Masaru's piano

I was watching a video of my nephew playing the piano the other day and it made me realize that I hadn't taken a video of Masaru playing!!
So this morning while he was being taught I took a video of one of the songs that he's been practicing.

He loves his teacher and is happy and that's what I care about the most.  It's not a fight for him to practice and I love hearing him play.  It makes me happy.  I hope he continues for a long time.  

Extra LP pictures I just received

 Masaru and his cuzzie who's jokes make him happy, down below.
Masaru's face cracks me up in this top one.  They did a lot of fishing.

 I think maybe my nephew is trying to look all handsome but Masaru is ruining the pictures.

 Nice photo bomb.

 Masaru loves Luke. I actually really like this picture.  I bet if I printed it off Masaru would stick it up in his room somewhere.  I need to do that.

 Ahh maybe he loves him because he tastes good? o_0

Close up of the fish and someone feet and hair.  Hmmmmmmm Luke's feet and hair?  Dunno.

My mother saw pictures of Lake Powell back in September and said to me 'Melissa you just look like you have the best summers, I want to come over for this'
I'm like 'Sure mum, come over whenever you want'
So skip over a few weeks and my mother told me her 2 weeks off school is at the exact same time that our LP trip is next summer and so her and her husband are going to come over for it.
She's just in the final details of booking it.
I haven't told the kids yet, just in case, but I couldn't be happier.  I think LP is the type of trip my mother would absolutely love.
So as long as Dru's family is ok with it, we could have some more kiwi visitors crashing LP with the Nakaya's hahahaha

Random stuff

 So first off here's some work by the kids that I need to record down since I throw almost everything out.  I dunno if my kids will be mad about that but I guess I gotta live with it.
I love Masaru's simple drawings.  I love that he loves the outdoors.  That makes me happy. 

 Here's a story Yuki did about Halloween.

 If she didn't make it then what happened?  Did she die?  Was she eaten?  I mean it just ended with her not making it!!  Nail biter. 

 I just thought this was beautiful.  I know I'm bias.

This one by Masaru was pretty cute.

It's true though, he does get mad when people get into his stuff.  He can eat at least a dozen gyoza in one sitting.  I love that he said he's not good at basketball.  How does he even know that?  His father's not good at b.ball as well, but I was pretty good.  

His favourite subject is art?  I thought it was P.E!!  Dru and I loved Art as well.  

I guess he couldn't get his favourite animal down to just one hahahaha

So his cuzzie he's talking about is Kate I bet.  Those two get together and laugh like highschool girls man.  It cracks me up.  Kate really does make him happy.  Sweet.

 So it snowed this week.  I mean I'm torn between being upset cause I can't mountain bike but being happy for the coverage of the back yard and the happiness of my kids.

 They've been playing outside a ton.  I love that my kids are so active.

 Takeshi making some 'eggs'

 Sweet gift Masaru got a couple of years ago.  It's a snow gun thing that makes the perfect snowballs.

Emiko gets into it as well. 

 Takeshi protecting his eggs.

 Wait a second is that Masaru eating the eggs?

Yep it is.  Sorry Takeshi.................hahaha
I guess he doesn't care.

 I was making tomato soup in the croc pot the other day and poured the thickener in and it made this wonderful pattern.  So I thought I'd take a picture of it.  Great soup if you want the recipe.

 What is this you ask?  Why am I taking pictures of a pair of brown boots?
Well people this is my FIRST pair of boots I've owned since I was FOUR YEARS OLD!!!
This is HUGE.  So I'm putting it in my blog.
Since I have more of a (ahem) muscular calf, boots don't fit me man.
Anyway I was at Macy's looking for a dress for my brother's wedding next month and happened upon $30 boots and thought 'alright man I'll just try some on'
Low and behold THEY FIT.  I couldn't believe it!!!

 And here's the reason why.  The zip only goes up to the bottom part of my calf.  So it doesn't have to try to make it's way all the way up my calf.  Perfect boot.  I'm happy.  They were cheap, they're comfy and so I'm happy.

Lastly this month's national geographic has a few page spread of my mates family/friends in Napal.  When I was hanging out with her the other day she pulled it out and showed me a picture of her father!!  He's the one (if you happen to have it) putting the prayer flags up in memory of those who died because of the avalanche.  Beautiful pictures and a great article.  Those people are amazing to me.  I love to just sit and listen to her talk and show me pictures of her village and life back there. 
So if any of you get this, have a read, and if you don't mind parting with it, you can give it to me to keep!!!

