Where am I?

I often wonder if I am back in Wenatchee, WA because we have tons of snow where we live and it's not typical - not at all!!! We've received over a foot of snow in the last 10 days. It's quite crazy. Last Monday, the wind was blowing therefore the snow that was falling was blowing everywhere so who really knows how much it snowed that day. Since then, the wind has been calm and the snow has been pretty constant. It didn't snow to day to speak of, so a little break. The cold is still with us however. It was about 20 today, warmer than some other days. We only get Portland news which is pretty far from us and the forecast isn't always accurate for us, but they are saying up to 50 degrees by the weekend. That's just going to cause a huge mess with all the snow everywhere. Oh joy!

I really haven't been feeling the blogging bug lately, obviously. I am feeling the need to just update it somewhat. I don't think I can really go back and catch up everything.

• Gunnar got glasses; that's been a struggle. Yeah, they were scratched w/in 6 hours and he constantly "forgets" to put them on (He can take them off to play in the snow).
• The boys have worn pjs for the last 6 days. School was cancelled last Thursday (which was the last day anyway and mostly school parties and goofing around). Church was cancelled on Sunday, the whole stake as I understand. So, they have just been lounging around. Good times, I guess. Gunnar keeps wearing the same smelly socks though everytime he goes out to play in the snow.
• Paden insits that Santa is bringing him Spike the Dinosaur. Have you seen this dinosaur? Santa is NOT bringing Spike. They both wanted one. Gunnar I think has given up, but not Paden. It's ONE HUNDRED THIRTY DOLLARS! Yeah, not worth that kind of money, even according to Santa!
• Once again, I have failed at gift giving. My darling husband's gifts won't be here for Christmas. He'll get what he wants, just not on time. Just like his birthday. I do feel terrible, although he doesn't believe me. I also didn't get anything for my staff at work - just really wasn't feeling it. There's two people that always give something to everyone, this year was scaled back, which was fine, but still. There's two people who do cards (not homemade, phew!) for everyone. It just seems too much for co-workers. My co-workers back in Q-town, I would go all out for because I love them. Haven't grown that love for my co-workers here. It's ok.
• I've got a mound of laundry - not really sure what's clean and what's not anymore -that's how bad it is. Just really can't handle it. I did a big clean sweep of our room and clothes like a week or two ago and after a week, it's a disaster. How does that happen? It's extremely aggravating!

So, that's my random thoughts. I hope I can work on some family Christmas cards tomorrow. I am sure I have some pictures to post, but the camera is all the way down stairs right now! So, maybe tomorrow!

Kung Fu Invitational

On Saturday we had a birthday party for Neil. His birthday is on Wednesday, but it's a busy day and most of our friends are going out of town . . . we're going out of town. So, we decided to have his party a few days early. Neil wanted to go bowling, so bowling it was! A couple of weeks ago we were cleaning our garage and found some McDonald's toys of Kung Fu Panda. Neil thought we should make some trophies out of them. So, Neil constructed some trophies out of wood and we put the Kung Fu Panda characters on the top. They turned out quite fabulous. We had many friends attend and it was pretty dang fun. Gunnar and Paden had a little bit of a fit because we were going to give away Po, Master Shifu and Snake (not sure if Snake has a different name). Well, we had two pandas, two shifus and only one snake. So, Gunnar says that who ever wins can keep the trophy for a little while but then they would have to give it back. Once we got there, luckily, the boys forgot about the trophies.

So, we bowled. We had a great time. The trophies were for high scores. Our friend Karli one first place with 127; she was the Dragon Warrior and won Po. Our friend Wayne won second with 123 - Master Shifu. Our friend Brian (Karli's husband) won third place with 105 and got Snake. So, Brian says he has a speech and proceeds to say that he would like to give his trophy to the most outstanding youth bowler he's ever seen - Gunnar. Gunnar actually bowled a 95 (bumper-assisted, of course). He was tearin' it up though! I actually bowled a 138, but exempted myself from the prizes, as we really didn't need those things coming back to our house!

We had Kung Fu Panda cake and I played Kung Fu Fighting song during cake. It was a good birhtday!! I forgot my camera. My friend Kim took a few pictures for me (thanks Kim!), so no pictures of Neil and all his greatness.

Just because . . .

. . . I am tired of seeing the word "politics" on my blog, I am posting something new. I don't really have a lot to write about. I am sure there is something, however I am totally unmotivated to blog.

So, a guess a couple things that has happened . . . Gunnar got student of the month for October for academics - his teacher commented that he's one of the smartest kids in the class. We had parent conferences. He's doing really well in school. His only downfall is following directions - that's about par for him. It seems as though he got rated down in PE for that reason and overall in his class he's doing well. He's still having issues with not focusing and not trying. His teacher says that she's got a good rapport with her and seems to try to do well to get her attention. So, she is doing something right - getting Gunnar on her team. He thrives on attention - negative or positive - when he gets it he's good to go - where he goes, nobody knows! He's really good at science. He's doing well at reading and writing. He's been doing pretty well at spelling when we remember to practice. He met his AR reading goal for last quarter and got to attend the party; he said it was fun. So, I guess is all is well in the first grade, I suppose.

Paden is trucking along in preschool. He makes some fabulous projects. We were pretty excited that the preschool had professional school pictures taken for them. We haven't gotten them back yet, but we should have them back before Thanksgiving. School pics are expensive, I think. I have been TERRIBLE about getting Paden's pictures taken since he was a baby, so it seems like having them at the school was a good thing, despite the cost.

Well, I think that's enough to get the "politics" word out of site of my blog. Mission complete.

Politics! Ugh!

I am not a fan of politics. I rarely pay much attention, sadly. I should, but I just don't make time for paying much attention. There are things that I do write in to senators/representatives while I am at work, if there's an issue that is bad for business owners. As far as personal issues, I don't find a lot of the major issues in the news that affect my daily life through which I am trying to wade. I am thinking that the older I get and the more I try to raise a family, maybe there are issues to which I should pay attention.

On this election night, for the disinterest that I normally have towards politics, I can't really peel myself away from the TV news coverage of the election.

I do find it interesting how many more registered voters are turning out this election. It's great. I have to wonder why. Are there more just because there is an African American running? Becacuse there's a female VP candidate? Just interesting. When it's two older white guys, people just kind of roll over and go back to sleep. Now, there's someone different people wake up and join the party. Odd. Just odd to me. I hope that people are really investigating what the candidates are about before voting and not vote for one just because of race or gender or age. I am a little afraid that there are many new registered voters who are only looking at one of those three factors however.

We'll see.

UPDATE: So, I think that the reason that I don't really get involved in politics because I really can't seem to understand how the country can call an election, can call a state when there is 1% or even 5% of the precints reporting. It must be about mathematics and what is possible. If you can win big cities, that outweighs the rest of the state. There sure is a lot of red on the map and when you drill down into the states, there is even more red in the counties within. Also, "they" say that every vote counts. Well, how can that be? If you are in line when the polls close, you are still allowed to vote. Well, about 8:02pm PST, when it's announced that Obama has been "projected" to win the electoral vote in the western states, why would you keep standing in line to vote. I am confused. So, this is why I really don't stress about politics, I really don't take a lot of time to pay attention to politics. It's just not making sense to me. I am also a little tired about how racial the election has become. We can continue to say it's not about race, but that's all that's on the news right now, so that leads me to believe that race is a big factor in this election.

OK, enough.

In the matter of an hour

the gas price at the local station went from $2.95 to $2.72. That is crazy. No complaints, just stunned in amazement! I left at 5:50pm for a PTO meeting. One gas station had lowered to $2.79 and across the street was still at $2.95. I come home one hour later and they lowered to 5 cents lower to the station across the sreet.

Well, I just had to express my amazement. I am glad gas is becoming more manageable in price. I've had a pretty busy week and I am exhausted. So, I am not spending more time here. My eyes are tired and my head aches!!!

Have a fantastic Halloween!!!

