Cammy, Gerry, Reed and Spring

NWSS

2011-09-24T09:51:00.000-07:00

Toward the end of July, we made our annual trip to NW St.ring S.ummit. It was a busy July for us! When we got home from Summit on July 27th, I realized that between July 1st and the 27th, we had been home for a grand total of seven days. All the other days we'd either been somewhere else, or in transit to or from our travels. What a month!

We got there on Wednesday because Gerry was a volunteer. It meant that we got to get a good camp site and hold down space for our friends, but the real fun began once all our friends showed up. We've camped with the same families for a couple of years now and the kids enjoy playing together. It's fun to catch up and watch their kids grow as the summers pass. We brought our hammock as did another family and the kids had lots of fun playing in them.

Reed and Spring playing with their friend R. This marked the first year that we would let the kids play out of sight on occasion. They weren't far, and we could still hear them, but it was a mark of the fact that our kids are growing fast! And I have to brag because I made the little red dress S is wearing here. I actually finished some of the hand stitching on it on the car ride down!

This was one of my favorite moments of the entire trip! The kids are having a jam session together! :)

Reed and Gerry down at the music. I think this is from Thursday night. This evening, Reed really wanted to go home early. We hadn't quite gotten into the groove of going down for the music yet, so we had forgotten to bring toys, snacks and jammies for him. I was torn. Part of me feared that if we went back early that night, that he'd want to go back early every night and I knew that neither G nor I was going to be excited to miss the music for the next few nights. But I also worried that if I made him stay, it would take all the fun out of it and he wouldn't want to come to the music any more. But when I stopped and considered how unprepared we were, I decided to go back to camp. It turned out fine and we stayed for all the music after that!

One of the cooler things we got to do while we were there was go do some tie-dye with the kids. Part of what I loved is that every parent in our camp had bought a pack of plain white t-shirts for their kids to dye, and every family brought all the t-shirts just in case another family forgot to bring some. I love how we take care of each other!

The actually tie-dying was a little chaotic. We went down early, wanting to make sure that we got there before the die ran out. Well, they weren't quite prepared for the huge rush of families they got. There weren't enough rubber bands, and the dye wasn't ready yet. They were making a turmeric dye which had to boil before it was ready. It all worked out though. The kids were super excited to do their tie-dye, partly thanks to a tie-dye video game we have on our ip.ad, but they stayed reasonably patient. Also, thanks to that same video game, I was able to offer some advice to other families for how to fold their shirts. Here we are, finally waiting in line to dye our shirts.

Here's Reed wearing his finished t-shirt (and looking like the spokeskid for An.nie's Bu.nnies). The flash makes it a bit tough to see the variation in coloration though. Also, check out how much his tooth has come down in just a week!

Spring silliness at camp.

S took more naps in my lap during the month of July than she's done in a LONG time!

And the point of doing the tie-dyes on Saturday morning (aside from it just being a cool thing to do) was so that the kids could wear what they'd made in the kids' parade that afternoon. Reed wore his, but you can't really see it under his costume. Spring on the other hand was tired and didn't want to wear hers. Actually she didn't want to wear the dragon cape either and soon wound up shedding it.

A happier Spring at the end of the parade, sans dragon cape.

On our way home, I caught a salamander for the kids. I was actually getting worried that I wasn't going to be able to catch one for them. It was Saturday and we'd been there since Wednesday, and I'd blown the only chance I'd gotten thus far by not being quick enough. But this time, I caught one. :) I'm not sure who was more excited, me or the kids!

G and R enjoying the Saturday night set.

Reed had been eagerly anticipating a paddle boat ride since the day we arrived. Sunday morning, it was finally time! Spring had no interest in going, so it was just the boys.

A fun shot of them going under the bridge.

Later in the day, Gerry went out again, this time with Reed and two other kids from our group, both about R's age. I think all the parents were wondering how well it would go, but the kids all did great and it wound up being one of Gerry's favorite parts of the trip!!

Hanging out in camp on Sunday afternoon.

Can you guess who took this picture? Just check out who's missing. :)

Another portrait by Reed.

G and I took our kiddos and our friends' son R out for a walk on Sunday afternoon. There were lots of fake mustaches and masks that you could use to have your picture taken here. Pretty fun!

And we stopped and saw a peachick that was being taken care of by the owners of the property (the chick had been abandoned by its mother). Of course Spring loved seeing a baby!

One of R's big accomplishments for the trip was learning how to slide down the pole on the playground by himself! G is there to spot him, but didn't touch him on the way down. At the top...

And landing.

Us with the two other families that we camped with. What a great group of people!!

Big week!

2011-09-15T11:35:00.000-07:00

As I work on catching up the blog, I think I'm going to jump around in time a bit so I can blog about current things and also catch up on the past! We had a BIG week this week. It was the first week for preschool for R and S! Sunday night before R's first day, we reminded him that he had his first day of preschool the next day. I hadn't anticipated an nerves on his part or I would have talked to him more about it earlier, but when we started talking about it, he got really serious and it was clear he was worried. We talked and let him know that everybody gets nervous before the first day of school! I hadn't planned on staying for the day with him at school and had some work I needed to get done before a meeting I had on Monday afternoon, so I stayed up late doing my work so that I could stay with him if he needed it.

Monday morning he woke up and was really excited to go to school! He even insisted that I take his picture (above) which Gerry had mentioned the night before and Reed wasn't thrilled about. :) We left early to give him some time to settle in before the school was crowded with kids and parents. Once he got there, I could see he was getting more comfortable. I stayed for about a half hour after class started, and when I left, Reed was just fine! Whew! Aside from being proud of him for doing so well on his first morning of school, I had a proud moment just as I was leaving and Reed had a question for his teacher. She was doing something else and I heard him ask, "Excuse me, Miss Ellie?" I was so proud to hear such polite manners!

Spring had her first day of school the next day. Reed really wanted to take her picture before school so this was the one he took. I was volunteering in her class that day and got to stay for the day. She did great, but it's clear that she's quite a bit more advanced than the rest of the class which has a wide age variation. S was invited to join the next class up but I declined because it would have meant that R would have been on class on Mon, Tues, and Wed and she would have been in class on Thurs and Fri. It just would have been too much I think.

S with her teacher.

And the other big news for this week is that we took the training wheels of R's bike!! We had experimented with taking one training wheel off at a time, but he had gotten frustrated at how tippy the bike was. We had borrowed a balance bike from R's friend T and had been encouraging him to practice lots on the balance bike because it would make his peddle bike easier. He took our words to heart and spent a lot of time practicing on the balance bike. Then yesterday, R, S and friend T had ridden bikes down to the end of our cul de sac with Miss K (our friend, nanny and T's mom). R and S were riding balance bikes and T had his peddle bike. T didn't want to ride his bike back up the hill, so in R's words, "I did a very kind and noble thing. I told T that he could ride his balance bike and I would take his peddle bike." Apparently, he hopped right on and rode all the way up the hill! Wow!! We are all SO proud!! Miss K says that everybody did a happy dance for R when they got to the top of the hill!!!

S has been doing great on her balance bike. She's a real daredevil and seems to have no fear of falling!! She'll ride all the way down our hill without slowing down and will actually push herself to go faster! Sometimes I can hardly watch and to make things more scary, she'll wiggle her handle bars every so often so she it looks like she's about to crash!

Our favorite places to ride are in the neighbors' driveway...

...and at the end of the cul de sac. It looks like they're about to crash in this picture, but they avoided each other!

Here is some video of R and S at the neighbors'.

Day out

2011-09-14T22:02:00.000-07:00

We got home from our sailing trip on a Sunday and the following Thursday, the kiddos and I headed off for a camping trip with Grandma and Grandpa Mills while G went backpacking.

Our first stop was a night at the De.nny Cree.k campground near Sno.qualmie. Reed and Spring were super excited to be camping in Gma and Gpa's tent trailer. We were trying to get settled down for the night and Reed was bopping around in his bed, when the lowlight of our trip occurred. He bonked one of his front teeth on something very hard.

The tears were immediate and urgent. Grandpa brought him to me and I looked at him. His mouth was bleeding and one of his teeth appeared to be almost completely broken off. We all felt sick immediately.

We began trying to decide what to do, when my dad suggested that maybe the tooth had just been pushed up into his gums (when he was young, he'd had a neighbor who had done that). I looked again at his tooth, it was one that he had chipped previously, and sure enough, I noticed that the contour of the chip was still there and I could see the outline of his tooth under his gums. So, we got on the phone with the nurse on call from Reed's pediatrician's office. She said we didn't need to be seen that night, but to call a dentist in the morning. Reed had settled down pretty quickly all things considered. We spent some time trying to talk him in to taking a dose of ibuprofen, but that just caused more sadness so we let it go.

In the morning when we woke up, Reed said it felt funny, but didn't hurt anymore. Thank goodness! We called a pediatric dentist's office and she explained that this is a common injury and as long as the tooth doesn't get infected, they like to leave it alone and the tooth would grow back out. With that, we were ready to head out for Da.y Ou.t with Th.omas!

Gma, the kids and I headed out to see Th.omas and all the attractions while Gpa packed up the trailer. There was lots for us to see including this engine that the kids could play in. Spring insisted on wearing the bill of her hat way down over her eyes so she had to tip her chin way up to see anything. It was pretty funny!

One of the stranger parts of our trip came when Gpa rejoined us. On the shuttle to Th.omas, he had sat by a family with a 4 and a half year old boy named Reed who had jammed his tooth into his gums during a camping trip! O.o What are the chances of that?!

Soon, it was time for our turn to ride Th.omas. R and S were super excited!! I love this picture, not because it's a great portrait or anything, but because you can see that they were just about to turn themselves inside because of the excitement!

We managed to get some good pics on the train too though. :)

Still waiting to depart!

We might be on our way at this point... it's hard to tell.

More cuteness on the train.

The kids LOVED seeing Tho.mas and I have to admit, I even got pretty excited when I saw him. :) You might have noticed that both R and S are wearing matching tie-dyes in this picture. It's not that I think it's super cute to dress them the same, but when I take them to a crowded place, I like to have them wearing similar bright colors so that if one of them gets lots, I'll have an easier time spotting them!

After our ride, we stayed around for a little bit longer, but we were headed to Potlatch next, so we left pretty quickly. It was a long drive there because Friday afternoon traffic was bad! Fortunately, Gpa beat us there and had the trailer all ready for us when we arrived. :) I didn't wind up taking a lot of pictures of us at Pot.latch because it rained a lot. I was thankful that we had the trailer to play in! We made it out to the beach a few times, went for some walks around the campground and even managed a to get out to do some bubbles.

We also went into Hoo.dsport on Saturday and didn a little fishing and crabbing there. Somehow though, I managed not to take any pictures of that. Perhaps I left my camera at camp or something. Anyway, despite the tooth and the rain, we all had a great time!

To Stehekin

2011-09-13T21:49:00.000-07:00

In early July, we took an amazing sailboat trip from the family cabin on Lake Chelan all the way to Stehekin! The day we arrived at the lake, we started prepping the boat for the trip. Gerry arranged beds for R and S on the boat. At that point we weren't sure whether we were going to try to sleep in the boat or in our tent. Here's Spring in her little bed.
And here's Reed in his bed. As it turned out, we didn't wind up sleeping in the boat, but it was nice for each kid to have their own little place to hang out and play.

There was LOTS of excitement the night before we left. And if I'm honest, I have to say, there were some nerves too. The kids don't always like to stay above deck on the sailboat, and I was dreading spending the entire trip below deck. I think Gerry was probably nervous too. He really wanted to make sure we all enjoyed ourselves!

But soon, we were on our way. It didn't take Reed long to discover that peeking out the hatch was his favorite way to take in the view.

We stopped to take a little walk along the way. We saw tons of butterflies on this trip, they were especially thick here. Somebody had spilled something sweet by the dock and there were dozens of butterflies attracted to it. By the time we were back from our little walk, most of the butterflies had gone.

And after about eight hours of motoring, we found our home for the night. R and S were definitely ready to get off the boat and play. There was just enough beach there for them to be able to throw rocks. :)

And we had a gorgeous view!

Reed found a pile of ash left from somebody cleaning out the firepits. That kid LOVES kicking dust around and making "smoke". It looked cool, but we had to tell him to stop, it was getting everywhere!

The next morning, we went and checked out the creek (Prince Creek?) that was a short walk from our campsite. It had very obviously jumped channels recently. There were large trees that were now in the middle of the fast flowing creek and a dry creek bed just a short distance away.

And then, we were on our way again. One of the fun things we did on the boat was watch for waterfalls and we saw a lot of them. It was a pretty short boat ride (2 hours?) till we reached Weaver Point where we would camp for the night. We motored again as there was not a breath of wind. If you know much about Lake Chelan, then you'll know that's pretty unusual.

