The Blog is moving!

After nearly 8 years of having our blog on Blogger, we're moving to wordpress. Everything else should more or less be the same, but the new url is:

misrafam.wordpress.com

All the old posts have been moved over, so we're hoping this isn't too big of a deal for any of you.

And since wordpress supports things like editing on mobile, hopefully this means you'll get more blog content on our regular weekly schedule.

If you have any questions, just let us know! The new site is up and running, but we're going to keep tweaking it over time.

Snowpocalypse (Part 2)

So I think this whole "snow" thing officially is getting old. On Sunday the roads were still icy so church was cancelled across the entire stake. While we love going to church, it was actually kinda nice because we just got to hang out at home as a family, play games, and just chill. We also took the whole 'home-centered, church-supported' idea to a whole new level by having our own church service at home! Luke wanted to lead the music so he was in charge of that, and then Jacy, Luke and Amit gave talks. We even brought up our mock podium that we used when Luke was practicing giving his first ever talk in primary!  The best part was that when Luke got up to "give" is talk about Nicodemus, we thought he was just going to summarize the story.  But then he started to talk.  Amit and Marinda looked at each other, and then Amit grabbed the children's new testament stories off the shelf and turned to the Nicodemus story.  And yeah, you guessed it, Luke was quoting from memory the ENTIRE story word for word!

And our next speaker, from the Baby's Quorum...

Hot chocolate (and hot chocolate goatees) have been an important part of the kids' snow experience

Sunday evening the snow started picking up again, and then Monday was the start of slushmageddon - snow that turned to rain which didn't quite melt the snow but just made it super heavy, and then it froze overnight. All in all, this meant no school Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and Amit worked from home those days. Since we didn't want the kids to spend all their time staring at a screen, Marinda instituted mommy school! She had the kids on a schedule (which they helped pick out using cards).

Activity cards

Our bushes were collapsing under the weight of the water-saturated snow

The other big thing this week was Valentine's Day! We are going to celebrate tomorrow (Monday) because 1) we didn't know if we'd be able to get down our hill with the ice and slush by Thursday and 2) it's WAAAAAY easier to get a good reservation a few days after Valentine's Day. But the kids had Valentine's celebrations at school - and we didn't even know school was on until the night before! But Marinda came to the rescue with her Cricut. The kids had a blast working with Mommy. Jacy was amazed that you pushed a button and it did all the work for you!

In other news, Asher is army crawling all over the place now! He can now get to the family room pretty easily, and thankfully the kids have been really on top of keeping the room clean and keeping legos and other small things off the ground. He also has gotten into trouble by crawling under chairs and getting stuck! We're glad our little explorer is so curious though! 

On the downside, Asher was sick this week. Maybe he's teething, or maybe he just caught something, but either way he has been pretty unhappy. The good news is that he is being a lot more vocal about how unhappy (or happy) he is. Sometimes we'll talk to him and he'll "respond" and Luke will be like "Hey! Asher said he wants more food!" or "Asher's talking! He says he wants his bottle!"

Snowpocalypse (part 1)

It snowed this week! We got about 7 inches Sunday night through Monday morning, so obviously this being Seattle school was cancelled and Amit worked from home. The kids had a blast playing outside. The first thing Jacy did was make a snow angel. Two other kids from our street came to play too and the four kids tried going sledding, and ended up just playing in the snow.

Kids watching the snow fall Sunday afternoon

So much snow!

Asher did not like being out in the cold very much

That night we had a movie night and let the kids eat in the family room!

The next day school was cancelled again because the roads were still in really bad shape, so Marinda invited a bunch of other parents and their kids to come play in the snow. We had 10 kids at our house (including Asher) which was a little nuts, but it was great for Luke to see all his friends.

Amit walked down to 173rd to see how the roads were (they were bad) and decided to take some pictures at the park!

On Wednesday they reopened the school, but the fun wasn't over yet! We got an early release on Friday because the second big storm of the year came in and dumped another 4 inches of snow on us

In non-Snow related news, Asher is getting better at army crawling! He can pretty easily scoot himself forward now, thought he's not getting so far to get into a lot of trouble (yet).

