Alice the camel has ONE hump

For $5/each, Emily and Connor got to ride a camel at our local zoo last week. Jared wanted no part of it. Emily and Connor grinned and giggled the whole time, and really enjoyed the ride!

Wishful thinking and some hilarity

Another entry from Emily's journal last year:


Wishful thinking: that she got her own computer, that her littlest brother got a stereo
hilarity: that Jared got a chew toy because of a wiggly tooth??!!??

*and milk came out my nose* (to quote Shan!)

A Grandmother's Love

My mom came over yesterday afternoon to stay with my kids while I attended the "no kids allowed" Kindergarten Orientation for Jared's class. When I came home, I stepped out into the back yard to find Emily Grace painting my mother's fingernails. I have NEVER, in all my 31 years, seen my mother with painted fingernails. Nor was I allowed to own, or WEAR, fingernail polish until I was in High School!

That my mother would sit and allow my 7 year old to paint her fingernails, speaks volumes, I think.



They don't even look half bad in this picture! (and believe me, they weren't great... ha ha!)


In Em's defense, it was over 80 degrees outside and the polish was drying rather rapidly, not leaving her much time to smooth it out...

Carhartt Boys

The boys have been bugging Dan for some Carhartt overalls for a LONG time now. We kept hoping we'd find them for a better price somewhere, without much luck. I just haven't been able to justify the cost of the overalls over having SEVERAL regular pairs of pants for the same price. LOL In speaking to a girlfriend the other day, she mentioned that her boys each have a pair of Carhartt pants, which are their "outside" pants. The pants stay in the garage and the boys change into them anytime they want to head outside to get into the dirt, and then they take them back off again before coming back inside. The boys get as filthy as they want and she doesn't have to worry about how much muddy laundry she's stuck doing (my boys can dirty up several pairs of pants in a given day). GENIUS!! Then she washes them at the end of the week. Since they're "outdoor" pants, it doesn't matter how ground in the dirt is... And since they're Carhartts, they LAST. The wheels started turning in my head, and when I spotted Carhartt overalls at Fred Meyer today, I grabbed each boy a pair. Even better? They were on sale for 20% off!!! We also got some barn boots because the Target rubber boots just don't last (they always crack!!). The boys are totally set to get down and dirty, and I had the most relaxing time EVER watching them outside digging in the dirt, wiping blackberry juiced fingers on their pants, etc.


Are these handsome little guys poster boys for Carhartt, or what?!? *grin*

Wedding Pictures!

I didn't take any pictures during the ceremony because I was in the wedding party, and I didn't take any posed pictures OF the wedding party after the ceremony because I was IN the wedding party, but I have two pictures to share from my mom's camera which she emailed me. The rest of the pics will be from the reception...

Like I stated Monday, my brother's wedding was awesome; I just hadn't gone through my pictures yet, in order to be able to share very many with you at that point.

The stage, nicely decorated with the arbor my brother and his good friend, Everett, built. Isn't it fantastic?? (someone should really teach me how to hold the camera straight!)


Tables decorated in their wedding colors:




Their cake (I got put in charge of arranging some flowers on top. I think I did a pretty good job, eh??)


Ali and Emily, very impatiently waiting to be allowed to put on their dresses!


Marc and Alisa included Ali in the exchange of rings, and Marc made vows to Ali to not try to take the place of her real father, but to be someone she could trust, turn to, learn from, etc. It was VERY sweet!


Posing for pictures after the ceremony (back row: Teasha, Leah, Trista, Stormi, Se-Ryong, Annette, Alisa, Marc, Everett, Matt, Josh, Brian. front row: Elektra, Emily, Ali, Jared, Connor)


During the Dollar Dance, Marc ended up with all sorts of women to dance with


And Alisa hadn't thought to have a cute little purse to collect money in, so she kept stuffing it down her dress! LOL!


There was a tree outside of the building which drew the kids like magnets...


At some point, we formed a line of girls and a line of guys and took turns pairing up and doing goofy dances down the center. I, stupidly, did not think to run for my camera until it was starting to pitter out, but OH MY, was it fun!




Another picture of the first dance from the back so you can see Alisa's pretty dress (which was custom made by her sister's mother-in-law, who also did four of the bridesmaid's dresses and the littlest flower girl's dress)


After everyone had pretty much gone home, we started taking down all the decorations and whatnot. The arbor had somehow managed to arrive at the location in one piece, but they quickly decided that it wasn't worth trying to take it HOME in one piece, so they grabbed a drill and took it all apart and hauled it out in pieces. It was rather sad, but they swear it will go back together again just fine...


The DJ kept up the music, all through the take-down process, and the kids were ROCKING OUT. Look how flushed and sweaty Connor was (he was dancing and running and dancing and jumping and dancing and sliding and so on!!)


Jared was using the practically empty dance floor to work on his break-dancing skills. Hilarious!


When the night was over, we took Ali home with us and all four kids were totally zonked out after we made the 40 minute drive back home. I thought it was hilarious that all four had their heads tipped the same way. Ali was JUST starting to wake up when I took the picture


Congratulations Marc and Alisa!

