Vomit

We all got food poisoning earlier this year so the boys are very familiar with vomit. Ethan talks about it often and when talking about the bathroom it is listed as one of the things we do in there. Last night when we were tucking him in he got this look on his face like something was wrong, brought his hands to his mouth and said "I am going to vomit".  A few seconds later he got the hiccups. Dan and I were laughing so hard. We tried to explain to him that he had the hiccups but he was convinced that he was going to vomit. You gotta love little kids!

Ethan's Quilt

I have been working on a new quilt for Ethan for a long time! It has probably been 6 months. I always make the boys a quilt when they move from the crib to a twin bed. It felt good to finish it and I love it! 

The Boys Love Being Outdoors

We love having a yard! We also love the trail in our neighborhood that goes to the Eno River. If I wasn't trying to keep Michael's cast semi-clean we would be outside even more. Two more weeks and the cast comes off!

playing in the sand

Playing in puddles after it rains

Riding bikes and playing in the rain (no cast yet)

Our tree thinks it is fall

Playing at the Eno River

Digging for rocks on the trail

Michael loves the backpack as long as someone is in front of him so he can see them.

Popsicles after our hike

Michael and the Broken Arm

A lady in our ward has been giving the boys swimming lessons at her neighborhood pool. Last week Ethan, Michael and I were playing at the park next to the pool while Parker had his lesson. Michael was on the play equipment but wasn't doing too  much so I left checked on Ethan really quick who was at the swings and out of my sight. I turned around to walk back to Michael just in time to see him put his knee up on the railing by the bridge trying to pull himself up and fall right through it. He fell head first from 5 feet up. I was mostly worried about a concussion. He was having a hard time calming down so I tried and tried to get a hold of Dan at work. He started to calm down but was very clingy and not really using his right arm. He would try to use it occasionally but you could tell something was off. He wouldn't put any pressure on it and kept holding it so I started to worry it was broken. I talked to Dan and decided to observe him while we waited for Parker and then we headed off to an Urgent Care facility. Before checking in I asked if they would even be able to help. They said they could do x-rays but could not put on a cast. And then they decided they wouldn't even x-ray him because he is so young. Considering I had all 3 kids I didn't want to waste my time so we headed out to the car. Dan called as we were loading up and was on his way home. Yay! A few weeks ago we went to Tennessee to visit with family and my niece, Adalee, and sprained her foot. They had taken her in and wasted a lot of time for them to say they couldn't do anything. I didn't want to go through that and spend a lot of money on co-pays so I decided to observe him until Dan got home and then we would decide what to do. He was doing pretty good and using his right arm a little but would not put pressure on it. By this time he had a pretty good bump right above his wrist so we ate some dinner and headed to the Emergency Department. We got there at about 7pm. They said every room was full in the pediatric wing so we would have to wait until things opened up. Michael did pretty good during the 2 hours we waited to go back. But as soon as people started coming in to look at his arm he was losing it. Not to mention that since it is a teaching hospital you get many many visitors (nurse, medical student, pediatric resident, attending, different nurse, orthopedic medical student, orthopedic resident, another nurse). And x-rays... forget it. Two of us had to hold him down and it still took several tries to get good images. After all of that he fell asleep. Both bones in his forearm were broken. They put on a cast and finally by 1am we were out of there! It took him a while to get used to his cast and start using his arm again, but now you would never know it is broken if it weren't for the obvious cast. He gets stuff stuck inside of it a lot and it is pretty dirty but he is managing well. He is a climber and this hasn't slowed him down so I am sure this is only the beginning. Oh joy!

Love that happy face!

Kindergarten

Last month Parker started Kindergarten at Easley Elementary. It is a year round school so he started pretty early. I didn't mind! So far he loves his teachers Mrs. LaRue and Ms. Covington. Luckily a friend of his from church, Alden, is in his class. He loves everything about school and until this week he hasn't had any problems with it. On Tuesday he was having a hard time and crying a lot. They couldn't get him to say what was wrong and also couldn't cheer him up so they called me. He wouldn't talk to me either so I went and picked him up. He told me he would show me when he got home why he was sad. When we got home he pulled out his lunch box and pulled out the note that I put in it (the first one I ever put in his lunch) and said that it made him miss me. It was so sad. He said I should wait until he gets more used to school before I put notes in his lunch again. Poor thing was homesick. I remember feeling that way at school. He has done great since then. I hope he continues to love it and get more comfortable. We sure do love that kid!