Funny Story

I will have to retell this story that Neil told me about Paden today. It's pretty darn funny.

Neil took the boys to tri-cities today for a few reasons. They met Cousins Jake and Marlys for breakfast at IHOP. They had a fantastic time and it's always fun to see family we don't get to see very often anymore. They went to the Children's museum. They had fun there, but they will tell you it's not as good as others they've been too. They also went on the big shopping trip for groceries.

At the children's museum, a kid that was a little older than Gunnar ran by Paden and called him "dude". Paden says, "hey!" Kid keeps going. Paden: "hey, I am talking to you!" Kid stops to listen to Paden. Paden explains sternly, "I am not 'dude'. I am Paden. P-A-D-E-N. Paden." Yes, he spelled out his name to the unsuspecting kid who called him "dude".

Paden is a funny kid and he's not afraid to speak his mind. He is not afraid to give anyone a hard time. He is pretty sweet sometimes too.

This morning I woke up and he was sleeping next to me; don't remember him coming in my bed! So, it's like 5-something in the morning and I roll over and he says, "Mama ..." I say, "yeah". "I love you." He was totally NOT awake! How cute! Then around 6am he did wake up more and wanted chocolate milk and a cartoon. TOO EARLY. I think I held him off until about 6:40am!

Oh the memories!

Halloween is Coming

Our first step to start decorating for Halloween was a family activity to make these spiders! We really want to go all out fo Halloween decorating this year. We haven't really started much yet. I think that we might not quite go all out as we thought we wanted to. We'll see.

On a Sunday afternoon a couple weeks ago, we took a nice relaxing drive out to the countryside/edge of town to find the materials to make the spiders. Thistles. We brought them home and spray-painted them black. One night for Family Home Evening, we created these:

No actual pictures of us working on them, as the camera battery was dead at the time and I just finally remembered to charge the camera battery. And yes, they only have six legs - pipe cleaner conservation day, haven't you heard of it?

Neil has been gone since Friday morning - out hunting with a friend. The boys & I have just been chillin'! I tried to watch some of General Conference, but it was hard with the boys. I did LOVE the show inbetween conference, On the Lord's Errand: Life of Thomas S Monson. It was so fabulous. It was great getting to know Thomas S. Monson. He was called to be a bishop at age 22 to a ward of over 1,000 members, including 85 widows. He made an effort to always visit the widows and amazingly has been able throughout his life to speak at many of the funerals of those widows; most of them asked that he speak. How sweet is that! At the end of the program he said something so wonderful. He said, "I always want the Lord to know that if he needs an errand run, Tom Monson will run that errand for Him."

Wouldn't it be great if we all had such a great attitude. I think I will work on that this week.

Road Trip Adventure

Some time ago, before his birthday, Gunnar decided that he wanted to go somewhere to dig dinosaur fossils. We told him that we might be able to make that happen. We were thinking about going to Utah where you can find dinosaur fossils. That seemed to be too much of a trip for the time we had or wanted to spend. However, right in our own state, there are lots of fossil beds. Grandpa Livingston wanted to take Gunnar (& Paden, too) to check out the fossils. They came and picked us up on Friday and we headed south of our place toward John Day, Oregon. Grandpa took a trip down memory lane as we found some of the houses he used to live in at John Day and Seneca. We went all they way to Burns to check out the territory. Grandpa was baptized there a few years ago! We stayed the night in Burns in a hotel with an indoor pool, of course. The boy LOVE swimming. They have no fear of the water. Paden wears a little vest and arm floaties and he just bails off the edge of the pool into the deep end. This pool had a ledge on the deep end that had a raised area where it was about 2.5 feet down to the water. Paden had NO fear to jump down from there. It was pretty funny to watch them both.

After breakfast in the morning, we headed back north. We went back through John Day and headed up to the town of Fossil. Along the way we stopped at the Thomas Condon Palentology Center. It was very, very cool. It has TONS of fossils that were all found in Oregon. I think the person there said that their fossils come from 22,000 square miles covering Eastern Oregon. Gunnar asked if they had a Pterodactyl. They said that they did find a bone that they believed to belong to one. The fossil doesn't live at that visitor center anymore. She said that the layer of earth is after the dinosaur period, so they usually find other animals and plants. She was really nice though. She said that is the first time anyone asked if they found a Pterodactyl.

We then headed off to Fossil to dig our own fossils. There's a place behind the high school in town where you can discover fossils. We were warned that the lady that runs it is kind of grumpy. And she was. It was sprinkling and she had closed it down. She did, after a little coaxing, let us go out and rummage through the rocks that people had already dug out. Good enough for our boys, we though. So, we didn't get to do real fossil uncovering, but we still found quite a few. It was sprinkling and I didn't bring the camera out. The very first rock that Gunnar picked up had a couple of leaf fossils in it. Here it is!

We stayed out there for quite a while, it was quite addicting just rummaging through the pieces that others had thrown out. I am not sure what people were looking for, but we found a lot. Paden believes that he found dinosaur fossils; he found a leaf or two. We brought home quite a few fossils. It was pretty fun. It started out kind of rocky because of the grumpy lady, but in the end it was good. We took a picture with the giant statue of the wooly mammoth. It's made of metal, it's pretty cool.

We then headed back home via the way of Heppner. We've not been there yet. People told us that it was a quaint little town. It is. We ate at "Howe's About Pizza". It was pretty good. Many of us in the vehicle were tired and ready to be done with road trip by then, myself included. We blew threw two pizzas and headed home.

All in all, it was a good trip. A whole lot of driving, but we had a pretty good time. Gunnar's favorite part was the fossils and his second favorite part was the pool at the hotel. Paden's favorite part was the pool at the hotel and his second favorite part was the fossil museum. We have some pictures, but they are on Grandpa's camera. I'll get them probably in a couple of weeks.

1st Day of Preschool

Paden started preschool on Tuesday, September 9th. His school is just about a block from our house, so that's kind of fun. Although I drive him there on the way to drop Gunnar off at school, he does get to walk home from school with papa and Max. We live in town (very, very small town), so there's not a bus for the little kids. Paden goes Tues/Wed/Thurs from 8am to 11am. We believe he's totally ready for preschool. I think by the time he gets to kindergarten, we better be prepared for the fast trackin', smart aleckin', crazy train that we call Paden Neil.

Here's a couple of pics of him on his first day.

I promise we didn't serve alcoholic beverages for breakfast!

A couple of noteworthy things about Paden (not to brag, but for us to remember later!):

• he can count to 20 (misses usually 14 and 18)
• he can count objects up to about 13, maybe more
• he can type his first name on the computer
• he googled himself; he typed his first name two times in the Google toolbar
• he knows almost all letters by sight (seems to not remember "U")
• his mouth often gets him in trouble
• he has known colors since he was about 18 or 19 months old (otter pops!)
• he knows basic shapes (circle, square, triangle, rectangle, octagon & pentagon)
• he is a wiz on the computer; he can navigate around various web sites - pbs kids, playhouse disney, bob the builder, nick jr, and cartoon network - he loves to print his creations.
• he loves chocolate - anything and everything - although I think they give regular milk at preschool and he does drink it.
• he's BUSY, BUSY, BUSY
• he likes to read books, hope that lasts - seems to have trailed off in Gunnar (we need to do better)
• he still doesn't sleep in his own bed all the way through the night (most nights he's in with me between 3am and 5am, sometimes sooner).

On the elementary school front . . . Gunnar is doing well. He seems like like school quite a bit. He's done really well with his handwriting and spelling words thus far. He got 100% on his first spelling test and some other math papers. He actually was helpful on Paden's first day. They didn't go to bed quite on time and slept in a little bit. So, when it was time to get up, they both didn't have time to get woken up and play. They had to get rigth in the shower. Paden was not happy and was crying; he didn't want to go to school, which we knew was a lie! So, Gunnar was coaxing him into the idea by telling him about recess and lunch! A mintue later, Paden was still wimpering and Gunnar says to us that he didn't know what else to say to Paden to make him feel better. He is really a great big brother!

