Kassi's "puppy"

With her birthday money from us & Great-Grandma & Great-Grandpa, Kassi chose this puppy for herself.

Kaylee took the camera and took several shots.

Sisterly Love...

Too bad they can't be this close & peaceful when they are awake.

My aunt and her kids stopped by on the way through to Seattle, so we doubled the girls up in one room.

Jetskiing...

Mike's brother, David, decided to spend some of his hard earned monies on some "toys". (What's the point of working so hard if you can't have some fun!) While he was gone one weekend, we took out his jetskiis and enjoyed an afternoon out on the river with some friends! It was a lot of fun. Getting the machines on the water was a bit of a challenge. I don't think our van was made to do this well, but it got done. Mike showed me how to "drive" and then we took our stuff to our "spot" and set off. The girls would not stop screaming as we zipped around the river. I think we scared a few people off with all their noise. Our friends joined us after a while, and then Jenny and I took the little ones off to a nearby wading area. The girls had fun, even "laid out" when they got a bit chilled. Then back to the river for more tubing and screaming and gathering rocks!

crafts & tennis....

Happy Father's Day!!

Yes, I still have the rest of my Houstan trip to blog, as well as what we've been up to since. Still need to get my hands on pics of the girls while I was gone...been busy with Activity Day Camp stuff that needs to be finished before the 4th of July weekend!! Coming up very soon!!

Kassi at Six

For Kassi's birthday, we had a lazy morning, then an afternoon of swimming with a few friends and cousins. Mike had gotten some water balloons, which they had a lot of fun playing with.

Ever since her cousins have gotten a dog, Kassi has been begging for one. Every day she'll ask, "when are we getting a dog mom?" Which the response has always been, "MAYBE after we build our house!" So...Before work this morning, Kassi asked Michael if he was going to make her a card for her birthday. He told her he would see what he could do. On his way home, he stopped to get a card and balloons for her. (You can see the card in the top left picture.) We hear him come home, the older girls run up to have me and Mikenna sign the card, shutting the door behind them...then I hear Michael telling Kassi, "Kassi! I got you a puppy!!" She starts screaming, "Where!! Where!!" Her sisters shout back, "Mom and Mikenna have it upstairs!" We're in the room signing our names, and Kassi runs upstairs and begins pounding on the door, "Open the door, I want to see my puppy!!" Michael is asking, "Are you sure? Are you ready!" He opens the door and Mikenna proudly hands her the card. (I'm giving Michael a "this is a mean joke" look...he's just smiling...) Kassi takes one look at her card, her happy smile turns sour and she throws it on the floor. I managed to get her to hold it and smile for a picture, but she was still bitter...

Then of course birthday dinner at Red Robin!!

Kassi...

Here's another birthday shot of Kassi with her cake...She kept changing her mind, but finally settled on "CampRock"...a simple ice cream cake with a lovely picture for a topper...Easy!!

Kassi is such a spunky six year old...she has grown and learned so much this past year, especially since she started school. She has developed a love for reading and wants to read books that really challenge her. She'll be fighting with her sisters one moment, and then is right there consoling and patting a back when a sister is hurt. She loves to sing and play the piano and is developing a love of playing the violin (hopefully :) She has a quick smile to share, but knows how to pull a very sad face. Kassi also loves to write notes for everyone. I love how she wants to hold my hand as she falls asleep.

Make up/Face painting at it's best...

clothes from Houston....

Here are pics of the skirts and tops Julia helped me pick out...the lighting isn't exactly the best...I don't think you can fully appreciate the coordination...

A slight trip....

Yesterday, we had just finished swimming at Grandma Chan's, the kids were running in the backyard, eating raspberries and etc. Kaylee is stepping over the diving board to get to some strawberries. For some reason, her 2nd leg/foot doesn't quite make it over-tripping her...She falls square on her left shoulder and cheek bone, scrapping her entire left leg down the front on the diving board. It was a horrible thud we heard when she landed. Luckily nothing was broken and she is left with scrapes and bruises-one leading to a lovely black eye.

H...6/12

Another morning of swimming, early afternoon of movies, coloring, puzzles...holding baby Olivia...

Then a fun afternoon of shopping!! My sister's sense of style has grown on my over the years, so, I like having her help me shop for clothes...we found a few cute skirts and shirts...

Followed by an evening of movies, ice cream, tong yuen, and web cam chats!

My girls are in Seattle...they are enjoying hanging out with my cousins Ada and Alicia...I think they went slip-sliding with the Miller's yesterday & got to go to see the HM movie...tomorrow will be the ballet!

H...6/11

Wow...we've been in Houstan for 15 days...I've been away from my girls and Michael for 15 days...still have 4 days to go...don't think we could have done it without cell phones and webcams...thank goodness for those...

Have I mentioned what the girls have been doing while I'm here in TX? Well, luckily for us, Mike's sisters' came for a visit...and so Grandma Gale was nice enough to help with the girls, that way they could spend time with their cousins, and Mike could spend time with his sisters after work and etc. They had a fun weekend together...I was sorry to miss visiting with them all as well, but am happy there were here to help my girls. (hopefully someone took pics and I'll be able to get my hands on them somehow...)

Mikenna wanted to go to the museum again to today...so we did...brought sandwiches this time, this place is huge, we hung out in a whole new area that we hadn't seen yet...this time the theme was all "motion"...we had a lot of fun there...of course we had to do the face painting again...sunshine smiley face, heart and stairs (anyone know the significance of stairs?)...before we left we got a few rocks, Mikenna has always loved marbles and such, so we got a few pretty rocks for her.

As we were walking back to the car, we noticed a light pole that other people had put their "entrance sticker" on...Mikenna wanted to add ours to it as well...

Once home, Mikenna snuggled right up to Olivia and fell asleep...

We to Olivia out tonight (met some of Tim & Ju's friends at a restaurant)...I had gone down first to make sure the carseat base was in correctly. As I went out the door, I shouted "make sure to buckle the baby in the carseat..." Well, when my mom walked out of the elevator into the garage, Olivia was in her arms, no carseat...so back up they went...

H...d14...6/10

Mom and I worked out this morning...the 4mile fast walk, only lasted 2 miles. Afterwards, Mikenna and I went swimming... it was 11:30 and the weather seemed perfect for swimming, except that it was rather windy...so we opted out and Mikenna "swam" around in the tub instead...Olivia joined her for a bit and seemed to really enjoy it...

The girls' last day of school was today too. Crazy that another school year is over.

Mikenna has totally befriended James...she kept chatting and trying to get him to play with her.

Mikennaism:
Julia is burping the baby. Baby's head is on Julia's shoulder, one eye is open and the other is closed, because it is against Julia's shoulder...

Mikenna, "I think Olivia thinks her eye is broken."

H...d13...6/9

Olivia had her first doc appt. today...all is well and she is 6 lbs. 9 oz.

After the appt. Julia dropped Mikenna and I off at the Children's Museum...we revisited some of our favorites, and checked out areas we hadn't seen yet...Mikenna's new favorite is face painting!

A few hours later, Julia came back to pick us up. We had to juggle things with the car today because James, Tim's brother, just flew into town until tomorrow to work on getting visas for Mexico...

We hung out for the rest of the day...Mikenna has really warmed up to James, it's kind of funny to watch....