Numbers and Running

I just had to say how much I enjoyed the General Relief Society Broadcast last night. Especially President Uchtdurf's talk. If you missed it, watch it on lds.org or tivo it. He had some great ideas on how to find peace and happiness - some things I hadn't thought about before. He started his talk with a fun discussion of how different men and women are. He talked about his wife's cooking and how wonderful it is. He says she will usually sit down and say things like, "I think I added a pinch too much ginger, or maybe next time I will add another bay leaf." He thinks her meal are amazng. When he cooks his specialty - fried eggs and toast - they usually end up greasy and burned. However, he feels like a super hero for doing it. Maybe us ladies could learn something from the men about that!

We discovered this week that Jessica knows quite a few of her numbers by sight. As I was quizzing her to see which ones she knows, I held up a 5 for Eric first and asked him if he knew what it was. He said his classic, "I don't know." Jessica pipes up with a, "It's 5, Eric!" YIKES! We have created a smart monster!

Abby ran in a 1/2 mile district wide race for elementary kids. Anyone can enter and she was excited when the flyer came home from school. They gave a ribbon to everyone who participated and then the top 6 were recognized. Her friend got 5th place and I think Abby must have been 8th or so. I think she was a little disappointed, but it was a good experience for all of us. Maybe I can get Kim and Eric to participate next year!

I have been working on a humanitarian project our ward is doing. We are making remembrance quilts for parents whose children die at the hospital at or soon after birth and never come home. They are tiny quilts - 18x18 - and we are piecing the tops. They come with a matching bag for the parents to put small momentos of the child - a lock of hair, hospital tags, etc... It's been a learning experience for me and a bit sobering to think about their uses.

Eric has been drawing lots of people lately, so I'll have to learn how to scan them and add them to the blog. They are very cute. Kim is doing well in school. It's been a good experience for her to have more tests. She will be in middle school next year. Of course, I have had 4 or 5 people ask me lately when she will turn 12 and go into Young Womens. I have to tell them she still has TWO MORE YEARS! She'll be ready.

Getaway

Stuffy noses, coughs, and headaches - that's been our week! We have all caught the cold everyone else has since school started. Not fun, but predictable, I suppose.

Reid and I went away for a day without the kids while Emily stayed with them. Thanks Emily! We had a blast. We went to dinner at a restaurant called El Gaucho - very nice and classy. I think we'll have to pay off the house before we can afford to go back :) They do lots of the food tableside - caesar salad, cutting the meat, making bananas foster, etc... They had a cool meal we saw at a table nearby where the chef has a huge sword with meat and veggies on it like a kabob. She then spooned flaming alcohol over it to cook it. That was cool! Then we went to a comedy show called Jet City Improv. It was mostly college students, but there were a few old fogies there like us. It was hilarious and the best part of it was their policy of keeping things appropriate for all ages - kids and grandmas alike.

The next morning we slept in late and went to brunch at the Space Needle. The restaurant turns a full circle in 47 minutes, so we got to see the view of the clouds and drizzle very well.

Then we got home to the reality of life again. I think we need to go away for longer next time! While I was trying to get Jessica and Eric to follow me upstairs to take a bath, Jessica told me,"Go away, Mommy. I love my Daddy!" It's nice to be loved. She will say, " I love you soooo much" occasionally.

Fun, fun, fun!

Eric started preschool this week. I think he's enjoying it and I haven't heard about any major problems (or any problems for that matter!). He loves to talk about what the snack was and what he learned about. He has school on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday. On Thursday he go to go to Chuck E. Cheese with Reid. He was getting a nasty cold, so he wasn't feeling 100%, but he did get 345 tickets!

Abby got to go there with Reid on Friday and she came out of it with over 700 tickets! I think Reid found a game that gave out LOTS of tickets if you figured out how to win it. Kim went bowling with Reid on Thursday and had a good time. They were supposed to go mini-golfing, but for some odd reason the place was closed.

On Saturday we went to "Touch a Truck". You get to sit in various city vehicles, fire trucks, police cars, etc... and pretend you are driving and even honk the horn. They have a bouncy house and lots of other little booths for water conservation, wearing helmets, car seat safety, etc... I think Eric really had a good time.

