The beach and other stuff

Last weekend we took a trip to Pacific Beach with 11 other families. The weather was great (for the coast) and we all had a great time. Caeden thought this girl needed a hat like his: The guys playing bocce ball:
Trey and Becks making a sand pit with Eli:
It's never a boring trip with Jeff Allen. Some kind of hawk was trying to snatch our snacks so he held up a Cheeto (is that really how you spell it?) to see if he would come close enough to bite it out of his hand:
The hawk circled around for a few minutes but never worked up the courage, so Rick decided to sneak up on him:

A few weeks ago Beckham, Caeden and I went to visit my grandparents in Shelton while Carson and Trey were at scout camp. My grandpa has Alzheimer's and is in a nursing home, so my grandma took us to see him and then took us out to Denny's for dinner. When we got to the nursing home, Caeden took one look at my grandpa and burst into tears. I was mortified but there was nothing I could do - I was holding him and telling him it was okay in a happy voice but he kept peeking around my shoulder at my grandpa and screaming again. Beckham saved the day by being totally comfortable and making everyone feel better, including me. I wanted to take pictures with him but of course Caeden would have nothing to do with it. Grandpa kept shading his face since he was looking into the sun, and Beckham copied him:
Here's my grandma with Caeden, notice the wary look in my grandpa's direction:
Speaking of Caeden, he has been exquisitely adorable and unbearably frustrating at the same time lately. He is just at that age. I almost forgot that Trey and Becks figured out how to get out of their cribs at 19 months until Caeden did the same thing right on cue. At least he didn't launch himself out onto his head like Beckham did, but then again, Caeden is not the average height and weight for a 3-year old at 1 1/2. But he can climb out now and will not stay in that thing for one minute. So we did what all good parents do (right?) and put a doorhandle on his room that locks from the outside to keep him in, just like we did for the other two. He is such an impossible little stinker. He throws fits and says "NO!" and hits his brothers at the slightest provocation. He hates being in time out but it doesn't seem to be improving his behavior. And he has ruined so many surfaces in our new home from his constant banging with whatever he can get his hands on, I don't even want to think about it. The flip side is that he can be irresistable, playing peek-a-boo, speaking in his high little voice, always wanting to ride bikes and play outside. He has sparkly eyes and an impish grin and is as mischevious as he is short-tempered. We love him to pieces.
And last, I finally read the Twilight series, all 4 books in 10 days (yes, my house is dirty) and I loved it. What a great story!

From the mouth of babes

Our good friend Jodee tagged Trey on the following questions, so here are his answers:

Trevor’s blog survey

1. what is something mom always says to you? I love you
2. what makes mom happy? Being a good boy
3. what makes mom sad? Being a bad boy
4. how does mom make you laugh? When she speaks in a funny voice
5. what was mom like as a child? I have no idea
6. how old is your mom? In the thirties
7. how tall is your mom? 40 cm (he measured with his fingers)
8. what is her favorite thing to do? scrapbook
9. what does your mom do when you're not around? Do stuff on the computer
10. if your mom becomes famous, what will it be for? A famous scrapbooker
11. what is your mom really good at? scrapbooking
12. what is your mom not very good at? Remembering stuff
13. what does your mom do for her job? Watch the kids
14. what is your mom's favorite food? Raspberry sorbet
15. what makes you proud of your mom? Being a good mom
16. if your mom were a cartoon character, who would she be? No one.
17. what do you and your mom do together? Snuggle
18. how are you and your mom the same? We have the same eyes (that’s not including the color)
19. how are you and your mom different? I’m a boy and she’s a girl
20. how do you know your mom loves you? ‘Cause she’s my mom

We asked Trey which of his friends he would like to tag and he said, "No one, I want to break the rules." So, there you go.

Idaho

This past weekend we drove to Idaho for the Pond family reunion. It was super fun to be there with my kids in Stanley, a little town in the mountains where I went every summer as a kid. Here's Caeden outside the cabin trying to get Carson with a sponge during a water fight:I saw almost all of my cousins but we didn't get many pictures; here's Hillary, me and my cousin Allison:

Part of the Sawtooth mountains looking across the yard from the cabin:
Caeden flying above the Sawtooths - much better than the ones we did last year trying to get Rainier in the background with flying kids. Trey and Becks have always loved to have Carson throw them up in the air but Caeden hates it, he was NOT happy afterward!

We went wakeboarding with our friends the Schick's in Boise - here's Jeremy and his son TJ on the boat. We always have a blast and go away with renewed motivation to work out!


