Fall Roadtrip

Okay, it’s been a little bit since the ol’ blog was updated!

First, Rylan is still doing fantastically in his new school.  It’s not really “new” anymore of course, but Quinn still refers to it as his new school, so I’m just going with it for now.  He is making friends with everybody, and seems to always be playing with new friends everyday!  I’ve been very impressed.  I volunteer in his class on Wednesday afternoons and sometimes sneak in a little early to see him play during his lunch recess.  He always looks like he’s having a blast, wrestling with three other boys, being the pitcher in a nonsensical game of kickball, and all the good things recess brings.  Academically he seems right on track, if not a little ahead, especially in all things reading and writing.  I believe they even have him in a big kid helper position in order to coach other kids in his class and the other first grade class through some reading, and during handwriting practice he basically has free time.  With that though, he has not been the perfect student.  So far he has gotten in trouble for bringing a “weapon” to school (a wine bottle opener – he thought it was cool), and BIG trouble for going out of bounds with a friend into the school parking lot after they were already told not to, so that wasn’t very good.  I made him write a letter of apology to his teacher for disobeying the rules.  I did not help him compose it at all, and I think it turned out pretty dang cute.  His teacher wrote him a note back, and now he is drawing her little notes or handmade comic strips for her during the weekend.  They don’t make much sense, but it’s still cute.

Students are on a first name basis with their teachers at Rylan’s school.

We’re fortunate that he seems to have really connected with his teacher, he enjoys school so much!

This week though, he got to take a day off school and take a roadtrip up to Moscow, ID!  We went up there to see a WSU soccer game and press some apple cider at a local orchard with the Schroeder cousins, but you know, while we were up there we also went to the farmer’s market, ate at my favorite restaurant, went to our favorite coffee shop, walk through our favorite arboretum, and all the favorite things.  Man, it’s been TOO LONG since I’ve been there (like, 10 years since I graduated)!  I sure do miss it up there in North Idaho.

The kids did well in the car ride (6 hours), and were pretty excited to sleep in a hotel (an uncommon occurrence for us to say the least!), and even more excited to see their cousins the whole weekend!  Apple Cider pressing was really fun, and we got both lucky and unlucky at the orchard, since we were there to press the LAST apples of the entire season: unlucky that we only got 4 gallons out of the whole experience, but lucky because at least we got some.  Now I have to pasteurize my portion…which hopefully will go smoothly!

Here’s some photos!

#WeekendActivities

Last weekend I took a trip with the kids to Walla Walla while Kevin stayed behind and worked on our dumb kitchen venting – one of those, “small job turned big job” type of situation.  We all had a blast, and were sorry to leave.  We had a lot of weekend activities to do all together, and then when we were lounging at the house, the kids were outside riding bikes all weekend.  Talk about awesome.  I’m glad Rylan has finally decided to get back on his bike after his major face-landing earlier this summer, otherwise he never would have been able to keep up with the cousins on the street and at the dirt bike park!  So awesome.

Our road trip up there, 4 hours, was pretty uneventful, but I had two good road tripping buddies.

We listened to good ol’ Hank the Cowdog audio book and sang and danced to their favorite “rocker”, Bon Jovi.  And by that I mean, we listened through the whole album about 5 times.  They still aren’t tired of it, but somebody else sure is!  How many times can you live on a prayer anyway?

Anyway, we got into town around dinner time and had dinner and celebrated my favorite THREE  year old’s birthday (belated)!  I think this was the night we popped homegrown popcorn.  I can’t imagine the work it took to grow this corn, but I sure do know the work it took to pick the thousands of corn kernels up off the floor.  Three times.  First, the ziplock bag holding the said kernels exploded from the bottom because Henry was squeezing the bag.  We picked them up.  Then I poured the collected kernels back into the bag with no bottom…we picked them up again, with much angst.  Then Simeon took the bowl of saved kernels off the counter and…well, needless to say, we picked them up again.  I am not mentioning all the cries of distress (except for now, of course) during this stressful time!  As we picked them up the third time I said, “someday, we may laugh about this.”  I know I have already laughed twice about it in past few days while retelling the story.  How about you guys?

Sunday was extra special because Jake had made spiced wine in the crockpot that morning, which was all ready for us and smelling delicious when we got home from church!  Pair that with cranberry goat cheese, salami, and crackers/baguette, and some kids outside bike riding, we had ourselves a pretty nice afternoon!