I love this picture! Spring had passed out for a late afternoon nap in my arms and I love that you can see Reed in the background fishing. We had seen some little fish (juvenile trout?) swimming around the dock and he was determined to catch one. Someday we'll tell him that he was fishing with an open swivel instead of a hook. We just didn't have the means to prepare a fish and didn't have any barbless hooks to catch and release. Anyway, he just looks so focused.

R and S had lots of fun playing on the beach.

You can tell by their clothes that it wasn't super warm there. Partly we were in the shade in the afternoon, but it also wasn't all that hot for most of the trip. Quite pleasant. :)

Then as early as we could get out the next day, we went over to Stehekin and tied up at the marina there.

Then, we rented two bikes and a trailer and headed off. Our first stop was the old Stehekin school house. Seeing all the pictures of previous classes in there kind of made me want to move to Stehekin.

Then we went up to Rainbow Falls. Apparently this was way more water than it usually has. It's hard to capture the full extent of the falls in a picture, but it was beautiful! And cold! Reed and Spring didn't want to stay there long!

Then, we biked a little further to Harlequin camp along the Stehekin River, a lovely grove of cedars.

By the time we left, it was starting to get hot and I was glad for every bit of hurrying we had done in the morning to get over to Stehekin. I think we went so far as to get the kids dressed and feed them breakfast on the ride over. You can't do that in a moving car!

We stopped at the famous Stehe.kin bake.ry for lunch on our way back. Not sure why I didn't take any pictures of it, but it definitely lived up to its reputation!!

When we got back to camp in the afternoon, it was hot and I had gotten cranky about something or other, so I decided to do something I never do, I jumped in the lake! I'm normally an ease in and hoot and holler kind of gal, but I knew I needed to do something big to change my mood and that easing in was not going to do it. It changed my mood instantly! I went in cranky and seconds later I was gasping and laughing!! I didn't tell G what I was doing because I was afraid if I talked about it, I would chicken out, so he was quick to have gotten this picture! And can I just mention how much colder the lake water is so close to the source? BRRR!

The plan for the next day was to get about halfway back to the cabin and camp again. We motored to Lucerne to visit a friend of Gerry's uncle and take a break. As we were there though, the wind started picking up. We made a bee-line for the boat so that we could actually SAIL in the sailboat! Everybody was having a great time and we were making good time, so we didn't bother to check out the first camps we passed. Then, as we started looking for places to stop, all the campgrounds were full, or only had hot, dusty spots available. At a certain point, we just decided to go all the way home! The kids got a bit tired of being on the boat, especially because it was rocking pretty hard in the wind and waves. I wound up letting them watch movies for a few hours in the ip.ad. It meant that I spent quite a bit of time below deck, but mercifully, I could see the hills out the small cabin windows so that I didn't get seasick.

It made for a long day (9 hours?) in the boat, but I think we were all glad to be back to the cabin. And coming home early meant that we got to be there for an extra day which was really nice. I think we would have been exhausted if we had come back from the sailing trip one day and packed up and driven home the next.

Bedtime that night. Some weary children having stories with Daddy.

Spring being cute. :)

One way to get your camera-shy kid to be in a picture is to be in the picture with him!

Daddy-daughter cuteness!

June?

2011-09-11T16:43:00.000-07:00

Here's the problem with letting your blog get months out of date (again). You lose track of the things you did! I only have a handful of pictures from June... and I don't see any major family events in June when I look back at my calendar, but presumably we did *something* that month. But all I can tell you about is the hike the kids and I took through the local park that month! Oh, and I took an advance doula training that month which was really cool, but I didn't take any pictures.

Poor Spring had chosen some pretty uncomfortable shoes that day. Really hard soles, hard leather upper and bordering on too small. She walked a long way in them, and I wound up carrying her part way home. Even so, she wound up with a blister. Yeah... I've since hidden the shoes.

May

2011-09-11T09:12:00.000-07:00

We'll start the May post off with some random cuteness. R and S were pretending that the toy boxes were boats. There may be nothing I enjoy watching so much as imaginative play!

The garden was off to a great start! I think Spring is munching down some lettuce. She really loves being able to pick food out of the garden and eat it right away.

We had purchased some kites and were waiting for an appropriately blustery day to take them out and try them. The first windy day we got, we headed to the park to try them out! This photo is for proof that we did in fact get one of the kites flying.

But most of the time we did a lot of running. It was really windy, but I think because the park is surrounded by woods, we didn't have enough wind close to the ground.

Spring was having a tough time. She was really cold and the wind kept blowing her hair in her face. It was hard to convince her to stay.

Though she did have occasional moments of fun!

After all the fussing and struggling to get the kites aloft, we finally packed up to go home, but then promptly took a detour to explore the creek that runs through the adjacent woods. Considering how sad and cold Spring had been just moments earlier, I didn't figure we'd stay at the creek long, but she must have stuck it out for another half hour! Guess the creek was more exciting than kites!

Reed at the creek. It was dim in the woods, but of course, he still wanted his sunglasses. It could be midnight on the darkest night of the year and he'd still probably want his sunglasses. ;) He's just too cool!

In anticipation of our summer travels, we got Spring a sleeping bag. The kids love to play family (note their Spring holding their baby) but with sleeping bags, the game turned into camping family!

Both Reed...

...and Spring were really excited about her getting a sleeping bag.

Reed very sweetly told her all about camping and sleeping in sleeping bags. He's such a good brother!

And Mem.orial D.ay took us back to the lake. The new favorite game was playing caterpillars. They wrap up in their chrysalis (aka hammock) and hatch out as a beautiful butterfly!

Peeking out of the chrysalis...

Beautiful butterfly!

April

2011-09-10T17:11:00.000-07:00

I think I got stalled on my April post because I wanted to make a really spectacular post because Grandma Lisa had come to visit. This is what happens when you let the perfect be the enemy of the good. :)

But before we show a few highlights from Grandma's visit, we started the month by going to Lake Chelan. The kids were thrilled to get to hang out on the boat, even if we didn't really go sailing.

Cute kissy picture. :)

Having Grandma here was good motivation to set up the cool picnic table that Gma and Gpa sent us. It's the perfect place to enjoy smoothies!

We made a trip to the Sea.ttle Aqu.rium with Gma.

Reed being a jellyfish.

We met with some of Gerry's side of the family for our Seattle adventure. It was fun to see the little kiddos together!

And you can always count on Gma to spoil the grandkids a little while she's here. R and S have been in love with the Buzz wings and spaceship since Gma got them!

March

2011-05-15T15:44:00.000-07:00

One of the things I've noticed while updating the blog today is that I need to get better about taking pictures!!

After months of Spring coming with me when I worked in Reed's class at preschool, we finally decided to enroll her in preschool too. She was getting REALLY upset on days when brother would go to school and she had to stay home so we finally just signed her up. Here she is on her first day. :)

Spring and Daddy starting some plants for the garden. She's definitely our little farmer. We've got lettuce growing right now, and she loves to pick it and eat it!

We also got out for a walk with some friends in Banner Forest in March. The kids found a HUGE puddle to throw sticks and rocks in. The sides by the puddle were really steep so I spent the whole time worrying that one of them was going to fall in, but everybody stayed dry!

Then we found a leaf that had been torn in the shape of a mask.

February

2011-05-15T15:14:00.000-07:00

One of the highlights of February was a trip to visit the upland portion of the Tom Farmer Oyster Co. Gerry buys fresh oysters from him all summer long at the farmer's market. He had repeatedly invited us to come see his operation, so we decided to take him up on the offer.

Here Spring and I are holding an enormous oyster shell.

We found an earthworm that Spring decided to hold.

And a rough-skinned newt that nobody but Mommy wanted to hold. I'll turn them into herpetologists yet!

Grandpa brought a load of wood over and both Spring and Reed, but especially Reed, helped unload and stack the wood.

Reed would get the wood out.

Put it in his wheel barrow.

He put some in Grandpa's wheel barrow too.

Then he would take it back to our wood shed.

And stack it up! What a helper!!! :)

Spring helped for a while, but soon found she would rather play in the cab of the truck. :)

I took R and S out for a hike at the Theler Wetlands. You can probably tell from their posture in this picture that despite the sun, it was COLD!

It was better in the woods where the trees sheltered us from the wind. R and S spent some happy time tossing sticks into the little spring here.

December/January

2011-05-15T14:35:00.000-07:00

This poor blog. I keep making resolutions to update it more frequently, but still struggle to do so. The thing is though, I love going back and looking at previous posts, so I know that future-me will be angry at present-me if I don't keep this updated! So future-me, this post is dedicated to you. :)

At the start of the year, we made our annual trip to the coast with friends of ours.

We made sand angels,

flew kites,

dug razor clams,

shot off rockets,

and generally had ourselves a good time. :)

I got a great pictures of each daddy with his daughter.

We dug razor clams on days. The first day, was like shooting clams in a barrel. I dug my own limit, helped dig Reed and Spring's limits, then helped a stranger (who had a special permit that allowed people to help her) to dig her limit. This was the two families' haul on the first day.

Later in the month, we got out for a walk at Machester State Park. It was cold, but it always feels good to get out and get moving in the winter!

We had some snow. It was really wet so it was quick (but heavy) work to make a snowman.

We had some other friends over too. The kids really enjoyed playing with their fishing poles together.

And some sibling cuteness to end the post.

Fall portraits

2011-01-23T15:55:00.000-08:00

Once again this fall, we had portraits done in our maple leaves by Kathryn Photography and as always, we got some amazing pictures!

Stir it up

2011-01-20T18:54:00.001-08:00

Spring explains how to make great oatmeal.

Goodbye 2010

2011-01-17T15:08:00.000-08:00

I knew that the blog was in desperate need of an update, but I didn't quite realize that I was going to have to go all the way back to October to update everything! Apparently it's time to renew last year's New Year's resolution to update the blog regularly.

We got to have a firetruck come visit us a preschool one day. Reed was clearly excited!

One of Spring's (and Reed's) favorite birthday presents has been a tea set given to her by her Grandma L and Grandpa S.

It only took me one tea party to figure out that while hardwood floors are easy enough to wipe up, orange juice spills are pretty sticky. Now they have their tea parties on a micro-fiber table cloth!

We had a frog and a golden dragon in our house at Halloween. The funny thing is that right up until it was time to get dressed up and leave the house, they both wanted to be tigers, then both of them had a last minute change of heart. I suppose that's the risk you run when you have lots of dress up costumes for your kids!

And they were cute tigers too!

November started out unseasonably warm, allowing us to go to the park without our coats and be quite comfortable, but alas, the warm weather was not to last long.

R at the park.

Super Reed and Super Spring on the swings on another balmy November day. This happened to be the day before R's birthday. R decided he wanted almost an exact recreation of S's birthday celebration. We'd taken her to the park on her b-day, then to the zoo the day after so for R, we went to the park the day before is b-day, then the next day...

We hopped on the ferry to head over to Seattle and the aquarium. R's favorite part of ferry rides these days in playing with the video games. And we haven't even started giving him quarters yet!

Posing on the ferry.

I thought we might not make it past the first exhibit. It's a huge tall tank that has a scuba diver in it for most of the day. Reed LOVES scuba divers! But what's better than watching a scuba diver?

BEING a scuba diver!! As long as R spent watching he spent even longer dressing up as a diver. Once he was dressed up, Gpa D would carry him around as though he were swimming through the air. He very nearly spent the whole day here until I finally decided to take S to see more. Only after that did R decide he wanted to see more critters!

We stopped on our way back to the ferry for a ride on the carousel. Spring liked it at first, but the ride lasted about twice as long as she would have preferred. She spent the second half of the ride in my arms.

Back at home, it was time for dinner and it was R's choice. It was no surprise when he picked Mexican!

And after dinner it was for cake and presents (it was a busy day!). It has become a tradition to let R and S help decorate their cake. This one was well-sprinkled! (On a side note, when R is really excited about something, he pats his chest with an upward motion - I like that this picture catches him in the middle of doing that.)

Eyeing the candles. Got to make sure to get them all out!

Then came a distinct end to the warm November we'd had. Snow!!

S and R liked playing with their animals in the snow on top of the hot tub.

This snow storm turned out to be quite an adventure! The forecasters and not predicted this storm accurately and it turned out much worse than they expected and the commute was terrible. Gerry didn't wind up getting home till 9:30! The power went out just after I fed the kids dinner. It was terribly cold out and I was afraid they would get cold in their rooms at night so I set up a bed for them in front of the woodstove. I let them stay up a little later to make sure they were good and sleepy since they'd be sleeping in a different place and were still excited about the power being out. Just as we were finishing up our bedtime stories, Gerry finally walked in the door!

