Silver Falls

I just came across some pictures of a little trip we took down to Silver Falls a few weeks ago. It was such a great day. We had driven to the Tulip festival only to find miles and miles of cars backed up to get in so we decided to keep going and find a new place to discover. This park was beautiful and had the most gorgeous waterfalls. This one you could hike behind and the girls thought it was pretty amazing to be able to stand behind the waterfall. I just love having all of these new places to discover.

Not complaining, Just sharing . . .

So I just got online to check the weather for the next week since the girls have been begging to go to the neighborhood pool that just opened. Now, I'm not trying to be a complainer, I just wanted to share our 10 day forecast. I am now repeating in my head the words "I love the trees, I love the greenery, I love the flowers" over and over again. Please note the words in orange.

TonightJun 1
Partly Cloudy
N/A46°
10%

MonJun 2
Partly Cloudy
67°52°
10%

67°F
TueJun 3
Showers
59°50°
60%

59°F
WedJun 4
Showers
60°49°
40%

60°F
ThuJun 5
Mostly Cloudy
63°53°
20%

63°F
FriJun 6
Few Showers
58°53°
30%

58°F
SatJun 7
Showers
60°49°
50%

60°F
SunJun 8
Few Showers
65°50°
30%

65°F
MonJun 9
Showers
63°49°
60%


TueJun 10
Showers
69°51°
60%

Goings On!

Okay, so I know I have not been a great blogger lately. Justin's been working nights this past month and I've been spending quite a bit of time curled up with some great books. So I thought I would post a few pics of what's been going on these past few weeks.

I got to spend a weekend at the coast with some girlfriends. We rented a beach house and just relaxed, walked on the beach, ate way too many swedish fish and enjoyed the beautiful Oregon coast.

We also had Abby's birthday - 6 years old. She requested an "artist birthday party". It was so much fun. I took way too few pictures due to the intensity of 10 girls and tables of art supplies. We made pet rocks, decorated goody bags, painted little ceramic fairies, made mugs, etc. They were messy and so happy. Abby even decorated her own cake this year to look like a paintbrush. It was so fabulous but you'll have to take my word for it because I totally forgot to take a picture in all the excitement. I can't believe it.

The last picture is just Emma being so Emma.

Early morning walk on the beach (okay, not SO early but early enough for me)

Our rental house - it's for sale if anyone's looking. It was SO cute!

The birthday girl!

Abby and a few of the partyers being crafty.

Oh Emma, we love you!

It's a BOY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay, I had big plans to learn how to scan the ultrasound picture and post it, but I am just not up to the challenge I guess. I'll have to have Justin help me with that (pathetic, I know). We are so excited! The baby is looking healthy and wiggly and "smudgy" according to Abby who didn't think the ultrasound picture quite lived up to her visions of "seeing the baby". After the tech told us it was a boy the girls both said "Yeah, we really wanted a boy!". It was fun to see them so excited to see the baby's hands and feet and point out things they could see. They will be great big sisters! And although Justin insisted he would be thrilled with either a boy or a girl, I know that deep down he is thrilled to have a boy and not be so outnumbered with the drama that seems to come with the girls in this family! Anyway, had to share the news. Life has taken over lately and blogging has been neglected but I will try to do better. I will post pictures soon of Abby's wonderful birthday party . . .

Woodburn Tulip Festival

We had so much fun at the Tulip Festival! Okay, so it was hailing when we showed up. But we still couldn't get over how beautiful the tulips were. The girls LOVED it and think that we should grow this many in our backyard next year . . . hmmm,

Words to Live By . . .

So I was flipping channels tonight and came across one of my all-time favorites. Karate Kid I. It just happened to be the part where Mr. Miyagi says one of my all-time favorite movie lines; "Man who catch fly with chopsticks, accomplish anything". I mean, seriously, how cool is Miyagi.

To Learn About Oneself . . .

It's amazing how much I can learn about myself from my girls. Apparently I must have had a hard week because this was our conversation tonight.

Me: Okay girls, what should our goals be for this week? (we set goals on Sunday night)
Abby: Doing what you ask without saying "no". (All said with a bored, annoyed look on her face.)
Emma: Going potty when you ask and not being grumpy. (Same goal for the last 8 weeks)
Me: Okay, what should Mommy's goals be this week?
Abby: Don't be grouchy anymore! (Rolled right off her tongue like she didn't even need to think about it).
Emma: Do yowa (your) haya (hair) a little pwettier!
Abby: Don't be sick anymore!
Emma: Don't be grouchy anymowa (anymore)! (wait, didn't we already say that)
Me: Okay, okay, that's enough goals for me this week. What should Daddy's be?
(long silence) . . .
Abby: Work really hard at work.

