Crawford Cameo

Six Flags in the winter!

2011-12-10T17:26:00.000-08:00

John had Saturdays off for the month of December (since Charlotte was born), and no matter what, he wanted to get out of the house (even when Charlotte was only 2 weeks old and such). I finally agreed to take advantage of our Season passes by going to Six Flags, great place to take a newborn, right? At least complete strangers are less likely to want to put their hands all over a newborn baby. Well, as it turns out, we couldn't find John's season pass, so we ended up buying new season passes that would be good for the month of December along with all of next year. Of course, after purchasing the season passes, we didn't bother to check the hours, we just assumed it would be regular season hours. Nope. We got there a full hour before the park opened and didn't want to have to pay for the bridge again to come back, so we were the first ones in the park! Yep, This is the closest space you can possibly get in the parking lot. Aren't you jealous?

California winters are a dream come true, but this winter has even been warmer than usual. Do you see that we don't even have coats on? Just long sleeve shirts!

Okay, well I have a sweater, but I'm not even a normal person (keep those thoughts to your self!) I'm always freezing, so that doesn't count.

There were no lines and we just enjoyed riding all of the rides together.

And we were so happy to get to have John with us!

So nice to have an extra pair of hands around for things like this! I love it when John gets to play with us on Saturdays!

The Walruses were extra attention-loving this trip too. This walrus kept following us around no matter where we were at the tank.

Ethan loved getting such a close-up look at the walrus!

All For the Sake of Quiet

2011-12-01T20:18:00.001-08:00

In the beginning of October, I had a friend of mine who decided to put together a group of people who were interested in making a quiet book. We all wanted quiet books to use in church, doctor's offices and wherever you might need a few moments of silence with the kids. We all wanted pages too, that had a religious theme.

The idea behind a group effort was that it's easier to produce multiples of the same page than designing and making a template and whatnot for that same number of pages. Plus a bonus of the group effort is that it's a little more motivating to finish it when you have other people depending on you (Otherwise I probably would only have one page down still)!

I decided to sign up (much to John's chagrin) and then the list of people who were interested kept growing and growing until, in the end, there were 28 of us! Yikes! It was such a huge project. We all finished our pages the end of October, just before Halloween. It was a tight deadline, and I think most of us (me included) were up most of the night before the deadline. Well after making some tweaks of my own to some pages and making a super fabulous cover for my books (I decided to divide my pages into two separate books since the stack was about 10 inches tall by itself). I now am proud to present to you the Crawford Family Quiet Book (s):

Here is the cover. I used a black purse handle and grosgrain ribbon to attach it. I also chose an outdoor canvas hoping that it would hold up better to the "elements."

I wanted a zipper to help hold all the little pieces in and basically designed it out of my head, but thinking of the classic CD cases from back in the day (that was so, like, 2000).

I lined it was a fabulous black and white polka-dot print and attached each page with grommets and then the metal rings that you can open and close freely. Where the rings are, I used button holes for reinforcement. I also used a two-way separating zipper so the book can open up completely flat.

This is my first page that has a little "This book belongs to" tag on top of a pocket for miscellaneous goods.

And this was my other page that I was in charge of. I copied it from someone else. Oh yes, and on each page, we asked people to put a scripture reference, so older kids can look up what story each page is in reference to. So this is Jonah and the whale with a lift-a-flap.

Jonah can be seen through the clear vinyl.

But you can also take him out and play with him.

This one is a "Put on the Armor of God," and has the pieces that you can dress the little guy in the armor of God. Then there is a pocket where you can store the pieces.

Here is a Noah's Ark with the animals. The bottom half of the boat serves as a pocket for the animals and for Noah.

This is a tic-tac-Temple board, all attached with velcro.

On the bottom, this one says, "I'm going there someday." The activity is that you can detach and re-attach each of the flowers, attached with a snap, a button and velcro.

Kids can learn how to braid hair with this page, it says, "Getting ready for Church."

This page represents the story of Joseph in Egypt with the Coat of Many colors, each color is attached with velcro.

Kids can learn how to tie their church shoes.

Go BYU football! If that's not religious, I'm not sure what is! The football is also a pocket for the puzzle pieces.

This page has a little slit in the mouth where you can put the good things to eat.

All the pieces are stored inside, and removed through the zipper at the bottom.

This is a little "wagon" color wheel and says, "Put Your Shoulder to the Wheel," a song about the pioneers coming west to settle in SLC.

The kids can match up the different colors. The top of the wheel is also a pocket to hold the different colored wedges.

The is the "Tower of Babel" and the kids can "weave" the tower.

In case you didn't know what I meant by weaving...

This a double page and it's a matching game to put the Latter-Day Prophets in the correct order.

Each of the cards has a picture of a Prophet and has the number on the back.

This is a "creation" page and you lift each flap to learn what was created on each day.

I think I need to add the scripture reference on this one still!

Onto book number two! This book was made in the exact same way, it just has a different pattern on the outside, and I also carried the polka-dots onto the zippered part.

This page is a magnetic matching game that has "sacrament Manners" The little red wand is the magnet that you can move all the pieces around to match them up.

This is another double page that has a mailbox that you can open up and put notes insides plus the flag can move up and down.

The matching page holds crayons, a pencil and 3 x 5 cards to write notes on.

This is a feelings page, and you can't really tell in the picture but the square on the left is a mirror and kids can practice making the faces that you see. The blue square is a pocket to hold all the faces.

The "On the Road to Church"page has a little orange car that you can "drive" along the road.

This is another lift-the flap page.

BUT under each window there is a picture window where you can put the pictures of your family members. See Ethan and Charlotte?

Then I put John and I, Lincoln and our dog, Sadie.

This is a magnetic fishing page where you can practice the "fishers of men" story and catch the fish with a magnetic fishing line and put them in your boat. The water on the bottom is a pocket for the fish.

This is a hide-and-seek page where kids can "find the lost sheep," each bush is a little pocket for the sheep to hide.

This is the story of Ammon and the bad guys' arms come off with snaps!

This is a build a Temple page, complete with an Angel Moroni on top!

This is a counting/numbers/tithing page where kids can velcro the gold coins to the piggy bank and the tithing envelope.

This page kids can match the different shapes.

This is the tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and kids can remove the little apples and put them in the basket.

This is the a little maze picture where kids need to move the beads from place to place and remember to "choose the right."

So that's 30 pages in total! So much fun for the kids, right? And so very much work! I'm so excited to give it to our kids for Christmas and I'm expecting perfectly behaved children in Sacrament Meeting from now on. Time to go wrap it up and hide it under the Christmas Tree!

Turkey Day 2011

2011-11-27T22:19:00.001-08:00

Amazingly enough, we decided to do a whole Thanksgiving meal this year (the early arrival of Charlotte made us think it was not going to happen). They boys got all dressed up with the appropriate bibs.

They were do excited for Turkey.

We tried to keep it simple, and made Turkey, dressing (which was absolutely fabulous, John), mashed potatoes and rolls (brought by Jane), Yams (of course, I would almost rather have yams than turkey) and then Jane brought pies for dessert. I was a little bummed at not being able to make a pie this year (let alone the regular six that I think I usually make!) But we needed to simplify and making pie didn't fit the bill.

John's uncle Jim came over for a visit and got to enjoy all the food with us! We made so much food, but really, is there a way to make a small thanksgiving feast?

Charlotte took a snooze while we ate.

And that Turkey hit Lincoln hard! He didn't even get to finish his plate before he passed out!

We had a fabulous day with family. Hope you enjoyed your day of thanks! We are so immensely blessed in our lives. I love this time of year where we can focus on our family and celebrate the season.

We Proudly Present...

2011-11-25T13:55:00.001-08:00

Charlotte Anne!

Miss Charlotte decided to make an early debut and arrive on her Grandpa's birthday. She came 3 weeks and one day ahead of her due date and you wouldn't believe the difference in attention that you get based on that one day (Lincoln came three weeks exactly before his due date).

This is me, shocked that she is here so early. John and I were definitely not prepared. We were climbing in the attic and getting the infant seat down while we were waiting for Jane to come to watch the boys. I mean, seriously not ready.

She was coated in the waxy vernix.

She was 6 lbs, 11 oz. and 19 inches long.

Getting her footprints taken.

Every part of her is so tiny! And her name actually means petite and feminine.

One of the nurses fashioned her first little bow for her.

Jane brought the boys in for a visit. They couldn't have been more excited. Lincoln kept exclaiming, "Baby! Baby!" And they each just wanted to give her a million kisses. John and I had to be on the defense telling them to give her some space.

Ethan holds her for the first time.

Ma brought so many presents! She took the boys to get mommy some flowers and some new things for their new baby sister. So cute!

Ethan was such a good big brother. He was being so gentle.

He wanted to inspect her head to toe and see all her parts. Here he is counting hew toes.

I can't believe I have three kids now! So crazy!

So I was saying that we (more she than me) got a lot of extra attention because she was so early. They consider her a "late pre-term" and they had to keep testing her blood sugars to make sure that her blood sugars weren't too low. Poor baby had her foot pricked every hour. Because of that, they didn't want to give her her bath until her numbers were high enough (because at bath time, they get colder and will burn away the sugars a lot faster). So I actually got to see the bath this time. Usually it's always John that goes, so it was nice to be able to see it. Here she is sunbathing under the heat lamp.

She was totally happy here. I would be too.

Look how wrinkled her little foot is!

They started by washing her hair and she totally loved it. She got the full spa treatment.

She was wide awake after the bath. So nice to be clean!

First picture of Daddy and our new baby girl!

We can't get enough of her!

That and we have to strip her down so she'll wake up to eat. We have to be so mean to make her eat often enough. She is such a sleepy baby.

She looks pretty big for a 6 pounder, doesn't she?

So we were trying to decide who she looks like. When she was first born, I thought she looked just like Ethan. Then, the next day, John took this picture and I thought she looked just like Lincoln.

So what is your vote?

Lincoln:

Or Ethan?

Now she just looks familiar to me and I can't tell at all.