The next morning was cold!! We've misplaced our snow shovel, but fortunately, G had some help sweeping the walkway the next morning. We invited some neighbors over to enjoy the heat of our woodstove and benefit of our gas range. G's mom came into town this day too, so by dinner time, we had a wonderfully boisterous, full house! Just as we were finishing a spaghetti dinner for everybody, the power came back on! :) It was great fun and we were thrilled to be able to help out our neighbors!!

No story behind this one, just a cute one of S!

Normally when this character visits us, we call him Bubble Beard the Pirate, but when you see this fellow in December? Well, you don't have to be a genius to figure out that you are in fact, looking at Santa!

More random S cuteness!

One of the highlights of December was getting to go to R's preschool Santa breakfast and concert. I really love R's teacher. She insisted that I take home the materials to make S a jingle bracelet and Rudolph hat, knowing that S wouldn't want to be left out! So, S and I made the hat (I actually made her bracelet one while volunteering at preschool one day). Sure enough, on the day of the concert, S HAD to be up on the risers and sing with all the other kids! The funniest part to me were the dozens of moms all crowded right in front of the risers madly snapping pictures of their kids (I was no exception). Instead of the paparazzi, we had the mamarazzi!!

To celebrate the winter solstice, we made pine cone bird feeders using homegrown sunflower seeds and strung popcorn and cranberries to decorate a Yule tree (or in reality Yule bushes).

We headed to Zoo Lights with some friends. Our friends' son M made himself right at home with R in our stroller! R's holding the big commuter mug full of hot cocoa!

Two of my favorite ladies in the world!!

The kids liked the lights, but I think they liked the play area even more. R and our friends' son P make themselves at home in a play nest.

S in an anemone.

And at last, Christmas came! R and S had lots of fun opening all their presents.

S with one of her favorite presents, a hobby horse we've name Brownie.

This post doesn't quite catch up the blog completely, but it's a lot closer than it was!!

"Us" the band

2010-10-26T21:07:00.000-07:00

Here's the setlist...

Too much trouble on the rail, spaceship, airplane, shower, owl owl bo bo dowel, clock not pointing on the time-nobody knows what time it is, Ziggy Marley family time, troublesome trucks, bee not pollinating the flower

Encore!

2010-10-25T22:23:00.000-07:00

One morning last week, Reed approached me with a brilliant idea, he said we should put on a concert! Well, I was excited enough about that, but Reed kept coming with more good ideas! He said we should clean up the living room, make flags to hang up for the concert and then he said that the people who played really, really good should get cookies, the people who played really, REALLY good should get hot cocoa, and the people who played really, really, really, REALLY good should get ice cream! I like the way this kid thinks!! :)

The first thing we did was clean up the house. We picked up the living room, Reed helped me sweep the dining room, and even volunteered to walk around the house looking for more messes to clean up. Once the house was deemed sufficiently clean, we set to work on our flags. We decorated them with a stamp set Spring got for her birthday. It required some focus, but it was fun too!

I wanted to take pictures of the finished flags and Reed wanted to pose with his space shuttle paper airplane.

So of course, Spring wanted a paper airplane too.

But Mommy couldn't figure out which airplane she wanted and much sadness ensued.

While I was getting Spring calmed down, Reed took the opportunity to photograph his space shuttle paper airplane. He took a dozen or so pictures of the plane, mainly focusing on the American flag on the back. He also took some great finger and nostril pictures too! :)

Settled back down, we were ready to try again at taking pictures with our flags.

But it didn't take Reed long to decide that the space shuttle needed to be in the picture again.

Fortunately, Spring, being the take charge kind of girl she is, took matters into her own hands this time and found the plane she wanted!

Reed decided he wanted to wait till Daddy was home to have our concert, so we played dress up in our Halloween costumes in the afternoon.

Then, it was concert time!! The video was posted on facebook, and I want to post it here too, but am having trouble finding on the computer. I'll have to ask Gerry where it is stored and add it to this post another day!

Birthday girl!!

2010-10-23T20:58:00.000-07:00

We celebrated Spring's second birthday last weekend! Within a week of turning two years old, Spring's favorite sentence has become, "No, no, no, no, NOOOOOO!" It's as though she knew that she was entering the "terrible twos"! :)

First thing we did after breakfast on her birthday, was start making her cake so it would be cool enough to frost later. Spring enjoyed helping stir!

Then, Spring, Reed and I headed to the park to enjoy the gorgeous day! Reed is "catching" Spring on the slide. She was stopped before she got to him but it was a very sweet gesture nonetheless.

Spring clearly enjoyed herself at the playground!

Reed did too, but is sometimes reluctant to have his picture taken so this was the best picture I could get.

Later in the day, it was time for one of our favorite birthday traditions, decorating the cake! Spring immediately jammed the sprinkle shaker into the frosting, but once we cleaned it up, and showed her how, she proved to be an excellent cake decorator!

Brother helped put some sprinkles on too.

The finished product. Those are some excited, about to eat cake, smiles!

Looking cute with her cake. Spring ate a few bites of cake, but spit some out too (I have the pictures to prove it!) I don't know if she was just full, or if she doesn't really like cake.

Then, what should we do to settle our sugar-stoked kids down since it's getting close to bed time? That's right, open presents!!!! Ha ha!

Reed helped Spring open presents, but he was really good about not opening them all for her and actually just helping.

Some gift highlights include this xylophone and a book about mommies nursing their babies from mommy and daddy, another book about mommies and babies from Grandma and Grandpa M. (Spring LOVES mommies and babies right now)...

And this awesome tea set from Grandma and Grandpa A. I put it through the dishwasher today, so we're definitely having tea time tomorrow! I'll try to get some pictures!

Then it was off to bed so we could get up the next day and go to the zoo! We loved seeing all the animals. Spring's favorites seemed to be the sharks and the tiger momma and her two cubs. Sadly, I didn't get any good pictures of us at those exhibits, but I did get a good picture with the elephants!

As much as we enjoyed seeing the animals, the kids seemed to equally enjoy playing at the zoo's kids area.

Forgot to add...

2010-10-12T08:22:00.001-07:00

I forgot to mention my favorite part of our trip to the pumpkin patch!

Lately, when we see pumpkins (and some other food items) at the store, Spring signs "no eat". Actually, her longest sentence to date was such an incident. She pointed to some onions, which I then told here were onions and while she pointed at the onions she signed "no eat daddy". In effect, telling me, "Daddy says don't eat the onions". It made me laugh because at the time, we had repeatedly caught her in the garden, munching onion tops and Gerry had been telling her not to eat them! Have I mentioned Spring LOVES picking and eating food?

Anyway, back to the pumpkin patch story. At the grocery store, she had signed "no eat" for pumpkins and I had told her that we could eat pumpkins, but I failed to mention that the pumpkins should be cooked first! So as soon as her pumpkin was off the vine, and in her hands, she lunged for it, mouth agape, prepared to take a bite!! Poor thing, all she got was a mouthful of dirt, but it was still pretty funny!

Pumpkin Patch

2010-10-11T15:47:00.000-07:00

Last week, we took a preschool field trip to the pumpkin patch. We had the most amazing warm fall day, not typical October weather at all!

We got to ride some rocking horses, and even one rocking cow while we waited for all Reed's classmates to arrive. Spring was the first to go for a ride.

Reed followed suit once he saw Spring having fun!

They both really enjoyed riding!

Then, we chose a mount to ride through the corn maze. Spring's purple unicorn had the whole unicorn (not just the head) and having so recently ridden the rocking horses, she insisted on riding on the back of the unicorn instead of on the stick. This meant that she waddled instead of walked through the corn maze. It was definitely a struggle until I got her convinced it was easier to ride on the stick.

There was no danger of losing track of the kids in the maze... what does it mean if your corn is knee high by the fourth of October?

Finally Spring rides behind the unicorn; much less frustrating!

Our next stop was a straw castle. It had a very wobbly slide which the kids enjoyed...

and windows to peak through.

Then, after a story, it was time at last to select our pumpkins!!

Then it was our turn to do an art project. I love the look on Reed's face here.

Reed did his with minimal assistance.

Spring on the other hand, spent most of art time nursing and got a significant amount of help with hers.

And the finale of the day was getting to feed some goats some apples and grain.

We weren't allowed to touch the animals (apparently for insurance purposes) so we put the apples and grain down the gutters they had set up.

Spring feeds some goats.

Reed as a sheep.

Spring as a sheep. It makes me laugh that she put her head all the way through!

San Francisco, here we come!

2010-10-09T14:52:00.001-07:00

That title should probably be in the past tense, but then it wouldn't be a fun lyric reference. :) We went down to San Francisco last week to visit friends and attend the Har.dly St.rictly Blue.grass festival.

Waiting for the plane. It was quite the journey down! We drove the car to the parking lot, rode the parking lot shuttle to the airport, rode the plane to SF, rode the airport train to the BART station, rode the BART, to the bus stop, rode the bus to our friends' neighborhood then got off and walked to their house. All this with two kids and all our luggage!

Arriving at the festival on Friday. Woohoo!

The boys got to ride together in the double stroller. The stroller came in extra handy the next few days when we used its capacity as a tow behind for a bike.

And Spring got to ride separate. It worked out well because she occasionally gets frustrated with Reed being in her space in the double stroller.

For our first stop of the festival, it was Hammer Time. Yep, MC Ha.mmer!! I'm pretty sure he falls on the "hardly" side of "Ha.rdly Stric.tly Blueg.rass". It was pretty fun though!

Our next stop was to see The Wa.ybacks. It wasn't crowded at all on Friday and it didn't take the kids long to find some mud to play in!

Fun times climbing on mommy-the-jungle-gym!

There was a fun park to play at along the walk home (we walked or biked everywhere since we didn't have carseats for all the kids). I think these were the only pictures we took on Saturday. We tried to see Joan Baez at the festival, but the huge crowd was so chatty, that we couldn't hear her. We did catch a bit of her music as we left though and she sounded amazing.

Spring playing the bulldozer game at the park.

You wouldn't know it from the coats, but it did get a little warmer on Sunday. I didn't mind the grey days though, it made for a very comfortable walk to and from the festival.

More Sunday cuteness! Despite a big Spring meltdown and our double stroller getting broken, Sunday was a great day. We ran into some friends' we know from other music festivals and we got to see some of our favorite bands. Ra.ilroad Ear.th, Ke.ller and the K.eels, and Y.onder M.ountain Str.ing Ba.nd.

Fun for the whole family!

Riding the BART on our way back home. You can see just how tired they are, but they look so cute sharing the earbuds for the i.pod.

Art

2010-10-09T14:37:00.000-07:00

I'm a person who has a hard time throwing things away. Especially things that I think I may have some emotinal connection to in the future. So throwing out my kids' artwork feels awful to me. In an effort to preserve some of the kids' artwork without having to build an additon on the house just to store it all, I'm going to start trying to scan their artwork, or take pictures of them with their artwork when scanning won't work. Reed and Spring did some painting while we were at Sun Lakes and wanted me to scan the pictures to put them on the blog. Unfortanately, when we got home, I couldn't tell which pictures were his, or Spring's and which were done by my cousin's son. So instead, I decided to scan and post some finger paintings Reed and Spring did recently. Enjoy!

Reed's painting.

Spring's painting.

Sun Lakes

2010-09-26T14:49:00.000-07:00

If you know us, you know that we're an outdoorsy family. Despite that, we had never taken the kids camping unless there was a music festival involved. All that changed last weekend when we went camping at S.un Lak.es reso.rt. :) We camped here almost every summer when I was a kid and this is definitely one of my favorite places in the world!

The trip was short (two nights), but we did our best to make the most of it. We spent a good amount of time at the beach!

I'd forgotten how full of snails this lake always is until the kids started finding lots of snail shells.

Gerry got to go out for a paddle with my cousin in his kayak.

Grandma and Grandpa brought their new (to them) tent trailer. The kids had lots of fun playing inside and I think Reed especially enjoyed the refuge from wasps. He's been really scared of them ever since he got stung at the Kit.sap Coun.ty fai.r. :(

Hanging out at camp.

Perhaps the coolest part about this trip is that it became a somewhat spontaneous family reunion. My aunt made reservations at the resort a while ago and started inviting family. As more family said they would come, other family members started finding ways to come so that we could all see each other. I was so worried that we weren't going to be able to make it because a stomach bug and been plaguing us for two weeks, but Spring, who was the last to have it, got better just in time to go. Thank goodness!!

Hats

2010-09-10T14:29:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, you need a good hat picture. I happened to capture these two great hat pictures a few days ago. :)

We haven't been up to much exciting lately as we've all been sick. Hopefully we'll all be better soon and can go on more adventures and take more pictures!

AUGUST

2010-09-04T17:32:00.000-07:00

In this post, I've posted all our August pictures so that the blog can finally be up to date! It was a busy month.