Looks like Justin already has it made. Apparently, I am a sick grouch with bad hair.

If you need to learn anything about yourself, just ask your kids. But be prepared for a way too honest answer.

Just thinking about you!

Okay, I know I say it all the time but I really feel so lucky to have Justin in my life. I don't know how he does all he does and still does it all so well. I think I can count on one hand the amount of times in the past 5 years that he has woken up past 6:00 a.m. He never complains and still finds a way to be the love of all of our lives. This picture was on Valentine's Day. My mom was in town and he brought all 4 of us flowers (my mom was taking the picture). The girls are always so excited to get their Valentine's flowers from their daddy. Thanks Justin for lighting up our lives.

HAPPY SPRING!

Sunriver Getaway!

Thanks to our fabulous brother and sister-in-law (thanks again guys!), Justin and I had a little getaway without the girls a few weeks ago. We drove out to Sunriver and stopped by Smith Rock on the way. It is this huge climbing mecca and is SO beautiful! We didn't have any of our gear so we settled for hiking around a bit and watching the climbers. It was pretty cold but there still were still quite a few climbers braving the weather.

Do you see the little people on the rock?Relaxing at our hotel in Sunriver. Justin enjoyed a great day of skiing at Mt. Bachelor while I opted for sleeping in, reading by the fire and taking a nap. It was fabulous!

Happy Belated Easter!

So I realize that I have a lot of catching up to do from this past month. I will slowly but surely get to it all . . . maybe not so surely, but I will try. We had a really nice Easter this year. Abby wrote a letter to the Easter Bunny asking him to please come on Saturday this year since Daddy had to work all day on Sunday. And you know what? That Easter Bunny listened and he came on Saturday. We were blessed with a beautiful sunny day full of egg hunts, picnics and dying Easter eggs. It was fabulous. It also left us with an Easter Sunday to spend time contemplating the true meaning of Easter instead of poring over baskets all day. Not to say that plenty of candy-eating didn't happen though. The girls really got it this year and were so excited to talk about the Resurrection and be thankful for all that Jesus Christ has truly done for us. We might ask the Easter Bunny to come on Saturday every year! We hope you all had a great Easter too!

Our Baby is 4!!!!!!!

Little Emma Lou Who celebrated her birthday this month. 4 is looking great on her. She has a whole list of things she can do on her own now that she is 4 (and will soon be a big sister). This new-found sense of responsibility is fabulous. We had a great "Princess" party with her friends - dress up required! Here is her cake from this year. Cakes have become a pretty big deal for the girls. They start thinking about the kind of cake they want months in advance which is nice for me so I have some time to figure out how I (not a cake decorator at all) am going to pull it off. Emma was pretty happy with how the castle turned out. Luckily they are not huge critics. As long as it resembles their vision, they are thrilled.
Pizza/dress up party = 8 squealing giggly girls, game of pin the lips on the frog prince, princess and the pea game (identify the pillow sitting on top of the rubber bouncy ball), cake, ice cream, more squealing and giggling, one happy birthday girl!
Cakes of Years Past - Lightning McQueen - 3 Years Old

Cinderella - 2 Years Old
I didn't include a 1 year old cake picture since I guess I didn't deem it necessary to take a picture of the store-bought pink double cupcake pkg. we bought for her 1st birthday. Must have been a rough week. Anyway, Happy Birthday Emma! We love you so much and thanks for filling our lives with so much joy! You are a gift!

Excuses, excuses!

Okay, so some of you may have noticed that I have been seriously slacking in my blogging lately. Well, I guess it's time to come clean about why! BABY ON THE WAY! Yes, we are expecting #3 and #3 is making me very tired and very sick. I guess it's time for me to pay my dues since I wasn't too sick with either of my other pregnancies, or it's been long enough now for me to forget if I was. All I have to say is, thank goodness for grapefruit and english muffins.

The girls couldn't be happier about the baby, they ask me every day if it's time for the baby to come. I'm 11 weeks, it's going to be a long 7 months!

The Great Outdoors!

Just a few reasons we LOVE Oregon . . .

the beach - (doesn't it look warm?) but beautiful all the same

waterfalls and moss

Multomah Falls and the Columbia River Gorge

Hiking with the girls

Exploring

Soccer Moms!

So I had to put a shout out to our soccer team, the "Leftovers". This was taken after our first big win. Yes, we went 3 games without scoring a goal. Most of us have never played soccer before so it's been pretty fun(ny). Way to go girls!

Sleepy?

Sometimes you just need a nap and can't be bothered to stop playing to do it. This is how I found Emma the other day. The funny thing is that about 10 minutes before this I asked her if she wanted to go down for a nap. "No mommy, I'm not tired at all!" She slept like this for over 2 hours.

