Buzz lightyear tooth

True had to have a 'baby root canal'..

 I'm thankful for UW pediatric dentistry. They are AMAZING!

They really helped keep us both calm and I felt like he was in really good hands.

I don't know where the idea came from, maybe from his love of all things Buzz lightyear, but when he came out, he was telling us he got a Buzz lightyear tooth! And it stuck!

He was so brave! 

Poor kid didn't get my teeth..we take really good care of teeth around here {because I'm a little obsessive about it}and he STILL had to have work done. He now has to stay away form all things sticky and sugary.

But shouldn't we all anyway?:)

He was so brave and so very cranky when we got home. I'm sure all those drugs they give a little guy are hard to handle. But he got to come home and eat pudding and jello and watch...drum roll please!

TOY STORY!

50th

We had the privilege of celebrating John's parents 50th wedding anniversary with them.

His sisters did a beautiful job with the party.

So I can remember when I look back and I'm forgetful ~

back row, left to right

Tonya, Torrie, John, Jeremy, Gavin 11, Deandra, Edward

Chastin 13, Joni, John sr., Donald on grandpas lap almost 4, Gail, True on grandmas lap 4, Pat, Jordan 17

Shilo 9, Audrey 6

And I think for my 50th, if we have the privilege of celebrating, I want to take a long cruise. 

Like a month.

Visit from Bridget

One of my all time favorite people came to Seattle for a visit!

We always have so much fun together. And we don't even leave my house!

You can't even tell, but she's like 7 months pregnant!!! Lucky girl!

I'm always so excited when she comes. We just fit together so well. It's like we're sisters, we can live 4 hrs away from each other, rarely talk,  text on occasion and when we get together it's like we were never apart.

I love her.

 Her happy , no crap attitude rocks and she always cracks me up!

When her baby shower invites went out, she texted me one. When she was trying to pick the perfect name for this little girl, I was selected as one of the few, close to her friends who got to give input. That's a really BIG deal. I feel lucky. She's so thoughtful and sweet to me.

 Can't wait to go meet the new baby!

 And introduce Pinkalicious {our favorite!} to the her!!

So excited:) 

Mothers day

In primary the kids made MOM signs. True was super happy to give it to me.

That made me smile:)

So cute!

 Shilo made me a diorama of our family, she was so excited to make it and give it to me. She thought it up all on her own, she's always such thoughtful little girl.

 And she ALWAYS knows how to make me cry..

She made me a crown too!

Chastin was trying to steal it off my head!

Man these kids crack me up!

They all got me an heirloom tomato plant {which have tomatoes on them already!}

We tried a new pizza place on Saturday night called The pizza Bank. It's in Kirkland and it's just as it sounds, a pizza place that's in an old bank! You can even sit in the vault! How cool!

The food was super good! The service was fabulous! Will definitely be going back.

It was a good mothers day.

Activity days

Our mothers day activity was to make cookie bouquets.

I've done this for my daycare a few times through the years and it's always fun.

I made some nice thick sugar cookies and some royal icing so they would be shinny like professional ones.

Sue brought a huge gamete of decorations and tulle to decorate with.

The girls had fun and a sugar buzz when they left.. 

True gets to be part of activity girls too because John has school on Wednesday nights.

I love this calling and working with Sue, it's so much fun.

Dinner Group

I started a dinner group a few years ago to add more fun to my life.

I thought I would do it for a  year and that would be it.

Well we all loved it so much that I've kept it up.

Once a month I have about 6 friends over, they bring a dish to share that is family friendly and we sit around and chat. It is so much fun that it's one of my most favorite days of the whole month!

We have an 'ugly' plate that we pass around and take turns bringing dessert when we have the plate. We have had SO many good dishes! It's always fun to see what other people cook for dinner.

This month I had the ugly plate and gave Pioneer Woman's  Apple dumpling a go.

Oh

My

Goodness!

So yummy that I wanted to just drink the syrup that these little apple filled dumplings made.

I had four left at the end of dinner group and decided that instead of sitting down with a vat of vanilla ice cream and these I should share with my in laws.

They loved them so much that they asked me to make them again~ and sent me home with all the ingredients that I didn't have! That's how good these little easy treats are:)

So go. Go now. Make these. You'll thank me.

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2008/02/apple_dumplings/

Moms Monday

On the first day of spring break we headed to St. Edward State park to go for a hike.

{one of our favorite past times}

 We stopped to check out the black slugs

 The trees and sky were just beautiful! 

 We had to jump over every ditch

 I can't believe my son is so grown up!

{and cute I might add}

 We took one of the more challenging hikes and headed to Lake Washington

 Shilo and True got as close to the water as they could

 Chastin is such a  climber!

 Coaxing the birds to come to her

 What a tease! We didn't have any food for them, but they just kept coming to check:)

 It was a beautiful day!

 I was just waiting for him to fall in and have to finish the hike all covered in stinky green lake water!

But alas! He was so skillfully balanced that  he looked like a natural out there.

 Shilo trying not to be covered in stinky green lake water!

 Found some soft sand

 And a cool hollowed out tree trunk

 True's mad mug

 the boys inside a  HUGE hollow tree

first try at a good one...

 second try...

 good as we're going to get!

 just like brothers~ best friends!

 Cute girl

 Had a fun time keeping up with the boys!

 True too had to do everything the 'big kids' did! 

 With a little of their help of course!

 This tree was growing straight out from the bank! So cool!

 So of course that posed a challenge to see how far out Chastin could climb &  me waiting, camera in hand to catch the moment he slipped into the lake. But once again, he was skillful and managed to make it out and back.

 Nature is so cool looking

 True spent a good amount of time running up ahead.
And I have to say, I didn't edit these pictures at all and the trees are so green!

 Chastin contemplating...

 can he do it?

 looks like a good seat..

                                     

 True can climb on a tree too!

 Sometimes I forget that it's so pretty here. On a nice day there's nothing prettier.
 I've heard people say that before, but now that my time in Seattle isn't a life long sentence I seem to have gained more of an appreciation for the colors... Go figure!

 Chastin ran with True when Trues little  legs got tired. Such a good big brother!!!

 Such cute kids!

After our few miles of hiking we headed to the giant play structure. I have always wondered if us parents didn't tell our kids when it was time to go if they would ever get bored...something to think about isn't it? Well the whole reason for me not working on Mondays is to enjoy my kids. So I had decided that  I would wait for THEM to tell me when they were ready to go. No matter how long. We were on spring break, what else did we have to do?

After 4 hours of pushing all four kids on the tire swing, pushing regular swings, catching True as he went down the slide, chasing after them & sitting in the sun, they finally succumbed  to tiredness and were ready to go to ice cream, With no prompting on my part.

4 HOURS! That's quite some time! I usually only let them play for about an hour. No wonder they aren't ready when I say times up. {not that it's often that I have 4 hours to play at the park:) }

 Ranch Drive Inn in Bothell has dipped cones in a variety of   flavors. The kids love it there.

 Vincent loved his swirl caramel dipped cone, Shilo had swirl chocolate dipped & Chastin had same as Vincent.

I don't know that True has ever had a dipped cone, but he had swirl dipped in caramel and finished the whole thing off! {with hardly any mess! impressive!}

We had a blast on our Moms Monday! It's always my favorite day! The kids are just so much fun to be around & I'm lucky I have a job that allows me to take every Monday off!