Arrogant moment

Hey first off, how do you like the new look on the ole blog! Pretty awesome huh? Okay, I know it's a bit MUCH but we just can't wait until kick off tomorrow night! Matt has been counting down the days and it sends my heart a flutter when he talks BYU Football with me. You see 6 years ago he was none such a fan even teasing and laughing at me for almost crying because BYU lost to Utah. Now he's even willing to take me to Hawaii to see a game no questions asked. (Okay who WOULDN'T be willing to go to Hawaii for ANY reason... bad example I know.) We both can't wait to see how the Cougars play this year and SO wish we could go to a home game and check out the new an improved look LaVell Edwards Stadium is sporting.

I digress though, on to the reason of my post. I had an ARROGANT moment the other day. So arrogant I burst out into laughter and decided it was share worthy, which is even more arrogant of me. It went something like this:

Me to Matt while driving home from a quick, but not as quick as I would have liked, trip to the grocery store. "You know sometimes it is more annoying shopping with the kids, not because of the kids but because so many people stop me to tell me how cute they are."  (Arrogant in itself, but hang in there it gets worse)

Matt: "Well Mick, at least we have cute kids."

Me: "Yeah you're right, I mean I think if my kids were ugly I would be really embarrassed to be SO pregnant with such little kids all so close in age but since we're such a good looking family I think society in general decides it's okay and even applauds us, you know? I mean if we were all ugly I would probably be getting all sorts of looks like 'Man your family is ugly stop populating the world with ugliness!' " (ZING!)

Matt's response: "Uhhh, okay." Probably internally thinking- 'Wow, my wife is in a crazy mood today' with a smirk on his face.

Me upon realizing how conceited that comment was "WOW! Hahaha I can't believe I just said that! How completely ARROGANT am I! Hahaha you gotta admit though Matt, we are a cute family." 

Matt's response was his hand squeezing my knee and flashing me one of his brilliant smiles.

Just reminds me of a funny I saw the other day...

Matt and I have some pretty stinkin' funny and candid conversations almost daily, try not to be jealous that you can't be a fly on our wall. 

A Little DG in Troutdale

We went to Dabney State Park in Troutdale last Saturday for a little Disc Golf. We packed a lunch and headed out. Matt liked the course, it's really technical and the scenery is nice.  After he finished it was about 12:30 and I was tired! Walking 18 holes that have hills gets pretty tiring fast. Well I should amend I just get achy in my hips and joints. They hate me right now... Matt is always a gem and pushes the stroller now with the kids since it's hard enough for me to just walk. (Yeah I know I am such a baby) BUT regardless Matt found a nice spot to eat lunch down by the river and the kids stripped and played in the water. I was wishing the entire time I could do the same! Instead I soaked up a little sun sitting on the pebbly beach.

A lot of people go tubing down this river I think it was called the Sandy River, next year we'll have to remember to go Disc Golfing then float the river. It's not super long and not deep at all so that makes me feel a little easier about it all considering one of my very greatest fears is one of my children drowning while I am on watch. Morbid I know but that is why I am insistent upon swim lessons!

ANYWAY the kids LOVED playing in the water. Ty chased around the "fish" not sure if there really were fish or not, i'll have to ask Matt but Ty thought there were. He needs to be trained in the art of Noodling I think. Ty has quite the imagination these days so sometimes I don't even bother to figure out if what he is talking about is real or not haha. Maylee just does her own thing walking up and down the river and getting dirty. Little lady beats to her own drum I think. Just recently she has started to try to make Matt and I laugh. She has quite a funny personality in the car. On this trip on the way there she faked being asleep and waited for us to say something about her then opened her eyes and squealed to "scare" us. Matt and I died laughing.

After we played for an hour and a half we stripped the kids down to fresh skivvies and they both fell asleep on the way home with in five minutes of getting in the car. In my opinion that means our Saturday was well spent.

REALLY!?

Normally I try to keep things fairly positive on here but I've GOT to get something out. It's one of my biggest pet peeves, I am fairly certain it's how I was raised to notice this sort of thing.

Do you ever have those "REALLY!?" moments? You know, the moment you see someone usually a random stranger, do something and you think "You are REALLY going to do that? or leave that?" etc etc. Commonly it's while driving but that is another story...

