Too Warm For Us Oregonians

Let's face it. When the temperature here on the Oregon Coast reaches 70 . . . everyone is complaining about how hot it is. I have to admit, my California blood is almost non existent . . . it's warm for me too. The difference is, I LOVE IT!!!! LOVE IT LOVE IT LOVE IT!! It makes me so happy!!

On that note . . . it's too warm and beautiful out to be sitting here blogging, so here a few pictures of the things we are doing while I am NOT sitting here. ;)

We went on a fantastic bike ride!!! We rode across town. All three kids on their OWN bikes! They did fabulous! We are biking family! Afterwards, we all lounged on the back "porch" and drank water and talked about the ride. I love this family!







Lovin' on my Honey! What better time than in the summer!

Our water slide fills up all sorts of time. We took a pool noodle and poked holes in it. Strap it to a 2x4 and run the hose into it. Perfect for keeping the slide wet and the kids cool!

Water guns. How so up Reece's alley these things are. He gets to shoot people. People don't really die. Perfect.

Come Dance With Me

It's the weekends my Sweet Dears! One of our favorite things to do around here is dance. We often have no rhythm and we look funny but boy, do we love it.
I'll ignore the laundry that I put on the couch to fold. You ignore your own list of chores awaiting you and put on your dancing shoes and come dance with us, we love you and the way you look tonight.

Need Your Feedback

So I want some black and white shots in my hall or living room of the kids. I want it to not look poised or formal, but to show off some of the kids facial features that I just love plus through in a side of their personality. I like this from over at My Life. There was another wall I saw recently, but for the life of me, I can't find it!!!

I absolutely love this shot of Mada. I love the wisps of hair falling around her face. Her profile looks lovely and beautiful. I can see her series personality here.

Reece is a goofball and I love the smile he is giving. I have another picture of him I'm debating on but I like the fun loving side I see here. I have to admit, his big gorgeous eyes are not shown off here, but his cute smile is. I love that smile!

I don't know why I am drawn to this photo of Grace. I think it's the memory that it provokes. She is smiling in wonder when she heard her brother's voice coming out of the pipe. I actually captured that look and treasure it.

Those are my three I'm leaning towards matting and putting up. I'm kinda thinking of these too . . .

How can you look at this and not smile

Or this for Reece . . . .

But then I like this profile one of him too . . . . .it's a bit more series, but I like the profile. He was talking with his Grandma on the phone when I took it and the one above. He was laughing at me sitting there clicking away at him.

What do you think? Leave me some feedback.

Running Away

My youngest two decided to run away today. I came walking down the hall and overheard the kids talking about their list of things to pack. I peek around the corner and see they have their bags out and are stuffing all sorts of things in them. Hmmm, I wonder if it is my cooking that is driving these poor kids away.

"Don't forget the food!" says Madison. Apparently she wasn't too distressed to have brother and sister taking off. Probably dreaming of a room by herself. She really wants her own room.

"Dark Haired Beauty, has food at her house. I'll eat hers." replies Reece.

"I just need my shoes." says Grace

"Mom! I'm running away to Dark Haired Beauty's house." Grace informs me.

"You are?!" I'm shocked. I thought we had a good day of fun planned. This is news to me.

"Yes, I'm going to ride my bike." She says.

"But how will you find it?" I ask

"I'm going to follow Reece. He is running away too."

"Oh, okay."

"I think I'm only going to ride half way," says Reece. "it's too far away."

"Yes, that's true. It's pretty far. Plus, I think Dark Hair Beauty has company already. You really should of called her first." I say.

"Well, then we'll go to Hot Aunt's house." Reece says.

"Well, that would be fun, but I think Cool Dude got in trouble and can't have company today." I say.

"GRANDMA'S!!! We'll go there!!" they yell.

"Oh, I'm sure Grandma would really love to have you, but she isn't home. She is at work and you are not allowed to run away to Grandma's work. She would get in trouble."

"Grandpa will take us!"

"But he is at work too." I shake my head. "I just don't think today is a good day to run away. How about we pull out the Waggly Water Dog and invite the neighbor kids over to play in the backyard?"

"Okay, we'll run away another day when we can call first." says Reece.

"That sounds like a good plan." I say.

The Week's End

It has been a very long and hard week. Everyone in my home has been effected and we are worn out. As a mother, I'm feeling like a failure. I feel like I have not been able to give my kids the time and activities I wanted to this summer. I feel I have let my kids down and not done the best I could for them. Anyways, enough of my own little pity party of one. The week has ended, it's Friday afternoon and I believe I have found a moment to breathe, kick back, relax and spend some time with the kiddos and brown eyed hunk I married.