She is such a little doll. We finally named her at about 11pm the night before we were going to leave. We were all set to go the next morning, then the pediatrician came in (the on-call one) and told us that we had to stay until she was 48 hours old. Ugh! Why didn't she mention that the day before when we talked about leaving the next morning?! She we took a lot more pictures and ended up having a relaxing day. Sure, we were bored, and we missed our boys, but we decided it was good to have a little extra time before getting back to reality.

Charlotte wasn't too happy about getting into real clothes. I was just happy that I thought of grabbing some real clothes before we ran out the door! Welcome baby girl!

Halloween Night

2011-11-01T23:10:00.000-07:00

We met up with several families to go trick-or-treating all together and it was a lot of fun! We went with the Osness, McKissick, Wiederhold, Linton, Garmon, Maravilla and Walker Families. Yeah, in Mormon world, that's a lot of kids.

There were so many kids, I almost felt sorry for the houses we stopped by. The people would open their doors to about 20 plus kids and were probably a little overwhelmed. We even discussed handing back a bag of candy afterwards for depleting their entire supply!

Between houses we would have to convince the faster 3-5 year olds to slow it down and wait for the rest of the group. I think they only ate a total of about 5 pieces of candy between all the houses.

Don't these boys look like they are on a sugar high? We had such a great time! And, as a bonus, no consistent contractions afterwards, so that's even better!

Afterwards, John and I took the boys to a friends' house where they had really taken it over the top. I don't think there was a foot of space (both inside and outside) that wasn't decorated!

Jane got Ethan some window markers for his birthday and I just wanted to document his fabulous handiwork to celebrate Halloween. It actually looks like a pumpkin! I won't brag that I also drew some pictures on our front windows for all to see, including some text that I had to write backwards (by not brag, I mean, not post a photo, of course).

Trunk N' Treat!

2011-10-30T21:46:00.000-07:00

John's mom took the boys for us to go to our ward Trunk or Treat (really it's Trunk & Treat, or even Treat in the trunk, right?). I had fabulous aspirations of making us into a family of skeletons this year, with glow in the dark paint and me with a cute baby girl bones on my belly and John with a belly of hamburger, fries, and a soda, but alas, I was working on a fabulous Christmas present for my boys and did not have the time (literally -- even with no sleep!) to complete our costumes. The boys seemed happy enough though to wear their outfits from last year. I was amazed that we were able to squeeze Lincoln into his!

Jane took them to our church building where she was able to throw our Mickey leash onto Lincoln to make sure he kept nice and close!

I was excited she was willing to take the two boys AND the camera -- and even get some cute shots of the boys.

Both of the boys enjoyed the donut on the string challenge.

Although, I think Lincoln missed the part in the rules where it says, "no using your hands"

They also had a bean bag toss,

And a favorite -- the fishing game.

They even had cute pages to color while they ate their pizza!

Thank you so much, Jane, for taking the boys! They did a little too well in the treat department, but don't you worry, John and I are taking care of that for them.

Pumpkin Farm with Papa and LeeAnn

2011-10-22T15:20:00.000-07:00

Today (I know, can you believe it? I'm posting REAL TIME) we got to go to the Pumpkin Farm. My Dad and his wife got to come for a quick trip to come and visit. What better place to go than the pumpkin farm? Of course, immediately upon arriving we headed to the line for the train.

Ethan was so excited. Lincoln was a little unsure. And no matter how hard we tried, he wouldn't perform his little "toot, toot." (He even does the little arm motion -- so cute!)

Lincoln still looks a little unsure about the train business. I'm pretty sure he enjoyed it, it was the sun business that he wasn't a fan of! It was 86 degrees today for crying out loud! Ethan wanted to wear costumes to the pumpkin farm and he was sweating like crazy by the time we were leaving. Lincoln had a little turtle outfit to wear, but it was just way too hot to put him in it!

I seem to have the problem that I'm always dressing the boys way too warm because I get their outfits out of their drawers when I go upstairs to get Lincoln when he wakes up (usually at 6:30 or 6:45am -- sometimes earlier) and at that point, it looks like it's going to be cold. Then 8:30 comes around and the boys are already hot. Someday I'll figure it out though, right? Here we are headed to school!

They have a bunch of Alpacas that you can feed while you're there too.

They had a whole little family, even with a nursing baby! Or, whatever they call baby alpacas.

This year they had a new contraption, called the "speeder feeder." You would put the feed into a little tin can, then ride the bike to rotate the wheel to move the can way up high on the wire then it would dump into a tube at the top that directed the food into a little feed bucket inside the pen. It was super cute. And Ethan said after we left that this was his favorite part of the trip!

The babies were a little rough on the feeding, and kept trying to eat my thumb knuckles. Maybe that's why they had the new speeder feeder.

Lincoln was absolutely enthralled with the feeding process. He kept signing "more" and "food."

They also had this cute little pot-bellied pigs there, along with the goats!

Lincoln was trying to snort at the pigs. He didn't tell me what he was saying to them.

They had a cute little hay maze set up. It had holes poked through the top of the bales of hay, so when you went inside, the light would filter through the holes and Ethan commented that it looked like spider webs. After I told him it was the light, we had a hard time keeping him out of there. Maybe I shouldn't educate him all the time like that. "Yes, there are spider webs, you should stay next to me."

We also learned all about chickens while we were there. This particular variety makes green and blue eggs!

Then, if you remember from last year or the year before, or the year before, you will recall that I really enjoy all the cut-outs. It hasn't changed.

How do we measure up this year?

Ethan is telling Lincoln that he's that tall.

Love this! McQueen can fly! Maybe in Cars 3, right?

This was too cute! LeeAnn, I love what you've done with your hair!

I told Ethan to make a scared face. He might have thought I said, "scary."

These boys were so good and excited even to pose with the pumpkins this year.

Lincoln also spent a considerable time observing these corn stalks.

Thank you Papa Rex and LeeAnn for such a fabulous (but quick) trip! We always love our visitors! And thank you ever so much for the ghost (white) pumpkin! I decided maybe we can just say that we got a pumpkin for baby girl as well. I'll let you know if the inside is white or not.

Happy Birthday to John!

2011-10-11T20:39:00.000-07:00

Actually, it's a little early, but this was one of his birthday presents. He has a tendency to buy himself things right in the beginning of October. Year after year, he would go clothes shopping for himself (which would ONLY happen once a year) or decide to buy something that he's been thinking about for awhile. The only problem with this is that I would usually be planning on buying that very thing for his birthday, which happens on the 25th of this month. It used to drive me crazy. Now, I just call them birthday presents and save any other ideas I have for Christmas!

Well, this year is a little different. He couldn't save this one for the end of the month. He found a guide to take him Salmon fishing. And Salmon fishing only happens for a little while, so this one was just fine for him to "open" a little early.

So John found a guide, named Mark, who took him on the Upper Feather River, I think in Gridley, CA. But he met the guide in Yuba City, which means he got up and left our house at 3:30 am. You never have to question how much he likes fishing. If you're willing to give up sleep for it, that's a pretty good test.

It was kind of fun, because I would just get random pictures of fish throughout the day on my phone.

John said they had caught their limit by 7:30am. They got on the water at 6am!

After that, they were just fishing for bigger and better ones.

This baby was huge!

So the limit they can each catch, was two.

These were John's babies. And they were HEAVY!

Oh, maybe I should warn you that these aren't for the squeamish.

Then the guide, Mark, even filleted the fish for us!

John said the guide's boat was super nice and he said the River was awesome.

I'm so glad I thought of giving him such a fabulous birthday present!

It was SUCH a fantastic present, that John was telling his employees about it the following day, and came up with the idea to pay for his employees to go the next weekend. We usually do a nice dinner for everyone and their wives/girlfriends, but John wanted to mix it up this year.

So he had two of his employees take him up on the offer.

And they fished right below a set of little rapids.

John hooked the first fish, then Matt caught one (above), so when John hooked another fish, he handed his pole to Victor to reel it in. He thought, if this is for them, then I want them to enjoy the trip, and it's no fun if you're not catching anything.

Victor fought the fish for quite a while. Then as soon as he got it into the boat, John said he wished he had been more selfish. He said it was the nicest fish of the day!

That thing ended up being over 18 pounds!

But the guys were happy, so I guess that is more important in the end.

John was glad that the guys were both happy to be at work the next day, in spite of hanging out all together for 14 hours the previous day.

When they filleted the 18 pounder, they discovered the reason behind all that weight! Just look at all those Salmon eggs! And that was only half, the other side had just as many.

Ethan's First Bike Ride

2011-09-09T22:18:00.000-07:00

The following day, Ethan had preschool again, and both John and I had to work. Ethan told Jane that he didn't want to go to her house, that they needed to come to our house so he could ride his bike. After I finished work, and came to pick him up, the first thing he wanted to do was to go ride his bike. Unfortunately, it was way too hot, so we had to wait for the sun to go down a little bit before we could get him out on the sidewalk.

Lincoln got to inherit Ethan's trike and spent a little time learning all the rules along with Ethan for bike riding.

He wasn't quite tall enough to reach the pedals, though, so we might have to review them later.

I tried to get more pictures of Ethan riding his bike, but they all turned out to be blurry! I can't believe how fast that kids is! I might have to beg Ethan to go out for another ride soon so we can properly document all the bike riding.

Ethan turns 4!

2011-09-08T23:12:00.000-07:00

We woke up early on Ethan's 4th birthday and headed to the best place around here to get donuts!

Ethan of course went for the vanilla sprinkles donut, and told me that Lincoln really wanted the vanilla with coconut sprinkles. To me, it looks like Lincoln wanted the entire case. Do you see how he's protecting his bounty?

We got the donuts home intact (Ethan held them on his lap for the ride home, so that really is an accomplishment), and Ethan got to blow out his candle on top.

Lincoln wasted no time in devouring his donut.

Although both of the boys seemed to prefer the others' donut, so we practiced our sharing and everyone was happy.

Everyone wasted little time talked and mostly just cramming.

These were my donut selections. Oh, anything with almond paste will make me swoon. I will have you know though, that Ethan enjoyed the old fashioned donut for lunch though. Breakfast and lunch of champions, right? Maybe that's why he didn't take a nap later...

This is how he felt after eating the donut, I didn't think the "crash" would happen quite so suddenly.