Gunnar had his second soccer game on Saturday and scored another SEVEN goals. He got a little bit of an attitude at the end because he was trying to score 10 goals. His teammate Samantha is pretty quick and got the ball first a couple of times. So, he was not too happy at the end. He played really well. By happenstance he made a great defensive play and an assist.

After his game, we made a quick trip to Wenatchee for a wedding. It was a nice outdoor wedding. A little more fancy than I am used to, but it was nice. I think she's the skinniest bride EVER!! They are a cute, happy couple. Good friends! We got to see some old friends from our old ward, which is always nice. We even got to see Leslie and Troy who used to be in that ward, but aren't anymore. Good times!

Well, I am feeling pretty good. I was NOT happy when I got home since our house was quite the disaster! I cleaned up pretty much everything this evening except the downstairs. I even put clothes away and folded socks. Wow, ya know if you fold socks when the basket is only 1/4 of the way full instead of waiting until it's overflowing, it is a MUCH BETTER experience! Who would have thunk?! :-) Still haven't moved the boxes of canned peaches out of our kitchen area, but at least I got most other chores caught up - even the nasty boys' bathroom!

I guess it's a good time for good night!

What does 57 + 21 + 1 equal?

57 = the number of QUARTS of peaches canned on Saturday

21 = the number of QUARTS of peaches canned on Sunday

1 = the number of broken QUARTS for the weekend

EQUALS

79 TOTAL QUARTS of peaches canned

This was not this past weekend, but the weekend before. I just haven't gotten to this part of our lives in the blog world. So much for chronological order, since I already blogged about the first day of soccer. Anyhoo . . .

We purchased a two burner camp stove thing-a-ma-jiggy from Sportsman's warehouse and set up camp on our back deck. We had 6 boxes of peaches and some of our friends had 3 boxes to can. So, we got up early and got all set up: small camp stove to boil peaches on, ice chest with ice bath for boiled peaches, camp stove with two canning pots, table for peeling and cutting, jars washing, lids boiling, syrup making, etc. We were in business by 9:00am (now that doesn't seem early, but I was up since 6:30am cleaning the kitchen and washing jars). Wow, canning is a lot of work! I felt so domesticated. My friend, April, was doing only pint jars and so we both got through the 57 or 58 jars each on Saturday. That's a lot of peaches, my friends. I finally gave up the ghost around 6pm. We had three boxes left between the three of us. We had to stop! I finished up on Sunday afternoon so I could use both canning pots and that went pretty quick. The last two boxes I did had much smaller peaches (about 5 or 6 to fill up a quart jar). So, we got 21 more quarts out on Sunday and about 8 cups of puree, which we froze for smoothies in the future.

Anyway, it was great success, I think. We did have a little bit of a mess, which is always the worst part for me. So, yep, SEVENTY NINE QUARTS. I think it's quite remarkable for me. Now, I know a little friend of mine who is a canning queen and good at everything else too, although I didn't see Leslie post a lot of canning adventures this summer - maybe the 450+ pints from last year lasted long enough! :-) Leslie is a fantabulous person and is really amazingly talented at many things, plus has the energy and gumption to do those many things! Miss you, Leslie!

Ok, better get my boys to bed. Paden has his first day of pre-school tomorrow! Maybe I can document that first day, since I missed first day of first grade. If I stop blogging now though, how can I finish watching re-runs of Scrubs!

the Blue Dragons

I have missed documenting on the first day of school this year. Yeah, the morning was a little on the whiney side on Gunnar's part because of the pants. THE. PANTS. I bought him Toughskins from Sears for the KidVantage program (which any jeans qualify, by the way). The toughskins have the double knee, so they have got to last longer. They were on sale and if they get holes in them before he grows out of them, then we can return them for a new pair. Sears is my new favorite store for that reason only. Anyway, one little problem with the toughskins is that they do not have the adjustable waistband. I am not sure why they don't, it seems completely necessary to have the adjustable waistband. So, the pants fit him fine, except they are a little big around the waist; not going to fall off - just a little big. Gunnar HATES belts - don't understand that one - and basically has a near meltdown every Sunday when we force him to wear a belt. So, he won't wear a belt to school. Yeah, so I didn't get any of those cute "first day" pictures. He didn't have a huge meltdown on his first day, but it wasn't a perfectly happy morning either. He survived and enjoyed recess, as always.

Well, we made it through the first week of school. No major issues, nothing majorly exciting. I am still waiting for the "meet the teacher" day; I guess we don't do that at this school. We saw Gunnar's teacher on the first day, but only for a minute. Hopefully, we get a chance to meet her and figure out what 1st grade is all about.

Gunnar is playing soccer. I think he's going to like soccer. It's a little more active than t-ball. They play with only 3 kids per team on the field at a time, so it's pretty active for them. Gunnar scored the first goal of the game and scored like 6 more after that. The little girl on his team, Samantha, scored several goals too. There's two kids that aren't all that into it, then there's three that are. It was cute to watch. It was a great day; sunny, warm, no wind! So, here's a couple o pictures of the first soccer game. Oh yeah, Gunnar invented the team name - the BLUE DRAGONS. The coaches liked it and went with it. I'll have to come up with something cool for the end of the season memorabilia for the kids.

What a cutie, eh? It was picture day too and I am pretty sure the above is a replica of the face he made during his individual pictures. Fabulous. Good thing I only orderd a 4-picture package. :)

It's still pretty crazy to me that he's 6, he's in first grade and that we have been in Oregon for almost a year. Time flies! I'll post some more pictures on ShutterFly, by the way.

Week in Review AGAIN

PREFACE: I have tried about 5 times to put spacing inbetween my so-called paragraphs, but blogger is just not cooperative tonight.

So, I usually like to keep bloggin' in chronological order and I am still pretty behind. Let's go back to August 16th or so where I last left off.

We returned from our mini-vacation on Friday night and then we basically spent the rest of the weekend not doing much of anything. We just kind of chilled at home, which was pretty nice. Then comes the next week . . .

Monday, August 18th - We had some FANTABULOUS house guests by the name of Sunny Lynn and Megan - two of the wonderful group of nieces that we love. They braved the new driving skills of Sunny and made their way down. I texted Sunny a little after 8am thinking she wouldn't be up yet to let her know that she could call my office if they needed directions. I was amazed when she was actually awake at 8am!! :) So, they got here (on time according to plan)and went to town to get some party items - i.e., tiki party cups and tiki party straws and a palm tree chandelier hanger! We had some party-licious homemade pizza! We played some spectacular games like scattegories, BS, uno, Thomas the Tank Engine cards, etc. We had a great time. Megan and Sunny also rock at Guitar Hero. I suck! No, I am worse than sucky! I rock at Super Mario Brothers though - too bad we don't have that anymore! We had SOOOO much fun. Paden made up his own card game. Megan and Sunny were hilarious at scattergories. It was a great time!! So, it was a work night for me, so we all ended up going to be about 10:30pm. I was so ecstatic to see those girly girls. They are fun and I love them! We hope to see more of them, along with their cousins, someday soon!

Tuesday, August 19th - had to get up early to go to a leadership class in Pasco. Got home after 6:30pm. Got the boys to bed and stayed up late doing who knows what. I couldn't sleep - not sure what the deal was. I was planning on getting up at 1:30am to go serve at the BBQ we were having at work. We do one on each shift and grave shift one started at 2:00am. Well, Paden woke up around midnight with croup. Since I didn't go to sleep yet, I was getting very tired. At about 1:30am, I realized I was NOT going to go serve at the BBQ. I got a hold of someone to let them know. I had to return to Pasco for more leadership class, so I HAD to get some sleep. Paden didn't sleep all that well, so I think I got about 2 hrs. Not so good for me.

