Summer Fun

It's been almost 2 months since my last post, so I guess it's time for another one! We've had a whirlwind of a summer so far with lots going on, but we've managed to sqeeze in a lot of fun stuff too! Below you will find pictures from our trip to the Point Defiance Zoo, which the kids loved, an outing to Tolmie State Park (a local beach on the Puget Sound) on a sunny afternoon, and our amazing trip to Oceanside, OR over the 4th of July with a group of friends. I will also post another blog in the next couple days with pictures from our trip last weekend to see my folks in Oregon. We had an action packed weekend and my mom took lots of great pictures, but I haven't had a chance to go through them yet. In the next post, I will give an update on our family as well, but for now you get over-loaded with pictures! Enjoy!


We were having a snack on the hillside in the background at the zoo, and this peacock charged at a mom and her little girl! No one got hurt and I think the peacock was just trying to get some space. After the inital shock wore off, it was kind of hard not to laugh. I wish I had gotten it on video.

Drew checking out the fish and awesome sea life...he LOVED every second.

This was taken on the car ride home from the zoo...two tuckered out kiddos. Anna really did enjoy herself, but she was watching her dvd player and about to fall over because she was so wiped.

Anna's first time on the carousel at the zoo! Loved it!

This was awesome! We had a front row seat as they trained and fed the walruses.

Dane and the kiddos at Tolmie playing the sand.

Miss Hollywood.

"Excuse me...could you point me in the direction of the weight room?"

Me and my girl after just arriving at our house in Oceanside, OR. Taking in the views!

Anna and her BFF Leah, enjoying their loot after the 4th of July parade that went right by our house that we rented.

Bubba enjoying some of mommy's mint chocolate chip ice cream at the Tillamook Cheese Factory. To die for!

Anna had already finished her own cone, so she started mooching off of daddy's.

Anna being adorable.

Anna and Drew loved the beach! Notice daddy in the background "sleeping"...someone had too much fun the night before with his buddies. :)

This is how Anna spent 98% of her time at the beach...running from all the waves and loving every minute! She slept like a rock each night!

Drew's eyes would get HUGE everytime a wave came and then he'd squeal with delight as the water rushed in!

I had so much fun running with Anna on the beach all playing all sorts of games. Priceless memories.

Playing catch up

So much has happened over the last month and a half, I'm not even sure where to start. I think I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. You'll see a recap of a trip to the park, Easter (including the day before Easter when Anna and I went Lattin's Cider Mill for a huge Easter egg hunt...very cool!) a visit to my parent's house, and of course, our glorious trip to Arizona. It's impossible to move pictures around once they're on this site (grrr) so my apologies on them being out of order.

These first pictures are from our trip to Tucson for our friend's Matt and Kelley's wedding. We had a BLAST! The kids did great at home with Dane's parents on Thursday and Friday and then my mom on Sat and Sunday. I was pleasantly surprised at how well they did...makes us want to take another trip now that we know they do just fine! :) Dane and I quickly slipped in to the "no kids" role, sleeping in each day, laying by the pool in the morning, getting in a nap every afternoon and enjoying drinks and great conversation with friends in the evenings. We enjoyed a lunch out in Tucson one afternoon, and then went to see a movie...in an actual theatre! That never happens! They even had a fishing pond, so one afternoon we took in an hour or so of fishing! One evening, we played several games of tennis under the lights which was a lot of fun. Especially because I won. The wedding itself was beautiful. It was literally out in the desert and HOT, but beautiful. They had an amazingly gorgeous cocktail hour which included the best sunset, and then the night finished out with the reception around the pool, with an full, open bar and lots of delicious food. Good food, good drinks, and good music = perfect night. This trip was just what we needed and we felt like newleyweds all over again. It was rejuvenating.


This was my perfect Mother's Day gift from my kiddos. (we got home from AZ on Mother's Day and my mom helped them make these). It made me teary.

Beautiful Arizona sunset during the wedding reception.

The ranch/resort that we stayed at was really beautiful!

Mike, Matt, and Dane...the three amigos from the days on the cruise ship.

The honeymooners... :)

In the desert for the wedding...5:30 p.m....it was HOT!

Kelley and Matt...it was perfect!

Look at that monster I caught! :)

All the horses...Tanque Verde Ranch was an amazing place!

Here's Drew at the park when we visited my parents last month. He's such a big boy!

Silly Grandma...playing in her princess castle. :)

Cowgirl Anna

Anna very excited about the first egg she found at Nana and Papa's house on Easter

Anna taking a tour of the fire truck at Lattin's Cider Mill. This place has a ton of farm animals, fresh apple cider, fresh apple fritters, and lots of games. They hold a HUGE egg hunt every year for Easter. We had fabulous weather this year! It was just mommy and daughter though cause Drew was home napping through the whole thing.

Anna and her BFF Leah, waiting for the horn to blow so they can get all their loot!

My little man looking all handsome.

This was well over a month ago...I think it was the first sight of sun, but it was still frigid. So we bundled up and headed to the park!

Such a happy boy.

Drew turns 1!!

Our baby boy turned 1 on Friday! So hard to believe...I mean, I know I say it a lot, but I truly mean it this time...where has the past year gone?! We decided to tone it down quite a bit for Drew's 1st birthday party, so we just invited family over, instead of house full of friends, family and a bunch of kids. The party was perfect, both sets of grandparents were here as well as Dane's brother and family. We had pizza, grapes, salad and lots of cupcakes! Drew was a trooper through most of it, but after he opened presents he desperately needed a nap, so he napped for the second portion of his party. Here are some pictures documenting the momentous occasion! Sorry that they are all out of order...they make it so hard to move pictures around on this stupid site, I don't even want to fuss with it. But you get the idea: Mmmm...cupcake.

