Happy Birthday! Hawkin

First things first he got to open his presents! He's still way into Starwars so it was a lightsaber (now we have 3, so each boy can defend himself) and a couple different SW lego sets.
Then it was off to watch the F15's take off! Those things are awesome! We hosted one of David's friends from his AF days who was in town flying some of those overhead... to have a fighter pilot in your midst is just coooooool! the jets take off around 10 & 2 if you want to check em out!




OH and you can tell we stopped @ Krispy Kreme on the way there for a birthday donut!

That evening we had a cool party...I mean pool party and the weather was a little coool! But I think all 11 boys and 1 girl had a good time!





Oh and for his 6th birthday Hawkin got to learn to shoot his first BB gun! He and daddy had an absolute blast shooting cans!



It's hard to believe it's been 6 years. I'm finally starting to realize how fast it goes. Hawkin can make his bed, get his own drinks, use the bathroom by himself, help out with chores... He's really growing up! Next month he will go to school ALL day! YIKES!

We're back!

We're back from what has now been our longest vacation ever, 20 days! We had a great time and saw family and friends. It's also GREAT to be HOME! Where did we go you ask? WA, AK & Canada! I'm going to give a little recap just for keepsake but if you want to read along well that's fine too!


Let's see, it all started the night before our trip....

...we were packing in our new and oh so cool luggage! We bought Hawkin and Soren their first suitcase; Hawkins' has an airplane and Soren's has a motorcylce. It was nice b/c they could pull their own which gave us one less thing to do! We also, bought them all new sheets H,S, & K (Starwars, Spiderman, & Lighting McQueen) in hopes they would want to go to sleep that night. It worked like a charm (plus they needed new sheets I had only one set for each of them and Hawkin's was ripped in the move.

Departure Day
We wake the boys up early in the morn' and load them up in the Suburban. Soren so sweetly say's "Mom, I'm not afraid of the dark". Our early out of bed trick didn't really work since they were all so excited about the trip but fortunately I had a bag of prizes for along the way which came in handy when our left rear tire blew just near the La Grande exit! 2 hours, some silly putty, and 4 new tires later we were on our way again!
The Lord must have been looking out for us b/c we were right behind a 10 car accident upon entrance to Spokane. I mean RIGHT BEHIND! David pulled over to hold the ladies head in a stabalized position. Again, perfect time to pull out a prize and explain a little bit about accidents.
On our way up to my dad's we stopped at the Hollingsworth's and the Main's for some good conversation and the boys enjoyed playing, especially the 4 Wheeler!  All in all I think our total time from point A to point B was about 14+ hours including all the stops!

Ariel's Graduation

Our first destination was Chewelah to celebrate my baby sister's graduation from High school! 

She is an amazing young woman, straight A student, athletic, a graceful dancer, Miss Chewelah, and very pretty (just like me of course ;0)  I am very proud of her to say the least and loved getting to spend some time w/ family!

Leavenworth

On our way to Vancouver we decided to break the trip up with a stop @ Leavenworth.  A small town replacated to look like a Bavarian village.  We have spent many a trips camping along Icicle Creek and since we lived in Bavaria for 2 years we wanted to go back and remenice.  We put some leaderhosen on our German born babe and took a few pictures.  That night we tried to eat at a nice German restuarant but decided to leave when it was obvious we were going to ruin everyone else's dinner.  The waitress even suggested Mcdonald's! We got pizza instead.

The Cruise

We met up with the rest of the family kind of surprisingly in Monroe, WA.  We were driving through and gave them a call and we happen to be in the same town at the same time so we all ate at BK and caravaned from there.  The cousins went wild!  I'm pretty sure the first thing JJ said to our boys was "Let's play ARMY!" and play army they did for an entire week! 

I'll keep the rest of this short and sweet and try to share some glimpses of the beauty we enjoyed while in AK.

ON Second thought there are so many pictures I'll try to make a slide show and post that in a few days or so hopefully.

We stopped at Juneau, Skagway, & Ketchikan.  We spent one day in Glacier Bay.  Alaska it gorgeous and RAINY!  Skagway was probably my favorite stop b/c it was fairly sunny that day and David gave me an hour that morning to tour the town myself w/out any kiddos to keep track of!  We also road the White Pass train up to the Canadian Border and enjoyed over 100 waterfalls and other awesome views!  We also panned for Gold in Liarsville, which David was quite good at!  

We saw totem poles, Mtns, glaciers, sea lions, dolphins, bald eagles, & whales.  One morning I got up early to catch a glimpse of the whales. The Cpt. had said they would be on the port side and they were, it was like fire works on the fourth of July watching these humpbacks blow there spout and then their tales as they dove down to the depths!  Each sighting took my breath away.  

The Return

On the way home we made 3 stops Lynden, Seattle (area), & CDA.  We first stopped in Lynden just a quick 20 minutes from the Canadian border to visit w/ my good friend Joy.  The drive that day was so quick & Joy was working we decided to go see UP with the boys @ the movie theatre.  We discovered there's a reason why 2 year olds are free!  We had a nice time visiting while the boys played the WII.

Next we made it 2 1/2 more hours to Kent where my brother and his wife live.  We enjoyed some time there just hanging out with family and again the boys played the WII! We also went to IKEA, the Rainforest Cafe' and failed at an attempt to go to the zoo! (they were wipped out from the first two events, so we went home for naps).

The final stop was CDA where we spent 3 nights with the Martin's who blessed us with good food and great hospitality! We hiked Tubs Hill on father's day, watched a bit of the CDA Ironman, and watched Jaunel practically salivate as she invisioned herself competing in this very same event!  (she's an inspiration!) The boys played effortlessly (on my part) with Pyper & Squish.  