It started out a bit rainy, but that didn't keep us inside!

Spring LOVES picking tomatoes. After she picks one, she goes to a specials spot on the lawn and does her "tomato dance".

Reed approves of the tomato dance. :)

Then it got really hot so of course we played outside some more.

R and S were transferring water and sand from the sand box to the tubs in their play house. A favorite game.

I love the look of sheer joy on Reed's face here.

The sunflowers that we planted in preschool last spring bloomed spectacularly!

We took advantage of one of the warm days to go to the splashy park in Brem.erton. It makes for a fun day since we take the foot ferry over.

Reed's shadow (Spring) followed him everywhere there!

We went to the Oll.ala Blu.egrass festival. We got to spend some time with some friends that we don't see nearly enough which was wonderful.

Reed using the big bubble wand.

Reed and I spent a special "Mommy and Reed" day to celebrate him growing up enough to decide that he was ready to be done nursing. He hasn't nursed in a really long time, but everytime I asked him if he was ready to be done, he'd say, "I'm just thinking about it". It was nice to get to spend some time just the two of us since we haven't gotten much of that since Spring was born!

Reed didn't want his pictures taken with the animals, but I like this one of him in the stroller.

When we got to the sharks, Reed finally, happily consented to having his picture taken with an animal... too bad I did a lousy job of getting a picture of the shark, but it's still a good picture of Reed!

We went to the Ki.tsap C.ounty fair too. Our first stop was the produce displays where we learned that Gerry's cayenne's had taken first place in the hot pepper division!

We ran into our neighbor in the llama barn and she let us pose with her llama.

Mommy and Spring wait for Daddy and Reed to be done with their ride.

Daddy and Reed enjoying the ride.

And we went hiking in Ban.ner forest. Spring LOVED munching on all the berries along the way. She ate red huckleberries, evergreen huckleberries and blackberries!

For most of the trip, Gerry carried Reed in the backpack and I carried Spring in the er.go, but part way through, we switched and Spring thought that was great!

Reed on what he calls, "the climbing hill".

And Spring on the same hill.

SCI

2010-09-04T17:01:00.000-07:00

At the end of July, we got to head back down to Oregon for a three day St.ring Ch.eese Incid.ent Festival. We hadn't seen Cheese since '07 when they retired so we were excited to see our favorite jam band again. But we were also a bit nervous. It's not as family friendly as North.west Stri.ng Su.mmit, the music goes later, and there would be no designated family camp. Fortunately, we were able to camp near several other families with children. And once the music started, all our doubts about whether it was a good idea to come dissolved.

The kids had fun playing with these big mushrooms.

One of our neighbors let R and S play with this drum, they loved it!

This is Reed's singing face. :)

Our camera went on the fritz part way through our trip so we didn't wind up with a lot of photos to share. The camera will be going back to So.ny for some repairs. :/

Open wide!

2010-08-24T21:36:00.001-07:00

I love this series of pictures taken at NWSS! I don't remember what Spring was feeding me. I love that G caputured these expressions because they're pretty typical for her.

What's that? You say you're hungry? Let me get you something!

Here you go!!

Open wide!

Good huh?

Northwest String Summit

2010-08-14T11:58:00.001-07:00

Still playing catch up with pictures. :) In early July, we made our annual trek to Northwest String Summit!

We thoroughly enjoyed ourselves!

We were able to camp with our long time friends Dave and Sarah and their beautiful kids,

and another wonderful family (Courtney and Rebecca and their daughter SJ) that we met a few summers ago at NWSS and have camped with ever since!

We got to see some amazing creatures while we were there! A golden bubble-blowing dragon...

A spotted frog (the cow that Spring is holding became her new favorite toy while we were there!)

And even a lion!

Having a snack, listening to the music!

The kids loved the music and especially playing with their glow sticks at night.

I wasn't sure how Spring was going to do with the earplugs, but once she saw everybody else in the family wore them too, she was happy to wear them!

And we would leave our earplugs in all night which helped the kids (and adults) sleep through the noise of the night. People tend to stay up and chat or play music.

Spring makes herself at home on a neighbor's chair.

Spring and our neighbor SJ play in the wagon as we pack up to leave.

Beautiful

2010-08-06T21:43:00.001-07:00

I have the most beautiful children in the world!!!

Back to the lake

2010-08-05T21:48:00.001-07:00

More catch up, this time from July! Eventually I'll get the blog caught up again, but we've been busy busy busy! :)

We headed over the Lake Chelan over the 4th of July weekend to avoid the fireworks and move a bouy that had drifted down lake. My folks came too which was great because it meant that there were extra eyes to watch Reed and Spring while Gerry worked on the bouy, and also meant that Mocha got to get away from the fireworks that so terrify her. Spring liked trying to take Mocha for a walk.

The highlight of the trip may have been when R and S when fishing with Grandma and Grandpa.

Reed caught his first ever wild trout! He's been fishing before at commercial trout ponds where you can hardly keep the fish off your hook long enough to put bait on, but this took a bit more patience.

It wasn't the biggest of fish, so it's a good thing that Grandpa is good with a fillet knife!! I LOVE how proud Reed looks here. I'd like to be able to say he ate every last bit of the fish, but unfortunately, while he was carrying it to the table, the plate slipped and some of it fell on the floor and Mocha beat us to one of the fillets... sigh... Reed did eat the rest of it though.

Spring wanted to pose after she saw brother posing for a picture with his fish.

June catch up

2010-08-04T22:27:00.000-07:00

Thought I'd post a few more pictures from June before I start posting our July pictures!

Just a cute picture of Gerry and Spring dancing together! :)

Before Father's Day came, I started asking Reed what he wanted to get for Daddy. He told me he wanted a to get him a train. As Father's Day approached, Reed told me more and more about the train we were going to get for Daddy. Finally, Father's Day came, and Reed insisted that we get the train out of the garage. Now, we have a model train that we keep in the garage, but neither G or I knew that Reed knew it was there and we'd never gotten it out to play with it before so we were little surprised when we learned that the train Reed was talking about was not an imaginary train we were going to give Daddy! So we got the train out and Reed LOVED it! It actually wound up being a pretty good Father's Day present too because it kept Reed so distracted that G and I actually had some time to talk (Spring was playing indepently the way she often does).

We went to our town's annual Fa.thoms of F.un festival and there were pony rides there! On Friday evening we went to hear Dea.dwood Re.vival and on Saturday we went to farmer's market, both of which were adjacent to the festival. Friday night, Reed got a pony ride and Spring seemed to want one too, right up until the moment I was about to put her on the pony. So Reed got a ride and Spring and I walked beside the pony. She got pretty sad when we left and I told her that she could have a ride the next day. That whole evening, she kept talking about "horse". I told her more about the pony ride the next day, and every time I asked her if she wanted to ride, she vigorously nodded "yes" so I thought she just might do it. We got there and once again, she really wanted a ride right up until the point that I was about to put her on the pony! I had to smile because I distinctly remember being a kid and loving horses, but being a little afraid too.

Tall ships

2010-06-19T21:26:00.001-07:00

We went to Farmer's Market this morning and were surprised to see that the tall ships were in town! What a fun surprise!!

We thought Reed would be pretty excited about the boats, but just the opposite, he was scared about going on the boats. I usually try to respect the boundaries that my kids draw for themselves, but I quickly realized this was not one I was okay with. Neither Gerry or I were willing to miss out on seeing the boats so we told Reed he had to go. He did okay, though he was constantly asking if we could get off the boat.

Spring seemed to have fun, though she looks a little skeptical in this picture!

Reed is listening to a big conch shell to see if he can hear the ocean.

No, this picture isn't sideways, Spring is leaning down to try to hear the ocean in the same shell!

I want to ride my tricycle

2010-06-13T22:20:00.000-07:00

Reed is getting really good with the tricycle he got from Uncle Brian for Christmas. At first, he was not so great at peddling, but it didn't take him too long to figure that part out. Steering was the next challenge, but now he steers great, rides forwards and backwards and with some encouragement from G and I, he is learning how to turn it around by himself on the sidewalk so we don't have to keep turning it back around for him! He's cute when he rides it, he usually pretends it's a steam train.

Reed is train obsessed!! :) Even Spring has caught the train bug. She still doesn't have a lot of words or sounds she makes consistently, but she will copy Reed with he makes "woo-woo" or whistle noises (high pitches squeals since neither of them can actually whistle) for his trains. The whistle noises are pretty cute because they both put their fingers to their mouth, the way some people do to whistle loudly. I'm not sure where they picked that up since neither G or I can whistle that way!

And speaking of words that Spring says, she has what I call "proto-words". They're not really fully formed words yet, but they are sounds that she uses for certain things. For instance, a loud "AH" noise means duck, or sometimes bird (sounds like the "a" sound in quack). She will whisper "puh-puh-puh" for puppy or dog. She says eeorse for horse. I wonder what the future holds for a little girl picks up horse as one of her first words and whose mommy and grandma LOVED horses! We might want to start saving for a horse now!! :)

And since I didn't get a picture of me playing clarinet, I thought I'd post a picture of us enjoying the sun today!

Music time

2010-06-08T22:16:00.001-07:00

We pulled out the clarinet and trombone recently. Reed and Spring really enjoyed listening to us play and playing with the instruments themselves. Reed said he would like to play the trombone when he grew up; I think that made Gerry proud!! When I showed Reed all the pictures, he said, "Now I want to see a picture of you playing the clarinet." But alas, there were no pictures of me... clearly, I need to remember to get Gerry to take pictures too!

At the lake

2010-06-01T22:07:00.000-07:00

We headed back over to Lake Chelan for the Memorial Day weekend. It always feels like a lot of work to get there, and the car ride back and forth is always a bit stressful, but we always love being there!

Putting pigtails in Spring's hair.

Ta da!

Reed's favorite type of boat ride seemed to be riding in the canoe.

But both Reed and Spring enjoyed watching the wake from the motor when we went over to Manson.

Story time with Hama.

Lawn Work

2010-05-27T22:18:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, we aerated and overseeded the lawn.

Raking up the moss was definintely the fun part.

A new place to play

2010-05-18T22:25:00.000-07:00

Thanks to a tip from a friend, we discovered a new park in town! On a side note, I can't believe neither the county or city parks website listed this park!! :( Anyway, it's a beautiful park and the kids love it!

Smiles!

And more smiles!

Spring, inventing the bulldozer game. I didn't get a good pic of both of them playing, but it goes without saying that Reed enjoyed the bulldozer game too!

Poster child

2010-05-15T15:08:00.000-07:00

At my job, we wanted to make a poster for Hood Canal, encouraging people to learn more about the water quality issues there and what they can do to help, but we were at a loss for a good picture to use on the poster. I offered up my adorable children and so, one day, a coworker and her child joined my brood and me for a Hood Canal photo shoot. Sadly, Spring didn't wind up in the picture, but it's a pretty cute picture of Reed!

2010-04-06T21:05:00.000-07:00

A bootleg video from the first ever performance of Reed and Spring. Early reviews compare it to a cross between Cirque de Soli and Stomp, however, toward the end, there is an the obvious influence from The Who.

Reed originals

2010-03-28T14:15:00.000-07:00

On a few occasions, I have made up stories for Reed and Spring. The first time I did this, it was after we had a bat in the cabin at Lake Chelan. It was exciting and scary at the same time and it happened right before bed. I could see that Reed really needed to process the incident before bed, so I told him the story of Bernard the Bat. He was a very friendly and curious little bat who wanted to meet a family staying in a cabin. Bernard goes into the cabin, but quickly realizes that he has startled the family and decides to leave and not come back so he won't scare them any more.

I've also made up stories to help pass the time when the kids are bored and cranky in the car. Reed really likes the story of Sally the Schoolbus. She is a brand new bus who is so excited to take kids to school on her first day, that she gets up too early and finds there are no kids at the bus stops. Another story I tell is the story of Frankie the Fish, which is basically the story of the salmon life cycle.

So it was exciting to me today, when Reed made up two stories for me! We were playing "a snuggle up in bed game" as Reed calls it (this by the way, is my personal favorite game we play) and Reed told me two bedtime stories. They were so great, I wanted to write them down to remember them, so here they are, in as close to their original form as I can remember.

R: Once upon a time, there was a little boy. He becided [sic] to go to the duck pond, and what do you think he saw?
Me: What did he see?
R: He threw some bread at the ducks! (In a later iteration of the story, he talked to the ducks and they went "quack, quack, quack".) Then he went home and played hide and seek with is mommy and daddy.

R: Once upon a time, there was a bird and he becided to visit his friend who was called a Eagle. And what do you think they did?
Me: What did they do?
R: They went swimming in the water together! Then they went home and played hide and seek together!