Ethan - 3 Years Old

In June Ethan turned 3. He is growing up fast! Here is a little bit about Ethan at 3:

• He is ALL boy! He likes to talk about poop and vomit. He loves to wrestle. He is always making sound effects. 
• When he gets upset he says, "Don't want to cry and talk." 
• He thinks every pool is a "hot pool". 
• He loves playing outside.
• He is finally potty trained. 
• He still sleeps with bear (a stuffed animal that my Mom bought him as a tiny baby).
• He still takes an afternoon nap. (Halleluiah!)
• He loves reading books.
• Some days he talks nonstop!
• He is always worried that I am going to leave him or one of his brothers when we are out.
• He loves planes, cars, robots, monsters, and Legos.

Olympic National Peninsula

Dan and I were fortunate to have great babysitters (thank you Grandpa and Grandma!) in Colorado so we went on a trip without kids! It was awesome! Dan served his mission in Tacoma, Washington and fell in love with Washington state. He has always wanted to drive the Olympic Peninsula. I must admit, I was a little skeptical...we are just going to drive around all day?!?  But I loved it! I had forgotten that traveling without kids means you can stop anywhere you want to and actually enjoy things. :)  We got to Seattle late on Sunday evening. We got our rental car and then drove to the home of a man that Dan met on his first day in the mission. He has been battling cancer so he is living in a nursing facility for now. His brother and wife were at the house to let us in.They were very nice to let us stay with them. First thing in the morning we went George's nursing facility to visit. It was really nice to meet him. He is great at keeping in contact with Dan.

Dan in front of George's house.

Then we started our drive. We stopped in Olympia for some breakfast. We found a place on Yelp called The New Moon Cafe. It was delicious! I almost wanted to drive back the next day and eat there again...it was that good! Then we had to hurry up to our campsite. It is a very popular campsite and is first come, first serve so we had to hurry to get a good spot overlooking the ocean.We made a quick stop to see one of the biggest spruce tree's in the world and still got a great campsite!

Kari hugging one of the biggest spruce tree's.

Dan looks so small.

Our campsite looking out over the Pacific!.

We spent the rest of the day walking on the beach. We took a long walk on the beach by our campsite and also drove North to another beach called Ruby Beach. It was so beautiful!

The next day we drove to the Hoh Rainforest. We hiked 2 trails through the rain forest. While on the first one we were just walking and talking and I looked up to see a large set of antlers just up the path. I panicked. Dan took pictures. It ended up being a whole herd of Elk. The leader gave the ok and they slowly walked to the other side of the trail eating as they went. It was pretty cool to see, but I was freaking out the whole time.

Then we headed toward Lake Crescent Lodge. We stopped in Forks to eat some pizza and chatted with a set of Elders. We got a little room right on the lake for the next night. It was expensive, but it was worth it. The lake was beautiful! I have never seen water so clean and clear in a lake. We rented a canoe and you could see to the bottom even out in the middle. It was hard to really capture the colors, but the colors of the lake were amazing! Dan of course had to take a dip even though we did not bring anything to swim (he just jumped in with what he was already wearing).

It felt like it never got dark in Washington.  We had a lot of time each day which was really nice. We had originally planned on driving up to Hurricane Ridge on Wednesday morning but had time so we went up in the evening on Tuesday. We were worried out little Chevy Spark rental car wouldn't make it, but Sparky did great! We were really fortunate to have made the drive on Tuesday because Wednesday was very cloudy. We probably would have missed the amazing view!!  And we definitely would have missed meeting a little mountain goat family.

The last day we drove through a little Scandanavian town called Poulsbo. We loved it! It was so cute. And they had the best bakery I have ever been to! We took the pretty ferry ride across the bay to Seattle before heading to the airport.