We spent a day in Wallace with my Mom & Jamie then returned for a BBQ with friends from the area!  I think there were 15 kids and 11 adults all running amuck! Good times, good times!

There were still many friends we did not get to see :(  hopefully on the next go around.

After much diliberation on whether or not we should leave @ 9pm and drive all night or the next morning we left CDA @ 9:30 AM and drove an easy breazy 7 hours w/ only 1 stop this time straight home.  Kristian slept from Grangeville to Eagle, which was a miracle if you ask me and one of the main reasons the trip was so swift! Thank you Lord for the the speed and saftey of that trip!

After 20 days of no real schedule it's nice to be home and trying to reestablish our routine! 

Just some pictures

Happy, last day of MAY!

THIS week we'll be finishing up Tball, the last few days of kindergarden, swim lessons, and packing for our trip to WA and AK! Hope it's smooth sailing! I'll see you all in a while. Until then here's a few pics just because.

May 29th A LOT to Post about!

First let me say I got a bit of a sinus cold while I was recovering from strep throat and whew what a SLOW recovery it has been!

I took the boys to the Park for Memorial day. We did the splash pad, played in the park, took a nature walk, and had a picnic lunch! All w/o Daddy (I impress only myself)

OK, let's see what else have we been up to... Oh yes, Soren turned 4! So my kids went from 2, 3, & 5 to 2, 4, & 5 and eventually for about 6 months will be  2, 4, & 6.  Not sure why I'm sharing that? Anyway, we had a nice family birthday for Soren with G&G.  We decided "party" bdays would start on the 5th bday and not sure if they will happen every year after that for a while or not.   He choose hotdogs and chocolate cake, I haven't raised the healthiest of eaters!

Soren is a pretty great kid.  I think his smile is his best feature but  it's hard to catch a "normal" one! He's a real goof ball, shy, sensitive, yet playful and intelligent (he knows how to work a situation to his advantage).  He makes me smile and challenges me a 100 times a day! Soren thrives off of quality time and touch like his Dad.  I love this kid!

We played on the slip N slide (after being denied by the Pool which was closed for repairs grhh!)



And finally my oldest graduated Kindergarden! Which is kind of a big deal! I had no problem sending him half day somewhere but ALL DAY, that's going to be tough! I'll just enjoy the time we have this summer and deal with the all day thing when we have to!


Well I think that brings you up to speed! Have a great day enjoy the sun!

May 24 Memorial Sunday

Today started out with church, I chose to go to Calvary Chapel halfway hoping I would see this girl there but should have known on a Holiday wknd I would not.   Though she wasn't there I stayed ; ) and church quite frankly is a whole other blog post.

We came home to find my husband not a work but home SICK.  Poor guy, he was so sick that even though they were low manned today his coworkers said GO HOME!  He thinks he's going to go to work tomorrow to cash in on the DOUBLE time and half pay but I don't think he'll make it.  I'm thankful I'm well enough to care for him and the boys!

While I'm much much better my ears are kind of plugged and my throat is still aware of the recent pain it went through.

So after naps we went on what has become a tradition in our family  The Memorial Sunday Drive.  We drove the boys through Veterans cemetery and talked about the soldiers who fought & died for our freedom and visit Officer Mark Stal's head stone (the only officer of BPD to die in the line of duty).  We also talked about the different branches of service to the country. 

I know  it may seem like a weird for us to take our kids their even though we don't really visit a grave site of a loved one but it really is quite normal and the kids are very interested.  I love how the cemetery is lined with flags and the view up their is lovely.

You want to know what was weird though?  We were walking along in an area where no one was around and all the sudden I hear this tune playing, I'm looking around for someone, something and find hidden in the grass some one's cell phone!  I answer, through David's prompting and sure enough it's the person who has lost it is calling it!  What's even more weird is that she asked me to leave it on a head stone and she would drive back in from Nampa and get it!  OK, whatever.

After our lovely drive we rented a movie, ate some dinner, and I tucked all my boys in bed and made some banana muffins for the mornin'!  

Happy Memorial Day! May you take the time to reflect and appreciate.

I'm Up and Running!

Well not running exactly but I did get a shower!

Since I haven't done much the past few days I haven't much to blog about. 

How about 5 on Friday, started by my friend Kelly.

1. David did great w/o me! He even bought flowers for Soren's preschool teacher on the last day of school w/o any prompting from me! Thanks couldn't have made it without you!
2. Soren finished Preschool! He has the best teacher I'm so glad all my boys will get to go there, even if Hawkin only went for 6 months.
3. Hawkin got in at Pioneer Elementary!!! Yahoo! we are so excited. It is a modified year round school of the arts.  He has always been interested in music so we are excited that it's part of the curiculum to practice keyboard 2x a week! PTL!
4. I still haven't unpacked all the boxes in the house, I've got to get on that. Which is why there are no pictures with my blogs b/c I haven't found the connector thingy.
5. I am working on obedience in my life and with the boys! Finding out I should have started long ago. But I'm gonna keep on working at it. Yes Mom (with a happy heart)! ;0)

I know it's "everybody's Memorial Day" weekend that doesn't really affect us other than overtime pay on Monday! So to all you out there who are on a normal schedule Happy Memorial Day!

I'm Sick!

Just thought I would let the whole world know that I am sick!

Came down with it last night, fever/chills (their the worst), sore throat, head ache!

David has been so kind to keep things running, please pray along with me for

a speedy recovery, I did visit the Dr. and get some medicine.

Hope your day is healthy