I had a moment a few weeks ago that I am STILL thinking about. My mom and I were at Wal-mart. There were BBQ's in the center isle area on sale at close out prices. A lone woman probably in her late 40's or 50's was pushing a shopping cart and while not looking full on rammed the first BBQ. The BBQ was moved quite a bit and both the pricing sign and the special features sign was knocked off because of the collision. She looked at both signs on the ground and the BBQ and kept on going. I saw the whole thing, I looked her right in the eye and said out loud, "Really?". Right afterwards I walked over readjusted the BBQ and put both signs back up. Now I'd like to think she just had back surgery and it would have been painstaking and life threatening for her to bend over and pick up two little flimsy signs but after I saw her with a few items in her cart later, some of which from home and garden that were heavy, I am thinking that isn't the case. I know, I know, I shouldn't judge and I should just help out and keep my mouth shut. But REALLY?

Another one of those "Really!?" moments for me is when I see a random stranger attempt to throw something away in a public trash can, they aim for the trash can, noticeably miss and walk off... REALLY? You are just going to leave that trash there un-contained so it blows all over or until someone else picks up your nasty trash because of your laziness?

Here is a novel idea people, be RESPONSIBLE for your ACTIONS and TAKE STEPS to FIX THE PROBLEM when you MESS UP.

I saw this quote on Pinterest that fits perfectly here, "If you don't have time to do it RIGHT, then you must have time to do it AGAIN" I hear my moms voice saying that to me in my head when I read it.

So in an effort to change the world, lets all put forth the effort to do it right, even if it takes a few try's, instead of doing it half way and leaving the mess for others to clean up. Yeah, can you tell how OCD I have become with these sorts of things? Even Ty, when walking to the mail box will find bits of trash and every time he says "Mom, this goes in the trash can why is it on the street? Their not supposed to do that." If it isn't dangerous, I'll pick it up and bring it home to throw away in our can.

Keep things neat, keep them tidy and for pete's sake keep them sanitary. It makes the world a better place. Oh and take the extra step to teach your children too, I am constantly working on it with my own. I know my parents had to work extra hard with me, believe me I was anything BUT neat, tidy and thorough, when I was a kid and hey look at me now! Pure Awesomeness! (Haha)

Oregon Zoo

After our Brunch in Portland on Saturday we planned to go to the Zoo while we were in the neighborhood. 

Ty and Maylee really enjoyed themselves and this time we knew that we could bring in outside food with no problem so Matt and I were able to enjoy ourselves more too by not having to pay 5 bucks for a corn dog. Haha 

 Bears!

 Ty spotted another sleeping one down below.

 Maylee

 Ty and the Lions

 Check out the reflection in the glass... The lions just lounging on a high rock.

 Ty got on Matt's shoulders to see better.

 Pygmy goat petting area

 Maylee even got in on the action

 I love Ty's CHEESE face, he was super excited to see the Giraffes and their looooooong necks!

Of course while we were at the Zoo we couldn't pass up the chance to ride on the train. This years experience was 10 times better than last year (awe precious flash back in last years link to when Ty carried his Thomas train with him everywhere), but still just as exciting for Ty and this year Maylee was excited too!

Waiting to get on the train.

We're on and getting ready to go!

Hey proof I was there! I try to always get at least ONE picture of me at these places... haha

Riding the train. 

Ty SUPER excited!

We took the chance to get off at the Rose Garden park (the only stop) and eat out lunch outside the garden that we packed. It was perfect! 

Then we got back on a different train. Ty was concerned and at first didn't want to ride it until I convinced him that the Chuggington (a Disney Junior show) train was going to bring us BACK to the Zoo so we could see more animals.  

Ty kept saying "We're on our way!!!" Maylee got a little more comfortable too. 

Looking at the elephants

We didn't even have a melt down leaving the train. Everyone enjoyed the ride then we went to see the "REALLY BIG FISH!" (what Ty kept saying it was) the sea lion that I am not a fan of really, really big swimming creatures. They super creep me out. 

Here are the little fish. 

There is the big Sea Lion!