Reed also has his first imaginary friend now. I think his friend may be an offshoot of Bernard the Bat, who we would occasionally "see" after we first met him at Lake Chelan. Reed's friend is Robinbird. Robinbird especially likes to play a snuggle up in bed game with us, but also likes to nap in my bed while Reed has naptime, and sometimes comes to the grocery store with us. It's very sweet!

And Reed is also dabbling in photography these days. Usually, he captures images of his feet, or the ground, but sometimes, if you position yourself correctly (as I've done here) the artist will see fit to capture your image!

And as for Spring... I can't believe she's almost 18 months old now! She is incredibly mobile (she can crawl into her high chair which is a little scary!) and communicating well. We're doing sign with her and off the top of my head, I can think of more than 20 signs that she knows (dog, cat, nurse, eat, apple, more, water, brush teeth, bath, shoes, cheese, wash hands, daddy, music, book, up, Hat, potty, bird, all done, waves goodbye and shakes her head no). There are also numerous signs that she will copy, but that she doesn't incorporate into her everyday vocabulary.

One of her tear ducts is still slightly blocked and has been since she was born. It's better than it used to be, but still not great, so we took her to an eye specialist a few weeks ago. Because her eye isn't terrible, he didn't recommend surgery, yet. We're doing some eye drops and vigorous eye massage to help her duct open fully. If not, she may wind up having her tear duct probed.

Outdoor fun

2010-03-26T22:45:00.000-07:00

With the days getting warmer, we've been spending as much time as we can outside. We've gone for several hikes at Banner Forest. For the first few, I carried Spring on my back in the ergo till she got frustrated, then carried her the rest of the way on my hip. On the latest hikes though, she has insisted on walking! Our biggest challenge with our hikes is not going too far, since we have to turn around and hike back (instead of hiking a loop trail). On more than one occasion, I've had to carry both Reed and Spring for a part of the hike because their little legs are too tired! Makes for quite a workout for me!

Reed looking contemplative.

Spring looking contemplative.

Just this week, we went to Manchester with Grandpa to play on the beach. We all had a wonderful time!

Throwing rocks... does it get any better than this?

Yup, it does, puddle stomping!

Florida

2010-03-15T22:39:00.000-07:00

We were really fortunate to get to go visit Gerry's parents in Florida again in February. As per their usual, the kids were amazing on the plane ride down. I always get a little tense about traveling with them, and they never fail to impress me! Gerry definitely had the more challenging role in the trip down. I thought the ever-wiggly miss Spring would be tough, but as it turned out, holding the hyper-because-he-didn't-nap, wrestling Reed was much harder.

We spent a lot of time at the beach, despite the fact that the weather wasn't all that warm (mid-50s). Thank goodness we brought our warm winter coats!!

Spring took off walking down the beach this day. She just kept going and showed no sign of stopping, so eventually, I had to pick her up and bring her back to the rest of the family. I kind of wonder how far she would have gone, but I'm pretty sure she only would have stopped when she got tired, and I thought my arms might get tired carrying her back.

It was hard to keep Reed from throwing the sand. Fortunately nobody got any sand in their eyes!

More beach fun.

Spring got Grandpa's shoes on and even managed to walk a little in them. She was SO proud of herself!

This could have been the highlight of the trip for Reed. Gerry's aunt's girlfriend brought over a train set and an engineer's hat for Reed. He LOVED it! There were all kinds of buttons that made train noises and a really loud horn that he would honk for minutes on end! Needless to say, the house got a little noisier after the arrival of the train, but all the smiles made it worth it.

Our last full day there, it warmed up a little (70 degrees I think). It was enough that we could be without our coats, so Steve and the kids and I headed back to the beach. This was a gorgeous day and there were even dolphins playing out in the waves!

Dig, dig, dig!

And dig a little more.

It was so much fun for me to get to watch my kids get to play with their grandparents! Both Reed and Spring loved digging on the beach with Grandpa and playing games like "jump on a stump" with Grandpa in the yard at home. I am so lucky to have such a wonderful family!!

Everyday photo op

2010-03-02T22:43:00.000-08:00

When your kids are this cute, even getting loaded in the car to go to the grocery store can yield some great pictures. Okay, so maybe I'm biased, but look at these two!

Spring was so cute in her new sunglasses that I wanted to take her picture, but just as I was getting ready to take the picture, she took them off. So I started to put the camera-phone away, but she cried! She really wanted to have her picture taken!! So, I put her sunglasses back on, took the picture, and had a happy girl once again.

And I couldn't take a picture of Spring, without taking a picture of Reed too!!

I've got lots of photos from our recent trip to Florida to share and photos from a recent hike. I'll get those up soon!

While Mommy's away...

2010-02-07T21:04:00.000-08:00

The kids will play... in the mud!! I got to go get a pedicure today with a girlfriend which was wonderful! When I came home, this is what I saw. To keep the kids entertained, Gerry took them hiking at Manchester State Park. Apparently their favorite part of the trip was stomping in a big mud puddle. :) Gerry said Spring would have wallowed in the puddle if he had let her. I'm just glad they had fun while I was gone and that we have a good clothes washer!

Spring and I were playing outside recently and the sun was bright. I thought she might appreciate wearing Reed's sunglasses (Reed was away at Grandpa's). I was right! She loved wearing them!!

Reed wanted to show off his new haircut on the blog.

I took the kids to an indoor playground last week. It was incredibly busy there, but they still had fun! Here's Spring playing in the little house.

And Reed playing in the bottom of a big pirate ship toy.

Let's do the time warp again!

2010-01-27T14:44:00.001-08:00

This post has nothing to do with the R.ocky H.orror P.icture S.how as you might be led to believe by this post's title (or maybe you've never seen that movie and you didn't notice the reference at all). It's just that the subject matter of today's post is somewhat older than things that have already been posted. So you see, we're going back in time a bit! :)

At the end of the year, we left for a family vacation with some friends of our in Pacific Beach. This is a tradition we've now kept up for three years!

The kids loved going out on the beach this year!! The weather was typical winter beach weather, wet and windy, but we managed to enjoy ourselves anyway!

Coming in from the beach wet!
Notice the light reflecting off Reed's jacket? Wet!

I was amazed that Spring didn't mind that beach weather. She was having trouble standing up because the wind kept blowing her down this day, but she was still happy as could be!

Daddy's girl, playing with a screwdriver and trying to walk in Daddy's shoes!

We got to play scientist when we found a ladybug in the cabin. We caught it under a glass and looked at it before we released it to the wild.

And of course, young scientists have to do a lot of studying. Gerry is reading a children's encyclopedia to the boys. It's been one of Reed's favorite books since Christmas!

We got a kite to give to our friends. We tried to fly it, but it was too windy. This is about as high as the kite ever got.

They let us have a turn trying to fly the kite too. Check out the angle of the line to the kite. The wind was blowing it straight down the beach and giving it very little lift.

We also went razor clam digging! It was really hard to see the shows with the high surf and wind, but we had a good time of it anyway! Dave and I went out before it got dark. I only got a couple of clams in that time, but then Gerry and Dave went back out and got their limits! The second night of digging, I opted to stay in since I hadn't had much luck the night before and the weather was even worse. Thanks Dave for letting my steal your razor clam picture!

The aftermath

2010-01-18T14:50:00.000-08:00

We had spaghetti and meatballs for dinner a few nights ago. Both kids ate about three times as much as they normally do (literally)! Spring has really been enjoying feeding herself, but of course, the consequence is that sometimes she's a bit messier after dinner than she was before. This was such a classic kid picture, that I just couldn't resist posting it.

Stomp

2010-01-12T23:43:00.000-08:00

Puddle stomping fun on a nice day.

Neglected

2010-01-12T23:09:00.000-08:00

This poor blog has been a bit neglected lately. I'm not one for making New Year's resolutions, but if I were to make a resolution, it would be that I'm going to get back into my weekly blogging habit.

To that end, I'm going to do a little December catch up! Oddly, I didn't take a lot of pictures in December, so there's not a lot to show. I think we were so busy with the holidays that I forgot to take pictures of everyday stuff and we didn't get a lot of great pictures from Christmas either. Ah well, such is life!

We had a great time selecting a Christmas tree. This was the first time we'd ever gotten anything other than a Douglas fir. We got a Norway spruce, and aside from the fact that it was a little pitchy and had pricklier needles than Doug firs, we liked it. This was the first year we managed to get a tree that was not at least a foot taller than what we actually intended to get and we liked having a smaller tree!

Reed and Spring had lots of fun decorating. We tried to put up only non-breakable ornaments this year and I still think we broke at least three. It was tough to keep Spring from taking down the ornaments. Such a contrast from Reed who left them alone once we told him no a couple of times.

Christmas day was wonderful! Gerry went crabbing on Christmas eve and got a limit of red rock and a limit of dungeness crab and Brian came late on Christmas eve to stay the night. When we got up in the morning, Brian made crab omelettes for us. Yum! We had an amazing seafood feast for dinner that we may have to have on Christmas from now on. It was so good!

And some good clean fun from December. Reed likes to pretend that he's a pirate named Bubble Beard while he's in the bath! :)

Cookie monsters

2009-12-21T22:58:00.000-08:00

Reed, Spring and I made cookies last week. Yum! At first, I thought it would really just be Reed and I and that Spring would just play, but I should have known better. My little girl has always got to be in the mix! So, for a while, we were all at the counter; Reed on his step ladder, Spring standing on a chair with me constantly holding her with one hand, and me trying to make cookies with the other hand (and constantly worrying that Spring was going to fall). Needless to say, it was not a good arrangement!

So we moved the cookie making operation to the floor! For a little bit, I let them both stir, but then I noticed Spring using her spoon to dump sugar and flour on the floor. I figured that would fix itself once we added the wet ingredients, but nope, then she just started putting globs of dough on the floor!

So Spring got to have her own bowl. She wasn't interested in it till I put a half inch of water in the bottom, but I figured water is easier to clean up than dough!

These were white chocolate chip macadamia nut cookies. We made a few chocolate and nut free ones for Spring, but she was not impressed. Her eating habits and Reed's eating habits are almost complete opposites. For example, one recent evening we had flank steak, homemade sweet potato fries and green salad for dinner. Spring ate sweet potato fries and tomatoes from the salad, Reed ate meat.

Santa breakfast

2009-12-06T20:47:00.000-08:00

Saturday was once again time for Santa breakfast at our local fire station. This is an annual tradition that we really enjoy! Spring woke up earlier than usual on Saturday, so we all got up and headed to breakfast. It was nice to be there early as it gets crowded later and you have to wait a long time for your picture with Santa to get printed out.

Remembering that Reed had been apprehensive about Santa last year, I explained what we would be doing the night before. It paid off because Reed was really excited to see Santa! Spring on the other hand, wanted nothing to do with him! We were surprised because she is normally outgoing, but not that morning. Some of it may have been that she was extra tired from the early morning, but I think it was mainly that she was alarmed by this big guy (the Santa the comes to the fire station is over 6' tall) in the weird suit. Spring watched Santa like a hawk as we ate breakfast. He'd circle the room, greeting all the kids, and as soon as he'd come near, Spring would starting sobbing! Not even nursing her helped and that's usually our magic cure-all!!

So, Gerry and I decided that allowing Spring to trust her gut instinct and not get close to this stranger who she so clearly did not trust was MUCH more important than getting a picture of her with Santa. We did get a good picture of Reed though!

Woot!

2009-11-14T21:46:00.000-08:00

Reed is going to sleep without a binkie tonight for the first time since he was born!!! And the best part is, it was his choice! Due to the traumatic circumstances of his birth, Reed had a pacifier before he ever even nursed so this is a long standing habit that he's breaking tonight. I think it really helped that he just learned how to go potty on the potty because he understands and likes the idea of getting a reward for doing this! I had dreaded this for so long because I thought that this was going to involve a lot of tears, but nope! I had told him a few times the kinds of rewards he could have for sleeping without a binkie, and tonight I was reminding him about the rewards when he said, "We should do that tonight!" He's not actually asleep yet, so maybe I shouldn't count my chickens before they hatch, but he's quietly laying in bed which I think is a darn good start!!

And in case I hadn't mentioned before, Reed has learned how to use the potty! It happened so easily, I'm still amazed. It started one evening when my dad came over and went in the hot tub with Reed. Afterwards, Reed came in and didn't want to get dressed so we let him run around naked. Suddenly, he announced he had to go potty and promptly sat down on his potty chair. When it happened a second time that evening, I decided that I would try to get him to go with a naked bottom the next day. The next morning came, and I asked him if he wanted a naked bottom and he said no. So I got a cloth diaper ready for him and he said he didn't want a cloth diaper, so he decided he did want a naked bottom afterall! He's only had a handful of accidents and we've been at this for about a month now, and lately, when he wakes up in the morning, his pull-up is dry! He was definitely ready!! :)

Spring is signing and saying more things which is also really exciting!! She signs for more, water, all done, nurse, she shakes her head no and tonight she signed for bath. She also says cat, dog, bird, and seeminly more. She was looking at my necklace so I asked her, so I started to ask her, "Are you looking at my necklace?", but before I could get the word "necklace" out, she said "necklah". Part of me finds it hard to believe that she'd know a word as obscure as necklace, but if she doesn't, then it's a really big coincidence! We've had a few other similar incidents, so her vocabulary may be much larger than what she shows off on a daily basis!

