First day of school 2011

Look at that face! That is pure happiness as he waits for the door to open to room 34 and start kindergarten. He loves it and this week he wrote his first sentence "Look at me" and read a book about apples to us. It is obvious that he loves school and everyone is already his best friend and he is the fastest kid in his class.

Emma started the 3rd grade in an accelerated 3/4/5 grade split and she is struggling a bit given everything last year was super easy for her last year. She doesn't like the homework which there is definitely more of, but I think she gets a sense of satisfaction when she studies for spelling words and only gets 1 or 2 wrong on the test and at the start of the week she got most of them wrong.

Introducing Kami

The house was super quiet at night after Kylie went to play pain free in heaven and we had talked about a new kitty when Kopa died, so in early July we went to the Humane Society after a couple visit prior and left with this little girl. She was pretty tiny when we got her but her extra large personality! She loves Ally but Ally hates her...with a passion. We thought that would get better but it has been a couple months and Ally is still hoping Kami gets flushed down the toilet I think. But she has definitely brought some happiness back to the family!

Ocean Trip 2011

The trip to the ocean this year was to honor my grandma Lu and her 90th birthday. As a kid, my dad's side of the family would travel regularly to the ocean but as the family grew we couldn't get everyone there. So, gram's birthday wish was for all of us to meet for a couple days at Cannon Beach and it was a lot of fun. The weather was great, the kids had fun, and it was great to share one of our favorite places on earth with our family. Did I mention the weather was great?!

Hawaii...without the kids!

The view from our room! Jealous much?

Scott getting ready for his part in the luau.

The turtle that Scott bumped in to under water...and than we found out if you "bump" into turtles its a $10,000 fine so Scott didn't actually bump into it he just thought he did=)

My beautiful friend Lynn and her wonderful children! It was so great to see them!

Scott and I went to Maui to end this summer without the kids and had tremendous time! We met our great friend Lynn and her family for dinner, got a massage, and enjoyed happy hour quite regularly. We began each day by working out after a cup of coffee and than either went snorkeling or just read by the pool. It was great weather, the hotel (the Sheraton) was beautiful and it was great to not have any responsibility and for 5 days not listen to any whining! I hope you enjoyed the pictures!

Sun Lakes 2011

We started our summer with a vacation initially planned around Kylie (it was cheap and they allowed dogs) and we went to Sun Lakes in Eastern Washington. I had gone to Sun Lakes when I was a kid for a couple summers in a row with my mom and family so I had fond memories of this place. While the cabin was super small and full of bugs and spiders, we had a great time. Each day we played put put golf (or pup pup as Owen called it), had ice cream to combat the heat (it was in the 90s both full days we were there), swam in the super cold lake and pool each day, and watch movies. We went to visit the Grand Coulee Dam and Dry Falls to break up the days. Overall, it was a fun trip and while we kept talking about how Kylie would have enjoyed this and that, it was still great!


The last night a wind storm came through the canyon and had gusts of very powerful wind! It was fun to stand in, although it scared the kids a bit. And we found out that that the door didn't actually ever lock...the wind blew it open! Scary!

The kids and daddy at the look out on Dry Falls. It was pretty fun for them and a beautiful geological creation!

Dry Falls

The kids in the ice cold lake.

Grand Coulee Dam!

Paddle boating on the lake, it was hot on the lake and difficult to paddle. We took turns!

Sad Day Times 100!

Scott and I always said after Kopa died that when Kylie died it would be the saddest day ever and guess what...totally worse than that. When a loved one dies that you don't live with, like a grandparent, it is super sad and you remember all the great times you had but you don't have a daily interruption to your routine like when a loved one you live with dies. The same day that I found out that my best friend and partner I team teach with at school had a blood clot (that ended up being a tumor when they had to do open heart surgery 2 weeks later after two stints in the hospital) we found out that Kylie had a type of anemia in which the body attacks it's own red blood cells and that she was very sick. It culminated that week in a blood transfusion from the vet's dog Bullwinkle and nearly 8 drugs twice a day that we had to force down Kylie. While her blood count was better she was not eating and lost 15 pounds over a couple of weeks. We had more meat and food for dogs in the refrigerator than ever before! We than took her back again and the vet said that if she still wasn't eating than it was something bigger like a tumor (and cancer is usually a trigger of this kind of anemia although the ultrasound didn't show anything) and we had two options: get an endoscope from a specialists which may take some time in getting or put her down. We decided with heavy hearts that the most humane thing to do was to put her down and on June 7the in the parking lot of our vet we said good bye to our beloved dog! There is isn't a day that goes by that we aren't reminded of how much we miss her, in fact Ally regularly sleeps next to the basket of Kylie's toys we still have out. We won't get another dog until next summer maybe and our house is a lot quieter without. It's funny, now that she is gone I realize how much she cleaned up the floor and we have to vacuum more regularly now=)

