At the Zoo

We went to the Seattle Zoo last Friday and the boys had a blast. We saw pretty much everything we hadn't seen before. The boys love the indoor play area. We were especially glad to hang out with my former job share partner/good friend Courtney and her sweet Elena!
They wanted to play inside first--well, it was cold!

From January 2011

Ryan loves fishes

From January 2011

Big boy Max

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Max and Elena

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Being beavers

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And turtles

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The only "big" animal we saw that day was this beautiful jaguar

From January 2011

From January 2011

The whole day Max said he wanted to see the snakes and so we did. Ryan loved the frogs of course and even loved the mama and baby crocodile. He does an impression of crocodiles. Bug world was a hit and definitely the penguins. We love the zoo!

Max's Sports Class

is hilarious! It's awesome to see 3 and 4 year olds learning about sports. They started with soccer.
Here's Max (2nd from the left) running laps

From January 2011

Here they are stretching (he's left of the coach in the blue shirt)

From January 2011

And trapping the ball (they played "red light green light" and "What Time is it, Mrs.Clock"?

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And the creme de la creme--the jumping jack video (Max is left of the coach)

Caught

You know when you have those moments when you're grateful for the peace and quiet but then you have to wonder why it's so peaceful and quiet? Thankfully this wasn't the time Ryan was throwing tub toys in the toilet. Here are my boys caught in the act.
Ryan wearing Grandma Pearl's ear muffs (oh mom, you left your ear muffs here ; ) and climbing in and out of a car seat.

From January 2011

Max with his cherished bristle blocks. I think if the house were on fire he'd grab his bristle blocks before he grabbed his brother. :D

From January 2011

Dirt and Orifices

Today I was so glad to see flower stems popping out of the dirt. It will be fun to see what flowers will grow at this house. I was glad to have sunshine and time to prune the laurel, lavender and heather. I was glad my boys got to play in the dirt. They played so hard that I had to strip their outer layer off outside and fly them to a warm bubble bath. There was dirt in almost every orifice. Then we sang french songs on the way to Tony's work so we could have dinner with him. Then we came home and I put on some french cartoons. Here's to hoping I can be diligent about teaching my kids some french.

Bonne Nuit!

Even if the boys are acting like crazy hooligans and I can't wait for them to get to bed, part of the reason is that I love our bedtime routine. We read the scriptures, practice an Article of Faith and the Primary song of the month which right now is: If I Listen with My Heart. I love that bedtime routine which I've seen my brother Dave and sister-in-law Casi do and so we've incorporated that into our home. Then comes story time and Max always wants me to tell him one "from my head" so I do. We like to use our imaginations, but I always ask him questions so he's really telling the story.
Tonight's edition: Once upon a time there was a little boy named Max and he had a brother named Ryan. They were outside riding their bikes when they saw a...
"mushroom", and a..."that thing we saw today", oh, a gnome (statue), "yeah, a gnome named Frankie". And Frankie said,..."Do you want to play?", and Max said..."Yeah and Ryan did too". So they went, "and the gnome fell in a big puddle of mud (this was demonstrated and there were sound effects). And then..."they saw a nice ghost and he laughed".....it goes on a little bit longer, but I think you get the gist of why I love bedtime. And to top it off, we pray together and give kisses which include a nose kiss. I love my boys.

Spinach Fail

So I'm trying to vary our diet so the kids can like different foods. I've never been a cooked spinach fan, in fact there's only two ways I've had it that have even worked for me. There's Spinach Quiche (yum) and a Xhosa dish I ate in S. Africa with potatoes, spinach and cheese. Mostly we eat raw spinach, especially in our Green Smoothies.
Tonight I looked up how to make spinach that kids will eat. I found this article
and put some of this cooked spinach (cooked without the water) on a Garden burger (Portabello mushroom variety-yum). I thought it was delightful--the kids not so much. I'll have to experiment more. So we had a Green Smoothie.

Any chance anyone has awesome, kid-approved veggie recipes (using other than carrots, tomatoes, lettuce, broccoli and corn)?

Learning About the Arctic at Joyschool

Here is Max and his two joy school friends during "library time".

From January 2011

They are learning about the arctic this month and different animals. Today's letter was "W" and they learned about the walrus and acted out being walruses. I love that my friend sent pics so I get to get a glimpse of this guy away from home too.
The three walruses. I think Max is showing tusks? I don't know, he's a goofy boy.

From January 2011

Happy Birthday Cousin Drew!

Our phone is having issues and we thought this would be a fun way to tell you we were thinking of you today!


We hope you have a fun day today! We love you!

Highlights!

First of all, how cute is Ryan as he tries to be just like his big brother by putting on his helmet.

From January 2011

Second, we have a mystery at our house. Someone has sent Max a subscription to Highlights magazine.

From January 2011

We thought it was one of the grandparents but they deny. We are having so much fun when they come in the mail. He loves the stories, puzzles, etc. He even got the idea to have a post office from one of the stories. Here is his post office (don't judge that my Christmas boxes weren't put away. They ended up being useful, see? And putting them away on January 14th isn't a problem, right? ; )

From January 2011

Happy Birthday Mom!