Wednesday - woke up early, drove to Pasco, sat through class (stayed awake amazingly), drove home and felt like I could just crash. Paden still wasn't feeling all that great, so we prepared for bed by getting all the necessities near by and go the humidifier going, etc. I got a few more hours of sleep, but we did have to spend 30 minutes in the bathroom with the steaming hot shower going.

Thursday - same as before . . . woke up early, drove to Pasco, sat through class (didn't fall asleep in class!), drove home (that was hard). Paden was feeling quite a bit better, but his croup usually lasts two nights pretty bad, then the third night not so bad. He did sleep mostly through the night until about 4:45am, so that was good.

Friday - woke up early, drove to Pasco, sat through class (only 1/2 day though! :), went to Costco, came home, made ice cream for RS Sleepover Enrichment Activity (yep, I am still the Enrichment leader), went to Sleepover, played some games, talked, ate too much food, drove home at 2am (got pulled over on the way, no ticket though!! Phew!), went to bed. Paden only had one little episode while I was gone and none while I was home.

Saturday - woke up relatively early, went back to cook breakfast for Sleepover activity, came home, got the boys dressed, left for Elder's Quorum activity of Bowling. Gunnar was having a very rough day as a child and it was not as enjoyable as it could have been. Some of our friends who have a son Gunnar's age actually didn't let their son come as he had a meltdown earlier in the day; maybe we should have done that. After bowling, we stopped at Safeway for a couple of groceries for dinner to cook for the missionaries. We asked the missionaries to come early because we had tickets to the Tri-cities Dust Devils baseball game. I kind of dozed off for a few minutes while I was supposed to be preparing the dinner. We wanted to make stew, well it turned out alright, but I had to microwave vegetables and brown the meat before putting it in the stew. We normally cook this in a dutch oven pot thing on the BBQ. Well, I used the bigger one we have it doesn't fit on the BBQ, so I had to heat up the house and do it in the oven anyway. It turned out fine. My kitchen was a disaster though. We didn't have time to clean up and we took off for the game. We wanted to go to Harbor Frieght, but it closed at 6pm which is what time it was when we were like 1/2 way there. We had some friends come with us to the game. We went to a different store and then headed to the game. Part way in to the game, I ran into my very best friend from my college days that I haven't seen for like 7 years (probably since my wedding). CRAZY!! They live just down the road from the stadium and have been back in tri-cites for like 5 years. I kind of lost track of them when they got done with law school in California. So, that's so awesome that they are there and we live close enough to see each other! So, the boys got to get sno cones at the game and run across the outfield during Dusty's Dash. They had a good time. The run kind of gave Paden a little coughing fit, not too bad though. We got home a little after 11pm, I think. That was a busy day.

Sunday - Paden woke up pretty yucky again. Gunnar thought he was sick, but he wasn't; he doesn't really get sick that much and of course Paden gets attention when he's sick, so Gunnar had to "be sick" too. The boys and I stayed home from Church; Neil went to his morning meeting and to Sacrament meeting, then came home.

That's all I can really remember from that week. Maybe tomorrow I can get caught up to current times!

Week in Review

It's another one of those times where there seems to have been a lot going on the last couple of weeks and all I can really do at this point is recap.

Following Gunnar's birthday party trip up to Quincy, we also celebrated with some friends of ours. A family in our ward has become good friends. They are older than us by a few years; their youngest son just turned 17. His birthday was three days after Gunnar's. They invited us to celebrate together. The son is our dog sitter, too. So, anyway, Monday night (8/11) we went out to our friends' parents house. They have a pool and a nice set up yard. We had hamburgers and ice cream cake. It was fabulous. The boys could have swam all night. I haven't gotten the pictures from that adventure yet. I know that Karli took some of me too in the pool, won't be sharing those. Both Paden and Gunnar are fearless; they jump off the diving board and went down the slide. It was fun.

We took a mini vacation on the 13th of August. We went to Portland to take the boys a few of places. We wanted to do some fun stuff before school started. We went to OMSI (Oregon Museum of Science and Industry). It's a VERY fun place. We spent about 5 hours there and they had to kick us out at closing time. That's the second time we have been there - officially paid for our membership with that trip. If you live more than 100 miles away, the yearly membership is like $60. It would cost nearly $40 w/o the membership to get in for one day.

We stayed in Vancouver actually for pricing sakes. We found a deal on hotels.com. It was like $75 a night including all the taxes, so we thought that was good. We had to make sure that the hotel had a pool so the boys could swim. We also needed to find some swimming accessories for a deep pool - floaties (flotation devices). We went to a couple of stores and finally at the 3rd stop at Fred Meyer we found what we needed, even in pink - paden's favorite color.

So after OMSI, we finally made it back to the hotel for the boys to swim for a little bit before bed. The next day we went to the zoo. It was alright. It was hot and the animals weren't really out. The boys did not find the zoo as fabulous as OMSI. They stopped at each animal for about 30 seconds then wanted to move on to the next one. It was pretty busy there, but it was alright.

After the zoo, we went to lunch at a place called Grandma Leeth's. It was AWESOME! It's a very kid-friendly restaurant where you can enjoy your dinner uninterrupted while your children are well-cared for and well-fed in the Performance Area. It's FABULOUS!! I had a fresh mozzarella cheese and Roma tomato salad with balsamic vinegar, I loved it! Could have ate two helpings. I also ordered the fresh-baked chocolate chip cookie with ice cream. It was a stupendous dessert!

After lunch we went to see Wall-E, the movie. Paden did pretty well in the theater; it was his first time. We liked the movie. Of course the kids didn't get the real meaning of it, but they still liked it. It was quite an interesting show. I didn't know what it was about AT ALL before we saw it.

We ate dinner at a place called Sweet Tomatoes which was across from our hotel. It's a salad buffet with soup, pasta and bread and of course soft serve ice cream machine. It was very good. We ate there two days in a row. It was really yummy!

Again, we swam at night back at the hotel. I didn't get in the water this night. Paden used a little swim life vest and arm floaties and he was good by himself. Gunnar used a round floatie ring and was good to go. The hotel pool wasn't heated - only downfall - so it felt pretty cold and I just couldn't bring myself to jump in the second time. The boys had a great time though. They would get out and get in the hot tub for a few minutes to get warmed up, then jump back in the big pool. Paden would go down to the 5 ft end, jump in, and kick his little legs moving himself all the way the length of the pool. He'd get out, run to the other end and do it again. Good times.

So, then on Friday our last day of our mini vacation, we went to the Portland Children's Museum. If we lived closer, we'd definitely have a membership there. We went there when I was pregnant with Paden. They have added a lot of stuff since then and the boys had a BLAST!! They didn't really want to leave there either, but we were heading home that day. We ate at Sweet Tomatoes again (one in Portland) before we left and headed home.

I am too lazy to post pictures on this post right now. Oh, but I did post them on Shutterfly already. There's some from the Children's' Museum. I didn't take any pictures at OMSI, I guess. Maybe I didn't get that far in my downloading - can't remember right now! We were pretty busy there.

Anyway . . . I need to get to sleep I am exhausted. I will have to finish last week's week in review later! I thought I could get through two weeks worth, but no can do.

Nighty night!

Gunnar's Birthday

Gunnar turned 6 on August 9th. It's quite amazing how fast time moves, really. It just seems like not that long ago when he was exploring everything with his hands and mouth. It wasn't that long ago that he was a fuzzy-haired toddler learning and growing. He's about the age where he should start remembering his life when he's old. I think some people remember their years before 5 or 6, but seemingly many people don't. I want him to remember the fun times. I want him to remember what we are trying to teach him. I want him to grow up to be a confident, self-motivated, successful individual. I want him to be respectful and polite. I want him to be happy and healthy. Not that the last 6 years haven't meant anything, but I am starting to feel the pressure of raising a child and having expectations met by him and his life. Ok, so I really just wanted to post a picture or two from his birthday, not go rambling on about my fears!

