March For Babies

We've participated in the March For Babies with the Greens the past few years. This year we did the walk at Point Defiance in Tacoma. It was early and chilly, but it wasn't raining, so we were happy.

Kaylin and Carter walked and held hands most of the time. They're so cute.

NO... we didn't get to park that close. Those cars belong to the volunteers. Don't get me started on the parking. I'll just say it was NOT GOOD.

At the end there were free Twinkies. Kaylin ate about half of hers. I didn't mind... less sugar for her and 1 1/2 Twinkies for me.

Lauren kept warm in her hat made by Nana and fleece pajamas.

Afterward we went to lunch at The Rock in Renton. Yum! The pizza we ordered had ricotta cheese on it. I was a little unsure about it, but it was delicious.

They give the kids dough to play with.

We had a great time. Thanks Greens!

80s Party

On Saturday night we donned our 80s best and went to Dale's 30th birthday party. Sadly, I didn't get many pictures.

Here is Kaylin before we left home. She picked the shirt. I put her hair in a side pony tail and she's wearing baby legs scrunched down as leg warmers. She loved wearing a costume. At first when I mentioned that we were going to wear costumes, she wanted to be a chicken, which is what she was for Halloween. Thankfully I was able to convince her otherwise.

I didn't get any pictures of Eric, Lauren, or me at home. Here's the only picture of Eric and me at the party:

You can't see it, but I have on black leggings and lame leg warmers that I made by cutting off the foot of knee-high socks. I'm going to turn them into baby legs for the girls. The skirt is from high school. My friends and I used to dress-up for dances. Somehow, I still fit into it 6 weeks after having a baby. I'm pretty sure it was too big when I was 17 :-).

Here's the group shot I stole from Kim's blog. Thanks Kim!

I love how Carter is the only kid smiling. Kaylin has changed from her skirt and leg warmers into pants and a tutu. She decided to pee her pants at the party. Lovely. Laura won the prize for most authentic 80s costume (there weren't really prizes, I just made that up). She's the one in the blue dress. Her sister actually wore that dress to the prom in the 80s. The sleeves were quite puffy. We had a great time at the party and it was so fun to catch up with some of our Marysville friends.

If you want to see pictures of the awesome decorations and PacMan cake, go check out Kim's blog. While you're there, check out her amazing crafts. She rocks.

Baby shower!

Kristina threw me a FABULOUS baby shower on Saturday. I told her that I didn't need one, since I'm having another girl, but she insisted. I didn't complain :-). We had a great time.

We played the game where you sift through a bowl of uncooked rice and safety pins with your eyes closed and try to pick out the safety pins. It was actually pretty tough.

Pam, Stephanie, Toni, and Aubrey

Carly and me. My eyes are closed on purpose, it was my turn for the game.

Angela, Krista, and Stephanie holding Bosten (Krista's one month old).

Opening presents and modeling the "body bib" from Angela. I think I might use the bibs until I have this baby ;-).

Kim and me with the AMAZING princess and the pea quilt she made. If you look closely you can see a little green "pea" button near the bottom.

Thanks everyone for a great shower.

Staycation: Day 2, Ballard Locks

After breakfast on Saturday morning we went to the Ballard Locks to see the boats and the salmon.

Notice the HUGE change in weather from the previous day at the zoo.

Eric and Kaylin watching the jumping salmon in the locks.

Silly Kaylin and Carter

There is a viewing area built into one of the weirs of the fish ladder. Most of the salmon we saw were Coho (Silver). There were also a few Chinook (King) and Sockeye (Red). I have a hard time telling them all apart. They just look like dinner to me. Ha ha.

Max had a busy day.

We stopped by Dicks on the way home for some burgers. When we got back to our house, we watched UW kick USC's trash and then while BYU was getting blown out we went to a park for a BBQ.

It was a great weekend!

Staycation: Day 1, Red Robin and Children's Museum

After naptime at our house, which didn't really work out as planned since the kiddos weren't really in the sleeping mood, we went to Red Robin in Factoria for dinner. Eric's birthday was Thursday and Brandon's was that day (Friday) and we wanted them to be embarrassed by the RR employees singing to them. Also, Eric had a coupon for a free burger.

Kaylin decided that it was better on the other side of the booth with the Greens. Or maybe she just really wanted some of Brandon's fish and chips. For those of you who know Kaylin's eating habits, YES, she ate some of Brandon's fish. Shocking.

After dinner, we headed through the ghost of a mall to the children's museum. The children's musuem at the Factoria Mall is free from 5-8 on Friday nights (are you noticing a theme here?). Kaylin still insisted on holding Carter's hand. I'm sure we'll be able to black mail them with these pictures someday.

In case you thought it was just the kids having fun, here are some pictures of Eric.

While Eric was sitting down a little boy asked him to come put on a puppet show. Too funny.

Eric also enjoyed the gears.

After the children's museum we all headed back to our house for the night. The plan was for the adults to play games while the kids slept, but we were all too tired. Instead we just watched tv and had some snacks. All 4 Greens decided to sleep in the same room. We slept great that night... I'm not so sure about them.

Staycation: Day 1, Point Definace Zoo and Aquarium

For the past four years we have always taken a camping trip with our friends, the Greens. For various reasons, it didn't work out this year. We still wanted to do something, so we opted for a "staycation". They came to our house last Friday morning for breakfast and then we headed off to the Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium. The Greens have a family pass and they get 3 guests in for free! Score! Thanks guys!