And here are some pictures that need to get posted from Halloween! Gerry collected all the pumpkins seeds so we could toast them. Yum!

Reed helped carve pumpkins too.

Ready to go trick or treating. Gerry was dressed as a cow behind the camera. Butterfly wings were the best I could come up with for a last minute costume. By the way, note that I'm wearing a 3/4 sleeve shirt and mary janes with no socks! I don't ever remember it being so warm on Halloween!!

The cutest little elephant and ladybug in the world! Call us nuts, but we didn't let R and S have candy. Instead, we got some small toys for each of them (toy cars and the like) and took them to our neighbors houses so they could give them to R and S when they came trick or treating. I just didn't want them to have all the sugar, but I wanted them to have the fun of trick or treating!

And this one's not from Halloween, but it's a cute October picture I wanted to post. Both my kids LOVE their grandparents! I can't wait till Grandma Lisa gets here so they can shower her with love in person (and vice versa)!!

Birthday boy!

2009-11-12T23:31:00.000-08:00

Three years old! Wow! I'm amazed that my little boy is three years old, and even more amazed at the person he is!!

We celebrated Reed's birthday yesterday by having some of his friends over to play in the morning. I tried to take some pictures, but honestly, it was a little chaotic, so I didn't get anything that was blog worthy. We had a bustling house full of moms and dads and kids and it was SO much fun! Reed seemed to especially enjoy playing "moons" with his friend T. They'd go into Reed's room with the lights off and curtains closed, then shine flashlights on the ceiling, and say "Moon!" :) Later, T and Reed both put on their mei tais and carried around dolls/stuffed animals. I can't tell you how much I wish I'd gotten a good picture of the two of them babywearing! So cute!

G had baked a cake during naptime and in an effort to cool it faster so we could frost it, he put the cake pan on ice. I can not recommend this as a good way to cool a cake, but it happens to be an excellent way to break a pyrex baking dish! Oops! We were a little worried because Reed had wanted to help make the cake and we were concerned he might be upset about buying a cake, but he was totally fine with it.

We took Reed out to his favorite restaurant for dinner, the rice and beans restaurant (most of you probably call this a Mexican restaurant, but not Reed!)

And then we came back home for presents!

And cake! Licking the frosting off the candle, one of the great birthday traditions.

I love how deliberate Reed is being about eating his cake here!

Baby Elephant - part 2

2009-10-29T21:40:00.000-07:00

It's been too long since we've posted a video... let's hope this one makes up for it.

Why walk, when you can DANCE!

Portraits

2009-10-29T21:32:00.000-07:00

Gorgeous, gorgeous, gorgeous!!! A million thanks to our photographer friend Kathryn for doing portraits of our kids. Here's a preview of the pictures she took.

Birthday girl!!!

2009-10-21T21:40:00.000-07:00

My how time has flown!!! We celebrated Spring's first birthday last week!

We let Spring open her presents in the afternoon so she'd have time to play with them before bed. Reed was pretty excited about the stroller that Grandma sent.

But eventually he let her play with it.

Reed was also good about helping her open the presents.

And happily, Reed let Spring open some on her own too!

Showing off her pearly whites after opening presents.

We spent the day together as a family and went out for dinner at our favorite local vegetarian restaurant. We got a wonderful surprise there when we discovered that there would be live music that evening. The music was a little hard to describe, trance-like and peaceful, but energetic at times too. The artist (Christopher of the Wolves) played various instruments simultaneously including didgeridoo, a type of steel drum call a hang (pronounced han), drum, bells, ectar (one string guitar) and a type of Chinese flute. The artist was really nice and explained to Reed what he was going to do while playing in case Reed got scared (though once he got going there was nothing scarey at all). Reed and Spring sat wide-eyed enthralled for the first few songs. Eventually, the newness of the music wore off and they started dancing to the music. After we finished dinner, I sat Spring on the floor so she could dance there while I cleaned up the sweet potato fries she'd strewn everywhere. She danced so vigorously that the musician joked that he thought she was going to start turning cartwheels!

After dinner, we came home and had cake. Spring wasn't super excited about the cake, perhaps because she had gorged herself on hummus and sweet potato fries at dinner, but we still got a good cake picture!

Then last night, we had my family over for dinner for a birthday celebration. Since we had already had a cake, I decided to make an apple pie. Spring seemed to prefer the apple pie over the cake, and I am reminded that for several birthdays, I requested an apple pie in lieu of a birthday cake!

Are you people seriously going to let that pie burn?

Yum! (For some reason, all the pie-eating pictures were a little fuzzy.)

The sticky aftermath.

Beautiful fall

2009-10-09T23:05:00.000-07:00

We've been trying to take advantage of the gorgeous fall weather we've been having by getting out as much as we can! I know that the rain will come eventually so I'm just trying to soak up all the sun I can, while I can!

We've taken lots of trips to the spinny park and the adjacent beach.

This picture illustrates one of the big differences between Reed and Spring. Spring LOVES to get messy. She loves to dig her fingers in the dirt and in the sand, she loves to squish avocados and peaches in her hands, she doesn't seem to have any aversion to different textures. When Reed was this age, he wouldn't touch anything sticky or wet (like diced bananas or finger paint). When we took him to the beach in Florida when he was a little over a year and he scrunched up his legs as I tried to put him on the sand in order to avoid touching the sand.

And we've played outside in the yard lots.

And last weekend we went to a craft fair at a local farm. Reed got to take his first ever pony ride on this cute little pony named Blue. As soon as he got off Blue, he wanted to get on one of the other ponies, but sadly, mom and dad didn't have another five dollars.

I also took Reed and Spring for a short "hike" at Manchester State Park. I explained to Reed that we couldn't bring the stroller and that since I'd be carrying Spring, I wouldn't be able to carry him. He did really well on the hike. At point, we noticed some logs of to the side of the path. Reed asked why they were there and I explained that a tree had fallen across the path and that somebody had cut it up and put beside the trail so people wouldn't have to walk over it. For the rest of the hike, he kept picking up sticks and putting them beside the trail! I told him I was proud of how he wanted to take care of the trail! Sadly I didn't get any pictures from the hike.

In other news, Spring is now up to three teeth. She's got her top front teeth and one on the bottom. She also set a new personal best a couple days ago for walking while we were at the library. She took five or six steps and these were very controlled as opposed to the lunging steps into our arms she'd taken before. In the days since that, she's taken a couple controlled steps, but still isn't walking across the room. Still could happen before her birthday though! :)

The Fair

2009-09-28T21:40:00.000-07:00

We made two trips to the Puyallup Fair this year! Unfortunately Gerry had to miss it, but we had lots of fun with Grandma and Grandpa. Here are a few pictures from our most recent trip.

Spring in the petting area.

Reed got to play with a tractor. This may have been his favorite ride!

Spring didn't want to miss out on the tractor fun either.

Reed went on a number of rides and Grandma took lots of pictures, but this may have been the best of them.

There was a huge contraption with lots of old metal objects (pans, teapots, computer cases, etc) hanging off of it and lots of sticks for kids to drum on anything they pleased. Reed and Spring both took a turn.

Dog?

2009-09-17T21:49:00.001-07:00

Reed, Spring and I went to the Puyallup Fair today. We had lots of fun and Reed said his favorite part was going on the rides. This time he went on the rides all by himself. His favorite was the canoe ride which was my favorite when I was a kid and Grandpa D's favorite when he was a kid!

After the fair, we went back to Grandma and Grandpa's house for a nap. When Spring saw Mocha, she pointed at her and said "gah". Now I'm not positive, but I'm pretty sure that she may have been trying to say dog! She repeated it several times, and later in the evening, back at home with Gerry, I said to Spring "I wish Daddy could have heard you say dog" to which she promptly replied, "gah"! Each time she said it, it was different from her usual babble and it seemed like she was trying to work her mouth in order to make the right sounds. It also seems that she's signing for "all done" these days. Either that, or she's just shaking her hands in frustration because she doesn't want to be in her high chair! I'm not sure I remember what Reed's first word (besided Dada and Mama) was, but I very clearly remember his first sign was for milk. Reed communicates so clearly now and it's exciting to think about how soon Spring may be doing the same!

Watch out world!

2009-09-16T20:38:00.000-07:00

It happened yesterday, in the front yard, with a little encouragement from mommy... Spring took her first few lunging steps! No more since then, but it probably won't be too much longer before she's walking all over the place!! I'm still not sure if she'll be walking before she turns a year though... any guesses?

More milestones

2009-08-30T20:45:00.000-07:00

The biggest milestone I have to report is that Spring is no longer our toothless wonder! Sometime in the night last night, her first tooth broke through! Yesterday evening, her gums were swolen and I could see the tooth under the surface, but couldn't feel anything hard. This morning, there was less swelling and I could actually feel a hard little tooth there. By this evening, it was even easier to feel.

Spring continues to stand unsupported for longer and longer periods of time, but still no steps. This could fall under the category of "be careful what you wish for" but I'm actually looking forward to her beginning to walk. She at the point now where I think she's frustrated because she can't walk.

Spring has also dropped her first nap, which I love! It's much easier to plan your day around one nap rather than two. She still gets cranky in the morning around her old naptime, but even on days where I've really tried to get her to fall asleep in the morning, she just won't do it.

Spring giving her flirty look! I love it! When she does this, she always tilts her head to the left.

Managed to catch her in the middle of squealing with delight!

We went to the Kitsap County Fair this weekend and one of Reed's milestones is that we have now entered the age of rides. He saw the rides from a distance and wanted to check them out, and once he saw them he wanted to ride them! He was just barely tall enough so we told him he could ride two rides. He chose to ride a car ride twice. Then the ride operator let us have a third ride for free and even stopped the cars over the bridge so we could get good pictures (she did this with a line of kids waiting no less!)

And I have to include a picture of Spring at the fair. After all, this was her first trip to the fair, and that, in and of itself, is a pretty major milestone in this house!

And Reed's other milestone is that he got to go on his first fishing trip! My dad found a little trout fishing place that had a special kids pond and took Reed and his new fishing pole. Reed did great and caught five fish!! Tragically, his fishing pole got broken in the yard a few days later, but at least we were able to keep the reel.

Grandma and Grandpa said the challenge was getting Reed to leave his fishing pole still for long enough for a fish to bite. They had to count to five, then he could reel it in (there were a lot of hungry fish!)

Reed and Grandpa show off his catch! His very first fish is the one on the far left. Grandpa smoke the trout for us. Yum!

Kitsap Live Steamers

2009-08-22T17:15:00.001-07:00

There is a park very close to our house that has miniature trains that run twice a month through the spring, summer and fall. We went for our first time two weeks ago. Reed LOVED it and has done little but talk about trains (and fishing) in the two weeks since. Well, the Kitsap Live Steamers were running again today and this time, I thought to pull out my cell phone and take a few pictures!

Daddy and Reed waiting for the train.

Mommy and Spring wait too.

Reed is waving to me, but wouldn't look at me. I think he was too busy anticipating their departure!

Here we go!

Waiting for Daddy and brother to get back.

Busy bees

2009-08-18T21:28:00.000-07:00

We've been very busy lately, so much so, that it has been hard to keep the blog up to date. Here's a brief recap of recent events!

We've gotten a couple of spiders in our bathtub lately, so before bath, we catch them in a glass and take them outside. The magnifying glass Grandma sent has come in handy for inspecting the spiders.

We've had lots of guests at the house. In addition to these pint size guests and their parents, we've been visited by my uncle and his girlfriend and my cousin who is moving out from New York.

We went to the LLL World Breastfeeding Week picnic at the park.

We went to the Ollala Bluegrass Festival. We all had a wonderful time!!

Spring liked clapping to the music.

Both Reed and Spring enjoyed dancing to the Clumsy Lovers!

At one point, the band suggested that the kids run the bases... Gerry says Reed ran the bases 8 times, but I think it was more than that. Suffice to say that Reed was running the bases long after the other kiddos quit!

I took Reed and Spring to the Bremerton water park. Reed got in the water a little bit, but then he fell on his hands and knees and wouldn't get in again.

He was happy to play with the carved stone slide and he's been talking about it lots and wants to go back again!

