Seaside, 2014

The one in which I post copious amounts of photos.  Heehee.

Roll tape:

Multnomah.  So so packed and crammed full of people, it took us 15 minutes to find a place to double-park.

Quick pics, then back to the car.

Arrive at the ocean.  Sunshine lasted all week, it was beautiful and we were in heaven!

Goofing off for the camera.

My favorite person.

Found some cutie cousins on the beach!

...and shells!

If you insist on taking pics like that, I'm gonna post them all over the web.  So there.

My favorite shot.

 

Boys.

A little PDA on the beach :) 

Family Photo Alert.

Dave, in typical style, took us out for dinner for Father's Day.  So fun!

...beautiful views.  Good food.  Astoria bridges.

My people.

The whole crew!

Joe, bein' studly!

All the kids.  We were definitely outnumbered.

Joe and I left a couple of days early so he could log some hours at work, and the kids stayed behind, where now the adults were seriously outnumbered.  Sounds like a fun, super-crazy adventure! 

We stopped in to say hello to my grandma, who always shares a book with me.  She is the sweetest and most cheerful soul!  It was so good to see her!

We took advantage of our exclusively over-21 status and stopped at Maryhill Winery to sample their best.  Which was pretty fantastic.  Bought a bottle and enjoyed it out on the balcony overlooking the vineyard.  It was a perfect day.

When we got home, we hardly knew what to do with ourselves without any children, but the time flew, of course :)

What a wonderful week!

Fun on Kamiak with Grandma!

Mom's Day

So, for Mother's Day this year, Joe bought me two microphones.  You can imagine my surprise when I opened them.  I thought he might be encouraging me to follow my dream of becoming a lounge singer, or the next Norah Jones.  And why two?  Was he going to be joining me on this escapade?  Certainly we cannot sing, so our fate was surely to be more of the Milli Vanilli variety.

But nope, this little microphone was taking the 50s idea for an intercom straight into the new millennium!  So instead of hollering up the stairs at my kids 14 times a day, I can just whisper into this little baby and the command becomes more than the children can resist.

I'm not gonna lie, we've also used it to karaoke to "Do you wanna build a snowman?"  Maybe Norah isn't in my future, but the kids can dream, can't they?!

Bloomies!

Signed up for Bloomsday this year, mostly cause I need motivation to get into the gym every once in a while, and if you don't train for Bloomsday, it will chew you up, spit you out, and feed you to its children.  Doomsday made me want to cry, and that is definitely where I lost momentum.  For me, running is 99% mental, and I was not feeling it.

But I love it as much as I hate it, and I will sign up again for the same torture next year.  But next year I'm gonna be good at it!!  Hehe...

Livin' it up on my birthday!

My dream vacations always involve, at minimum, these three things:  Joe, a good glass of wine, and sunshine.  So when it was time to plan my birthday celebration, we landed again on a little getaway to the Walla Walla wine country.  Joe, some hotter spring sun, and loads of delicious wines.  We had a fantastic time.

On the second day we were there, we hit this winery that had a small three-hole golf course.  Birthday luck brought me this close to a hole-in-one.  Say what you will, that was pretty fun!

See, the hole was way out there!!

...and here I am!!!

We took a break between rounds to enjoy a lunch of wine and cheese.

Best man.

Oh yes, this advertisement for a Walla Walla church promises it to be better than Baskin Robbins!!  How can that possibly be??!

And my favorite spot on the drive, The Dusty Country Store.  This place is awesome!  I always pick up some chick-lit from their used book selection and maybe an old CD from the 90s....love this place!

Then we headed home to see the kids, who showered me with yummy scents and loads of fun jewelry...

It is a good.life.

Let's just say we take basketball very seriously around here.

By: Kayte

Ben's First Ball

Taking things very seriously and having a whale of a time!

Did someone say Costume Day??

No?  ....I thought someone said Costume Day. 

Please notice the cross taped to my forehead, that's the best part.

April Fools' Day

Kayte wanted short hair and glasses for April Fools' Day...so we faked it!

No one can top this kid on celebrating every holiday known to man.

What would be really fun is to give her a daily guide to national holidays, like, today is the national holiday of tofu-inspired pasta salads!  That would keep her super-busy...and she would love every minute of it!