We had his party at the Quincy pool, at his request. It sounded all cute, at first. He said that he wanted to return to Quincy to have his party with his family . . . so he could get more presents. Yeah, cute - the first part anyway. So, we agreed to have his party at the pool like we have for the last 5 years. It's kind of a tradition that will be hard to break actually. Gunnar was able to go down the slide all by himself this year. He used what he learned in swimming lessons to help him out, but he's tall enough now to land without someone having to catch him. Despite the weather being April-like rather than August-like, Gunnar swam his little heart out. We waited for my mom, Grandma Pam, to show up to open presents and have cake. I am not sure what I was thinking because I did NOT get a picture of Gunnar with his Grandma. She make a long trek to come by to see him and I am so glad that she did.

Here's a couple of pictures from the pool:

Gunnar loves: swimming, transformers, Ben 10, watching TV, playing computer games, jumping on the trampoline, having everyone's attention, being loud, playing in mud, wearing only underwear, snuggling with mama, chocolate milk, stawberry-banana smoothies, eating fruit, telling people he doesn't eat junk food, his dog, his brother, his family.

Gunnar does not like: cleaning when asked to (likes to help when not asked), being too hot in the sun, being too cold in the air conditioned car, getting hair cuts, candy (sugary cereals are a-ok though), being interrupted while watching TV, being alone, having to try more than once to get something right.

Gunnar is good at: writing, spelling (for a kinder graduate!), drawing, imagination, building with his hands, working with grandpa, being a big brother, anything requiring athletic ability.

Gunnar struggles with: having patience, not giving up quickly, using indoor voice indoors, not whining (still, does that end at some magic age - not 6 apparently), being too dramatic, not being the center of attention, not knowing when enough is enough.

Gunnar's quirks: stroking his eyelashes when he's tired - if someone else's eyelashes are available, he'll use them too - he has to play with his eyelashes to fall asleep; striping down to underwear AS SOON AS we get home from being out regardless of season/weather, plans for the rest of the day, etc. - the kid just doesn't like clothes;

My chubby baby boy is quickly growing up and I hope that I can guide him to find his strengths and focus on what is important in life.

PIG OUT!

Annually, we travel to the mountains just west of Cle Elum to the Pig Out (it's an official event for us, so it gets proper case). Some good friends of my grandparents have several acres of forest land and they have an annual gathering for family and friends and family of friends and friends of family. There's more than 100 people for sure. Some of them come days before, the night before and some show up just in time for pig. The hosts definitely have roasting a pig in the ground down to a science. It's quite the production. It's a fun time. About 4 years ago, we were introduced to some family members of the hosts. They are about our age and have a daughter that is about 6 months older than Gunnar. They live in Ellensburg. We see them usually just once a year and Gunnar and their daughter, Allie, pal around all weekend. They've been really cute over the years. They get along really well. Because we have an Ali in our family, we have to distinguish between "friend Allie" and "cousin Ali". So, we saw friend Allie this weekend. It was great weather. We slept in a tent. We left the dog at home with a babysitter, ok, I guess that would be a dogsitter. We didn't want to buy gas to take the truck, we didn't want to have to worry about our dog trying to attack my mom's dogs, so it's just easier for everyone. We found a very responsible young man to come stay at our house while we are gone. We've done it twice now and it works great! So, anyway, we headed up to Cle Elum and hung out for the weekend. It was relaxing. I do get lethargic though when I am not active. I should feel refreshed in the mountain air, but I really just wanted to take a nap. Not sure if that means that I needed sleep or if I just am so used to being on the go, that my body was really not sure why it was stopped.

So, here's a couple of pictures from the weekend. At then of the trip when I wanted to get Gunnar's picture with Allie, he didn't want too, of course! Paden usually cooperates for pictures though. Good times!

When we left the Pig Out today, we came home via Moses Lake to listen to "cousin Robert" speak and try to report on his mission in about 2 seconds. The other speakers took up all the time, but Robert did a good job cutting down the information. It's good to see Robert and see that he has grown and learned on his mission. Robert is still Robert, just like any other missionary, I suppose. They don't usually do a 180 degree transformation, but they do learn and grown and I am grateful that Robert was able to serve a mission and learn more about the gospel and himself. We saw Aunt Ann and the Pyle family. It's always good to see family and really, to me, that is what going to listen to a mission farewell, misison report, run-of-the-mill talk, etc. is all about. It's just about being with family. It's nice to hear your family members share their thoughts and feelings about the gospel, but it's just nice to see them. We live a little further away and probably have reserve trips to see them to the more noteworthy events. I do recall a time when we all were able to travel to hear someone sing, someone speak, someone play musical instruments, someone dance, someone play sports, someone have a birthday. It seems as though, the older we all get, the less of that there is and I miss that.

Ugh, tomorrow is Monday. Back to grindstone. Better hit the hay! {Where the heck did that saying come from anyway?}

We have COLOR!

In our last house, we did not paint the main part of it. We painted the boys room after Gunnar drew his masterpiece in black permanent marker on the wall. We painted our computer room too. The rest of the house was white - wait dirty white (literally dirty!). Now in our new house, we have a pretty plain, although not white, color scheme going on. We repainted the bathroom downstairs already back earlier this year. We have painted the boys room. Now, the living room! Yeah. Something that other people might actually see! No pictures tonight - too tired, too late, too tired - oh wait, already said that. I am very excited about the living room though. It's a brown and one wall is a slate blue color. It looks great! We're working on building a mantel for the fire place and just have a few little touch up spots for tomorrow, then we'll get stuff put back away, THEN take pictures!

OK, so time for some re-runs of Scrubs and then sleepy time! Hopefully, some good sleep comes my way!

Hasta luego!

Calling all Friends, Family & Honorable Mention

I've been wanting to change the blog template for a LONG time. I have downloaded and experimented with a fake blog. The fake blog has seen many new templates, but I have real issues with the widgets. So, I found this template entitled "I work" which is quite fitting for me, I guess. I really wanted a pink background of some sort. In the changing of the blog template, I did delete some widgets to get it to save. I have tried to recreate my Friends and Family list. I am calling out to all who I might have forgotten! I did not write them down or etch in my brain who I had on there! So, anyone out there that used to be on my list but is not now, feel free to let me know. Also, no one should really be offended by my forgetfullness, it is past my bedtime! :)

Hope you all had a wonderful 4th of July!

We made it through . . .

• . . . a minor league baseball game and fireworks show with a 5-year old and a 3-year old, neither of which are really that big of baseball fans. Arrive at home, oh just after midnight.
• . . . three hours in the ER
• . . . four stitches
• . . . second late night in a row (first being aforementioned game). Arrive at home, oh just after midnight, AGAIN.
• . . . about 4 nights of seemingly excruciating toothaches which equals very limited sleep
• . . . two trips to the dentist on consecutive days to Kennewick (only about an hour drive at $4.26/gallon).
• . . . one tooth extraction, followed by insertion of spacer and a crown of some sort to hold the spacer in place.
• . . . one whole month without going to the grocery store (except for bananas and ice cream, which really doesn't count). Bread & milk also do not count, since those items can't last a month.
• . . . the first month of summer vacation and both boys are still alive and well!

So, I suppose I should explain. We attended a minor league baseball game in the Tri-cities. It was opening night and it was fabulous. Gunnar was all excited and he wore his little league t-shirt and hat and brought his glove. It wasn't quite as exciting for him as he though it would be. We got seats (free) in the first row behind the home team dug out, so that was pretty cool. A Company perk! There was a pretty cool fireworks show afterwards. The boys loved that. Paden watched Ben 10 videos from YouTube on Neil's phone and he was happy as a clam for the whole game. So, we ended up not having time to hit Sonic before the game and so we went afterwards. The boys drank most of their drinks before they fell asleep. Late night, but good night.