While we were at the water park, Gerry and Grandpa went fishing. I think Spring was pretty alarmed by the salmon, but Reed was interested. He's really looking forward to going fishing with Grandpa sometime!

And we got our first garden tomato! Look at the size of that thing!!

In other news, we took our first trip to the library and had lots of fun! I'm sort of embarassed that it has taken me this long to take the kids, but we'll definitely be going back!! Reed has started saying, "I love you" with regularity, it melts my heart! Reed also got his first bee sting :-( Spring is now going to sleep for the night in her crib, but transfering back into our bed in the middle of the night once I'm too tired to get up anymore. She's eating all kinds of foods now, but her favorites are applesauce and diced fresh peaches. She LOVES the peaches! She's done more standing unsupported, waves to herself in the mirror and claps to music!

Flower children

2009-08-15T13:57:00.001-07:00

I took this pictures the same day as I took the fishing pictures, but didn't have time to post them before. Enjoy!

Fishing

2009-08-06T21:23:00.000-07:00

Last week, we were at Costco, and they had some great small fishing poles (with LED lights in the reel!) for sale. We had been wanting to get Reed a fishing pole so we grabbed one for him, and then, since we weren't sure where we'd ever find reels with LED lights, and wanting to avoid future sibling jealousy, we bought one for Spring too. So we've been doing a lot of "fishing" at our house lately!

"I know where to get some fish mommy!" This got old fast so we tied a pacifier on the end (the handiest thing I could find that I could actually tie on the line, that was heavy enough to cast, and that wouldn't cause damage if it hit anything) and headed outside.

"Casting" into the water!

"Look mommy, I caught a sucker fish!"

Spring enjoyed splashing in the water...

And playing with her fishing pole in her own way!

Spring-kler

2009-08-01T22:13:00.000-07:00

A little more than a week ago, Reed insisted that he wanted to run through the sprinkler. It was warm, but not what I considered warm enough to go through the sprinkler, but he was insistent, so we went out and set it up. He did a lot of talking about going through the sprinkler, but never really got wet. Apparently Spring decided that she would see for herself what all the hype was about...

So she motored over the the sprinkler...

Sat down and commenced sprinkler fun!

I think all the layers she was wearing helped prevent her from being deterred. After a little while, she started to fuss. I think that was the point at which her skin started to get wet! And thus ended sprinkler time!

More bragging

2009-07-25T13:43:00.000-07:00

Grandpa and Grandma have Reed today, and Gerry is gone on a backpacking trip and suddenly I have time on my hands to step back and appreciate my family more. I already bragged on Reed in the previous post, and now, I'm feeling the need to brag on my baby and my husband!

Spring and I were just having a wonderful nursing moment. She was snuggled up, nursing, but was also fascinated by the necklace I'm wearing. She'd settle back and nurse for a few moments but then almost immediately have to sit up and play with my necklace. Then she'd sit back again, only pop right back up. Then I signed "milk" for her while she was nursing and she thought that was great. She smiled so big that she couldn't actually nurse, but I could see her tongue still moving, trying to anyway. Really cute! It's nice to have days like today where I have the time to let her explore and I can just appreciate the age that she's at and how curious she is. It's the close moments like these that I know I will miss when she's older.

And Gerry. There was this great moment a few weeks ago when all four of us went to the grocery store. I was getting ready to put on one of our slings to carry Spring when Gerry said, "I really want to carry her." The sling that we had with us is very pink and very girly, and I LOVED that Gerry didn't care. To me, that is a REAL man. I know he misses us while he's out in the back country and we miss him too!! I look forward to a time when we can all go backpacking together!

I'm so lucky to have such an amazing family.

Big brother

2009-07-25T12:11:00.000-07:00

It's fun watching Reed be a big brother. Of course, not all of the sibling interactions are positive. Two recent incidents come to mind. A few weeks ago, I heard Spring fussing and came around a corner to see Reed, sitting on her back, Spring splayed on the floor (a failed attempt at a pony ride days before left him trying to ride a lot of things for the next few days). And just a few days ago, I left them alone together for a moment only to hear Spring cry. When I came back, I asked Reed what happened and he told me that he bonked her head with his guitar. At least he's honest right?

But yesterday, we had two fantastic brother moments. We were getting ready to go to the grocery store and Reed decided that he wanted to bring Elmo, so he ran off to his room to get him. When he returned, he had Elmo and Teddy (another very special toy). He put Teddy beside Spring and announced that she could play with him. So sweet!! Then later, Spring had a mysterious bout of vomiting. I was taking her temperature and she was NOT happy about it. She was trying to pull the thermometer out from under her arm and I was desperately looking around for something to occupy her hand when Reed appeared at the bedroom door and asked "You need some help?" Yes! I asked him to go get a toy for Spring and he did just that. Such a good helper!

A lasting impression

2009-07-24T10:47:00.000-07:00

Our trip to NW String Summit has made quite an impression on Reed. He's been having concerts for us where he plays his ukulele along with music (he prefers to play along to Norah Jones for some reason). He pretends to put our earplugs in, goes and gets snacks from the vendor village, and has even run back to camp for various forgotten items. I love it.

This morning, Reed was dancing and eating his breakfast, and we had a great exchange. R: What is dancing for? Me: Dancing is for having fun. R: Music is for dancing! -- Truer words were never spoken!!

In other news, I think Spring may have started trying to wave goodbye. Time to start with the sign language!

Horning's Hideout 09

2009-07-21T21:02:00.000-07:00

Gerry and I took our fifth annual trip to the Northwest String Summit this past weekend. This is something we look forward to all year long. There's good music, wonderful people, and camping at one of the coolest places around.

Highlights from this trip include reconnecting with friends who we made over the years at summit, camping with good friends, Reed saying salanamander (there was a pond there with lots of rough skinned newts), seeing the space station pass overhead one evening during the music, and of course, lots of great music!!

The lowlight of the trip was that Spring came down with some sort of bug the night before we left. We decided to go ahead and go and hope it wouldn't be too bad, but she was out of sorts for most of the weekend. Poor thing is still under the weather and worse yet, we managed to spread the bug to other kiddos and parents while we were camping. :-(

As a result of Spring being sick, we didn't take tons of pictures, but we did get a few good ones.

Spring thought it was hilarious to sit in the suitcase while I packed.

Mommy and Spring, enjoying the music.

Daddy and Reed enjoying the music. The camera freaked out because of the dust, but I love this picture anyway!

Spring crawling on Daddy.

Darkness means it's time to play with glow sticks! Spring was enjoying chewing on her glow stick so much, that Reed thought he'd see if it was all she made it out to be.

Reed listening to the music, playing with our poi.

The happy family.

Summer fun

2009-07-04T17:45:00.000-07:00

We've been spending a lot of time outside lately!! I've been a real shutterbug trying to capture good pictures of Reed, who is getting increasingly difficult to photograph because he's always in motion! And of course, if Reed is out of photo range, then I'm taking pictures of Spring.

Love this little white dress!

Spring has been starting to enjoy solids... which is to say, she actually eats them now instead of just spitting them out!

More time outside!

How cute are both babes with their sunglasses on (or sun-kwocks as Reed calls them).

Smiley girl!

And one more, of Spring just for good measure.

Reed and his garden.

Reed was playing in the water that leaks out of the faucet when the hose is turned on.

Another good one of R.

Gerry and my dad went crabbing. No dungeness, but a limit of red rock crab!

Crabby!

Catching up on June pictures

2009-07-04T17:11:00.000-07:00

I need to play catch up on some good June pictures! Here are Spring and I observing Daddy working on the fence.

Reed, lounging on the couch.

We took the kids down to Olympia so Gerry could help some friends install new bamboo flooring. Mommy E and baby J accompanied us to the farmer's market. It was a tight squeeze in the back of the Escort, but we made it!

Then we headed to the Olympia children's museum. Reed loved it!

Spring and J loved the baby mirror.

Reed got to drive a school bus (and several other vehicles).

Then after heading back to E's house so the kiddos could take a nap, we headed back out to a park so the daddies could get more flooring done. I'd love to know what Spring is saying to J!!

Reed on the teeter totter.

Spring reached the top of this climbing wall with only a steadying hand from me to help!

Reed at the summit of the climbing wall, telling Spring not to come up! LOL!

Big boy

2009-07-03T21:56:00.001-07:00

Out of the blue, Reed came up to me today and said, "I'm getting to be a big boy now." So I said, "You sure are." To which Reed, pointing to his upper lip replied, "Yep, I got some whiskers growing!" It was so cute! I made a big fuss and oohed and aahed over his lip, even though obviously there was nothing there (except for some macaroni and cheese residue). A little later, he pointed his cheek and said, "I got some whiskers on my cheek too." Apparently he and Grandpa had been talking about whiskers a few days ago and the conversation really stuck with Reed.

I highly recommend...

2009-07-02T13:36:00.000-07:00

checking out this post on our friend Katt's new blog!

I love it when it goes like this

2009-06-30T21:33:00.000-07:00

Last night, I was really ready for the kids to go to bed. It had been a long day (not a bad day, just long) and I was running low on patience and energy by evening. This evening was completely different. Gerry made a tasty dinner, then Reed started asking for bath time, but it was way too early for bath so I told him he could play. He was being a rambunctious two year old and after asking him not to throw his slinky several times, he started throwing other toys. I told him, "It looks like you really want to throw some toys, let's go outside and play with a frisbee," and Reed was excited about it! I always feel so good when I come up with a good solution like that. Anyway, Reed and Spring and I all went outside and played with the frisbee. Then we blew bubbles and Reed thought it was really fun to take turns popping the bubbles with Spring. That made my day because we're definitely struggling with the sharing concept right now so if we could get good about taking turns, that would be good progress. Then we had a fun bath time, and Spring practically passed out after stories. I wish all evenings were this good!

A visitor

2009-06-27T20:51:00.000-07:00

We had a busy Father's Day weekend and I had a busy work week, so I'm just now getting around to updating. Gerry's unlce John came and visited us over Father's Day. Reed and Spring absolutely adored him!!

We took him to the beach and made a trip to the Pike Place market, where we stopped for the obligitory pig picture! :-)

And we put uncle John to work too! Gerry's building a fence in our front yard. Here's what it looked like before John's visit.

And here's how it looks now! Nice work eh?

Smooth move

2009-06-17T21:32:00.001-07:00

Reed's not much a fruit or veggie eater, but recently we discovered that he likes to make smoothies and drink them. I figure it's a great way for him to get some balance in his diet. I can even sneak a handful of spinach into his smoothie without him noticing. So lately, we've been making a lot of smoothies around here. Reed was enjoying a blueberry, blackberry, banana smoothie when I thought it would be cute to get a picture of his smoothie 'stache. I ran for the camera and came back to this...

My mom asked "Aren't you glad you've got the hardwood floors installed?" Yep!!

Reed was holding one of Spring's teething toys which also got smoothied. Reed chose to lick it clean. No smoothie wasted there!

And we did get some good mustache pictures too. Fortunately, the whole smoothie didn't spill, only about half.

More from Spring's six month photo session

2009-06-11T21:41:00.000-07:00

Thanks goes to Kathryn for once again, capturing our beautiful babies in photos!

Rejoining the world of the living

2009-06-10T21:02:00.000-07:00

Long time no post eh? That's because last week, our whole family fell ill and it seems we've just now finally recovered.

It all started two weekends ago, with our first family trip (with the four of us) to Lake Chelan. Gerry and I were a little worried because Spring is a less than enthusiastic car rider and doesn't sleep well in the car. What baby doesn't sleep well in the car? Seriously, most people I know put their baby in the car to put them to sleep, but not our Spring... The thing that made the car ride survivable, was that I figured out how to nurse Spring while she was in her car seat. Comfortable? No! Easy? No! Private? No! (Until I finally got tired of staring out at the other cars and semis and put a blanket in the window.) But these are the things mommies do for the babies they love! And the bonus was that not only was she full, but she could fall asleep nursing as she loves to do.

When we got to Lake Chelan, Reed was okay, but by evening, he was really out of sorts. We thought he was just tired, but then I noticed a bunch of gunk in one of his eyes. That night nobody slept because Reed and Spring kept waking up unhappy. The next day, Reed had a fever and was fairly miserable. Spring was starting to get the cough Reed already had and my throat was getting sore. Great... It was not the successful first family of four trip to the Lake we were hoping for. By the time we had to go home on Sunday, Reed was doing a little better, and the rest of us waited until we got home to get really sick.

As you might imagine, we didn't take many pictures while we were there, but we did manage to get a good one of Spring and I with Hama.

Backhoes for Spring

2009-05-24T21:24:00.000-07:00

Reed wanted to draw a backhoe for Spring the other day. Over and over he'd say, "Reed draws a backhoe for Spring". It was very sweet!