He made a quick recovery though once he noticed the pile of goods, just waiting to be opened.

The rest of the day, I dedicated to making this masterpiece! I am very proud of my first solo-attempt at working with fondant. Never a good idea to do in a pinch, but I certainly am not going to make this kind of an effort just for the sake of practicing, it was far too much work!

That night we had a few friends over to enjoy an obstacle course.

I was planning on having them hold hands as a train to get through, but decided they probably would enjoy just racing through better. I think themes can be a little too much effort sometimes. They sure are cute, but a lot of effort.

I didn't get pictures of it, but we did have railroad tracks up to our door (made from duct tape) and a detour sign to lead them to the side gate. There there was a sign that said, "Give us your loudest CHOO CHOO and the conductor will open the gate." Then where they came in, there was a railroad crossing sign.

Dinner was fabulous! (I can say that, because John did all the BBQ-ing) He made tri-tip, hot dogs, and grilled corn, and Jane cut up the fruit for fruit salad, and I opened the container of potato salad. I was too exhausted after all the cake-making.

Evidently red is the best color for blondes. Maybe there was a little more theme-ing going on!

Then it was present time! I was amazed at all the kids' willpower in looking at the pile of presents.

And if there was any theme at all to his presents, it went with the party theme! I don't think we need any more Thomas paraphernalia.

And he loved every minute of it!

The boys were all so excited to see all the train and car things! Grammie Pammie sent a whole package of goodies, with a new coat, blanket, and lots of cars things.

Jane brought about a million presents for Ethan to open, including a huge art easel with a giant roll of paper along with markers, paint and chalk. She also got some super cute dress-up clothes, including a bee costume for Lincoln. I'll have to get pictures of it all sometime.

The big present from us was this super sweet orange "specialized" bike. Ethan was so excited and wanted to ride all around from then on.

We finally persuaded him to get off the bike for the cake.

Here is a somewhat extended version of our Happy Birthday song!

Ethan got a drivers suit of Lightning McQueen from Papa Rex and LeeAnn. He was so excited about it that he wanted to wear it to bed that night, even though it was about a hundred degrees in his room.

UPDATE: Jane got a great picture of the easel in use later this month. He is starting to love coloring! I love hearing him explain what he is drawing!

Ethan is one spoiled boy, we were amazed at all the generosity of everyone. I don't think we need to buy any presents for Christmas now, there isn't anything he could need!

Ethan goes to Preschool

2011-09-07T13:28:00.000-07:00

I cannot believe it! My little boy is old enough for preschool now! He has been so excited to start school, he's asked more about school in the past 4 months than he has asked about his birthday in the past week.

Such a handsome big boy!

He definitely will have the coolest backpack around, so that will give him a head start.

Mrs. Perona is so awesome! She had some new friends in the side yard to meet all the kids as they came in. Ethan went straight from the bunnies, "Poopsie" and "Sweet Pea," inside to put his backpack away. He was totally fine. I, myself, wasn't even prepared to get a little teary-eyed. But if you know anything about me, then you will realize just getting teary-eyed and not having full blown tears is a pretty big accomplishment. Good luck little man!

Happy Labor Day!

2011-09-05T22:16:00.000-07:00

John did what a lot of people don't do on Labor Day and that is, WORK! We were lucky enough though that he was able to finish a little bit early so we could still enjoy some fun times with friends. We got to visit what we call Camp Webster and do all the fun things that that entails.

Anthony brought a shotgun, so the big boys spent some time shooting clay pigeons.

The kids spent a lot of time ~~on the beach~~ in the mud/sand,

Or if you look very closely you can see the kids on the zip line. Who has a zip line on their property? Geniuses I tell you. Or is it Genii? So much fun!

We had some wagon rides.

And spent lots of time on the slide going into the river from the dock,

and of course, what everyone does on the Delta, boating!

Of course, the food couldn't be left out. The Hiatts converted us all to veggie stix. They certainly must have changed them, because I remember them tasting like styrofoam, and they pretty much just tasted like potato chips -- although maybe I was really hungry ;)

Look how cute their family is!

These guys love the camera, and wagon rides.

Janelle took us on the "Jungle cruise,"

where there was a little time for more posing,

But most importantly there was time to go FAST!

Thank you Websters for inviting us all out to the camp! And thanks VanDykes, Hiatt's and Tuckers for all the entertainment! What a great way to spend an evening!

Truckee Weekend

2011-08-29T00:31:00.000-07:00

We have mastered the art of vacationing this summer. I think everyone at our church thinks we have quit entirely; we have been gone so much this summer. I think I was here a total of 4 Sundays this whole summer. We just know how to play. We went straight from our Monterey week to a weekend in Truckee with 3 other families.

The night that John and I were in charge of dessert, we made s'mores with the Rossi's traveling fire pit (Don't you think the Pioneers would be jealous?)

Another family shot. See? I wasn't kidding about making a real effort here. I need options when someone asks for a family shot, dang it.

The kids all loved roasting their own marshmallows.

And only some of them caught on fire. Strike that. Quite a few did. But because I'm a total square, I made the kids eat their burnt marshmallows. Dude, we only brought one bag for 24 of us. Sheesh. Besides, kids hardly have any taste buds anyway.

But the dream of it all was that we brought multiple kinds of candy to put on the s'mores. Sure, we had the Hershey's chocolate, but we also brought Reese's Peanut Butter Cups (my fav), and Junior Mints (John and E's favs). Dream come true. Although, I do have to say that with the thickness of the Reeses Cup, it really works better if you let the cup melt a little before consuming. It takes a whole lot of willpower, but if I can manage for a few minutes, ANYone can!

The house we stayed at was my former boss's boss, the head honcho at my old work and it was supremely nice! I think they just finished building it this year. In fact, they just finished the plumbing in the bathroom downstairs the morning of the day that we got there. We were so lucky to be there!

We rotated breakfast, dinner, and dessert, and I think it ended up working out just fabulously! Sure the fridge was crowded, but I think it would have been worse had we all been preparing our food separately!

Lincoln decided he was not a fan of his high chair anymore this trip. Maybe all 15 of those other kids running around got him thinking, "why am I the idiot strapped in this chair?" and he certainly revolted.

Overall, the kids got along fairly well. I think with that many kids and that kind of chaos all day long, the kids are certainly going to get overwhelmed. But they stayed cute for most of the weekend.

We had two trips to the beach over the long weekend, and the second beach, Sand Harbor ended up being our favorite.

Just look at this view! And those rocks across the way provided some excellent entertainment for people from our group to swim over and jump off.

We spent most of the time just digging in the sand and swimming in the chilly water.

My boys are smiling anytime they are dirty.

Another trip we took was a little hike down into Emerald Bay. Yes, it is a little hike as in duration (only 1 mile), but as far as difficulty, and difficulty for a 6-month prego lady, it was quite the treacherous terrain. That hill was wicked steep. Up at the top of the hill (To clarify -- you start at the top, hike down, then hike back up), they had some fantastic rocks that Ethan loved to climb to his hearts content and jump off.

I love that his eyes are completely clamped shut in this picture.

Lincoln even got his climb on. Good thing we brought the Keens. Those shoes stick to everything.

We waited up at the top for the rest of the folks to get ready to hike down, so we spent some time taking pictures.

We did eventually reach the bottom though and got to enjoy some fabulous views along the way.

We even stopped to each some lunch and listen to the beginning of the tour guides' schpiel.

Then we went on a little side hike until we realized that we couldn't climb up the steps with our stroller. So we had another little photo shoot while we waited.

And thank goodness we got a family shot too!

Then we hiked our way back to the stop taking FREQUENT breaks! It was so steep we made Ethan get out and help push too. Character building is our top priority around here, people!

A view on the way up. If you look very closely you can see the little stone castle built out on the rock for tea parties.

Looks like we might have made Lincoln stay in the stroller a little too much today. Just look how happy he is to be running around.

Back at the cabin we enjoyed some relaxing time in the hammock. What, Ethan, are you not relaxed?

And of course, took some group shots in front of the cabin.

Including some girl shots. (Ahem, I may or may not have just pinched April's behind in this photo, yep, April, IT WAS ME!)

But before we had to leave, Ethan spent some time jumping out some energy.

Definitely a weekend well spent with friends. Thank you Jacobs, Rossis and Dolls! and Thank you Hogans for letting us use the castle!

Crawford Beach House Week!

2011-08-23T23:16:00.000-07:00

It has been who knows how many years, and John and I have never, NEVER, spent an entire week at my Parent's beach house. I guess with it being so close, we definitely take advantage of the weekends almost every time, but taking time off during the week has never happened. Of course, this would coincide with car weekend in Monterey!

First stop on our list: The Concours d' Elegance along Ocean Ave in Carmel. Ethan thought the cars were far too noisy. He believes the same thing of fireworks, but at least he didn't close his eyes for these beauties.

Each of the boys were actually quite attentive and ended up being darling little angels throughout the entire event. What? Why are you laughing. They REALLY were this time!

They watched intently while each of the cars came down the road. Ethan got very excited for the cars with numbers on them.

See? No fits here. I think I will forever be surrounded by car lovers. If my 16-month old can sit through a car parade, I think I'm toast.

These Mercedes 300's seem to be the hit this year, they seemed to be everywhere. They had the sweet wing doors -- think the Delorean from Back to the Future.

Wait, wait, wait! Did you think I was really going to post the 100-thousand pictures I have of all the cars? No, I promise. This isn't John's blog or Ethan's or Lincoln's, so there will be exactly one car photo that does not include people it. Pinky promise.
The boys (all three) got a kick out of this retro firetruck.

We had at least 5 people stop us and ask to take our picture throughout the weekend. They were simply in love with our stroller and gave us lots of stories of how they were buying their daughter one immediately. Should I be worried about complete strangers taking pictures of my children? No joke, I did have one random lady just take a picture of Lincoln. No stroller story, just a nice, close-up picture of my child. I made sure I held onto him very tightly after that. And I ran away from her.