So for the first time in what seems like forever, I got to celebrate my mom's birthday with her. We celebrated a day early with family in Ohio, then feted the day on an exhausting plane ride home (see below) and then went out for Pho the day after.

From January 2011

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The boys already miss you!

From January 2011

The story of our flight home and how we celebrated mom's true birthday:
Plane was to depart at 7:56pm (Ohio time). Max and I had been up since 3:45 (Seattle time). We board the plane (boys are tired-GOOD). Then we get word that there is a missing flight panel and they're looking for the mechanics to fix it. Flash forward to 2.5 hours later and we're finally taking off (after being in airplane seats with a wiggly infant on my lap). Right before take off one of the lenses of my glasses falls off and cannot be retrieved in the dark cabin before take off or after take off. We'd have to wait until we landed to look again (flight attendant did find it upon arrival). So, I have one eye (and you know how that can make you woozy or cause headaches so even though my boys did fall asleep (Ryan all over me), I didn't get to watch the movie this time either. Boo! Max fell asleep with his face on his seat and his knees on the ground. He eventually slid to the ground and I hoped the flight attendants wouldn't say anything as they prepared the cabin for landing. They didn't. So I let my boy sleep on the floor of the airplane and didn't wake him up until we landed. Then my lens was found, we hiked and trained to baggage claim, shuttled to where our car was parked and made it home at 2:30 am (23 hours of wake time)! But it was still worth it to go! :)

Cousin Time

We went to Ohio to see cousin Anna baptized. I'll cover the highlights. The flight home was an adventure to be told another time.
Aunt Casi and cousin Anna

From January 2011

This playroom was the nucleus of most of the activity (Ohio is COLD)

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From January 2011

Before the baptism

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After the baptism. Anna and her best friend were baptized and a friend gave them white roses.

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Lots of kids running around afterwards with open access to a table of cookies and punch. Pure madness!

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My brother Dave and his wonderful family

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Uncle Alan took the kids outside to play in the snow

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From January 2011

This picture is to record the duct tape over some of the toy bins to eliminate a little of the chaos

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Oh no! (Uncle Dave's gone duct tape crazy (and the cousins loved it)!

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Cute moment--Caiden and Max were watching Winnie the Pooh and Caiden looked at Max and said, "We are friends". Max said, "We are cousin friends!" Awwwww

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I love snuggling and Ella is a snuggler

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And now a few videos that the cousins can giggle over:


We missed having Darin, Kris, Drew, Ashley and Austin there!

Six Years

Though we're celebrating our anniversary with some date nights and a trip in February, it was January 8th, 2005 that I married Tony in the Portland temple. We feel so lucky to have each other. Sometimes it feels like we just got married and other times it feels like we've always known each other and have already spent lifetimes together. There's a song that I love and I just found out it was covered by Stevie Nicks, so here you go Tony.
Any guesses why I would pick this one?
And another one (I'm going old school for this anniversary ; ), (one of your favorites)

And a few fond memories of our day

From Wedding Pics

This pic makes me laugh because it is so Tony

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I love these girls

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Just for fun

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From Wedding Pics

Photo-less Wednesday

It's shocking to me, but I haven't been taking a lot of photos lately. We've just been enjoying time with my parents. The boys have loved going to story time at the library and having lots of story time with grandma and grandpa. Max started joy school again and will be doing a sports class as well. He loves Sunbeams. Ryan still wants mom or dad around during nursery. Tony started school again and this term is going to be more difficult. We're constantly thinking about and praying for our sweet (great)grandparents. Here's a picture of Grandpa Bob (Robert Max) and our (Robert) Max when Max was 2.

From Ryan's baby blessing

Max is always asking questions (always) and when Tony left to go be with Grandpa Bob after his stroke, Max was asking questions about why. So we explained that Grandpa's body was hurt. More questions, more explanations. Then Max asks, "Why is he hurt? Did Spike do it?"
Oh the mind of a three year old. Spike is Grandpa's Jack Russell Terrier. I'd love to know Max's thought processes sometimes.

Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam!

Max is a sunbeam (the 3-4 year old Sunday School class at church). He did really well (yes, I peeked in on him) until the end when he had a little break down. I think lasting 2 hours until the last 5 minutes is pretty good for a 3 1/2 year old. He's got the coolest teacher. She provides lots of handouts so that during the week, the families can emphasize the things they have learned on Sunday. She even gave them a teddy bear today. Wow!

From January 2011

Yep, his pants are on backwards, but that occurred at home (after church) and I didn't feel like worrying about it! ; )

Ryan rocks!

Our Ryan showing us his one of his favorite Christmas presents and smiling for the camera. Love this boy!

From January 2011

From January 2011

Fun Way to Ring in the New Year

We played Jungle Speed! Hello 2011! We look forward to many more fun nights and happy, joyous adventures (not the other kind of adventures, just the fun ones, thank you)!

January 2011