There's supposed to be more snow this upcoming week, so we're predicting this is just Part 1 of the Snowpocalypse!

Luke's obsession with Portal 2, Jacy's Dance Show, and Asher's First Swing!

This was a pretty normal week, so nothing too exciting happened, but we do have some funny things to share about the kids.

Jacy insists on wearing socks that don't match every day. We're not sure why she started doing it, but every morning she comes out with a new 'pair' of socks and says 'Look!' and she shows us how her socks don't match.

This week was Jacy's show week at dance/gymnastics! Amit even came on Thursday since he was working from home. Beforehand, he took in Asher in for the baby class, which is really just a bunch of adults sitting around with their babies sitting on the floor. Asher just looked around and was not in to the bubbles or the guitar at all. But after that Jacy did her dance routine! She was so happy we were able to go in and watch her up close and she did great too! After that she had her costume change for gymnastics. She got to show us all the cool stuff she can do now like go backwards on the balance beam! Meanwhile, Asher hung out by himself in the open play area.

Luke has been really excited about reading to Asher lately! There's not much more to the story than that, but we're really excited that Luke's excited!

Remember that Portal shirt Luke got for Christmas from Grandma and Grandpa? Well, Luke is wearing that same shirt every single day so we had to order more. In related news, Luke is doing a lot better at keeping his clothes (really his shirt) clean now that he knows he'll have to wash it if it gets dirty.

Luke beat Portal 2 and then replayed the ending over and over. And last night he started making drawings of stuff from Portal, like a portal gun and a turret. He has also informed us he wants a Portal-themed birthday party with a turret cake (why couldn't he pick something easier like a companion cube cake?) We're not sure what we can have the kids do that's like Portal. Laser-tag maybe?

Marinda played Portal 2 for a bit on Saturday with Luke watching (do you see a theme in Luke's life by any chance?) But apparently Luke has perfected every level of Portal so when Marinda didn't do things exactly right he'd tell her what exactly she should do. Marinda, getting frustrated, said to Luke, "I know how to play Portal. Do you know who taught YOU how to play?" To which Luke replied, "Yeah, Grandpa!" forgetting about when he started playing a couple years ago. And apparently Portal is now Luke's game, not ours because he plays it. Something like squatter's rights I guess. Anyways, at one point it got so bad that Luke said to Marinda "Do you even know how to play? Why aren't you doing it right?"

Luke is also doing Portal drawings. It's just been that sort of week I guess.

Lastly, Asher got to go in the swing for the first time this week!

Asher's trying to crawl!

This week was not all that interesting, mostly because Luke got sick! Starting on Saturday or Sunday night he came into our room because he wasn't feeling well and on Tuesday night he had a really bad fever. So he was sick most of the week and got lots of screen time, which meant Jacy got lots of screen time too. Luke really loved watching 'Cool Runnings' over...and over...and over again and loved it every time. By Friday afternoon or so he was pretty much fine, just in time for the school week to be over :)

Other than that our little Asher is starting to turn into very mobile boy! He's not crawling yet, but he's rolling more than ever, army crawling a foot or two at a time, and getting into some crazy yoga poses as he's trying to figure this whole movement thing out.

Asher is also getting much better at eating solid foods. The other night we gave him Cheerios and on his tray. We'd come back a few minutes later and all the Cheerios were gone (many on the floor, but others, presumably in his tummy). Thinking he was just munching them down we kept putting more and more on the tray. When he was finally done, he took the tray off and there were Cheerios all over his lap and chair!

Another fun story is that we took the kids bike riding and Jacy is doing so much better (Luke is still awesome at riding his bike, don't worry). Jacy also showed off her super almost-four-year-old muscles by lifting up her bike and carrying it herself!

And since it was a slow week, here are some more pictures of random stuff that happened.

There was a lunar eclipse and this is the best picture we got of it. 