These two gents are totally famous. What, you don't know them? One is the owner of Haggerty car insurance, the people that insure classic cars and the other is Wayne Carini, a TV show host for "Chasing Classic Cars." It was actually pretty sweet. They are filming these two talk about the car they are looking at, and Ethan strolls straight up to Wayne and says, "Hey, my daddy watches you on the TV!" Nice. Thankfully, they started laughing and not rolling their eyes or something. They were actually totally nice about the whole thing, and no I wasn't the one letting my child run into the camera shot. Wayne later shook John's hand too and talked to him for a few minutes.

After two back-to-back car shows, our friends came down for the weekend to stay at the beach house with us. We decided the first stop should undoubtedly be the Dennis the Menace Park. And I also found out that going to the park just before dinnertime is the perfect time to go! There was actually room to run and only a few people at the roller slide. Ethan loves climbing up onto the tippy-top of the train and yelling at the tippy-top of his lungs at everyone around him.

Lincoln really enjoyed chasing the birds through the park.

Lincoln eventually realized there was a super-huge and sweet train next to him, and that it was meant for climbing.

Manning the Engine.

The two boys are starting to play together so cute now. Ethan especially loves to see pictures of the two of them together and always says, "Aww, soo tute."

Our friends, the Websters, made a family train of their own. Wait, where is Suzanne!?

I must really like slide pictures. Or my boys really like the slides. I took a lot of slide pictures.

But they really do make the best pictures.

And yes, I did narrow them down.

See? here's one of the suspension bridge.

We even had slide races. Oops, back to the slides, sorry.

John discovered that if you jumped on one side of the bridge, you could launch the people standing in the middle of the bridge. I think other bridge patrons were not as pleased as our bunch at John's discovery.

Low and behold, the bridge emptied out and just our two family played trampoline on the bridge for a while.

Lincoln is relaxing in his car seat after a nice hard park time.

Now, let's get going, I'm HUNGRY.

Ethan is still amped from the park. He can never get enough outdoor playtime.

The following day we went to the tide pools! John worked extra hard and found some fabulous crabs there.

I think the tide pools are just as much fun for adults as they are for kids.

These tide pools were covered in seaweed though, and were a little rough to navigate.

But it was beautiful.

And Ethan found his first sea star. Did I tell you that the Monterey Bay Aquarium will correct you if you call them starfish? They do.

Here is crab number two that John found. It was even a Dungeness. I think it might have been a keeper, but how far will one crab really go with 10 people?

I tried really hard to get family pictures of us everywhere we went. I think I was looking for a family picture of us recently and had to go back to last December for one. Hmm. Must change that.

After the tide pools, we timed it right to arrive at our favorite Monterey Pizzeria, Gianni's. They have the most amazing breadsticks. I usually just eat these when we come here. Pizza Schmizza.

These cutie patooties had such a fun time hanging out this weekend.

Even though we were beyond full from all of those breadsticks and a small amount of Pizza, we squeezed in a little gelato between the cracks.

We took our friends to the real, live car auction next and I found my namesake there, a Mitchell!

The following day we had a little nature time at Point Lobos. I couldn't believe it, but John had never been there. We got a fantastic group shot of all of us!

And of course, the family picture.

We saw some unexpected wildlife. Who knew there would be deer this close to the ocean?

Here are those cutie-patooties again posing for the camera.

Look at our view from the hike!

We found a ton of purple sea urchins. Wait, what are these called again? I can only remember the sushi name for it!

This was a blow hole coated in mussels.

You probably can't see it, but that whole middle section is coated in seals.

We were surrounded by this crazy rock that just looked like someone dropped a bunch of cement onto the beach and stuck all these tiny rocks and sand in it.

My three boys.

Who could resist wearing a rock hat?

We took the boys on a bike ride down to the wharf.

Spotted about 50 huge sea lions. One of them might have been the huge bull that wanted to kill me when I sailed into his territory on a kayak all those years ago. I think I blocked out the details though, so I'm not sure I could find him in a line up.

Our boys found a little tractor outside a restaurant at which we ate the most divine eggs benedict.

We also spent two days at the beach, doing lots of boogie boarding. John wore a hot pink wetsuit. I got a family picture with him in it. You're welcome.

Ethan even got to do some boogie boarding. We had so much fun! We really need to spend more full weeks at the beach house. It was a dream come true! And thank you, Websters, for coming with us!

And yes, you did just read a post with 51 pictures in it. May I mention that limiting pictures is not my strong suit?

Random Moments from August 2011

2011-08-15T23:03:00.000-07:00

We finally gave Lincoln a "big boy" haircut this month! He has taken to stealing Ethan's bike and pushing (read: NOT pedaling) the bike all around the backyard.

Doesn't he look so much older with the new 'do? I guess he likes riding anything with wheels around the house. Good thing we have a few options around.

Another thing Lincoln has taken to is playing Peek-A-Boo from the closet.

I love his look of surprise as he opens the door.

He will say "Bee-Boo" over and over again throughout the whole ordeal.

Such a cutie!

We got the chance to meet up with one of our favorite Elders, Elder Pagaduan! He gave John the discussions right before John got baptized, and did the confirmation. I can't believe it's been almost 7 years now! Wow, and we're up 2 1/2 kids already, crazy!

Last random moment of the month. Ethan has decided that the area under our stairs, where we store most of the toys is his "house." Too bad his version of "cleaning" HIS house ends up with mine being covered with toys. One afternoon, he decided he should take his nap in his house. And that's just what he did. I got him a blanket and pillow and he went right to sleep. I was shocked. Although, I know how tired I get from cleaning house too...

August Fishing 2011

2011-08-14T22:37:00.000-07:00

I've decided to try and post things as they happen, in addition to playing catch-up. Otherwise, I'm going to miss out on all the funny stories that happen along the way and the little things that happen during the day.

This was a quick little fishing trip we decided to have one day to spend a little family time together. Poor John wants to go fishing every minute of his free time -- and I would happy to let him do it. However, the only problem is that he doesn't get a whole lot of free time, so he likes to combine his free time and family free time. Unfortunately, that means that John ends up fishing while I end up chasing children around a dock.

This time, we actually spent some time fishing! Only for about 10 minutes. But it is official. We fished!

It was a good thing we stopped and got a chocolate milkshake before we went, because I'm not sure we would have lasted as long without it.

That, and the sketchy people next to us, that let Lincoln confiscate their chair. Yikes! He even put his chocolate shake in the cup holder. Make yourself at home, kid.

Good to the last drop.

Milk mustache, anyone?

This is what the boys spent the majority of time doing. Looking at the water through the small opening in the dock, and throwing things through the hole.

Daddy even caught a fish! We had so many bites, and those sneaky fish kept stealing our bait.

We tossed the lucky fish back into the Delta. Surprisingly, I'm counting this as a successful fishing trip. I'll try to remember that in the future, Babe, and not drag my feet so much.

Girls Camp! August 2011

2011-08-07T18:01:00.000-07:00

I love girls camp. I always have! This was my first year they asked me to come as a leader! Wahoo! And I have to say, it was the best place for me to be too. They asked me to be in crafts. Tell me exactly, who doesn't want to spend a week crafting the days away?! Dream come true I tell you! My friend Tammy got asked to be in crafts as well. She is a true crafting genius, so it really was no surprise. Together we crafting this banner. Valerie, who we met for the first time as we began this whole adventure (you plan for months in advance, so we met Valerie at one of our first meetings), began crafting our banner and then needed to leave one of our prep meetings. Tammy and I decided that we needed to "take it home." And, boy oh boy, did we. If you can't tell from the picture, we used all sorts of items from the crafting bins to make a whole camp scene. It includes a teepee, a campfire with someone roasting a s/more and sitting on a bench, a dock, a lake with fish, a person fishing, a bird, the flag circle and flag, and a first aid area.

If you turned around from where this banner was hanging, this would be your view. The craft cabin was located smack dab in the middle of everything. A perfect place for a secretly pregnant lady (only some people at camp knew I was pregnant, evidently they don't want to make it a hard and fast rule that all pregnant ladies can go to camp, it was all touch and go at the last minute if I was going to be able to go right before camp).

The theme for girls camp this year was Heavenly Ever After and involved many of the different Disney princess stories. Of course, we had to make some crowns for the first night, skit night, to show off our princessliness.

Evidently I have a hard time keeping a straight face for the camera. Oops. This is me coming up with my costume for being Pocahontas.

Tammy went all out as Ariel. This red wig, which was nothing close to a wig at all, but rather a bunch of curly string, came into great use I think every night of skits during the week of camp.

Valerie is pictured here as Cinderella and Shelisa as Belle. We made up a song using the tune of "Look at this stuff" from the Little Mermaid and talked about all our crafty crap. It was highly clever.

The following morning (ish -- The days all seemed to run together as we spent the entire time either crafting and eating) Valerie and I woke up before six to go do the Polar Bear Swim. Can I just say, it was FANTASTIC! I was much too much of a sissy to do it when I was a young woman at camp, but this year, the water and weather was perfect. It was a little chilly going in, but by the time we got out, it was perfect!

To participate in the Polar Bear Swim, all you have to do is swim to the little dock (pictured at the left) and back, but we decided to go all out and swim to the rock across the lake. All the girls decided to go all the way too, so there ended up being a huge group of us crossing the lake together. Afterwards, the brethren had hot chocolate waiting for us! It was so nice!

That day, I spent some more time doing crafts, and surprise, making unsolicited winks at the camera.

These girls were youth leaders and were somewhere in between being real leaders and being girls. Basically, they got all the fun of being the girls, but none of the responsibility of being a leader. Sweet gig, eh? Daylene on the left made all the colors of the knit bracelets (there was a color for every value in Young Womens) and their popularity skyrocketed after she was sporting them all around camp.

This is Brittany, another youth leader, who got to spend a lot of time at crafts with us too.

Snow White, I mean, Emily Merrill was HI-LARIOUS throughout camp. She was the Assistant Camp Leader and one of the head honchos. Most nights she dressed up as a Disney Princess and talked to the girls in a seriously funny way about the different values they represented. Tammy is of course, laughing her head off at Emily, because that's what he did most of camp. Did I say AT? I meant WITH. We love Emily.

So, I was the notorious nazi over the rings at camp. It was not my craft, but I totally took it over. Mainly because I was obsessed with making these cute fabric covered rings. I limited myself to making just one a day. But then I was a total hypocrite making sure the girls didn't go over their limit.

