If this is winter, I'll take it!

Our weather has been awesome this winter! For the last few weeks it was sunny and 60 almost every day.

We're making great progress in the backyard and having a little fun while doing it.

Recess is always better when it's sunny outside (for the kids and the parents on duty!)




Last Sunday we even took a bike ride to the park for a friendly game of baseball!


By Tuesday we had some rain and colder temperatures move it but the sun is back out today.  And speaking of TODAY stayed tuned for what happened on Today (if you haven't already heard) ;)

Daily life

Thank goodness for my photo-a-day project. It makes updating the blog a little easier!


There is still A LOT of dirt in the backyard but with all our spring-like weather, we're making great progress. It will be in great shape my summer!

Working on Valentine's in bed.

Lucas carefully writing everyones names on their valentines!

The walls are poured, the old deck in about gone.


Can he get any closer to the house?

The Olympics are well underway and everyone seems to have a little Olympic spirit around here!



Valentine's Day has been celebrated with roses from Eric for all his girls,

and a Valentine's Day bake sale at church to raise money for another well in Africa. And also a little shopping over the weekend with my brother, Mia and Holly.

With no school on Monday, the kids and I took off for a day trip to explore the Olympic sites in Vancouver. I posted more on Facebook, so click HERE if you want to check them out.

Worn out!

Joey has been running from my camera lately, I finally caught him today! I will always win. :)

We've been jumping around

We're hopping from one thing to the next but for tonight I'm going to leave you with one of our favorite pastimes lately, jumping off our huge dirt piles in the back yard. It makes a huge mess but the good thing is I get to mess around with the settings on my camera more and more! Happy weekend!

Multitasking

Just going through some pictures from today and this one made me smile.

Celebrating

It was Eric's birthday this week so we got to celebrate him (along with the groundhog)
Everyone spent some time putting together their own "special" gift for their favorite Dad and making him cards. This is Joey's, he's hard at work.


Then we headed to our favorite pizza place, La Fiamma! And what makes it our favorite is

...every one's own personal plate of pizza dough to play with while they wait for dinner,

...the pizza of course,

...the company you choose to bring along

...the ever so INCREDIBLE s'more dessert smothered with insane amounts of carmel!

...and the birthday boy! We love you, Dad! Thanks for being the greatest!!

The dirt

I figured I'd quick update tonight, I'm sure most of you are sick of looking at the rat. :)

Here is a picture of our beloved Magnolia tree hanging precariously on the edge, waiting for its new retaining wall.

And here are 3 little boys, just home from school. Can you just imagine what's going through their minds?!?

Yup, you're right! How quickly could they get into that dirt!

Our backyard renovation has been a project in waiting until now. The retaining walls are collapsing and the posts are rotting out on our deck so with this springlike weather we've started some major demolition.

Wish us luck. The rain is back and you can guess what our backyard is now. :P

Just happened to catch this moment. One shot, that's all it took and that's all I got until they saw me.

The much anticipated end of B.E.A.R. week (Be Excited About Reading = no t.v./computer/electronics week), character parade at school on Friday. Once Friday morning rolled around, it was great, however reaching a decision on what character to be was not an easy one for anyone accept Holly. (you'll see why in a minute)

Joey started with, switched a couple times and came back to a pirate.

Tyler ended up as Batman (thanks, Kathy) but not before thinking about possibly being a dinosaur or R2D2.


And Lucas, dear, dear, Lucas. A week ago he wanted to be a shark, then it became a few other things until a trip to the library this afternoon and he wanted to be this, the Tiger Moth Ninja. I threw in the towel only to have it picked up again by dear, sweet, Mia. She took on the task (and they even did a big reveal) and she did a mighty fine job! Thank you, Mia!!

Finally, Holly. She saw this book in a recent book order and has been making her way through it. It's a book about Holly, a little puppy. She knew immediately what she wanted to be and wasn't changing her mind. (Thank YOU!!)

I happened to stop in her room at just the right time. The kids were all taking turns introducing their character and what book it was from.

Oh, and basketball is under way, too.



Everyone is playing but Mia. She's happy to just hang out at home on basketball night or come along when she wants. I do think she'd rather be at school playing with those rats, though.

The Rats

The fifth graders get to study a unit in science using rats so their class "adopted" 4 of them. Every day Mia comes home with stories how the rats got out at night and where in the school they've found them. And her teacher wonders why no parent has signed the form agreeing to take them over the weekends or to "adopt" them when the units over. :Pp

(Traci, the close up above is for you! You said you hadn't seen them yet, I'm sure you'll sleep well after seeing this!) :)