My Baby Emma is turning 3!

Yesterday we celebrated Emma's 3rd birthday. Emma was up at 5:30am ready for her party. This is the first year she really gets the birthday party thing. Although when she opened presents from people who were not there she was confused. It was cute. The theme was "Dora under the sea". It was beautiful weather. We had snow cones, the pool, fishing, and crafts. The kids had fun swimming, playing on the swing set, and making snow cones with Uncle Gregg.

Fircreek Day camp pic......

This is Madison and Hunter on the last day of camp. They have two more weeks to go.

Convition

So I started this blog thing to keep grandparents up to date and keep a running record of my girls daily life. I stuble upon old, new, lost, and dear friends who are blogging as well. Funny enough three of them (all from very different times in my life who did not know eachother at those times) are friends with eachother and are all adopting from Africa. I had the privilage of going to Africa (Ethipia) when I was 25 years of age. I went with my dad and we visited with a friend my dad had in college. We were able to travel down country and experience, observe, and serve, different people who were there. I even at one point was asked to preach (if anyone knows me they know this was a stretch). The experiences I had were amazing, hard to put into words, and have stayed with me all these years. Since then I have gotten busy with marriage, having premie babies, and working at my job with people with disabilities. I have been "busy" but have thought many times "why did I go?", "what should I do?". However, in reality, I have "DONE" nothing. So now I am confronted with these old, new, lost, and dear friends who are "doing" something. I pray for them as they follow this journey of adopting over seas. I find myself having mixed feelings .... is adoption what needs to happen?.......is it better for me to send money? adopt a family? adopt a classroom? Will the kids who are being adopted to the US have a passion for their country and impact their homeland when they are older? What about the kids and families who are together and stuggling everyday for food and water? One vivid memory is going across a bridge and looking at the river. I took a picture. At the top of the river people are watering thier cows, down river people are bathing, down river more people are washing thier clothing, and at the end of the river people are collecting the dirty water from that river. That image has stayed with me all these years, it was a "defining" moment. I find myself stuggling with my kids birthdays. Both my daughters were born as micro premies with tremendous struggles. Birthdays are so important in celebrating thier life and all the struggles we went through as a family. However, as we celebrate birthdays I am stuggling with all the "things" we have but how much other do not. This video was on a friends site. I watched it and then had my hubby watch it...."what do we do with the knowlege and wealth that we have?"

Day Camp Life

It has been a tradition the past two years for my nephew to come spend time with us in the summer and go to Fircreek Camp. This year Madison is able to go as well. Through email they (via the moms) decided on what weeks they would be going to camp. This week is the first week. They come home dirty, tired, and talking about thier adventures every night. They wont let me take pictures so i'll have to sneak some tomorrow. They have two more weeks this summer and they are more excited then ever.

Is that where it goes???

So today I had four kids (my two girls and my two nephews). I was attempting to keep everyone happy, fed, and safe when Emma (who will be three in a few days) decides to stick one of Madison's crafting beads up her nose. Emma then runs and hides from me (she knows she did something bad) and proceeds to try to get it out herself. Nose bleeding and green bead in hand she brings it to me. I was concerned however that she may have injured her nose or there were more beads up there. When I asked her "Honey did you put one bead or two in your nose?", her reply was"three, four, five, six mama". I call the on call nurse at the my trusty Dr. office. She assures me that MANY people's kids put things up their nose. At this point my nephew, Hunter, who is 9 says "I had a friend last year that stuck a rock up his nose and had to go to the ER" (we know who is riding the short bus). The nurse is laughing and tells me to ask Emma again if there are more in her nose....to which my sweet child replies "three, four, five, six mama". It is decided that there is nothing we can do at this point and that if there are more up there they will work themselves out. After the blood is cleaned up and the scare is over I (being the smart mother that I am) gives her a bowl of M&Ms (now who's riding the short bus) I realize my stupidity and say "Emma where do your M&Ms go?" , to which she replies "Only in my mouth mama, not in my nose". Lesson learned? we will see. Here is the picture of the culprit.

Friday, Family, Fun.......

Grandma Debi spent the night on Thursday night. We decided that we would go have some fun on Friday. I have my nephew Hunter (sister's son) while she is on her honeymoon, and my other nephew Jayden (while my parents are on vacation) for the weekend. We went to Lafiama, a favorite restaurant and the kids played with pizza dough while we waited for our meal. We then went to Fairhaven a walked around for awhile. The kids had fun running on the park green and attacking Gregg. It was so much fun.