More Birthday Pics

Ben's birthday this year landed on a Saturday, so we had lots of time to fill up with celebrating.  The highlight of the day was most definitely our trip to the theater to see Captain America 2!  Ben loves a good fight and he whoops and hollers through the whole thing as if it was a spectator sport.  

It's tough to get this kid down, we love him so much!

 

Ben loves a good tower, and this one did not disappoint!

He is very much looking forward to basketball season starting up, and he knows his way around a dribble...funfun!

Put me in coach! I'm ready!

So, way back in March, 10 days before my littlest guy turned 6, we were going over a wish list together.  Ben said that what he would really like for his birthday was for me to make him a quilt...and some legos, of course.

In kindergarten they are introduced to the art of quiltmaking by a long-time dear family friend, Miss Chris.  She, of course makes it look quite easy, and whips out quilts with skill and speed.

I explained to Ben that I couldn't make him a quilt, well, for lots of reasons, but the most obvious obstacle was that my sewing machine took a dive (probably out of fear for what I'd try next).  I'm not a seamstress by any stretch, but back when I was 15 or so I managed to stitch a few things together for my American Girl doll that she seemed to think was quite snazzy.  (And yes, I still played with that doll well into highschool.  They were historical.  It was for research.  Seriously.)

Anyway, I was laughing about this ridiculous birthday request with my seamstress friends, and one of them said, "Oh sure you can do it.  It's easy!" as she went on to show me one of her own masterpieces, hand quilted.

So, haha, I got it into my head that I might give it a try, using some of her quick and easy tips, and my sister's sewing machine.  I'd like to mention that the thing I love about doing something technical like that in which I have zero confidence and even less skill, is that I can impress myself so easily!

"I successfully threaded the bobbin!  Woohoo!!!"  I update my facebook status, with smiley faces and photos.

I spent the week making teeny progresses while Ben was at school.  There was no dilly-dallying, and very little food consumed.  There were major hiccups, and I became intimately acquainted with that little thingy that pulls out stitches (and yet, we are still not on a first-name basis, apparently.)

The last afternoon I spent sewing in my bathroom.  I was desperately worried that Ben would hear me or catch a glimpse of the sewing machine or a pile of misused thread.  I put him in front of Netflix and locked myself in for the last lap.

Does it look like I'm doing this right??

When I was all finished I was so super-proud of myself it was actually shameful.  You know the Holiday Inn commercials where people got such great rest that they are now sure they can perform a tracheotomy on a dying pedestrian?  Yep, that was me.

But the very best part in the history of the world was when my son opened the quilt on his big day.

There was jumping and squealing and hugging of the quilt.  I'll tell you what, if you ever want a pat on the back, do something for this kid.  He will bowl you over with his enthusiasm.

Worth.every.minute.

Absence makes the heart grow fonder.

Ben, my sanguine child, was up at the school today for a whole hour helping his Grandma. 

Cute as a button. 

When we got home, he didn't even bother to close the car door as he ran into the house yelling, "Hello!!  I'm home!!!  Did you all miss me?!"

And, as it turns out, we did miss him, very much.

Happy Fourth!!

It's gettin' all festive in here!

Happy Independence :)

Ben, conversations in the car.

We were driving home the other day from the pool and it was going to be a quick shower and then off to another event.  I told Ben to make sure he brushed his hair.

He pipes up in a panic, "But I don't know how you want me to style it!!?"

 

****

 

Later we were on our way to the doctor's office, me and Will and Ben.  Will had to get a tetanus shot and I was giving him the usual pep talk.  Will is actually a pretty tough kid, but I liked to cover all the bases, more for Ben's benefit then Will's.

"Now remember, no crying, right?  Crying doesn't make the hurt go away, so there's no point in doing it, right Ben?  Tell your brother."  says I.

"Yeah." says Ben.  "But being happy about it doesn't make it feel better either, so...."

I can see my days here are numbered...

True Story.

So one of my kids, I won't name names, haha, has a bit of a more gullible nature, most likely getting that gene from myself.

This person says to me, having gotten this hot tip from a friend, "did you know that chewing gum burns like, 10 calories a second?"

Um, no.  That would be 600 calories every minute.  My child insisted that this was the gospel truth as all good playground tales are.

 

And yet.....all of a sudden, I'm like "hand me a cheesecake, I'm buying a pack of gum tomorrow."

Like I said, gullible's in the blood.