Next night, Paden, Gunnar and I went to the river to play. As we were leaving, we were almost the truck, where Paden tripped on his towel, fell onto a big shale boulder and split his forehead open right above his eyebrow. So, I call Neil freaking out! It was not bleeding much, actually. But, it was split pretty far and it was all glossy looking and I thought for a couple of seconds that there was a piece of glass in there. There's broken glass there near where he fell. Anyway, so I scoop Paden up and run through the thick sand (that's hard to run in!) back down to the river where I proceed to tell Paden to close his eyes because I am going to dunk his head under to get the sand out. He was already wet, so it didn't really matter. Neil arrived with warm cleaner water and a washcloth or two. There still wasn't very much blood, none to speak of really. But we got loaded up and headed into the ER to get stitches. Once Paden calmed down enough, he was excellently behaved. He was really cute. We check in with Triage and he's telling the nurse how he fell. I don't recall if that was point where he told everyone that I should have been carrying him so he didn't fall, but he did say that some time. So, we go to admissions to get the billing stuff taken care of and get Paden admitted to the ER. He gets a braclet with his name on it and he tells the lady "thanks", then he says to me, "that was sweet of her to give me this bracelet." He was being so cute. So, then we go wait to get into the ER. Then we go into a room and wait. It was a long wait that night! Paden was so good while they were stitching him. He was trying to talk the doctor. I had to finally tell him that they were busy concentrating and couldn't talk to him; Paden was getting a little irritated that they weren't listening to him. Once they were done, he says in his cute little exhausted voice, "thanks . . . thanks, guys." So, we get out of the ER about 11:30pm and again get home just after midnight. I am not sure how many of you would really appreaciate seeing a picture of a gaping gash in my son's head, so I will spare you this! All I can say is that's gonna leave a mark! A good scar!

Only a few short hours after we got home and got to sleep, Gunnar wakes us all up with his wailing. He was experiencing quite the toothache. Grrrreat! Not much sleeping going on that night. So, we called a dentist the next day (which is Tuesday I think). Can't get him in for ONE week and one day. Yeah, so not going to work, but I make the appt any way, just in case nothing better comes along. Call another dentist (pediatric) in Kennewick, but call after 4pm - closed at 4pm. There's those jokes about "banker's hours" - I think the joke should be about "dentist's hours", really! Another night of waking up wailing every couple of hours. Tylenol seems to help a little. The next morning, I call the dentist back and surprising get him an appt for later that afternoon. So, we take him up there to get the bad news. I feel so terrible as a parent to let him have gone so long and his tooth was bad!! That seems like an understatement. So, they have to pull the tooth and put a spacer so that the molar doesn't come over and block the permanent tooth to come. Yeah, not so good. They explain the treatment plans before we heard what the problem was. Then they come to explain the problem and we are supposed to choose for his procedure. They really pushed the sedation. So, we had to pay up front $205 for the sedation. Neil took Gunnar back the next day and just had a terrible time with the sedation. In the end the dentist agreed that it was not a good idea to sedate him. Seems like most kids get sedated and they probably do that out of experience; there are probably many a kid who freaks out at the dentist. Well, Gunnar freaked out with all the devices attached to him because of the sedation and he DID NOT like how it made him feel. But, they got in there and got the work done. We had told Gunnar that if he was good, he could get a new toy. Neil tried to get him to wait when he was feeling better to go to Wal*Mart, but Gunnar insisted to go then. So, they went. Gunnar was still a little out of it. He took a long nap on the way home and when he got home. So, when he woke up he saw his new toy and asked Neil where he got it. He remembers looking at it the day before but that we didn't buy it the day before. He DID NOT remember buying it following his dental experience. He still doesn't really remember. So, he was out of it!

We were able to sleep finally - back to somewhat normal at least. The boys did climb in bed for a night or two - not sure why exactly! But, now it's Monday night and Gunnar has made it back in his bed all night and Paden is back to normal - comes in 2 or 3 am to sleep with mama.

This is an extremely long post already, but I do have to mention that we went to the park tonight for Music in the Parks. Tonight was a steel drum band. It was awesome! It's a band of kids; they are so extremely talented! Check out their website here - Bram Bratá. We bought their newest CD for $10. I really enjoyed it. The town has quite a bit of activities this summer, so we are trying to enjoy most of them.

Ok, so it's late - the end.

catch-up

I have really wanted to do some catching up on the ol' blog, but I just really haven't been feelin' it. It's tough. So, I have a meme (which I really don't know what the means) that I need to do, as I was tagged by my niece Deborah. I have many self-portraits that I haven't posted. Gunnar finished T-ball. Grandma Great died. Gunnar finished Kindergarten. I am sure there are many other things that I was going to blog about at one point in time. The boys are always doing funny things, none of which I normally remember after about 3 minutes. So, where to start? I haven't a clue . . .

I think I will throw in a couple of SPTs. So, let me back track to June 3rd - emblem of the land I love. Although I have a better idea for this, I didn't get it done and I am too engulfed in a headache and a tummy full of milkshake that I am NOT going out to take the picture I want to - maybe another day. Here's what I have on hand (also too lazy to get up to connect to the external hard drive for more variety of pics):

the "self" in these portraits is of course these cute little "mini-me" guys

So, maybe to most people, the Columbia River is not an emblem of the land, but it is definitely an emblem of the geographic region! To me, it's my emblem. I love it!I have always lived near water - not right on it, but right near it - with the exception of the college years I spent in Ellensburg. Although there is a small river there that was good enough for those years! So, we love living near the river. There are some nice beaches and parks in our tiny little town and it's really nice. In the distance, we can literally see Washington. It was a little weird to move out of Washington into Oregon. We realized the other day that because we can still see our home state, it makes it a little easier - almost like we didn't really betray it and leave it - we're only 40 minutes from the state line by freeway, but probably about 10 minutes by boat (if we had one, which we don't)!

Speaking of boat, we do really want one, but don't really want to have to be indebted to one. The bishop in our ward, however, has a boat and basically offered us to use it anytime. He said that he bought his boat brand new in 1994 (or so) and it has 421 hours on it. He said that he has boys that love to fish, but none are old enough to drive it on their own. So, Neil went out the other day with the oldest (at home still) son of the bishop. This is the results:

This picture is probably not the greatest (something funky with the formatting too), but again recall the laziness and this what I have on hand at this instant. Can you see the size of that fish? Probably not exactly. It's EIGHT FEET LONG and 6 inches, so they say. It's a sturgeon caught by Neil (with some assistance from Daniel, bishop's son). It's crazy!! They said it took about an hour to real in. It's catch & release. Thank goodness since I wouldn't know what to do with an 8 inch fish, let alone an 8 foot one! :) This is right out our front yard (OK, we live like a mile from the river, but close enough!) CRAZY! So, I think I mentioned this, but I really do love the river. It's just so fun. Now if we can get the wind to stop blowing because I really don't love the wind.

So, that's all the energy I have for now. I need to get my packing done for the scrapbook retreat! I suppose I need some clothes to wear!

The 200 List

Neighbor Jane Payne's puts out a fabulous weekely newsletter, of which I am not currently subscribed. But, I saw on Susan's blog this challenge from Jane. This week is her 200th newsletter and so she posted this list of 200 things and asked us to duplicate this list in our blogs (or whatever) and bold all the things that we have done. My snide commentary is in italics and the stuff I have done is in bold.

