado sirens...to the car.  We found Rhya huddled under our towels by the car, not realizing she had the keys to get inside.  Not the ending we wanted, we didn't even get to see Atmosphere's performance, but it was still an awesome day with some awesome people.  We'll definitely be going back next year!

As for the rest of our Memorial Day weekend, it was pretty quiet, just what we needed!  Thursday evening we went to Jamie and Adam's for dinner with them and the boys.  Friday night Trevor and I went to see Men in Black 3 in 3D (yes, it was good!).  Saturday and Monday were both lazy days with a little homework for Trevor and a walk for all of us.  Monday night I went to see The Lucky One (a bit disappointed with it) with Cassie.  Pretty great weekend, really!  Hard to believe a year ago this past weekend we were at a send-off ceremony just starting all this deployment stuff.  Hope you all enjoyed your long weekend, and remembered the reason for it, with your loved ones!

-A