That's the end of this random post.  Thanks for playing.

'New' Clothes

So since Dru's the youngest in his family we get clothes.
I've mentioned this before. It's awesome.
So since we were just down in Utah we got a couple of bags from his sisters. We all made out man. Dru and I got some jackets and the kids got things.
It's nice cause I don't like to shop and they get neat things and keep them nice and then are glad to get rid of them by the end of it and clear out some space in the draws/garage/house.  Win, win right?  Right.
My kids always love to go through the bags and see what 'new' things they've gotten and try some things on and get them in their draws and talk about them.
It's pretty neat.
This is the first time Emiko has gotten into it.  Her and I were at home alone for the morning and she wanted to try on a whole bunch of her new clothes.  So we did a little fashion shoot.

 

New swim suits.  She says "Mum these are from my cuzzies"  It cracks me up.

She gets into princess things more than Yuki.  So she was pretty excited to have TWO of these PJ's.  Her cuzzies are twins.

Cute swim suit right?  We when we were trying on other things I realize this doesn't go together.  Classic me man.  I dunno what goes with what.  But it doesn't look too bad though.  If things are suppose to go together I need them attached, otherwise I make no promises.

I wasn't coaching her to pose at all.  She just did this. 

Here's the right pants for this top.

Hahahaha this is her new smile.  She looks like she's in pain.

Check out those big guns.

I messed up with these too.  These pants don't go with this top.  But it looks like it could right?

Love her face in this one.

Is her hand up?  Does she need something?

There's the right pants right there.  That looks better actually. 
Anyway thanks to the cuzzies for their sharing as these cuzzies in Boise LOVE it.

Humour me

So we've decided which pictures to print out but we love a lot of these pictures that were taken of us and so I need to put them up here so as they're printed in the blog book.  Otherwise they'll get shoved away never to be looked at again in some CD box collecting dust.
So for the blog book, here we go.

 How cute is this face?
Come on man, if this didn't make you smile then I dunno what will.

Cute pic of the two girls.  This one above is the one we'll frame and put in the girls bedroom.

 This is the one we chose to frame for Emiko.

This family pic was in the finals but just got beat out.  We still love it though, but it won't be hanging up anywhere in our house, so it'll have to be ok just hanging out in our blog book.j
We love Masaru's real smile in this picture.

 The one of Masaru that we'll frame.  I love it.

 This is more true to Takeshi's faces he gives us.  This face is classic Takeshi.

But we really like this one.  So this one will be framed.

This one will be framed of Yuki.  She's just about to lose her front tooth.  So I'm glad we got these pictures done before that happened.  She'd look beautiful no matter what though.

Here's the boys picture we'll frame and put in their room.

 Here's the picture of us girls we'll frame and put in the girls room.

 Then here are the others.  I love Emiko in this one.

I love this one too.  Look at Emiko's face man, it's like she's up to mischief.  Little rascal.

 Masaru's face was a little too fake for us in this one.

So we went with this one for framing in the boys room.  Masaru's face is a little less fake and Takeshi's face is so cute I can't even handle it.

 We went with this one for the boys room.

All handsome boys.

This one for the girls room.  So cute.

We liked this one too.  If only we could get Masaru to give us a real smile hahaha.
Then Takeshi liked playing with his pant pockets as well...............I think we did pretty good for 6 of us and 4 being kids though.

 We decided to go with this one for the couple's shot.  I love the background in these pictures.  Those are where the majority of Dru's and I's dates are, up in those foothills on our bikes. 

 How beautiful are those foothills in the background?

I love the outside pictures.  Great spot for our family.

 I really like this one of the kids.  Takeshi cracks me up.

This one makes me laugh.

 More family shots.

 This family one above is the one we'll frame.  We wish we could take Masaru's real smile of the other one and shove it in this one as everyone else looks good and we love the background.

Almost the exact same shot except I like a little drunk in this one.  Oh well.

 We really liked this one as well.  It was in the top 4.

 As well as this one.  I love the arrangement and everyone looks good.

Almost the same shot except Masaru's smile is that golden smile we only get to see every once and a while (love it) but look at Takeshi's face!!!  That kid cracks me up man.

 Then we've got some candid shots.

Love these.

So that's it.  This was the first photo shoot with Nat that it wasn't extreme weather.  The others were snow, rain and wind.  This shoot was pretty tame in comparison. 
Always nice to know a mate who's good with the camera.
Nat you're the best.  Love you forever.
Here's her blog so you can check her out and like her on face book.
http://nataliemarieboisephotography.com/