Anna, not missing one drop of frosting.

Cousin Cole, Uncle Neil and Anna diving into their cupcakes

Big boy getting so close to walking! He's taken about 4 steps on his own, and then doesn't trust himself, so he goes to his knees. Any day now he'll just take off! He loves this walker!

My attempt at sports themed cupcakes. Dont' judge the soccer balls...those were hard!

This was on Friday (Drew's actual birthday) when I came home for lunch. Nana had dropped off a cake for his big day, so after we had our lunch we got some yummy cake!

Home on my lunch break celebrating with the birthday boy. I REALLY didn't want to go back to work that day. :(

Here's bubba, not too sure about his hat. :)

Happy Birthday Drew (aka Bubba, Bubbs, Drewskie, Bubby, little man)!! We all love you to the moon and back. You are such a joy in our lives and an absolute blessing that I thank God for every day! My eyes swell with tears when I feel the overwhelming amount of love I feel for you. We adore your sense of humor, your giggle, those toothy grins, your admiration of your sister, your kissable cheeks, your tickleish feet and tummy, your love of food, your curiosity, and all the other endless traits that make you who you are.

My munchkins

I know it's been forever and a day since I've posted a new blog, so what better way to get back into the swing of things, than a post about the kiddos!

We took the kids to get their pictures taken in January and here's a little sneak peek. I was really happy with them. The occasion was to document Anna's 3rd birthday, and just because poor Drew hadn't had any professional pictures taken yet!

Just last weekend, Dane was in Seattle overnight for a bachelor party so my mom came into town to get a grand baby fix. Saturday morning we took Drew for his first "big boy" haircut. He's had a couple of chop jobs done by yours truly, but he needed a good, over priced haircut, so off we went to Jack & Jill's. He did really great, but grew tired of the clippers after about 3o seconds. He looks like such a little man!

All done! They even put gel in his hair to spike it up! :)

Mommy and her handsome boy!

Time is just flying by, and it's hard to believe that Drew is going to be 1 year old in just 5 weeks. I'm overwhelmed sometimes at how much I love this little man. He is such a riot and has the BEST personality! He loves playing little games and is very ticklish. He's got the best laugh ever, and one of my favorite things he does is crinkle up his nose and breathes hard through it, to where he does this light snort thing. It's hilarious, and all you have to do is do it to him and he will reciprocate on demand. He adores his big sister and wants to do whatever she's doing. If she's reading a book, he'll crawl right up on her lap on top of the book...just trying to get a good view of the pictures. :) Anna doesn't quite see it that way! He is the busiest boy I know and is into everything. For the longest time he would only do the army crawl on his belly; well finally, he found that he was much faster on his hands and knees and he hasn't slowed down since! He's cruising around everything, and will walk behind a little push toy,but he's still pretty unstable. Bubba will be walking before we know it! Another little tid bit about him is that his favorite thing to do in this entire world is eat. I'm not even kidding. I literally cannot keep the food coming fast enough...I'm still cutting it up and putting it on his tray, and he's shoveling it in faster than I can chop! He will eat anything. Grilled cheese, chicken, hamburger patty, pancakes, eggs, sandwiches (any kind), pizza, chicken pad tai, fish, any fruit, any vegetable, yogurt, spaghetti, his sister's leftovers...I mean anything! I have to monitor how much I give him, otherwise, he probably wouldn't stop! I love a good eater. :)

Anna is getting very good at being 3. The difference between a boy and a girl is astounding to me. Anna is our little emotional roller coaster. Her core is made up of truly the sweetest and most loving little soul. She is always aware and concerned about other's feelings and is (so far) the best big sister we could ask for. Her outer 3 year old shell will be running around laughing and playing a game (usually to her rules), when all the sudden, a wrong move was made (usually by mommy) and she's reduced to a sobbing heap of tears on the floor. And I'm left standing there wondering what I did wrong. With that being said, she has the most impressive imagination and it's so much fun to play along with her adventures that she makes up in her mind. On a normal day, you could find us in a "boat" trying to get safe from all the sharks in the "water". All the sudden, we'll see her friend Leah or Jaxson in a boat next to us and they are fishing and catching salmon. They share the salmon with us and we all feast on delicious fish. The End. Another ritual we have every night at bedtime is that I read her a book in bed, and then she tells a story to me. Every single one starts off with "Once upon a time, there was a little girl named me." They are always about adventures that she goes on with her friends (either to bouncy houses, the aquarium, the zoo, etc) and they always end with each of them going home for "night night" or for a nap. I love it! Anna's favorite thing to do ever is to dance. She usually has to go upstairs and put on a "pretty dress" that does the "twirly twirl" and then she puts in requests for which song she wants to dance to from the ipod. She calls all songs "jams" because probably a year ago, I heard a song in the car that I loved and I turned it up and said "Anna! This is mommy's jam!" The other day, Dynamite came on and she yelled "Dynamite!! This is my favorite jam!" I just can't get enough of this girl. Her sense of humor is awesome and she is always saying things that make me laugh and I think "I really need to write these things down". My little cuddle bug melts my heart every day and I love the mother/daughter bond that is between us!

Dane and I count our blessings every single day!