We also went to the pumpkin patch, which led to some fun down the big slide down the haystack, and pumpkin carving later!

On Sunday evening, I drove up to the Tri-Cities to visit one of my best friends, and Rylan fell asleep on the way back.  (It was pretty late).  Good thing we had Uncle Jake there to help tuck him into bed!

Our last day took a turn for the worst when poor Hannah managed to get stuck by wasps about five or six times!  Talk about bad!  Fortunately, she was okay, but that is enough to traumatize a person, that’s for sure.  After lunch on Monday we packed up and headed home.  Nobody wanted to leave, so we loitered around for a while, meaning we also got home later.  But that’s okay, since Kevin was waiting for us with dinner all made!  What a guy.  I guess it’s nice to be home too.

 

 

 

ANI if you’re reading this

Well hello there everybody!  If you’re wondering, I had a fantastic start to July 2017, and I’ll tell you all about it right now.

It started out wonderful because I got to go on a road trip.  To Portland.  With my sis.  For my cousin, Ani’s wedding.  See, with so many fantastic things going on in one weekend, it’s bound to be great!

So I left my family in Boise and drove up to Washington where I spent the night at my sister’s house before having her join me for the last leg of the trip the following day.  Turns out a road trip is waaaay easier with only two adults in the car.  We stopped whenever we wanted, talked about whatever we wanted, and ate snacks without having to share any of them – and considering they were chocolate covered pretzels…all the better.  Our drive came to a close much too soon and before we knew it, we had arrived at our cute little rental house and walked down to some local shopping with my mom (who was there waiting for us)!

That first night, we all got together for some pizza, and I know there was a camera somewhere with pictures of the five of us infamous cousins, but unfortunately, I guess that was not my camera, so I came away with no pictures from that night!

On Monday, July 3, (the wedding day) we went out for an extremely mediocre breakfast, which was very disappointing.  My mom, sister, and I stepped into a Columbia store to look around – turns out everything was on sale!  So my sis and I both bought dresses there that we ended up wearing later that night to the wedding, instead of the pre-chosen dresses we had brought with us.  And honestly, I think it might be my favorite dress ever anyway.  Here’s a picture I sent to Kevin on our way out that evening:

Along with the caption: “IT HAS POCKETS!” (which I had just discovered).  That in turn reminded me of this, which is totally true:

The evening was full of beautiful weather, beautiful people, beautiful alpacas, amazing food, great music, and fun memories.  As any good wedding should (in my humble opinion), there was indeed a photo booth there with a ton of good props.  Of course, though I came away with quite a few pictures from the booth, my computer scanner is broken.  So you’ll just have to make do with some phone pictures of them.

Here’s the one I have of all five of us cousins!

This one was used to trick my Yamma, just purely for her reaction.  Not true in any way!!!  Totally pulled it off…until Facebook was notified!  Haha!

It was a super fun night, and we were all so happy that Ani and Jeremy tied the knot!  Love you guys!

Unfortunately, the fun eventually ended and we had to leave early the next morning to get home to all of our people.  My mom and I drove into Boise after a long day at about 3:00 pm.  I could barely keep my eyes open!  Also unfortunately, since it was the fourth of July, we ended up doing fireworks in our cul-de-sac with neighbors until like…10:30 or 11:00.  It was great, but ugh!  I was so tired.

Here are pictures from the weekend and a few other things we have been doing this month.  More soon to come, I’m sure.

Lincoln City Family Reunion

My family always loves reunion-ing at the beach.  The Oregon coast, to be precise.  But since life races by, the last time we were there was in 2010!  Back then, there were no little kids – and this time there were SIX!!! Going to the beach with little kids is not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure, but we all had a great time together!  We rented out a duplex for the entire week, Saturday 7/16-Saturday 7-23.  My parents and grandparents stayed on one side, and the Kingsbury and Schroeder families (the ones with kids) stayed on the other, with a big shared deck in between.

Golly, that was so long ago now I can hardly remember what we did…Let’s see:

1.We took endless walks on the beach, every day.