Therese is such a doll:
The 4 of us at their house, just like back in the days at the Y -when we had no kids, few responsibilities, and lots of fun.My sister Hillary played a drum to entertain the kids and Beckham thought he'd do a war dance.

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Carson wakesurfing and Jeremy wakeboarding on Lucky Peak Lake.

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"No Title"

Last week we had our work summer party. We went to Lake Sammamish and had a beach party with a BBQ and some fun on the lake. The boys enjoyed the sand more than anything else.





On Saturday we had our ward Pioneer celebration. It turned out to be a lot of fun playing the simple games and helped us realize that the overly complicated world that we live in is not necessary for a better life as we sometimes slip into thinking. Carson won the stick pull for the 40 and under crowd.
Marisa didn't want her husband to best her so she gave it all she could, but ended up losing to the women's champion.


We had some good friends invite us to go with them for dinner to Kanaskat-Palmer state park by our house. It was a nice 72 degrees and the boys couldn't resist the water.
Sometimes getting wet was intentional, and other times it was not...
In the end everybody (the boys at least) were naked and happy back in the car!


This week started off kind of crazy. On my way to work on Tuesday I got a call from Marisa saying that Bex broke his tooth. She threw the boys in the car and met me at work about 20 minutes after I arrived. It was true, Bex broke a tooth right off at the gum line. The two funny things are that he was happy because now he is "a big boy" like his brother who has been losing teeth and also, we still have no idea how it happened. He said he was just jumping up and down then it came out. We grilled him many times to see if he fell on the floor or ran into the counter, but nothing. The only thing we can think of is that he fell and hit it some time earlier, but it didn't come out, then when he was jumping he noticed it was loose and pulled it the rest of the way out. The root tip was still in there so something must have hit it hard enough to break it. I wouldn't put it past him that he grabbed the pliers and broke it himself then didn't tell us because he was afraid. He is a very tough kid and brought the pliers to me when Trey lost his last one...


On Monday we were supposed to have Trevor's friend bday party, but the whole family came down with a strong sickness. I have only thrown up a couple times since I was a kid and Sunday night was time number 3 or 4. Every single one of us threw up so our house was not a pleasant place. On Saturday night we went to a movie with some friends when Caeden was the first to start with the sickness and we didn't know what we were dealing with yet. Here is a picture of the babysitter's clothes when Caeden threw up "twice his body weight" on the babysitter. We felt bad because his mother had to bring him over a change of clothes and he showered at out house. We made it up to him by giving him some extra $ as part of his hazard pay.
We postponed Trey's party to Thursday because of all the sickness and it turned out great. The best part was that I finally found a place with a Wii instock. Costco, Target, etc. had all been out for a while, even many places online were out of stock if their price was reasonable. One of the Targets got a shipment in and we were able to get it for him that night. Last Christmas Trey wanted a Wii and we told him that Santa doesn't bring our family gifts that big for kids his age. He would have to save up and maybe he could get it for his Bday or next Christmas. We thought that would be a good way to push it off so that he would stop bothering us about it. We were amazed to see him save all his Christmas money, all his money from regular chores, extra chores that he asked to do and this year's bday money until he had enough (for half b/c we said we would pay the other half if he saved that much). He did it and had a little extra for a Sonic game, his favorite!


On Friday we went for a picnic in a park in Bellevue after I had my meeting with the bank for the business loan (now that I am finally getting started on the tenant improvements). The bank personnel have followed me on this 2 year delay so meeting with them was like meeting with old friends. Every few months they have called to see if we should meet and I have had to say about 10 times, "No, it looks like it will be just a few months more." In the end they were so impressed with my business plan and pro forma they suggested that I should start teaching a class on how to present for small business loans. That made my whole weekend!



We are passing major milestones in the progress of our new house. For the first time yesterday we were able to pull both cars in the garage! I put together some filing cabinets and book shelves that allowed us to move some more office storage boxes out of the garage. That makes me very happy because I am a clean garage nazi. Buying and putting together the filing cabinets was the last major thing to do for the inside of the house. Now we just have a few minor things, it only took 4 months :(

We are almost done with the outside of the house too. This week we finally get the gates put on (that was supposed to happen over 6 weeks ago, but we had a hard time getting the fence guy to come back). After they get put on we will stain the fence, get a little more topsoil and we're done with the outside for this year! Can't wait to scratch those things off the honey-do list and remember what sitting on the couch felt like.