Dance, Dance, Dance

On Thursday June 19th Madison had her dance recital. Madison chose to be in hip hop this last session. Madison had so much fun and was able to take the class with one of the girls from her kindergarten class, Emma. Madison danced to "The Big Bad Wolf", she does such a great job. Grandma Debi came all the way from Yelm, Hunter (cousin) came, Grandy and Grandpa Randy, Grandad, Nanny & Bacha, and Jayden. It is so wonderful that my kids have so many people who love them in their lives. Madison was so excited to get flowers at the end of her performance from Grandma Debi. You can see in the background as well that Grandy gave Emma and Maddy each a frog and their initial. Emma is excited that she will get to be in the Christmas performance.

The Wedding.........

Here we are all beautiful.

Preparing for the Big day!!!

It was so beautiful. It had rained most of the week but when we got up it was sunny and hot. Everyone was so calm. The day started at 9am with hair and makeup.

The sitters (Ben and Laurel) their sole job was to make sure that no one mesed up their hair and they don't get dirty. Laurel (and Ben) were such a blessing. I was able to enjoy myself and Gregg could take pictures, video tape, and be the wedding gofer. (He was incharge of the woopie pies).

Emma was not so thrilled with her hair being curled. We had to bribe her with alot of gum....we need more granddad if your reading this.

Madison was the perfect pupil. She loved getting her hair done......no screaming this day.

The Night before the BIG DAY!

We had our rehearsal at the church and then a big BBQ between the two B&B houses that each family rented. Tom's mom and grandma served a great rehearsal feast. Here are three of the flower girls. They were all sooo cute and became fast friends. Auntie Catherine gave them all windmills to blow.
The view we saw all week from our house.
Our house we stayed in for the week.
Playing baseball. This is Pat, Tom's other friend from Maine. Madison also became fast friends with Tom's Uncle Ebby and played baseball with him.
Part of the bride's side. Rebecca (maid of honor/best friend), Me (big sister), Shawna (friend from forever), and then three others. plus SIX flower girls.

The boys side.
The happy couple getting instructions for the big day.

Catherine rented us old fashioned umbrellas and gave us rain boots it was really cute. Cant wait to see the professional pics.

Madison and my umbrella.
Emma and Mommy and the umbrella.

The Week Before the Big Day!!!

So here is our week in a nutshell. I stayed around the house the first two days with the kids. It was nice and I was able to read and play with them. Tom's (the new bro in law) mom and dad gave Hunter a Boston Red Socks Uno game, which Madison learned how to play. She couldnt hold her cards so to make it fair we all had to lay them out, which made for a very long Uno game. From their she learned how to play other games. The kids played outside the B&B. They played frisbee and baseball. They got the frisbee stuck and Hunter thought it would be a good idea to climb up the tree. He got his foot stuck .... all I saw was a little boy in a wedding with a cast.

Tom brought fishing polls so his friend Shaun (from Maine) and Madison and Hunter all went fishing in the rain. They loved it but caught nothing.

The kids played Hide and Seek all week long. Hunter would hide under the beds, wait till we would come into the room, then jump out and scare us. Well the first day my Brother in-law had full charge of Hunter he lost him....lol Hunter had fallen asleep under the bed waiting for Tom to come in the bedroom to scare him. Tom however was afraid that Hunter had somehow drowned in the ocean. That was his first "official" parent scare.

Ah Shaun. Madison had her first crush. She followed him everywhere, and when I found my camera she had take many pictures of him. He was a great sport and played lots of games with the kids all week long. It was hard for the kids to say good bye to him. Maybe he will get that Job in Oregon. I think Hunter had his first "Man" crush as well.

On Thursday we all went over to Pike Place Market (Tom's Family and Ours). The street perfomer played a bunch of sing along songs for Emma. She loved it and sang with her Big Cousin Hunter.
Hunter, Madison, Emma, and Mommy at Pike Place Market on the golden pig.
Hunter and Gregg waiting for Allison to stop shopping.
Our Moto for the day......found the sticker on a post and sent a pic to Catherine. Its hard to entertain people outta state sometimes, especially when you got a wedding to thing about.
The kids, Gregg, Allison, and Grandma Debi decided to have coffee and play at the arcade while everyone else when to the space needle.
We had lots of fun riding the ferry, hanging out with Grandma Debi, meeting Tom's family and friends, and just enjoying being a family for a week. My sister was so calm...we were scared. It was really a fun week.