It was a beautiful Seattle day. Here is a view of Mt. Rainier from the zoo.


One of the first stops was the petting zoo. I've never seen a petting zoo at an actual zoo before. And the only animals to pet were goats. Anyway... Kaylin enjoyed feeding the goats, which translates to throwing a food pellet into the goat pen and then running away while laughing.

That's about as close as she got to the goats.

Kaylin and Daddy looking at an animal, I'm pretty sure it was a tiger.

28.5 weeks preggo.

Kaylin insisted on holding Carter's hand. He obliged about half of the time.

There was a fun playground near the entrance. Kaylin and Carter enjoyed playing on it while Max had his meals.

Kaylin used a public restroom for the first time while we were at the zoo. I think she decided to try it out because Carter was using the bathroom. She insisted on taking off everything but her shirt and socks. She did a great job!

More baby presents

Our friends Kim and Dale had their baby boy at the end of last month. Well, Kim had him, but we'll give Dale some credit too.

I of course had to make Kim some fabulous baby presents. Here's what I came up with:

Hooded towel.
I LOVE these things. Kaylin still uses hers and probably will for a very long time. So big and cozy for little people.

Bath mitt
This was my first attempt. I used a hand towel and embellished with felt. In case you can't tell, it's supposed to be a cat.

Burp cloths
One can never have too many burp cloths, as I learned quickly after Kaylin was born. Dale requested that Kim make about 5 million (give or take), so I tried to help her out.

Aren't I so environmentally friendly? I wrapped the burp cloths and bath mitt inside the towel. I know, I'm cool like that.

Happy new baby, Kim and Dale! We love you guys! I'm sorry I can't give you some magic sleep potion or something. This will have to do.

Now you know how OLD I am

We have been BUSY. After our trip to Oakland/Sacramento for my brother's wedding, we were home for 5 days (one of those days was when we went to the Seahawks' Training Camp) and then we were off again.

Here's the quick overview of the past almost 2 weeks:
1. My 10 year high school reunion
2. A week in Bellingham with the fam
3. THE FLU

We'll start with my 10 year reunion. Yes, I am OLD. Don't rub it in.

Friday night people met at a bar to hang out. We didn't go to that part. We didn't think Eric needed to get off work early so we could drive up there for that. Plus, Eric had a golf tournament for work on Saturday morning that he really wanted to play in.

Saturday night we had dinner at Chuckanut Manor. The view of the bay and islands was amazing, but I didn't take any pictures. It was fun to see people that I hadn't seen since graduation.

Sunday afternoon there was a BBQ at Cornwall Park. Kaylin had a great time eating watermelon and playing on the swings and slide. I actually took a few pictures at this one just to prove that I was there :-).

The cake.

For those of you not from Bellingham, I will explain the odd cake. Our class went to Bellingham High School for three years. Our senior year, BHS closed for remodeling and Squalicum High School opened. All of BHS went to SqHS (yes, there's a "q" in there because there's another SHS in town. I will not name that school :-)). We were the first graduating class of Squalicum. But a lot of people had MAJOR issues with that. Kinda funny, really. We ended up with 2 diplomas, one from each school. As you can see, people STILL had issues with the fact that we technically graduated from Squalicum.

Me with Schurie Moreau Harrison. I still remember singing an oldies song with her on the volleyball bus, the lyrics escape me right now.

Ah yes, it went something like this, "Sugar... do do do do do do... ohhhhh, honey, honey... do do do do do do... you are my candy girl, and you got me wanting you..."

Tyler Stevens, Lis Mortimer Stevens, me, Amber Mathies, Billy Clem.

Lis is holding Billy's one week old baby and another one of his kids (they have 3) is in front of Kaylin. For those of you who want to know, Billy only went to BHS for 2 years but married Jenna Green from our class.

Overall it was a fun weekend. It was great to catch up with so many fabulous people. There were a lot more people I wished could have made it, but hopefully they'll be there at the 20 year reunion!

Mt. Rainier

I've lived in Washington for basically my whole life and I've never been to Mt. Rainier. Eric has lived even closer to the mountain than I did and he hadn't been there either. We made a list of things we want to do and going to Mt. Rainier was high up. So when our friends, the Heals, planned a hike we had to go.

We went on one of the free National Park days, so it didn't cost us anything to get into the park. Yea! We went to Mowich Lake. I'm not sure if I'll ever go there again. There was a long, bumpy, windy, gravel and dirt road for something like 20 miles. It took forever to get to the lake. But the lake was beautiful and there were a lot of cool little streams and waterfalls around too. Kaylin's favorite parts were the frog we saw by the lake (she is still talking about it) and holding hands with her friend Kimball (she has stopped talking about that).

On a trail by Lake Mowich

We didn't last long on that trail because it was covered in snow. In the middle of July. And it was warm outside.

Mt. Rainier, part 2

Blogger is only letting me post 5 pictures, so this is part 2 of my Mt. Rainier post.

Kaylin and Kimball are sitting on a picnic table surrounded by snow. It was hard to believe there could be so much snow when it was warm and sunny outside.

Kimball got his picture taken on these rocks and so Kaylin decided that she had to also.

Bye!