Day 4 of our trip

(getting sick of ocean vacation pitures yet??)

My three babies, all sunscreened and sun-tanned, ready to head down to the beach!


While Dan and the boys were napping, Emily and Gram water-color painted elaborate maps of each floor of the three story house we were renting, then planned out little clues so the kids could do a treasure hunt. Gram hid plastic jelly-beans (like eggs you would hide at easter) and put little prizes inside. Each clue would show an alphabet letter that corresponded to a room in the house (each room on the maps was lettered), would show what color jelly-bean was hidden in the room, and then had a drawn clue of where in the room the jelly-bean would be. It was a time-consuming process to set up and the kids LOVED it. Each kid got to be "Captain" of a certain floor of the house and got to wear the flower lei during their turn.


Watching the sunset this night, I kept being drawn back to the whale and the elephant in the clouds. LOL Had to edit the pic to show you, too!

Congratulations!

Congratulations to my brother, Marc, and his new bride, Alisa!


The wedding was beautiful, the food was good, and everyone had a good time. The bride and groom's only complaint was that people left too soon! They had the DJ until midnight and most people were gone by 7pm. The bridal party stayed and partied until closer to 9:30pm (including loading up all the gifts and decorations, etc). It was an awesome day!

And maybe congratulations are in order for a potential future married couple? LOL Alisa's niece, Elektra, was following the boys all around asking them to dance. It was sooooooo cute!

Day 3 of our trip

Favorites from day 3:

Connor was obsessed with picking up all the little jelly-fish laying along the shoreline. I don't remember ever seeing so many on our past visits to the ocean!


Jared spent a large portion of his day dragging this huge glob of kelp and seaweed up and down the beach, making trails, which he'd follow afterwards. (I didn't have my camera down at the beach with us for most of the day, but took it down again at night, which is why the pics are pretty dark)




I love this one!!


And finally, here is one of the rare family photos we have. I can probably count on two hands how many we have in total; pretty sad!

Day 2 of our trip

Connor wasted ZERO time getting down and dirty in the sand


Emily wasted ZERO time getting into the water, though she ended up getting more than she bargained for (that wave hit her good from behind and the backsplash ended up right in her mouth!)


Jared was a little more hesitant about the waves...


Connor was a little iffy about the waves at first as well... He was busy throwing sand at the waves, then a larger wave than "normal" came towards him and he took off, mid-throw!


They all ended up in the water, soaked and sandy, by the end of the day!


The kids also enjoyed kite flying, for all of about five minutes






I loved seeing all the little footprints in the sand:


PS Happy Birthday to my Mama!!

Day 1 of our trip

On the drive down to the coast, we saw this ENORMOUS American flag. I wish I would have had more time to line up a shot to show a size comparison, but as you're driving down the road, you take what you can get. It was HUGE!


We spent the first part of the trip listening to the music on Dan's ipod. He's got a "kids" playlist that we listen to, which is basically every song on his ipod that doesn't have swear words of any kind (which means we listen to a lot of Beatles, basically! LOL). One particularly rock-ish song came on and Jared grabbed up his ball yo-yo (that winds itself back up again so you LOOK like you can yo-yo) and hooked it up to the hook in the ceiling of the van, then pulled the ball part down low like a microphone and started rocking out, singing along with the song. It was soooooooo funny! He had his head banging and everything. So cute!


We arrived at about 6:30pm, and unloaded our stuff. This is the beach house we rented (that topmost section is the loft bedroom that Dan and I slept in, the middle section windows you see are the kitchen and livingroom, and then there was also another bedroom, and a bathroom. The lower floor windows you see are the bunk room, which had TWO bunk beds, a couch, and a TV, plus plenty of floor space for kids to play; also on the lower floor was yet another bedroom, a bathroom, and a huge laundryroom)


After we unpacked, we had dinner, and then decided that although it was getting dark, we wanted to go down and "say hello" to the beach quickly before bed. We walked down the path and wandered in the sand a bit. Then Dan wanted to go check out a rock that was right on the edge of the water. One extra big wave came through and suddenly all three kids are wet from the knees down, while fully clothed. Next thing I know, Jared's sitting in the water up to his waist, Connor's splashing around like crazy, and Em's wet up to mid-thigh. LOL All in a matter of seconds!!! At that point, we figured they may as well just go for it, so we stayed down for another half hour, letting them splash and go crazy in their clothes, in the darkening night.



(this was just as we were arriving down at the beach, but he made me laugh INSISTING on having his sunglasses, even though it was past sunset AND it was an extremely overcast day)


Now you can see him SOAKED up to about his armpits...


This one was before he got TOO wet


Connor's shorts were so heavy with water they kept falling down, so he'd walk around pulling them back up every few steps. LOL!


I was trying to self-take a family photo, but Jared refused to scrunch in close, and Connor only willingly stood there for one picture, and as you can see, it was a failed attempt. LOL


And I had originally had the camera turned sideways, then at the last minute changed my mind to orient it tallwise instead, and I somehow managed to take this picture! Crazy! I tried desperately to recreate it "just for fun", but I never could.