2. We saw debated on the potential whale-sighting for far too long.

3. We celebrated the TRIPLE-30 birthday people!  Kevin, Mantz, and Jake.

4. We went to the Newport Aquarium

5. We went to the Alder House Glass Blowing place

6. We looked for sea shrimp (and caught several, too)!

7. We tried to drink the ocean – okay, maybe that was just Hannah

8. We got lots of cuddles from lots of different babes

9. We ate lots of food, played lots of games, and had lots of visiting

10. And most importantly, we all got wet at one time or another!  Featured in the picture: Kevin and Jake!

A LOT MORE PICTURES IF YOU CLICK HERE.

Summer Plans Finalized

Well to start, we had a great time over Memorial Day weekend with my sister and her family coming into town last minute.  We got to meet the newest baby of the family (2 months later!), but for some reason nobody took a photo of baby Bekah with her new favorite aunt! In fact, I hardly took any photos over the weekend since I forgot my camera most of the time.

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As the kids get older we can kind of see how they’ll split off and who will really connect with who (just mainly based on age and interest).  Hannah and Rylan get along really well right now, with Henry kind of flitting in and out of their games, so those three older kids will definitely have a lot of good memories together!  It’s easy to see that Simeon and Quinn will really hit it off, since we realized they’re really only 4 months apart and are both — let’s face it — the cutest of the bunch!  Who knows what role Bekah will play in the future…time will tell!

Kevin and I have officially finalized our summer plans, and it will be a summer to remember!  A very stressful situation at Kevin’s engineering company (no work coming in), impending layoffs and cut benefits turned into an amazing gift for our family when,

1. I suggested that Kevin take a sabbatical and we go traveling all summer…
2. Kevin totally agreed (because he’s amazing and loves adventure like I do)…
3. Kevin talked to his boss, who totally went for it!!!

So….WE’RE LEAVING ON SATURDAY!!!  Here is our summer plan:

Our first “leg” or, “loop” will be this next week up in Olympic National Park, San Juan Islands, and Seattle.  This will be all tent camping, and we’ve never been tent camping for 7 straight days.  Our friends think we are crazy for doing this with our kids, but what kid doesn’t love being outside 24/7, sitting in dirt, hiking, and having campfires every night?  Well, our kids love it anyway!  We’re coming back from this first leg because of many previously planned activities including the Kevin and Rylan’s birthday, weddings, bachelorette party, and a 5K fun-run.  Also, we’ll need at least a week (or more) to prepare for the second loop of our journey, almost 4 weeks (probably tent camping) doing Lake Tahoe, Yosemite, Redwoods, and then meeting up with my family at the Oregon Coast for the last week…making it 5 weeks on the road, mostly camping.  I feel like dirt and grime will have just immersed itself into our skin at that point.  We are very excited!  After that our third loop will be up to Glacier National Park for a wedding (plus, it’s Glacier, which we’ve never been to)!

That is our last official trip, although the week following I am meeting up in Utah for a 10 year high school reunion with 6 of my best friends from high school (still friends with all of these girls!), and going on yet another camp trip with friends in town for a few nights in southern Idaho.

It should be fun.  This summer is definitely not a normal one, and definitely not an inexpensive one, but I am so excited to make these kinds of memories with our young family.  One day we can look back and say, “Remember that time we ditched everything and left town for the summer?”  What a cool opportunity!  I am so thankful that not only do I have these crazy ideas, but that Kevin can overcome his rational-engineering side which would never even consider doing something like this, and embrace his adventurous spirit and realize that even though we’re not getting a paycheck this summer, THIS is the stuff that really matters.

 

See, I can still be spontaneous

Well it was shaping up to be a very normal ending to a very normal week, when I received a phone call from my sister over in Washington.  “Could I come over tomorrow?” she said.  And of course I said yes!  The next morning I packed up both kids and the dog and began what became the worst 4-hour car ride ever with Rylan.  Of course it’s somewhat amusing now, but I pretty much lost my marbles around the Pendleton area!  Here’s a glimpse of my trip:

Rylan: Mama, I’m silly!

Me: Yeah you sure are

Rylan: I’m NOT!!!!    

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Rylan: Look Mama, a train!

Me: Yeah I see it!

Rylan: You DON’T!!!!

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Rylan: Mama, talk to me!

Me: What do you want to talk about?

Rylan: STOP TALKING!!!!