Craft, Eat, Craft, Eat, truly my dream come true! To be fair though, I did spend some time doing crafty humanitarian things too and made a fantastic aqua beanie for a newborn.

There was a day sometime in the middle of the week where most of the girls were out on hikes. We asked some of the youth leaders to cover the craft area while Tammy and I went out canoeing. We had so much fun! These lake is beautiful!

The following morning, the crafty ladies all got to go to archery together. Here is Tammy, Marci, and I trying on the equipment.

Don't we look super scary?

See? No normal faces from me. Everyone else is smiling and I am freaking out. What, am I four?

I did get a bulls eye though! And then of course, I made myself a bead to commemorate such a skill.

Remember how I said I was a nazi about the rings? This is me, also being a nazi about the rings. I found the perfect brush to mod podge the rings (to help them stand up a little better, wear and tear, wise) and I totally wouldn't give up the paintbrush. I would simply offer to do it for them instead. I am a super square, aren't I?

Now, speaking of mod podge. I was wrong almost the entirety of camp calling the substance, "modge podge." Until one day I noticed by looking at the container that it was indeed called "mod podge." I tried to tell everyone about this craziness and Tammy called me out, telling me she had noticed me calling it the wrong name all of camp, and it was driving her crazy, but she was trying to be nice, so she didn't correct me. Uh, who on earth wanted the name to be "mod podge?" I must write a strongly worded letter informing the company of their need to change the name to a more pleasant sounding one, perhaps "modge podge" which springs forth from one's lips with greater ease. They will thank me profusely I'm sure. So watch your crafting aisles for the change. It's only a matter of time.

Exhibit Z on weird faces. I have issues. But, now I also have headbands for Baby girl when she comes in December.

This is not a weird face, why? I'm simply staking claim on my dessert for the evening. Heaven forbid I miss a dessert.

On the evening before camp ended, we got together for a Bishops' fireside. These are all of our ward members at camp. I think everyone had such a good time!

And here are my peeps, the crafting ladies. Love them. We had more fun than anyone else at camp. This was the perfect calling. From the left, Valerie, Tammy, Me, Shelisa, Marci and Heidi.

So the last night, before our skit, we may or may not have thrown all consciousness and rules out the window. We made lots of rings. We made rings to our hearts content. All for the sake of the skit of course. Grand total of rings for me: 14. Shhhh. Don't tell the girls.

Discovery Kingdom & Muir Woods with Papa Rex

2011-07-30T23:43:00.000-07:00

Papa Rex and LeeAnn got to come and stay with us a few days after the month at the beach house. Okay, not an entire month, but wow, talk about back to back vacations! We decided that a trip to Discovery Kingdom was definitely in order!

Lincoln was taking some ownership of his bench on the train.

We got to ride the helicopters. They were so much cuter when they were all Thomas themed with Harold. I wonder what happened?

We got to see the whale show this time!

The boys loves hanging out in the shark exhibit. Ethan would squeal as each animal would pass. He especially loved the stingrays.

A few days later, we decided to venture out yet again, this time to go to Muir Woods. I have never been here before. The fog was completely eerie as you drive in, but once you arrive it was so peaceful and amazingly gorgeous.

There is something about redwoods that makes me want to breathe a little deeper.

The boys loved running around together. They have about 5 bridges you get to cross and they were thrilled with each one!

Of course, running through trees is always a bonus.

I definitely like posing inside trees. I guess it's a bonus for me as well!

Too bad we couldn't all fit in the tree!

Every time Papa Rex comes for a visit he helps us get some job done around the house. This time he helps is pour cement at the front of our house, extending our porch on either side.

We love how it looks now! Thank you so much! We had a fabulous time with all of our visits this summer!

My sweet boys, just after waking up. I love them so much it hurts.

Oh My GOODNESS!

2011-07-21T09:28:00.000-07:00

This morning I made these delightful PINK lemonade cookies. I promise. They are divine.

I am bringing them to work today because, yesterday, we found out we were having one of these:

And yes, it is a pink version. Coming December 2011! Our Ultrasound Tech was quite the interesting character. She told us she could "usually find a pecker, no matter how small." So I guess she was pretty confident that we're having a girl!

Beach House with Papa Rex!

2011-07-16T00:07:00.000-07:00

My dad had the beach house for three weeks in a row! We got to come down and visit for all the weekends! In the last year or so we have discovered this fabulous gourmet Mexican place in Carmel Valley and we now frequent it multiple times when we are down in Monterey. My Dad's wife, LeeAnn brought her kids (and families) to the beach house, and my brother Nate actually got to come as well. It was a great time!

These kids were so funny, they loved hopping and jumping around together the entire time.

We convinced Derek to try sushi for the first time.

Immediately after this face, he said, "actually it wasn't all that bad. I was expecting much worse."

But what can you expect from this guy?

Can you guess where we went?

Yeah, for the tidepools! At least we hit up a different section of tidepools each time, and really, there are new surprises every time we go.

Ethan found a pre-historic looking animal and told me he had found a roly poly bug. I think he nailed it.

Papa Rex!

I love that all the boys are focused on different treasures.

Ethan found the remains of a crab and spent quite some time studying it. He is such a curious boy, always excited to learn.

Lincoln was just so happy to be able to run around by himself. I think this is the first time we've let him explore the rocks on his own!

I think John is giving Rex a rexplanation!

He found us a HUGE sea star to enjoy!

John also found a real crab and the boys were comparing specimens.

I love Lincoln's face in this picture. "What are you doing? Are you kidding me?"

"No, you are kidding me!"

And of course, the kids loved playing at the park! Aren't you glad I have so many new and exciting places to show you?

Lincoln got his exploring on.

We even attempted some family photos. Although no one told us about any coordinating colors.

As a family, meaning John, Me, Ethan and Lincoln, we just weren't feeling the photography bug. The boys were completely restless!

The wind was not cooperating either!

But at least we got a few cheesy ones in.

Look how fast this kid runs!

Look how quickly his top teeth are coming in!

Love these slides!

Maybe we should just take some family pictures in slides from now on, since they are my favorite pics.

Pure bliss.

This sequence cracks me up.

I love that he squeezes his eyes closed!

They are starting to play so well together and every time I see it, I want to remember it forever.

It just didn't feel right without a picture of the red roller slide.

John and I got to go see a 3D movie, the last Harry Potter! Fantastic! And those shades were ever-so-glam!

Lawrence Hall of Science

2011-07-06T23:37:00.000-07:00

Another one of our field trips we took this summer was to the Lawrence Hall of Science. They had a pretty cool exhibit was animated dinosaurs.

I think my favorite thing was this giant pin machine. You usually see these that are about the size of your hand that you press on and the pins are displaced by your hand and show the image on the other side. Well they had giant-sized ones that Ethan had a ball playing in!

They had a dino dig area, where you could uncover real dinosaur bones!

If Lincoln were talking right now, he would be asking "why on Earth am I stuck in this stroller?!"

Measuring up!

I remember being mesmerized by one of these when I was little.

I want to put one of these up in my house! It had all these plastic rectangles that you could manipulate all around this board and create pathways for little balls that you would drop from the top. I would want to play with this one for hours!

While we were here, I learned that there is no such thing as a bracheosaurus. Evidently the confused the wrong head from a previously named dinosaur. They also claimed that they now believe the dinosaurs had feathers through their teenage years. Weird!

I loved the little science discovery area too where you could perform all these physics experiments. Don't mind the unders, Ethan did his own experimenting through the pond earlier.

What a fun place to play! We will definitely have to come back in the future!

A Trip to Oregon

2011-07-04T22:45:00.000-07:00

John and I drove the boys up to Oregon for a whirlwind of a trip! We had lots of major events all jam-packed into an extended weekend. The first night we were there, we had a little barbeque at a Park. The boys loved playing on the swings.

We loved relaxing.

My sister even brought a little firepit for s'mores!

Lincoln had some major investigating to do with new cousin Seth.

The following day we went to the Portland Zoo and Washington Park (which is a massive rose garden). There we got to ride an amazing train ride from the Zoo to Washington Park. I don't remember what we paid, but it was definitely worth it!

Look, Lincoln is getting some top teeth finally!

Doesn't it look like a sweet ride?

This rose garden was amazing! It just kept going and going with hundreds, maybe even thousands of different rose varieties. It made me want to plant a hundred roses in my yard.

I fell in love with so many different varieties. I loved that they had a plaque below each one, identifying it.

Once back at the Zoo, we were just as impressed. This zoo was HUGE! I liked that it had everything organized by region, so as you walked around you would visit the southwest or the northwest. Look at this beautiful tree! It's called a Baobab Tree. I loved the look of it.

Ethan found a sweet set of bongo drums. He could have stayed here the rest of the afternoon.

They had this land rover set up as part of the exhibit so the kids could pretend they were on an African Safari, pretty inventive, right? The front half was in with the wild dogs, but the seats were on the other side of the glass.

These two passed out right at the same time. My mom said she loved that Justin and I each had bright green strollers, it made us really easy to find in the crowd.

They had so many different kinds of Monkeys/Orangutans/Gorillas/Apes.

I just liked this carved wall.

All throughout they had fun things for the kids to explore.

They even had a cool river exhibit with the kinds of fish you would find in different rivers in each region.

John likes to get Ethan excited about Turtles. I think he's trying to persuade Ethan to ask me for one.

Even the farm area was super cool. What kids doesn't want to drive a tractor?

Or a wooden horse? We were so impressed by this zoo!

After the zoo, we met up with my sister's family for her little boy's birthday party. Ethan is posing with the man of the hour.

It was at this cool splash pad with water that shoots straight up from the ground. It reminded me of Disneyland.

Lincoln loved climbing all over these cement steps. I did not.

All the kids gathered around for some snacks, cupcakes, and presents.

The adults got a chance to take a break too.

And Ethan did his share of baby inspecting.

Lounging Lincoln.

Here are my twins.

At first, I don't think the boys knew what to think of the splash pad, but then they totally got into it.