Today we are doing this . . . . .


Of course, it's only fun when the neighbor kids join in too.

Plus, throw in some things to hit each other with and it's the perfect recipe for fun in the afternoon. We did get a moment this week to enjoy some of our favorite Portland Parks.

Reece and Grace enjoyed talking into this thing and listening to each other across the play structure. Pretty cool.



Maddie admired herself in the mirror. Such a cutie.



A funny little thing. On the way home Reece asked me about when he was in my belly. He was curios what his name would of been if he was a girl. I told him we never had any girl names picked out for him, because we found out he was boy and then a few months later, we were able to pick out his name. Reece asked about Maddie and told the kids that Maddie was almost a Morgan. It wasn't until about two months before she born that we changed over to Maddie. If Maddie had been a boy, she would of been Ethan Michael. The kids were all laughing and thinking this was funny. They asked about Grace and told them we didn't know if she was going to be a boy or girl till she born and we had Ethan picked out for her if she would of been a boy. Of course this conversation leads to more questions and Reece asked how we knew he was going to be a boy before he came out of my tummy. I told him about the machine at the hospital that can see through my skin and look at Reece's baby body inside of me.


"But how can they see if I'm a boy or girl?" Reece asked again.


"Reece, your boy parts are long and girl parts are small." Madison quipped.

Well put my dear girl.



**Lastly . . . Here is Reece, just in case you have a few extra minutes you want to spend in the sprinklers.

The Suit

It's funny how one event brings back memories of another event in the past, sometimes making the pain just too fresh. I mentioned earlier about Mike's Grandpa Charlie passing away this past week. He was a fantastic Grandpa and a amazing Great Grandpa. He was funny, generous, hard working and loving. He is going to be very missed.
Yesterday, after church we were driving over to a couple's house who were so very generously loaning Mike a suit jacket to wear for the funeral. Mike's eyes were swollen and teary and I too was a bit choked up (missing both Charlie and my own Grandpa who passed a few months back). It was a solemn moment in our van.
Grace, being our ever so curious daughter, asked Mike where we going.
"We are going over to Dave and Heidi's home so I can borrow a suit jacket to wear tomorrow. I'm going to be a Pall Bearer tomorrow." Mike says.

"You are going to be a POLAR BEAR!" Grace shouts

What a little blessing our dear daughter gave us. Nothing like a funny remark to make us all laugh and lighten our hearts.


*** A little side note. Mike and I are just so thankful for our church family. The kind words given to Mike about his Grandpa have been treasured greatly. Dave who loaned Mike the suit jacket. I'm speechless. The coat Dave loaned Mike is his very best suit jacket. It's one he JUST GOT. His daughters gave up their Christmas gifts in order for Dave to get his suit. We can tell the suit was very special to Dave and he so freely loaned it to Mike. It was incredibly touching.

It's What's For Dinner

It's been a rough week. Our family has been hit hard this week and we are weary and tired. Isn't it always the case, that when you are having a rough time and life is throwing the hard stuff at you, that it doesn't hold back, it just keeps piling it on? Such has been the week for us. It's much like my laundry that I have shown you before, it just gets more and more, bigger and bigger.

On that note, tonight I was making dinner. I wanted to make something special for my husband who lost his dear Grandpa this week. I decided to make my family's favorite, Chicken Alfredo with a white wine sauce. Well, I was balancing a few things at the time and trying to get the dinner together quickly. I grabbed the wrong bottle and ended up pouring a Merlot into my sauce.

The picture doesn't do it justice. My sauce was purple. We ate purple food tonight. If it wouldn't of been so funny and given Mike and I a good laugh, I would of cried. Who serves purple food to their family anyways? Oh ya, I do. ;)

Popped

I think Reece popped one of his stitches out today. Uh-oh. Official word will come in tomorrow when Mike takes him to the Dr. I hope he didn't, but it sure looks like it. If he did, he'll have to get stitched up again and have another 10 days of resting his leg. Very hard for a little active boy to do.

In other "Popped" news, 4th of July was great.

The kids got to do sparklers.Madison enjoyed sparkling the backyard.

Reece played swords with his sparkler.

I stood on the deck and annoyed all who came around. This is what I do best.

Mike lit the fireworks and then ran for his dear life.

All the cousins sat down to enjoy the display. What fun they had.

This last picture I threw in because it is just because. Mike took his little niece over to watch the big display that was going off. Looks like a hill is on fire or something, doesn't it?