200 Things

1. Touched an iceberg (glacier, I think)
2. Slept under the stars (does in a tent count, probably not, huh?)
3. Been a part of a hockey fight
4. Changed a baby's diaper
5. Watched a meteor shower
6. Given more than you could afford to charity
7. Swam with wild dolphins
8. Climbed a mountain
9. Held a tarantula
10. Said I loved you and meant it.
11. Bungee jumped
12. Visited Paris
13. Watched a lightning storm at sea
14. Stayed up all night long and watched the sun rise
15. Seen the Northern Lights
16. Gone to a huge sports game (I think the Seahawks playing on Sunday night ESPN is pretty "huge" isn't it?
17. Walked the stairs to the top of the Statue of Liberty
17a - Walked the stairs to the top of the Eiffel Tower (my own #17)
18. Grown and eaten your own vegetables
19. Looked up at the night sky through a telescope
20. Had an uncontrollable giggling fit at the worst possible moment
21. Had a pillow fight
22. Bet on a winning horse
23. Taken a sick day when you're not ill (not ill enough to really stay home anyway!)
24. Built a snow fort
25. Held a lamb
26. Gone skinny dipping (going to have to say that the drunk people that were there thought that my friend and I were also skinny dipping, but we had our suits on, they did not.)
27. Taken an ice cold bath
28. Had a meaningful conversation with a beggar
29. Seen a total eclipse
30. Ridden a roller coaster
31. Hit a home run
32. Danced like a fool and not cared who was looking
33. Adopted an accent for fun
34. Visited the birthplace of your ancestors
35. Felt very happy about your life, even for just a moment.
36. Loved your job 90% of the time.
37. Had enough money to be truly satisfied
38. Watched wild whales
39. Gone rock climbing
40. Gone on a midnight walk on the beach (in Alaska in July, did a little gold pannin' too!)
41. Gone sky diving
42. Visited Ireland
43. Ever bought a stranger a meal at a restaurant
44. Visited India
45. Bench-pressed your own weight
46. Milked a cow
47. Alphabetized your personal files
48. Ever worn a superhero costume
49. Sung karaoke
50. Lounged around in bed all day
51. Gone scuba diving
52. Kissed in the rain
53. Played in the mud
54. Gone to a drive in theater (the challege should be have I ever stayed awake at a drive in theater)
55. Done something you should regret, but don't (I am sure I have, but I can't think of it . . .)
56. Visited the Great Wall of China
57. Started a business
58. Taken a martial arts class
59. Been in a movie
60. Gone without food for 3 days
61. Made cookies from scratch (my husband does a much better job than me though)
62. Won first prize in a costume contest
63. Got flowers for no reason
64. Been in a combat zone (not during combat though - the beach at Normandy in France)
65. Spoken more than one language fluently
66. Gotten into a fight while attempting to defend someone
67. Bounced a check
68. Read - and understood - your credit report
69. Recently bought and played with a favorite childhood toy
70. Found out something significant that your ancestors did (Livingston ancestors)
71. Called or written your Congress person
72. Picked up and moved to another city just to start over
73. Walked the Golden Gate Bridge
74. Helped an animal give birth
75. Been fired or laid off from a job (my first real job when I was about 16; i wanted to be a camp counselor for the 6th graders and I didn't ask for the time off until it was too late!)
76. Won money (got a scratch ticket in a Christmas card and won ONE dollar that I never cashed in)
77. Broken a bone
78. Ridden a motorcycle
79. Driven any land vehicle at a speed of greater than 100 mph (don't tell Grandpa L!)
80. Hiked to the bottom of the Grand Canyon
81. Slept through an entire flight: takeoff, flight, and landing
82. Taken a canoe trip that lasted more than 2 days
83. Eaten sushi (won't do that again, I don't think)
84. Had your picture in the paper
85. Read The Bible cover to cover
86. Changed someone's mind about something you care deeply about
87. Gotten someone fired for their actions (it's kind of my job . . .)
88. Gone back to school (one semester of a Master's program, hope to go back again to finsh)
89. Changed your name (before freshman year of HS, changed my last name to my fake dad's last name - long story about the fake dad)
90. Caught a fly in the air with your bare hands
91. Eaten fried green tomatoes
92. Read The Iliad
93. Taught yourself an art from scratch
94. Killed and prepared an animal for eating (king salmon in Alaska)
95. Apologized to someone years after inflicting the hurt
96. Communicated with someone without sharing a common spoken language
97. Been elected to public office
98. Thought to yourself that you're living your dream
99. Had to put someone you love into hospice care
100. Sold your own artwork to someone who didn't know you
101. Had a booth at a street fair
102. Dyed your hair (only a couple times and once with Henna, remember that stuff?)
103. Been a DJ
104. Rocked a baby to sleep (oh, how many times . . .)
105. Ever dropped a cat from a high place to see if it really lands on all four
106. Raked your carpet
107. Brought out the best in people
108. Brought out the worst in people
109. Worn a mood ring
110. Ridden a horse
111. Carved an animal from a piece of wood or bar of soap (thank you girls camp)
112. Cooked a dish where four people asked for the recipe
113. Buried a child
114. Gone to a Broadway (or equivalent to your country) play
115. Been inside the pyramids
116. Shot a basketball into a basket
117. Danced at a disco (singles ward 70's theme dance, outfits and all)
118. Played in a band
119. Shot a bird
120. Gone to an arboretum
121. Tutored someone
122. Ridden a train
123. Brought an old fad back into style
124. Eaten caviar
125. Let a salesman talk you into something you didn't need. (I really thought I needed those orthodic inserts for my shoes, Neil and I both bought them. I did wear them for a year or so, then my feet grew during pregnancy and I haven't worn them since. I am still alive, so I guess I didn't really NEED them.)
126. Ridden a giraffe or elephant
127. Published a book (in the 4th grade at the UW Library)
128. Pieced a quilt
129. Lived in an historic place (temporarily in Mexico, I think that was kind of a historic place)
130. Acted in a play or performed on a stage
131. Asked for a raise (it was actually on a job offer, but close enough)
132. Made a hole-in-one (at the Leavenworth mini-golf course on the 18th hole!)
133. Gone deep sea fishing
134. Gone roller skating
135. Run a marathon
136. Learned to surf
137. Invented something
138. Flown first class
139. Spent the night in a 5-star luxury suite
140. Flown in a helicopter
141. Visited Africa
142. Sang a solo
143. Gone spelunking
144. Learned how to take a compliment (still need a little practice sometimes)
145. Written a love-story (if you count the story of my love for Lake Cushman, it was actually a descriptive essay)
146. Seen Michelangelo’s David
147. Had your portrait painted
148. Written a fan letter
149. Spent the night in something haunted (we believe that my brother who passed before I was born "haunted" or visited my grandma's house.)
150. Owned a St. Bernard or Great Dane
151. Ran away
152. Learned to juggle
153. Been a boss (currently)
154. Sat on a jury
155. Lied about your weight
156. Gone on a diet
157. Found an arrowhead or a gold nugget (what's your interpretation of nuggett? a fleck or two?)
158. Written a poem
159. Carried your lunch in a lunchbox
160. Gotten food poisoning (my friend who is a Quality Assurance Manager says there's no such thing as the "24-hr Flu", it's food poisioning)
161. Gone on a service, humanitarian or religious mission
162. Hiked the Grand Canyon
163. Sat on a park bench and fed the ducks
164. Gone to the opera
165. Gotten a letter from someone famous
166. Worn knickers (pretty sure those were fashionable when I was in elementary school!)
167. Ridden in a limousine
168. Attended the Olympics
169. Can hula or waltz
170. Read a half dozen Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys books
171. Been stuck in an elevator
172. Had a revelatory dream
173. Thought you might crash in an airplane
174. Had a song dedicated to you on the radio or at a concert
175. Saved someone’s life
176. Eaten raw whale
177. Know how to tat, smock or do needlepoint
178. Laughed till your sides ache
179. Straddled the equator
180. Taken a photograph of something other than people that is worth framing
181. Gone to a Shakespeare Festival
182. Sent a message in a bottle
183. Spent the night in a hostel
184. Been a cashier
185. Seen Old Faithful geyser erupt
186. Joined a union
187. Donated blood or plasma (going on Saturday to donate blood. I don't think I have ever done it before. I do remember that I used to not weigh enough when I was in HS and first part of college, but I definitely don't have that excuse anymore!)
188. Built a campfire
189. Kept a blog
190. Had hives
191. Worn custom made shoes or boots
192. Made a PowerPoint presentation
193. Taken a Hunter's Safety Course
194. Served at a soup kitchen
195. Conquered the Rubik’s cube
196. Know CPR
197. Ridden in or owned a convertible
198. Found a long lost friend
199. Helped solve a crime
200. Responded to a NJP newsletter

That was pretty fun, Jane! Thanks.