The next day, we all went to Seth's Baby Blessing. See? We were super busy. Well, we just had to show up for things, my poor sister had to plan everything!

Mark's parents even got to come out from England for all the festivities.

Later that evening, we had my niece's baptism. It was fantastic. All except for the fact that my sister asked me to lead the music to a song I had never heard and didn't have any music to follow. That was awesome.

Seth is worn out from all this partying.

Maddie and I had a great heart to heart.

Here's the whole crew!

Later that night, we got to celebrate the 4th of July!

Ethan and Lincoln both enjoyed the sparklers.

I got to play around with all the different settings on my camera.

We had quite a show.

Maybe a little bit too big of a show!

So we moved to a different location and definitely broke some rules.

It was worth it. Well, I can say that now, we were all kind of freaking out the whole time.

I love the 4th!

The next day we were going to leave, but didn't get a chance to use up all our fireworks. So we headed over to the Parsons' to hang out one last time before heading home.

The kids really enjoyed the show, even though it wasn't quite as spectacular as it would have been had it been dark.

By kids, I mean the big kids of course.

The sparklers were still a hit with the little ones.

What a whirlwind! Did it you make it through all the festivities? We had such an amazing time! We always wish we lived a little bit closer!

Breathe. Just Breathe.

2011-06-20T00:30:00.000-07:00

No, you're not dreaming. I actually posted again! After a brief (ahem -- 11 month) hiatus! I have a lot of catching up to do. No promises. This is a guilt-free blog. Someday I'll catch up. You'll get a random blog about last July and boating from last summer. Someday I might actually post something that happened within the last month. But for now, enjoy at your leisure, or not at all!

A Trip to the Oakland Zoo

2011-06-15T22:40:00.000-07:00

While Pammie was here, we got a chance to go to the Oakland Zoo. There was a group of my friends going for our little field trips, so we decided it would be a fun thing to do with Pammie. Boy, oh boy, it was HOT. Oakland is not supposed to be this hot. We saw some not-so-pink pink flamingos.

And some Sun Bears, who, as it turns out, don't really like the sun all that much.

When we went to go see the otters, it was really funny. Ethan said, "Hi, Otters" when we walked up to the wall to see the otters, and these otters raced over to greet us. They must have been expecting us!

They have several super huge turtles that were all resting in the shade.

Ethan thought this thing was pretty cool and asked for a picture.

Can you believe this turtle is just chillin' on the back of an alligator?

Here we found some of our friends, enjoying the same crazy turtle/alligator spectacle.

Next, we headed down to the petting area and the boy had a lot of fun brushing all the animals. They also had an excellent set of misters, so even though it wasn't all that pleasant smelling with the goats, I was more than happy to hang out.

I can't see a warthog and not have tunes from the Lion King running through my head.

Ethan is getting a much closer look at something.

Here's more of our little crew.

I think it would be funny to see this number of children running around amidst all the strollers.

We took a lot of rest breaks in the shade. There are a lot of hills in Oakland, and the zoo is no exception! We definitely got our workout for the day.

This was as many kids as we could sandwich on the bench.

This was our "family shot." We had about 7 attempts, and Ethan is jumping up and down in every one.

Pammie and I took the train ride around a small portion of the zoo with the boys. It was really all Ethan wanted to do since we got there.

I love this shot of the boys.

So, funny story, directly after coming through this tunnel, there is a fake snake on the side (they had little fake animals posed along the route of the train). My mom, who is deathly afraid of snakes, was sitting on the same side as said snake and nearly had a heart attack as we came out of the tunnel. I was so bummed I didn't capture her reaction on camera. It was priceless.

On the extremely short train ride we pretty much just saw kangaroos and Emus. As cool as they are, I don't think it was worth the $15 to see them. Although maybe seeing Pammie pee her pants from the snake scare was worth it (okay, not actually peeing her pants).

Pammie's Beach House Week #2

2011-06-12T16:09:00.000-07:00

We went back to the beach house with Pammie and was also joined my my Aunt Dani, Aunt Lori, and her husband, Martin. We decided it was a great time to keep driving and go and see Hearst Castle. We've been going down to the beach house for so long now, and have talked about this trip for, what seems like, forever. It was fun to actually make it happen this time!

We got two backpacks for the boys, thinking we might be able to keep control of them a little but better this way.

Wouldn't you love to take a dip in that?

Pretty much, everything was over the top immaculate and ornate.

We got lost in seeing so many different rooms, all so elaborate.

Ethan spied this little fountain and squealed, "He's peeing in the water!" Thankfully, everyone on the tour heard it too!

Wow, this is a HUGE dining hall!

Here's the group of us!

And the amazing indoor pool, with real gold inlay.

We had time to do two different tours. The second one involved a lot of stair climbing.

Check out their view! I love California's coastline!

I think I was most amazed by all the ceilings. This is Mr. Hearst's personal study.

I also just loved the architecture.

I think if I were to stay here, I would like the room in the highest tower. Such nice natural lighting!

I thought the boys did remarkably well. It was a 2 1/2 hour drive down and then 4 hours of asking them not to touch anything, even the carpet. That's a lot of asking of a three-year-old.

Look at the wood work under the roof!

I thought the kitchen was totally sweet. And he had stainless steel countertops, that I had to point out to John (only because of our long running joke about our stainless steel dining table that he hates and I love).

What an amazing set up!

I LOVED this old mixer! It made me want to go home and start cooking after I saw it.

The grounds were all so beautiful. It also made me want to landscape our yards. If I only had 345 billion dollars...

After the castle, we drive north to see the elephant seals.

This guy was coming out of the ocean. It looked like a lot of hard work.

Just look at all this laziness! Looks nice, doesn't it?

We took everyone to the Julia Pfieffer State Park to see the waterfall running onto the beach.

It turned out to be the perfect time for good lighting, and a good family picture!

We love our Grammie Pammie!

One of the girls! We had so much fun! Thank you for another fabulous weekend, Pammie! So glad everyone was able to come!

Happy Birthday to Tara

2011-06-06T15:37:00.000-07:00

I turned 31 this year! Yikes! That sounds so old! I did hear a report on the radio that said that women hit their peak at age 32 (physically), thank goodness I still have another year then before I can really get depressed about it! For my birthday, we went to 1515, one of our favorite restaurants. We ended up sitting next to the owner's entire family and had a grand old time. They kept sending things over to us that they were requesting for their grandkids. And their kids were far louder than ours, so that's always a good thing.

The owner promised Ethan some ice cream if he was a good boy at the beginning of the meal, and he told Ethan to give him the "thumbs up" sign as soon as he was ready for it. Ethan was so excited and kept asking if it was time for the ice cream yet. The owner definitely came through for Ethan, the minute Ethan's little thumb went up, the owner called the waiter over to bring us some ice cream for the boys!

The owner found out it was my birthday too, and sent over a little dessert for us! What a nice surprise!

Here's to another good year!

Beach House with Pammie

2011-06-05T00:22:00.000-07:00

This June we got to go down to the beach house for two weekends in a row with my mom! While we were there, one morning we noticed literally a hundred dolphins and seals moving right along the beach. We sat and watched them for awhile and John got really excited about fishing. He started explaining that there was a huge bait ball and that we should definitely go down to the dock and fish. Well he went out and bought a new fishing pole and the necessary equipment to fish for sardines. Evidently there is a special setup that has several hooks running along it and there is, of course, a special "ocean-fishing" kind of pole. Well, moments after the pole and equipment was purchased, we were down at fisherman's wharf with about 30 other people throwing our line in the water. And, can I tell you? It was actually pretty fun! John would cast out the line and immediately start reeling it in, and it would have a few fish on it!

Some of them would wriggle off before you could get them in the bucket, but it was the perfect scenario for fishing with a 3 year old! John caught 12 fish and brought them back to the beach house to cook them up. I was definitely hesitant about eating sardines. Eww, yuck those nasty things with lots of bones in cans? Count. Me. Out. Then we barbequed them with a little olive oil, garlic, lemon, and thyme. Oh my. They were fantastic! I couldn't believe they were so good. What an experience!

Look at Lincoln's two little teeth! He finally can eat a little texture with his foods!

Lincoln is such a good cuddler and loved having Grammie Pammie around to give him lots of loves.

If you look just past the boats, you can see the beach house!

We got to take lots of walks this trip, and Ethan even discovered a nice spot of wet cement to run around in! Oops. I guess he didn't read the "caution:wet cement" signs posted all around. Thankfully, the guy was close by and just started laughing and waved us along. It would have been kind of cool to be able to see his footprints along fisherman's wharf every time we are there though.

It's really hard to get a forced smile out of this kid these days. It's a work in progress.

Maybe it was just too bright outside, despite being overcast.

We had a great time at the beach and just running some energy off.

Oh weird, we wound up here again. I wonder exactly how many times we come to this park?

Are you tired of seeing the same park pictures yet?

I hope not, because there's more!

And of course, some of the red slide.

Here the boys go down all by themselves. I can't believe how much they are growing up, and I love watching them play together.

These chaps are just so cute!

These guys love the slide. They still are my favorite kind of park picture. Good thing this park has at least 10 different slides.

We got a family picture! Not perfect, but everyone is focused on the camera.

Memorial Day at Collin's Lake

2011-05-29T00:06:00.000-07:00

For Memorial Day Weekend we went to Collin's Lake with the Rossi's. Oh my goodness it was crowded!

It really wasn't a super warm weekend to go boating, but that didn't stop Teri!

They brought their trailer and we set up camp just down the hill from them.

Look at the HUGE fish John caught!

It might have been cold, but the boat rides are always fun!

And if we're near water, you know there is a fishing trip planned!

Ethan and Riley are always willing to pose for the camera.

It was a beautiful sunset while we were fishing.

I don't think we caught anything, but it was still a nice ride.

I think we might have had two desserts that night, ice cream cones, and then s'mores. Shh. Don't tell the kids. Thanks, Rossi's we always have a good time camping/boating with you!

Daddy/Son Campout and a Carnival

2011-05-14T23:55:00.000-07:00

Our ward had a Father/Son campout and John only brought his phone (as a camera).

Since I wasn't there, I can't give great commentary.

John said it was great to hang out with everyone and they woke up early the next morning to break camp and eat pancakes, yum!