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Imagine that going on constantly for almost four hours!  Doesn’t a road trip like that sound delightful?  He was a little monster, I tell you.

Here’s a picture of Rylan and Lizzy on the road trip (as usual, click on the image for more pictures)!

So it was with great relief that we pulled into Mantz’s driveway.  Soon after we arrived, we all went for a walk to a nice little park close by and let the kids and Lizzy play a bunch before heading home and ordering pizza for dinner.  Mantz and I tried to put the kids to bed that night with all of them sharing the same room, which has worked fine in the past, but this trip it ended with every kid in a different room of the house!  As a result, it was the first time in my life I’ve shared a bed with Rylan.  It went pretty well, despite the fact that he is a bed hog.

Saturday it took us a while to get out of the house because Mantz blocked us in the carport with her battery-dead car that she was vacuuming out!  Way to go Mantz! But we made it out to grab some lunch and have a picnic at another park with all the kids, which everyone seemed to enjoy.  This park also had a “bird zoo”, with some exotic type birds, and a nice rose garden.  But by that time all three of the kids were pretty tired so we went home for naps.  Henry and Rylan were down for the count for about three hours!  Rylan woke up last and was very ready for his all time favorite meal: hotdogs!  Mantz ran to the store to get them while Hannah and I cuddled on the couch and watched The Incredibles.  When Mantz got home she realized she had left the hotdogs at the store.  Way to go Mantz!

That next Saturday I was not looking forward to the car ride home, but had to suck it up and get in the car at some point.  But my worries were all for nothing, because on the way home, Rylan and I actually had the BEST road trip we’ve ever had!  He was very cute and agreeable, plus he slept almost two hours of the time!  I got back to Boise without having to stop a single time.  Woo!

All the adventures of last weekend

I got a *few* pictures of last weekend, but only because my sister + family were in town, and we had to think of some interesting things to do!  It’s always a hoot to have Rylan interact with his crazy cousins, that’s for sure.  Unfortunately, Jake had to miss out on some of the festivities because he went to Portland on a business trip (hence my sister and the kids coming over for the week), and Kevin has been working a lot of overtime lately because he is the lead engineer on a few important projects at work, so a few times it was just my sister, me, and my parents for dinner, just like old times! (A little different with 4 little kids of course).

Thursday night, when the Schroeder clan all drove in, we met for dinner and then re-convened at my parents house for a little visit.  All the kids adore their Nana, and here they all are “flying an airplane” on the couch, which Rylan still talks about.

Last night Rylan told Kevin and I about his ambitions to become a pilot, and reminded us of the importance of putting on your seat belt before you drive a plane!  There’s “Plane Flying 101” for you.

Friday, we met at “Nana’s Library” (the library she works at), got heart suckers, and walked over to Starbucks for some hot chocolate.  Henry looked especially hipster with his “coffee” cup.

After that, my sister and I took all the kids downtown (or “Town-Town, as Rylan says) for a walk to some favorite shops down there.  One new shop is a baby boutique called “Buns in the Oven”, where everything seems overpriced, but pretty cute.  I bought a lace-hair-band for Baby Sister, but otherwise came away empty-handed.  After nap time, we found that Nana and Papa had found a lot of old toys to play with that none of the kids had ever seen before!  The only downside was there were lots of little pieces, so the toys tended to get quickly scattered…everywhere.  Here are Hannah and Rylan playing together:

Hannah: “Oh hi horsey!  Let’s go over here!”

Rylan: “Okay! Nice to meet you! A-gah-bah-dah!”

They were pretty cute.  Henry also played cute – but more of a Godzilla cute, which made these two kind of mad at him sometimes!

Saturday was the day I had my first (and last) baby shower thrown for me.  A lot of people ended up coming, which was great to see everybody.  We were truly overwhelmed by everyone’s generosity toward Baby Sister, and I think we are more than prepared to have her make her arrival now!  (I mean, we still need a car seat, but that’s a minor thing, right)? Once naps were over, we all went to our favorite ice cream store Goody’s.  Here are Nana, Rylan, and Henry at Goody’s, but as you can see, Rylan was upset over having to share Nana’s lap, which is usually strictly his.

Meanwhile, this week continues as normal!

Thanks to everyone who has submitted their Baby Sister Ballot so far!  I have really enjoyed reading all the responses – especially all those name suggestions!  So much to consider…