PS - I also have a Tag list from Deborah to do . . . I'll get to that this week, I think!

More Pictures

I guess I didn't have time last night with Gunnar's t-ball game and all to get the pictures posted on ShutterFly like I wanted to. So, even though it's a little late tonight, I got them done and posted. WARNING: There is A LOT of pictures. Since discovering ShutterFly, I don't really discern which are the only the best pictures to post, like I would on a blog . . . I just post them all. But, ShutterFly is quite nice in that you can select all photos and view slide show and change the speed to fast and view them quite quickly. I enjoy it and I hope you do too. We have thousands of pictures and I feel like we don't get to share them often and I am WAY, WAY, WAY behind on scrapbooking them.

Anyway, there's a few new "albums". They are: Hummingbirds, Afternoon at the "Beach", Evening Walk, and Flowers.

I think I have more, but I am starting to tire . . .

TTFN! Hope you enjoy the pictures!

Happy SPRING!!!

So, I am not totally motivated for blogging (if you haven't noticed). It's just nice weather out and I really have other stuff to do apparently. I have some things I could write about, but just no motivation to do it. I apologize if you are really trying to keep up with what we are doing in our live through this blog. Every time you see the same old post for weeks, you can think how much we must be enjoing life (away from the computer) and be happy! :)

I do have some pictures that will get posted on ShutterFly - flowers from our yard, afternoon at the river, photos with grandparents, hummingbirds . . . Iwill try to finish that tomorrow (Wed).

For memorial day weekend, we went first to get haircuts for the boys (all 3) at Brian's Barber Shop - great haircuts for a great family deal price. We stayed the night at gramp & gram Livingston's house Thursday night. We got up Friday morning and started making our way toward my grandparents - Great Grandpa & Great Grandma in the mountains - up near Colville. We went out to the new Cabela's in Post Falls, ID. That wasn't all that special, I didn't think. The boys had a good time at the shooting gallery though and Neil has been enjoying fudge. We stayed with my grandparents two nights. We had to take off for a bit on Saturday to get the boys out of the house, so we went to the city park in Colville. For being memorial day weekend, that town was ghostly - apparently everyone leaves that town for holidays. Many of the downtown shops were closed - crazy. So, we let the boys run around at the park for quite a while. Paden threw up his cheesy pringles after too much time on the merry-go-round. NICE! Luckily it was on the grass near a tree where I was sitting and it didn't get on me or him. It was toward the of the time at the park anyway, so we left after that and left the puke behind! We went back to my grandparents for a home cooked meal - love going there! Simple, but good food!

We came home on Sunday - stopped by our friends (Perez family) in the Tri Cities. It's always good to see them. We enjoy visiting with them! We love having time at home too, so we got home early evening on Sunday (like before 6pm, I think). We tried to keep the boys up on Sunday night thinking they would sleep in on Monday (yeah for holidays), but no such luck. Gunnar went to sleep after 10pm and woke up at 6am. What is up with that? Paden didn't sleep in either. So, we were up and ready for the day pretty early. We actually had to stall for a while before we went out to work in the yard since we didn't think our neighbors would appreciate lawn mowing at 7am - we waited until 8:30am. We worked in the yard. We got some stuff cleaned up - weeds, cardboard, etc. The side of our house, which no one really sees (not even us most of the time) was kind of impassable because of boxes, hoses and a pile of wood - so we (meaning I) cleaned that all up and that was very satisfying to accomplish that task! Neil mowed the front and back and cleaned up the flowers a bit. It's all looking beautiful. We've never had a real yard before, so this is all new for us. It was pretty fun to come home Sunday afternoon and see what new flowers bloomed. We have a lot! I documented quite a few individual flowers on ShutterFly. I wanted to take a yard picture today, but didn't get around to it - maybe tomorrow.

So, here's a couple of preview pics from the last weekend. I guess my grandma has any pictures that might contain my husband. (Sorry love, you didn't make the blog today, but I still love you!)

A story about my grandma's hummingbirds. We (meaning Neil) took over 100 pictures of my grandma's hummingbirds. They were amazing. There are at least 10 or 12 hummingbirds that hang out at the house. There is a hummingbird feeder right off the poarch that you can see from the living room and dining room. There are CONSTANTLY birds eating there. SERIOUSLY. CONSTANTLY. It's crazy. The birds go through the entire feeder in a day. So, I tried to pick out a good picture of the 100+ that we have. It's hard to choose. Neil went right to the feeder to take pictures and they almost landed on the camera. They really don't care if you stand there by them. That is not characteristic of any other hummingbirds I have seen. We have 3 that come to our house like once a week . . . maybe more, I don't know b/c I am not here all day. Anyway, it was pretty cool to watch the birds. I'll put the rest of the good pics on ShutterFly (maybe tomorrow).
Anyway, that's it for tonight. It only took like FOREVER to get the pictures off my camera and so no more writing, downloading, uploading - it's just too much already! TTFN!

Have you ever sold it ALL????

Yard Sale Saturday, May 3, 2008. 5:30am set up time. 8:00am start time. It was supposed to be nice. It was the town's Cinco de Mayo celebration was supposed to mean lots of people in town. Well, it wasn't the greatest of weather, which probably didn't do well for our Cinco de Mayo or the Yard Sale. It did not sunshine, it did rain briefly. We didn't have floods of people -but I guess that's how yard sales go.

However, we did very well. We sold quite a bit during the morning and people kind of came in spurts. By the end of the day, we made double the money than we expected and we SOLD EVERYTHING!!! No, seriously. We sold all that we had. Now that doesn't ever happen, you say. I know! So, it was about 4pm and we were kind of rushing to get the rest of the treasured junk that hadn't sold packed up to take into the Goodwill. So, we have it all in the back of the truck and in the back seat, front seat. We had quite a bit left over (we had a lot to start with). A guy who had come earlier came back by with a friend; they were looking for something (tools, which we didn't have). They told me to make sure we get a receipt for the Goodwill so we can put it on our taxes. So, they start slowly driving away and Neil yells, jokingly, from the back of the truck as he's tying down stuff, "Or you can buy everything here for $20." They said no and drove down the street. It's a dead end street, so they had to drive back by. I was just about to get in the car to go take the sign down. They drove up and said that he (the driver) changed his mind and he wanted to buy our truck full of stuff for $20. NO WAY!! YES WAY!!! That is the truth! Ask my in-laws, they were there and they don't lie! It was so stinking crazy! So, we literally sold EVERYTHING!!! How cool is that. We didn't have to take the truck load to the Goodwill - which would have cost nearly $15 to drive there and back.

Thank you to Grandma & Grandpa Livingston for coming down and side-tracking the boys for a while. Ok - another funny story. Some people come by and they are buying the old car seat and they were looking for a walker. I didn't have it out, but I said that I did have one that I didn't mind selling. I just hadn't had time to go through all of our baby stuff to see what could go. It's all up in the attic in the garage tucked away. So, I climb up there and get the dumb walker that is in the BACK and stuck on the crib. So, I get it down and Paden starts having a melt down when these people were going to buy it. He doesn't want to sell it. He hasn't even SEEN the thing. I seriously don't remember using it with him. We might have, but he doesn't remember it. If we used it, he was about 7 months old. Our house was small, so I didn't really use the walker much. It was soooo funny that Paden was having a meltdown over selling that. The boys did pretty well with having to get rid of some of their stuff. I tried to get rid of most of it while they were gone, so I gave many toys away for free to little kids whose parents were parusing our merchandise. Paden did tell me yesterday, I think it was, that he didnt' want me to sell his green truck, blue van and something of Gunnar's. I think he's forgotten it now though. All in all, it was a lot of work and we were very tired at the end of the day. But, WE SOLD EVERYTHING and we went to bed richer than when we woke up.