Ethan told every person we met, at least for a month about how "daddy drove over three rivers and he is crazy."

Evidently, the road was a little low and John had to drive through the water that ran over the roadway to get in and out of the campsite. Ethan thought it was insane!

After they got back, John went to work and I took the boys to a nearby carnival at a school.

Lincoln was not too happy about hanging out in the stroller.

Ethan loved the fishing games.

And the fishing games.

But, impressively, he got two "ringers" in horseshoe!

Camping at Big Sur

2011-05-08T23:36:00.000-07:00

We went camping to Big Sur and had so much fun!

After setting up camp, we immediately started the fire. It was COLD!

Lincoln loved sitting in the big camping chairs by himself.

The following morning we set out on a short hike at Julia Pfieffer State Park. It was a quick, but beautiful hike!

I think it's the only place in the United States where a waterfall lands on a beach.

My handsome boys!

Ethan really enjoyed running through the tunnel that ran under the freeway.

There was even a nice little river that ran alongside the pathway.

We returned back to camp for some snacks. Our campsite had a few Albino Redwoods growing there. Weird.

Then we set out on the longest hike ever! We didn't realize it was going to be so intense at the time, of course. We hiked from our campsite to Pfieffer State Park and the hike was not all that well-used, and seemed a bit treacherous for my liking -- especially with a three-year-old.

Once we got to Pfieffer, we took a hike up to see some waterfalls. Along the way, we stopped to take a rest and this gigantic snake slithered right behind where I was standing!

We made it to the top, and definitely enjoyed the view.

On the way back, we decided that walking along the highway back to camp was a good idea. Still scary, but less scary.

Don't you worry, we made our s'mores that night!

Bringing a high chair was a brilliant idea, Lincoln stayed much cleaner this way!

On our way home, we stopped at our favorite park!

We couldn't just drive right be and not take advantage of the red slide.

Look at these cute brothers.

Ethan hated the swings when he was little. Lincoln LOVES them!

We had such a nice weekend, and what a great way to end it!

Hiking around...

2011-05-02T23:23:00.000-07:00

One afternoon, we decided to go hike around Lafayette Reservoir. We've gone fishing there several times, but this time, John left the poles at home and we hiked around the reservoir, I think it's just over 2 miles.

Ethan didn't last too long in the carrier. He wanted to RUN! And it was hot enough outside, we were happy to let him!

All around the reservoir there are fantastic views. It just felt so nice to be outside!

Lincoln loves the hiking backpack.

Along the way they had signs talking about the wildlife or plants. Ethan loved looking at all the pictures and then playing i-spy along the hike.

Can you spy the deer?

Ethan would say his legs were getting tired towards the end, but then he would sprint towards me. He made it the whole way though! Such a strong kid!

Happy Easter!

2011-04-24T23:09:00.000-07:00

Easter weekend we were still in Utah, after celebrating Pammie's Graduation. The boys had fun dying the Easter eggs.

The did a marvelous job of coating them with sticker and the other whatnots.

Easter morning came bright and early (I was hoping the time change would let me sleep in a little - but it did not!)

I had a friend of mine make matching hats for the boys. We really need to go to Disneyland with these! Sidenote: Every time Ethan watches a Disney movie and the castle comes on in the beginning, he always gasps, "Mommy, you forgot to take me there today." That we did, Buddy.

The Easter Bunny brought punch balloons for the boys!

And a bubble gun! It might be freezing outside, but anything goes when bubbles are involved!

Chocolate Bunny Ears - The breakfast of champions.

Lincoln was much more health-conscious and opted for the pancakes.

Ethan had so much fun playing with Grammie Pammie's train set!

We had so much fun with Pammie, Uncle Nate, and Honey this weekend!

Technically, this picture did not happen Easter weekend, but I had to show a picture of the boys in their cute hats!

Grammie Pammie Graduates from BYU!

2011-04-22T23:08:00.000-07:00

I love that my mom got into BYU and now is graduating! I'm so proud of her and, of course, love the opportunity to lecture her on talking on the phone and making sure she is keeping up on her studies. I flew out with the kids to watch her graduate. The night before, they had a smaller graduation ceremony with just the people in her program.

Can you spot Grammie Pammie in the middle?

She was well-loved by everyone in her class. We had lots of people tell us how awesome she is.

Then they had a little food reception, of course. She graduated in Dietetics, so of course they would have food there! What a good major!

We got to hang out with my Cousin, Annie, and her little boy, Kamdyn.

The boys got along so well!

The following morning was the real deal, the one in the Marriott Center. Doesn't she look so excited?

My mom was surprised to find out that ALL of her siblings came to watch her graduate. She had no idea they were all coming. My aunt Karla helped me out with the boys during the graduation. I think they did remarkably well for a 2 hour event.

Her she is doing the hand-shaking and diploma-receiving.

It's official!

Here are the kids! Her favorite kids of course! Ok, my sister might be having a baby in a few weeks, and Nate might be working, but we know who really loves her ;)

What good is a graduation without some food to celebrate! After the big to-do, we all went o my Aunt Karla's house to fill up our bellies. Here is My Aunt Lori with my brother, Jared.

My uncle Reggie, Glen girlfriend (can't remember her name, oops!), Uncle Glen, and my Aunt Sharleen.

My Uncle Dale is sitting next to Justin.

Here are all the Storer children! Dale, Sharleen, Pammie, Glen, Lori and Karla!

Ethan and Justin making a little mischief.

Lincoln said he really enjoyed the cake.

Later on, Justin made the mistake of falling asleep on the couch. Nice 'stache, bro.

Happy 40th Tim!

2011-04-03T22:37:00.000-07:00

John's brother, Tim, turned 40 this year! We got to go over to his house for some fantastic sandwiches and chocolate cake.

Ethan could see Tim was going to need some assistance blowing out all those candles.

He also provided some supervision while Sharon cut up the cake.

Lincoln kept Grandma company.

Then we all got to dig in to some chocolate!

Every time we go to Tim's house, we take a family photo in front of his house. I love this tradition!

Camp Webster April 2011

2011-04-03T22:36:00.000-07:00

Friends of ours, the Websters, are renting a house on the Delta and invited us to come for a visit conference weekend. John was so excited to spend some time fishing, we ended up bringing our tent and everything for the weekend. Thanks Websters for putting up with us!

First thing in the morning, my boys were out on the dock getting their lines in.

Not too long afterwards though, we had some girls come and join us.

Janelle made waffles with strawberries for everyone. It was such a treat, delish!

Ethan thoroughly enjoyed them. He didn't even know cream on waffles was a option, now I'm really in trouble.

After that, we had a little fishing excursion on the dock again.

A very successful excursion I should say.

Elizabeth caught a fish as well.

Janelle even had some crafts for the kids to do while they were "listening" to conference.

What better way to spend a day than fishing and shooting?

Good, that is, until you let the recoil from the gun knock you in the head and split your head open. Doesn't my man look, so, extra, manly?

They have a zip line set up for the kids as well.

Here goes Ethan!

He wasn't so sure about this to begin with, but after an excellent demonstration by Caroline, he was ready to go.

Then he thought he was super tough.

Janelle's parents came out for a little shooting. Her mom was an exceptional shot. I don't think she missed one!

Janelle's brother too came for a little zip line fun. And yes, he told us it is still fun, even if you're dragged on the ground for the last 50 feet. Well, it was fun for us too.

Here's our little setup for the weekend.

Janelle took us on a fabulous twilight cruise around the Delta.

Look at their setup! I love this place!

Then of course, before dinner we had a little more time for fishing!

And a little relaxing.

The kids had so much fun together. Love the Websters, and their cute girls! Thank you so much again, for a fantastic conference weekend!

March Madness...or not!

2011-03-30T14:45:00.000-07:00

I finished Ethan's quilt! I've been working on this for about a year now. My mom was the one that found the fabric line in Utah, I looked online and I was sold! I had previously found a free quilt pattern online and that was the final product.

It was a lot of work (all those circles are hand-appliqued) and a lot of money (i.e. next time John will not question if I decide to buy an entire bedroom set for $300 dollars). BUT, it turned out just as I wanted it to. Next time, I will not listen to my mother when she suggests that I make a KING size quilt! Sorry Pammie!

Other random picture from this month include Ethan.

Who is slowly discovering his sense of humor. Such a delight!

St. Patrick's Day happened this month as well! Look how cute my little Irish lads are! And FYI, I didn't even plan on them matching this day. I simply went to each of their drawers and pulled out the first green items I saw. Turns out I have the same taste from boy to boy, eh?

My little brother got to come for a visit this month! Wahoo! So glad he has a sister office just a short ride away from us! We made him make us crepes. Although, I don't think he had any complaints.

We also got to go on Ethan's first bowling trip.

They gave us this huge ramp for kids to help them center their ball. Maybe they didn't want Ethan shotputting the ball down the lane? This little guy is so strong!

We had our Relief Society Birthday celebration dinner for our ward this month as well. I think it turned out to be a fantastic event, celebrating the history of Relief Society. My friend Tammy and I had a brilliant idea to make giant birthday cup-cakes for each table at the event and covered them all in marshmallow fondant. This was my first time working with fondant, and I think they all turned out pretty cute! Good thing we have a fridge in our garage, right?

I also made little cupcake toppers for each of the cakes with a different past Relief Society president on them. And no, that cake isn't leaning to the right. It's just your eyes. We made 12 cakes! They can't all be perfect!

I took the boys for a walk this month, with promises that we would get some frozen yogurt. Sadly enough, this was their state by the time we got there. I had to eat the yogurt all by myself!

Lincoln turns 1!

2011-03-28T15:18:00.000-07:00

This little man got so many presents! He is so well-loved!

We had a small family gathering -- my second oldest brother, Nate and one of his best friends, Eric, came over for the celebration too!

Jane and the Mitchells from Oakland also made their presence known.

I made knock-off Betty's sandies. Oh, I love me some fried chicken and cabbage slaw.

At first, Lincoln needed a little coaxing to open the presents.

But he had some fabulous helpers.

Ethan had the next present ready for Lincoln, as soon as he was finished exploring the current one.