Kids being entertained by the activity packs during Stake Conference. Thanks Stake Primary Presidency!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! We enjoyed a nice, (relatively) relaxing Christmas with just the five of us. On Christmas Eve we decided to relax and just spend it at home. We ordered Thai takeout and did a mini-devotional in our living room. We sang a couple songs, read the Christmas story in the Bible and Book of Mormon, and read our new copy of The Shiniest Star, which is the book Marinda's family read every Christmas Eve growing up. And of course, the kids were wearing their new Christmas PJs from Grandma the entire night!

Kids tracking Santa's progress online

Christmas morning started with Luke being a bit too eager to go out and see what Santa had brought before we were ready, but eventually he settled down after having a good cry in his room and was happy to see his presents from Santa! Luke got the Fire Response lego set he asked Santa for and a Chopper (Star Wars droid) pillow, and Jacy got the hot air balloon lego set she asked Santa for and a Wonder Woman doll. Both got an orange, a bell, some jam and nutella and baby reindeer stuffed animals. Asher got an elephant chew toy and some baby food crackers to chew on, as well as a stuffed reindeer and a bell. Amit got a gift card to nearby escape room and some chocolate, and Marinda got a child development book that Amit has been bugging her to read for months (how did Santa know???) and some sour punch straws. After opening presents, we ate some pancakes and the kids enjoyed playing with their presents!

Jacy finishing up her hot air balloon.

After enjoying a break with Santa's presents we opened presents within our immediate family. We gave Luke a coast guard lego set, Jacy a play tea set, and Asher stuffed beaver with a chewable tail (notice a theme with Asher's presents and chewing?). Asher gave Luke and Jacy Christmas train lego set each. Luke and Jacy got each other paw patrol toys, which prompted a giant tackle-hug from Jacy to Luke. Marinda got some new jewelry - a pair a of ear cuffs from the kids and a necklace from Amit.

Then we opened presents from Jejema and Jejebapa and Dadai (presents from Grandma and Grandpa would have to wait a couple days until they came in person). Jejema and Jejebapa sent dinotrux toys for Luke and Jacy and a penguin toy for Asher. Dadai's present was the one we were all anxious about though. All Thanksgiving he was teasing Luke that he was going to get him vegetables for Christmas. But Luke really wanted a clone turbo tank lego set, which is one that they stopped making so is really hard to find except on ebay. Thankfully, Dadai came through with something besides cauliflower and got Luke his lego set! He also got Jacy an airplane lego set and Asher a water play mat. After opening these presents the kids definitely had enough to play with, and they basically just played with toys for the next two days.

Well, the kids played except for one important thing - gingerbread houses. Luke had been looking forward to eating his Gingerbread House for days. But when it came down to actually eating the whole thing...well, let's just say expectation did not match reality. He ate some of the candy but then realized he didn't actually like most of the gingerbread house and left the rest.

Asher is enjoying being adorable in various Christmas outfits. Just look at him in his Santa outfit!

Asher is soooo ready to crawl! All week he's been getting his knees under his hips and once he even got on his elbows and knees and started rocking back and forth. We are excited to see our little guy get more mobile but also terrified of how to manage a mobile baby in a very-not-baby-proof house.

On Thursday Grandma and Grandpa came! Luke and Grandpa continued their tradition of playing Portal together, and the next day we opened more presents! Luke got a Portal shirt from them, which he wants to wear all the time now. He also got a sail boat lego set. Jacy got a doll train play set which she loves to death. The kids also got a set of toy cars that all of them can play with from the Slacks!

That night we went to Mod Pizza for dinner. Last time we went to Mod Pizza Luke ate his entire mini pizza and most of Jacy's pizza since she wasn't hungry. So we decided to just get him a regular (Mod-size) pizza and he was REALLY excited. And I guess the excitement was contagious because Jacy got caught up in it too!

Last but not least, the kids expressed their gratitude by writing thank you letters to Santa. Luke wrote out his own letter (with help) and Jacy traced hers. They both did a great job! Merry Christmas everyone!