We also cleaned the garage on Saturday. Amazing what a little moving and organizing can do! Now to clean out the freezer . . .

Back to School!

Kim and Abby went back to school on Wednesday. Kim went back and forth between a few teachers, but finally ended up where she started with the teacher she had last year. I think they are having a good year so far. They don't share a whole lot, but it always come out :)

We went to the BYU game Saturday - yes, they were up here playing the University of Washington. If you don't already know, we won! It was a lot of fun to be there and it was not a boring game at all. LOTS of controversy over the win actually. We really only get the Washington opinions here, though. It probably isn't such a big deal everywhere else.

Eric and Jessica stayed at Reid's parents' house and did not want to leave when we got there, so I guess they weren't traumatized by it. While we were driving down there to drop them off, Eric declared to us that we are different from Chinese people. A rather random, but true, statement.

Jessica has been singing "Happy birthday Jee - caa - caa" for days now. Too bad her birthday isn't until the end of February! I was picking up a babysitter this week (her name is Samantha, but it comes out sounding like Santa when the little ones say it) and Eric told us that there were two Samanthas. One brings you presents, and one is a babysitter. He's rather full of observations lately!

Getting ready for school

Well, school starts on Wednesday for Kim and Abby, and Eric starts next Monday. We've done all the school shopping (we think!), and the kids are excited. We re-arranged the beds a bit this week. Kim and I moved her loft bed up to Eric's room, although he will still sleep in his old bed under the loft bed. Kim now has a regular bed that she can flop down on. We loved some of Eric's toys and furniture into Jessica's room and finally moved the bed and closet doors that have been stored in Jessica's room.

My muscles were NOT used to all that, but their rooms look good and it went faster than I thought it would!

Yesterday we helped Emily move to her new place. It's a few miles down the road from her old place and will hopefully have less mold, etc... for her to get sick from. Abby enjoyed bugging Nate the whole time (sorry, Nate :( ) and we had a few sad moments fighting over the tv (hmmm.....), but overall, they were helpful or at least stayed out of the way!

Tonight we met Logan's girlfriend (visiting from Utah). She is very fun and we had a good time. Abby kept tickling her, so we told Abby to play hide and seek with us, she would hide, of course. She came up wondering why we weren't looking for her! What a crazy girl!

Summer's over!

Rain, rain, rain!

It has rained a TON this week. I guess it saves on the water bill, but the kids wish they could enjoy the last couple of weeks before school starts. We went to a baseball game on Wednesday (the Everett Aquasox). It had been raining all day, but we decided to head out anyway. It was not raining at the ball field, so we went for it. The game was supposed to start at 7:05 pm, but at 7:10 they announced a new start time of 8:05. It didn't actually start until closer to 8:20.

There weren't too many people there, and Abby was enjoying the view from the top of the stands instead of at the bottom where we were. A foul ball was hit right by her and she was able to pick it up off the ground before anyone else got close. She's the luckiest one in the family! Jessica enjoyed cheering for the "Applesox".

We went school clothes shopping and spent lots, but they have enough (for now)!

Eric gave a talk in Primary today and did a great job. He held the picture in front of his face while he repeated the words I whispered to him.

Birthday Week

We just finished birthday week. We had Reid's birthday on Wednesday and Kim's birthday on Friday. For Kim's birthday we had 4 10-year old girls over for a sleepover party. They went to Libby Lu and got their hair and nails done and then went to dinner at the mall. Then they came back to the house and made some videos of them singing Jonas Brothers songs. It was a lot of fun to have older kids here who can entertain themselves. They claimed to have stayed up until 4:00 a.m., but they certainly weren't so loud they kept anyone awake.

Kim got Guitar Hero for her birthday and we've all enjoyed playing it. Jessica even gets Abby's guitar to play along. She even sings :)

Tonight we had a birthday party with the family. We had 18 people here, mostly adults. I think that's the most we've had here. Again, it was fun to have family here we haven't seen for a while.