Tagged!

So I've been tagged, sorry it's taken me a bit to get to it Jill! I think I did this a while back so I will try and think of some different and Oh So Interesting things about me :)

1 - I cannot stand the words "cankerous", "crusty"(unless referring to bread), "moist", and "festering". Just to name a few, my repertoire of disgusting words is ever-growing as Justin is so sweet to share many from his medical books. I will spare you the worst of them, as this is a family blog.

2- I have lived in Utah, Connecticut, Delaware, Chicago, Israel, France, San Francisco, and Portland. I LOVE to travel, it is actually a really big obsession. We don't do it too much these days but I dream about it constantly. I love to learn about different cultures, try different foods and meet new people.

3- Justin and I would love to do international medicine in the future. We had the chance to go to Ethiopia for a few weeks to do Ophthalmology research and humanitarian work. We loved it and feel like that is part of our life's mission.

4 -I am always changing my hair style and color. I get an idea in my head and can't get it out. I've had blonde, red, black and now brown. I am really trying to keep the current one for a while. It's killing me though.

5 - I fell in love with Justin at first sight. We met at the Freshman orientation dance at USU and I asked him to dance. We dated for 2 years, waited for eachother on our missions, and have now been married for 6 wonderful years.

6- I love to clean! Whenever I feel down or upset, I vacuum. It is amazing what it does for me. I never feel better than when I have a clean, organized house. Not that it is always like that, but I would love for it to be.

7- I am playing soccer for the first time in my life. I have never played soccer before except for a few pick-up games in France. I am playing on an indoor team with some girlfriends here in Portland. It is so much fun and I'm so happy to pick up a new sport at age almost-30. I scored my first goal last night!

Okay, way more than you ever wanted to know. I tag all of you! I love to hear things I may not have known about you!

Before and After

So, here's my attempt at being very HGTVish with the before and after shot. We have been struggling with this one wall in our house/apt./duplex (I never know what to call it), our home! We just have not been able to figure out what to hang on it. We also struggle with the "brown factor" and have in fact deemed our home the Brown Wonder. We love it, love it here. But the fact remains that all is brown. The walls, the carpet, doors, trim, cupboards, you name it. It is also a fact, in case you haven't heard, that it rains quite a bit here in Portland. So, living in the Brown Wonder in the rain can start to feel a little dull. I needed a little color. Now I didn't want to exert to much time or money on a rental so we decided that maybe just the wall could use a splash. Well, I thought, why not bright orange. I love orange. So by then I couldn't be stopped.

But then, what to hang on the orange wall. My sister-in-law gave me these fabulous old windows, thanks Meg. I knocked out the glass and spruced them up with a little spray paint and crackle glaze to make them look old again. Justin had the fabulous idea of filling the panes with happy fabric. I don't think he actually said "happy fabric" but that was my interpretation.

Here is the result and I have to say that it has made me extremely happy the past 4 days to have an orange wall in my house. Now if we could just do something about the ceiling fan . . .

One of my other projects since we moved in was painting this table black and recovering the seats. We are hoping soon to move to a bigger table that actually allows for plates and food on the table at the same time. But this one has served us faithfully for 6 years of marriage and with the new look has let me hold on to it for a little longer.

This next project is New Year's mania taking hold of me. We went from a chart-free home to a chart-run home overnight. But it is wonderful and is helping us all stay in line. We have the Prayer chart, Family Home Evening chart, Chore charts, and schedules for each of the girls. The schedules have been so great for the girls. I used to make these with my special ed students all the time and they have been a dream with my girls too. It keeps them going with what they need to be doing and helps me to follow through too. Plus, they get to reward themselves by putting the activity in the happy or frowny face bag when they've completed it.

Blogger Slacker

I have been a major blogger slacker lately. Things have been really busy since the New Year (aren't they always). But I have been busying myself lately with a lot of projects, painting, reading and organizing. The usual, I know, but I've been doing even more than usual lately. So, I decided I would combine the two and post a few of my projects on here for posterity. Okay, mostly just for my benefit so I can keep a photo journal of them. Here are a few to start!



These are the elf tea towels I stitched for a Christmas present. I loved these patterns, I thought they were so simple and sweet. The great thing is that there are so many crafty people out there that post patterns on their blogs now so I can benefit from their creativity.


This was my favorite Christmas project. I made these capes for the girls. They were a major pain since I made them out of satin - but they HAD to be shiny! They are reversible. So the one side is the princess crown with their initial and the other side is the lightning bolt if they want to be a little more superhero. They LOVE these capes and wear them all the time. I'm glad they liked them since they took quite a while to make. Okay, more to come . . .