You can see, all the marks on the sidewalk. Most of them were backhoes, a few were rainbows.

As ever, Spring enjoyed watching Reed. She'll be drawing her own backhoes soon enough I'm sure!

Going mobile

2009-05-23T20:51:00.001-07:00

Spring crawled across the living room floor this evening! She got up on her hands and knees, and I started to tell Gerry how yesterday she had taken a couple of crawling "steps" when she proceeded to demonstrate just how far she could actually go!! And what was so worthy of crawling all that way? Brother's ball of course! Reed was not thrilled with Spring playing with it, but we convinced him that we should let her keep it since she had crawled for the first time ever, just to get it! The thing that made me laugh is that some college friends of ours keep a blog about their kids who are about the same ages and Reed and Spring and they recently made a post about their kids' difficulty in sharing the exact same type of ball!

And in other Spring development news, she can also get herself from lying down to sitting up. And she wants to pull herself up to standing whenever she can. And Reed development, he's finally getting mine and yours figured out as well as me and you, though the word "I" still seems to be problematic. He usually says "my" instead of "I".

And now, photo highlights from the last few weeks.

Reed tried to bring me a flower, but shook it a bit too much. I actually got a picture as the flower was falling.
Fortunately, Daddy went and cut another flower for Reed to bring to me!

Long time blog readers will remember that last summer, I ruined one of the great joys of childhood for Reed, running through the sprinkler. If you did not read that particular post, it's pretty funny and worth a read if I do say so myself. Anyway, you'll all be happy to know, that this year, we got the sprinkler set up, free of incident and Reed loved it!

Spring was happy to hang out with her Daddy and I and observe Reed going through the sprinkler.

Reed needed to walk around with his bear (the bear's name is Cheesy Grilled Bear, so named because he often likes to make a dish of the same name with the bear). We put it in his mei tai and we carried his bear around wearing nothing else but his diaper. Part of what I love about this picture is the look on Spring's face. She always watches Reed so intently!

Best Mother's Day ever!

2009-05-10T21:45:00.000-07:00

I've had a wonderful weekend and a fantastic Mother's Day!!

Yesterday, we spent the morning deep cleaning the house, then after Spring's morning nap, we went to an arts and crafts fair nearby. We saw lots of moms and kids we know, and it was a gorgeous day! Gerry said I should pick out a Mother's Day present for myself, so I happily bought myself a beautiful new sling.

Our friend Kathryn was there and snapped a couple of pictures of Reed and Spring.

I baked some oatmeal raspberry muffins last night so I got to have delicious muffins for breakfast, then Gerry took Reed to Starbucks to get mommy a soy latte. Not as tasty as a cow's milk latte, but I'm going dairy-free for Spring and it seems to be agreeing with her. On a side note, Reed calls Starbucks, the "chocolate milk house" because when we take him there, we let him get chocolate milk. It cracks me up! Anyway, when they returned from Starbucks, Gerry asked Reed if he has something to say to me. Reed said, "Happy Mother's Day mommy!" Talk about melting a mommy's heart. I scooped him up and gave him a bunch of kisses and hugs and he laughed. When I put him back down, he said it again, and we went through the routine a couple more times. It was so sweet I almost cried!

Mid-day, we had a bbq with some families from a parenting forum I'm part of. It was a really fun way to celebrate Mother's Day and once again, the weather was gorgeous! Then this evening, we went out to a great vegetarian restaurant that's fairly new here in town. We came home and gave Spring a nice relaxing bath in the sink while Reed splashed in the other half of the sink beside me. And to top off the day, Gerry made oatmeal chocolate chip cookies. Seriously, I don't think life gets much better than this!!!

Six month photos

2009-05-08T22:50:00.000-07:00

We had a six month photo session for Spring last week with our photographer friend, Kathryn. She gave us a few pictures as a sneak peak. I'll post more when we get the rest!

And of course, we couldn't let Spring have all the modeling fun!

Dada

2009-05-01T22:38:00.003-07:00

Today, for the first time, Spring said, Dada(dadada)!! Oddly enough, I'd been just a touch concerned about her verbal development. At four months, she should have been blowing raspberries, at five months she should have been make vowel-consanent combinations (like ah-goo) and at six months, she should have started repetitive syllables (like da da da). But it wasn't till about two weeks ago that she started blowing raspberries, and then two days ago, she started saying ya ya ya ya. It's been my experience with Reed and talking to other moms, that babies seem like they can only learn one thing at a time. Spring was focused for a long time on learning to crawl, or at least get up on her hands and knees. Now that she seems to have the hands and knees thing mastered, she's playing catch up on the last two months of verbal development!

Last summer, Reed started pretending when he was playing. He'd "feed" his stuffed animalsl, put them down for naps, etc. We've had a new development in the realm of pretend where now, he pretends to be somebody or something else and he'll also tell Gerry and I that we are being something else. Okay, so this doesn't seem so cool while I'm typing it, but you'll have to believe me that it's a fun new development!

Lots of pictures

2009-04-28T20:52:00.000-07:00

I've been a bit delinquent in posting this month, so I'm going to play catch up a bit!

Spring listens in rapt wonder as Reed tells her a story. There are actually several books that he has memorized that he likes to "read" to her!

Spring really likes to get on her hands and knees now. Not much forward motion yet, but soon I think.

It's hard to get a picture of your baby on the floor...

...when you've got a helper on your back!

Reed using his bubble mower. Every time he plays with his bubble mower, he asks me to take a picture of him. Seriously, I must have 100 pictures of Reed running with his bubble mower.

I try to be good about taking pictures of Spring when I take pictures of Reed, even if she's just hanging out watching brother, like we were doing here.

Photo evidence of Spring's very first bite of solid food! Mmmm.... mashed bananas...

All done!

Another Spring milestone occurred last week when she pulled herself up to standing!

Mini-me? I suspect that Spring will look a lot like me, and I feel like our resemblance is especially striking in this picture (which I made Gerry take because I love the jammies she's wearing and she's about to outgrow them).

When the weather was so nice, we went for a picnic to Belfair State Park.

I think Spring might need some cool shades too!

And after our picnic dinner, we went oyster hunting. It all started out fine.

But it wasn't long before Reed got stuck in the mud. In fact, the only person that didn't get really muddy was Spring!

Reed playing at our favorite local park. Check out the view!

Outdoor snack time at home, enjoying the nice weather.

Reed lounging.

What a difference a week makes!

2009-04-19T09:13:00.000-07:00

You wouldn't know it by the wonderful weather this weekend, but Monday we had fresh snow. (ok, it was actually hail, but it stuck around until mid-day tuesday).

Here's Spring in front of the bulbs that grandma Lisa planted last fall right after she was born!

This weekend, it's been great, and we've been outside a lot working in the yard. Got the onions and lettuce planted, and Gerry's started attacking all the hedges with his new high powered trimmer. It's not quite as cool as the weed dragon, but is a close second.

Just pics today

2009-04-06T21:28:00.001-07:00

I have lots to say, but no energy for writing anything, so tonight, just a few pictures! In case I don't get around to updating the blog for a while, I suppose I should add for posterity, that Spring is now mobile. She gets up on her hands and knees, the scoots herself backwards and back on to her belly (though tonight she managed to scoot forward to get a toy)!

Giddyup!

At the Pike Place Market on Saturday.

Spring's first food

2009-03-30T21:58:00.001-07:00

Well, I was going to wait until she was six months old to introduce foods to Spring, but it just so happens, that she got her first taste of solid food today. Was it mashed bananas as I had planned? No. Was it what I gave Reed when he first had solid food, rice cereal? No. It was a sunbutter and raspberry jam sandwich on whole wheat bread... It was supposed to be for Reed!

We went to a playdate today and I had packed a sandwich for Reed. It was a VERY busy playdate. I had Spring in my lap, the sandwich in my hand, and Reed was in Grandma's lap right next to me. Spring started to wiggle and leaned to try to bite the sandwich and without thinking, I put it in her mouth!! My mom pointed out what I was doing and I immediately took it away, but as long as she could see the sandwich, she had her eyes locked on it. I just lost track of which child I had in my lap for a moment and thought I was feeding Reed a bite. Oops! Thank goodness she hasn't had any allergy issues so far!! In a couple more weeks, we'll give the mashed bananas a try! :-)

Reed has really been getting into is role as a big brother lately. He plays with Spring as he's doing here, he gives toys to her and even helps with her evening massage. Spring absolutely LOVES watching him and laughs at him all the time!

Firsts

2009-03-22T20:07:00.000-07:00

We've had a lot of firsts these last few weeks! It's hard to know which one to post about first!

Tonight, Spring got up on her hands and knees for the first time. Initially I put her on her hands and knees and she rocked back and forth for a few seconds. Then, she decided that she liked hands and knees so much, she worked hard to get off her belly and do it herself!

Spring has been sitting up on her own for the last few weeks. She can't do it for very long and often supports herself with one hand, but it seems like everyday, she can sit for a little longer.

Spring had her four month check up a few weeks ago. She was right around the 75th percentile for height and weight and somewhere between the 75th to 90th for head circumference. It's quite a change for me to have a baby who is not on the bottom of the growth curve!

Reed had a big first over this past weekend. Gerry took him to Lake Chelan for two nights. This was his first overnight trip without Mommy!! It was a little lonely around the house without Gerry and Reed, though it was also nice to have some one on one time with Spring. Reed had a good time at Lake Chelan. We talked to him about it for a few weeks before he left so he was really excited to go!

And it only took one of our snowiest winters ever, but Reed finally played in the snow for the first time!

Cutting a rug

2009-03-12T17:43:00.000-07:00

I took this picture to send ot Gerry's aunt Nancy to say thank you for the lovely rug that Reed and Spring are sitting on, but the picture turned out so good, that I thought I'd post it here too!

In other news, Reed has refused to nap for the last three days.I lay him down, then he just babbles for the next few hours. I fear he's going to stop napping and I'm not ready for that!!

I can't believe

2009-03-08T21:21:00.000-07:00

I forgot to share about my two favorite plane moments from our trip to Florida!

We flew down there on Valentine's Day. We were well into our second flight, Spring asleep in my lap, and Reed asleep in Gerry's lap, when I nudged Gerry and said quietly, "Happy Valentine's Day". Gerry started laughing! In all the stress of traveling with the kiddos, Valentine's Day had been the last thing on our minds! I lamented that we had not left our mp3 players out since neither Gerry nor I could get into our bags to get them. So Gerry began to sing to me :-) I joined in and it was way better than listening to mp3s. Honestly, I think it has to be one of my sweetest Valentine's Day memories ever!!

My other favorite moment occured on our trip home. We were about to begin the second flight of our journey. I had just changed Spring's diaper and returned to our seats to find Reed at the plane window yelling something with a lot of excitement. I couldn't quite understand what Reed was saying so I gave Gerry a questioning look. Gerry said, "holy crab." As we had been landing in Dallas, Gerry had spotted a huge mega-church with a seven story parking garage out the plane window and had exclaimed "holy crap!" Now, Reed was giving us his best imitation of Gerry, only Reed, fortunately, saying the more polite, "holy crab!" LOL!

West Sound Sailing race #1

2009-03-03T18:44:00.000-08:00

This was a picture I had to share (Gerry Here). It's from last saturday's WSSA sailling race. The course took us about 16 miles from the North end of Bainbridge island, up to Jefferson Head, then across to Magnolia, back over to Eagle Harbor at the south end of bainbridge, and back to the start. It's a pretty fun course, because it takes us into an area that we normally don't sail much. It also passes though a major shipping lane.

The sailboat is "Carpe Diem", who I've had the pleasure of crewing on a couple of times over the past year. It's a pretty nice IOR 32', and Rob has done some awesome interior work on it. I can't imagine what the view was like, from where they were. There were well clear of it, but... 'yikes'...

BTW, photo credit goes to Jason, our other crew, who was smart enough to have a camera.

We've done this race twice in the past, and both times it was pretty miserable. Being the first race of the season, there are always plenty of bugs to shake out. This year turned out to be a great race. Winds were good, the tide was slack, and the sun even came out for a bit.

Also different this year, is Cody has a new boat, "Aldebaran" a Catalina 30 that he bought from another guy, Ole, who I also sail with when I can. In case you were wondering, 'Aldebaran' is the star that makes up the eye of the constellation Taurus.

The Bull. (insert sailing joke here)

We've taken her out a couple of times over the winter to check her out, but this was her first race, as well as our first time trying to flying the spinnaker on this boat. Luckly, there were no major disasters, and we had a great race.

Literally?

2009-03-01T21:50:00.000-08:00

I love how literal kids are. Reed had the hiccups yesterday. Grandpa, joking around, asked Reed, "Where did you get the hiccups?" Without skipping a beat, Reed replied, "In my mouth!" LOL!!