But Lincoln caught on quickly and seemed to enjoy himself just fine.

Of course, sometimes I wonder why we buy presents, when these kids would be perfectly fine with a box and some peanuts.

I made Lincoln a cute shirt with some leftover quilt pieces, couldn't let those got to waste!

This part, Lincoln needed absolutely no coaxing, and no instruction. We put his cupcake in front of him, and he went to town.

I love me some cream cheese frosting too, Buddy.

This little guy is such a joy in our family. So easy going, and SUCH a good sleeper. He is always happy and ready to explore everything around him. Happy Boy little man!

Justin goes to Discovery Kingdom

2011-03-21T22:11:00.000-07:00

While Justin was here visiting, we took our first trip of the year to good ol' Discovery Kingdom. I think it was drizzling when we left to go there, leaving the park practically empty! By, the time we arrived, it was sunny and awesome!

We took some time hanging out with the penguins.

And giving Shouka some hugs.

All the boys studying the general life habits of the dolphins ever-so-intently.

The dolphins even came over for some socialization.

Can you tell me, why on why do they make garbage cans look like dolphins? How many thousands of kids put their hands and faces on this disgusting trash can because it looks cute?! People, trash cans should look like trash cans. You're not hiding anything. You're just making it harder on parents, and making me want to dry heave.

Justin and Ethan stopped for a quick break.

Then the big boys got a chance to do some rides. I think they rode at least 5 times in a row because the lines were so short!

Did you think you would get away with a trip to Discovery Kingdom without the Looney Tunes zone? Nope. Not ever. Ethan is enjoying the airplanes as much as ever!

Look at this handsome little conductor. I think the entire train was empty this ride!

The brave guy even rode on the teacups. I think I got sick just watching him.

Keeping Busy in February

2011-02-28T23:41:00.000-08:00

This month we went to the Jelly Belly with friends. Unfortunately, they don't allow you to take pictures inside the factory, you know, just in case I decide to use some trade secrets and start making jelly bellies at home.

Tammy, Sophie, and Violet met us there.

Here are the cute kiddies with the Jelly Belly man himself.

Lincoln is starting to walk with an assistive device now, well as long as Ethan will let him have it. Unfortunately, since Lincoln has shown an interest in push toys now, they have become much more interesting to Ethan as well.

But he's slowly getting the hang of it. Literally.

I remember I have a picture of Ethan in this exact same position. Why, oh why must they want to get beyond this gate so much?

But since they are as cute as they are, we let them hang out for a bit.

Ethan loves helping mommy. Any time he can be next to me in the kitchen, he will be. Dishes, Cooking, all of it.

He's an expert stirrer and actually manages to keep most of the food in the pot, so that's a bonus.

This little guy is definitely into cruising right now too.

This little one either poses nicely for the camera,

OR works on his comedy routine. You just never know.

This video is extremely long and meant for grandparent perusal. Basically, Lincoln has learned to clap and is showing off his skills, it just takes over a minute for that process to happen, so you may here an excessive amount of "motherese" happening.

Academy of Sciences with the McMillans!

2011-02-23T14:56:00.000-08:00

Our friends, the McMillans, invited us to go to the Academy of sciences with them. Ethan and their little boy, Tyler are only 1 week apart, and their next child is I think 3 days apart from Lincoln, so Heidi and I have had a lot of fun with our kids playing together. This was our first visit ever to the Academy of Sciences and I had been wanting to go here for a long time! We jumped at the chance when they invited us to go with them! They had this awesome fish tank that you could walk all across the top with peeking windows. Can you see the stingray swimming by?

The famous Albino Alligator! John says, he remembers with alligator being there when he was little.

Ethan loved watching them clean the massive fish tanks.

There is something about watching the fish in a massive tank that you can kind of get lost in it. I find it very relaxing, which is saying something when you're chasing around this little munchkins.

Can you tell what this is? I didn't even know that there were upside-down jellyfish living in the oceans!

Ethan also loved looking at the turtles. John has been working on convincing me to get one of those massive turtles that will grow to be like 3 feet tall. Although I think they are nice, they just don't seem to offer all that much back to the family.

The penguins were awfully friendly and kept the kids entertained for quite a while.

They also had this huge area of stuffed animals. I guess it beats paying for the care of all of them!

But in the end, the boys preferred the little portals to the underwater.

And by the end, they were ready to have some hands on experiences.

They had this awesome play area for little kids to run some energy out. It included a huge treehouse.

And a giant boat, which Ethan gladly took the helm.

I loved the little bunkhouse.

The porthole was cute too.

We had such a fun time McMillans, Thank you!

Lincoln's First Haircut!

2011-02-05T12:17:00.000-08:00

I know he's cute, but this kid need a cut!

Ethan was very helpful in showing Lincoln exactly what was happening during the whole ordeal.

Lincoln wasn't quite sure he was into the whole idea.

But as long as he was chewing on something or playing with my necklace, he seemed to do just fine.

He looks so much older now!

Random moments in January

2011-01-30T23:11:00.000-08:00

As we were packing up all the decoration from Christmas, Ethan and Lincoln did their part to help me out.

Wouldn't you love to get these packages in the mail?

Ethan is loving the job of "big brother" and likes to teach Lincoln lots of things, especially if it involves the proper use of riding cars.

Ethan also wants to be the best helper.

I think Daddy loves to get his help too.

Cute buns!

My boys enjoying a nice ride at Costco.

Ethan loves to take bike rides all year round. This time, he learned all about making wishes.

Take a deep breath.

And blow!

Ethan also learned how to button his shirts all by himself!

Lincoln is cruising around on all fours this month.

Lincoln packs in the food like nothing else, he must be getting ready to GROW!

A day in SF

2011-01-22T23:33:00.000-08:00

To be fair, it was really only an evening in SF. We started out the late afternoon after the boys had their naps and after John got home from work. We took BART into the city.

First item on the agenda is to see the trolley cars. Ethan is completely obsessed. He loves to see the bus around our hometown that he calls the trolley bus. The real deal was even more exciting.

I am just completely obsessed with this cutie. It's a good thing he loves his Ergo Baby.

The Trolley car comes into view!

I mostly just wanted you to see my sweet boots. My sister got a whale of a steal on Amazon and I got to buy her cast offs! Merry Late Christmas to me!

We went down to the pier and got to watch all the huge boats.

And more importantly, follow the train tracks we discovered there.

Alcatraz even looked beautiful.

Ethan found a loving pair of seals to take a rest on.

Then we ended the evening at, where else? Ghiradelli! We really need to do this more often!

New Years at the Beach House

2011-01-02T22:50:00.000-08:00

Immediately after returning home from ID for Christmas, we headed down to the beach house with our friends. While there we had a fantastic bike ride.

John doesn't look too thrilled about riding his new bike. It might be because I gave him a sound thrashing for not buckling his straps on his helmet. Ahem. Attempting to ride his bike without first buckling his helmet. Safety first, my love.

Teri is a power horse for riding with both Riley and Ethan in the trailer. Those kids get heavy!

And of course we had to let our friend enjoy our favorite park. How many pictures do I ahve exactly of the red roller slide?

April is taking one for the team in helping Jackson down the slide, obviously.

I wish, I WISH, I knew what this conversation was about. Please submit your own caption here.

Playing, as it turns out, is a lot of hard work.

The fantastic bridge.

See? Lincoln had a workout.

We spent lots of time at the beach house also getting our groove on with Rock Band.

Playing some "friendly" games of Settlers too.

Janelle rocked us all with her mad skilz on the guitar. I think she must spend the majority of nap times perfecting the art of Rock band.

We know how to bring in the new year with style.

Do you think we apcked enough people in the beach house. I't sa good things these boys aren't afraid to get cozy, eh?

What would a beach house trip be, without a visit to the tide pools?

Ethan instructed everyone in the fine art of "squish the things."

Everyone got to enjoy the tide pools.

Ethan found his own starfish!

We were extremely fortunate to have low tide at the same time as "optimal colors" time with the camera.

Thank you everyone who was able to come, the Jacobs, Rossi's, Dolls, Lees and Evans! Glad you aren't scared to take a risk on a packed house!

Yellowstone at Christmas 2010

2010-12-28T22:08:00.000-08:00

We opened an awesome present Christmas morning. You know I love you, since I'm willing to post such an awful picture of myself, just for the sake of documenting. Papa Rex and LeeAnn paid for us to go to Yellowstone Park and go via Snow Coach! Such an incredible gift!

We moved the boys' carseats in the snowcoach and we were on our way!

Family shot! We got great seats, right at the front of the coach.

Someone, please tell these beautiful trumpeter swans that they forgot to fly south for the winter!

Dude, check out my lens. We decided if you're going to go on a once-in-a-lifetime trip to Yellowstone, you might as well pack the goods you need. Which, of course, includes a lens as long as your arm.

Ethan loved getting out to get a closer look at all those Buffalo.

Isn't it amazing they can brush their heads side to side to dig down through the snow to get to the frozen grass? Talk about brain freeze!

We had several stops along the way, none of which I would remember the names of, had I not taken a picture of the name posted.

Poor Lincoln preferred to stay in the coach where it was nice and warm!

So this is what a snow coach is, in case you were wondering. It's basically a bus outfitted with snowmobile tracks instead of tires.

I loved seeing the hot spots all along the way.

But brrrr it was freezing!

I think my favorite parts was seeing what they call the "paint pots." Such gorgeous color.

It was like visiting a different planet.

It was so cold though, it was tempting to want to jump in that 200 degree water.

Lincoln came out for this one, although I'm pretty sure, he would have preferred to stay in the coach.

I love our little family shots along the way.

We saw so much wildlife in the park too. Especially considering the temperatures outside.

We even saw a pair of bald eagles!

Look at that beautiful snow coach.

This buffalo came right up to the coach, I had to put on the macro lens for this shot!

Lincoln was such a trooper through the whole trip. Actually both boys did an amazing job with the long ride through the park.

And of course, we saw Old Faithful.

Although the wintertime version seemed to be much different than the spring geyser I remember from my youth. It ends up being a whole lot of sputtering steam in the winter!

We had such an amazing trip! Thank you Papa Rex and LeeAnn!