Happy Mother's Day!

This Mother's Day we had brunch at our house and invited family over to celebrate and eat good food! I received a lovely necklace, a heart in the kids' birth stone, and lots of love from the kids. The best part of the day was when Owen said "Momma, does Mother's Day mean you are in charge all day?" I replied, "No, it means you are good to momma. And I am in charge every day!" His reply was "Oh". I wish you all a great Mother's Day!

Sad Day!

Before Kylie, Ally and the kids, we found Kopa. I was house and dog sitting and we took the dog on a walk to Kopachuck state park. We heard the loud obnoxious meowing from the bushes and when we looked it a skinny little kitty about 5 months old can out to greet us. She obviously did not have a home but after taking her home we watched for signs and news that someone was looking for a lost kitty. She became our first child and even though she did things that tried our patience we loved her. Scott and Kopa had a very special relationship and she loved him very much. Most people never got to see her and we knew she was getting sick when she let the kids actually pet her without freaking out.

This is a picture of Kopa and Kylie about 2 hours before she finally went to kitty heaven. Kylie knew something wasn't quite right and went to lay with her pal. It was quite sweet. Kopa couldn't move very well but Kylie's paw in her face didn't last long.

This was about a week before she passed. She was snuggling with Scott and allowed the kids to come over and pet her. I think they were able to pet her more in the 2 1/2 weeks before she died then they were during the time they knew her. We have her buried in our back yard so we can visit her when we want to!

Too Funny!

This is one for the girlfriend!!! This was how we found him after riding his scooter!

Basketball

Emma's first run at basketball has been a great learning experience. As you can see from the picture, Scott is the coach but not by choice as there wasn't anyone stepping up to coach the team. We are a pretty scrappy team and the kids have a lot of fun playing, which is obvious as most of them smile the entire game. We have lost one game so far but have played all really well! Emma is doing great and seems to be having fun (although I don't think it's her passion =))

Scooters from Santa

Santa brought the kids scooters this year. Owen's was stolen off our front porch last fall and, while Emma has a bike with no training wheels she doesn't have the strength or the balance to hold it up, so she got a scooter also. She loves this scooter and while she fell a couple times she loved racing Owen and so did he; he's quite quick with his.

Kylie the Wonder Dog!

Even though she is almost 10, has an arthritic hip and a titanium hip she is quite the playful do still. She loves this toy, which Santa brought and shortly after this great display of athleticism she was so mad at the Piggy she ripped out his insides! It is fun to watch her play since we had to go through so much to get her back to where she is now.

Brownies!

This is Emma's Brownie troop. It is our first year with the Girl Scouts and it is making life a little crazy but Emma is enjoying it. She is working hard right now trying to sell cookies for her troop so that they can do something fun like horse back riding camp or Great Wolf Lodge at the end of the year. She made cookies, seen below, and was very proud of them (I wished we had made a couple extra because they were quite tasty!).

This picture was taken at the Cookie Rally which they nicely scheduled for a Friday even so everyone was on their A game and not snotty or anything...can you sense my sarcasm? They learned a lot about the cookies and had fun making crafts so I guess it was worth it!

Happy New Year!

While we didn't actually bring in the New Year, we celebrated the end of a crazy year the way we do every New Year's Eve. We each picked an appetizer and watched a the last Shrek, which was really fun and we went an did poppers outside around 8. It's an early night but a fun tradition and it keeps us safe from all those crazy drivers! We wish you all a very great New Year with lots of safe and fun adventures!