We stayed and watched it for about 10 minutes. Ty left saying "MOM THAT FISH WAS HUGE!" I was standing back while the kids and Matt got really close. 

The Zoo was pretty busy considering the weather was perfect and it was a Saturday so we had to park a ways out. As we were walking back they have THIS beauty on display and a way for the kids to play in the train too. Look close you can see Ty's cheese face and Matt "steering" as Ty directed him to do. 

Ty played for about 15 minutes in there he was so excited. 

We left the Zoo around 3:30, we left the house that morning at 8. Neither of the kids had naps. They were so good all day! Ty had a mini tiny little melt down because he didn't want to leave but it wasn't bad. It was a really fantastic day with the kids, they did SO well and we all had a really fun time. One of those perfect family outings that you hope for every time as a parent when you leave the house for a full day.  

TMT: Special Surprise Visit!

Last Wednesday Matt's Aunt Stormy from Iowa called and said that last minute she and a few others decided to fly in to Portland to attend her nephews wedding (on her husbands side) and they would love to see us. 

We were so excited! I haven't seen Aunt Stormy and Angie since our wedding, I hadn't seen Kevin since before Matt and I were even engaged and I had never met Matt's cousin Angie's husband Sam. We worked out a plan but things got busy with wedding stuff for them so we scheduled and re-scheduled with them.

We ended up planning to meet them in Portland at a local eatery for Brunch Saturday morning called Screen Door. I wanted to pick a place out that wasn't a national chain and something a little more original to Portland. We got a few recommendations and boy did we get Portland Originality! It was pretty darn good, super packed and quite "Portland". Their specialty is Fried Chicken over a Belgian Waffle... weird right? Kevin ordered it, he said it was good. 

I digress, we met up with them and I was nervous because our children especially Ty, struggle with meeting new people and warming up quickly. Usually Ty is a super grouch for a few hours (sometimes a day) before he decides someone is okay. We tried to prep him as well as we could telling him who he was meeting, where and that they were very nice.

When we met them Ty was a little stiff, but within 10 minutes he decided she was okay with Aunt Stormy. Then after about 10 more minutes he decided he LOVED Aunt Stormy, he sat with her at the table and he held her hand walking back to the car. He was SO SAD that they had to leave and kept asking if he could go in Stormy's car instead of ours. It was May that was a stink, which was a shocker.

Regardless it was a WONDERFUL meeting with family I haven't seen in years and Matt hadn't seen since last year. 

Sam, Angie, Kevin, Stormy, Ty, Matt, Me and Maylee

It reminds me of a quote by George Bernard Shaw "A happy family is but an earlier heaven". It was a little bit of heaven catching up, sharing stories, future plans, laughing and smiling with family. We LOVE seeing family, ANY family and LOVE when they come to visit. We wish we could see our family more. Matt's side of the family or my side of the family we love seeing them all. We were so happy that they could meet up with us with such a busy schedule and hope to see them again soon. 

Cousin Visit!

A week ago Britany, my brother H.D.'s wife called and let us know she would be in town with the kids and that she wanted to stop by to see us. Lucky us we got to see them twice!

They came to play Thursday afternoon (which I forgot to take pictures of) then they came back on Friday morning to play. Britany grew up around here and her younger sister was getting married. The ENTIRE family was staying at her parents house so knowing bathrooms would be in short supply with all those people trying to get ready at the same time I offered our house for her and the kiddos to get ready.

While Britany got herself showered and ready I entertained the kids, okay they entertained themselves. After Brit got ready she got the girls ready. Ty was SUPER SUPER exited to wake up to his cousins at the door to play. That is why everyone is in pajamas still.

 I love Ty's cheese face, they were checking out a spider on the side of the house.

 Dean who is 7 months younger than Maylee is all ready taller than her and out weighs May by 7 pounds or so. Kid is a tank and just learning how to walk. He kept trying to play with Maylee who is a sissy pants and would squeal Nooooo! Whenever he touched her. I just watched and laughed while Baby Dean followed her around the house.

The kids did a lot of this, which is fine with me. Forgive my bad camera skills.

The chair and backpack by the stairs were in an effort to slow down Dean from going up the stairs. He can go up fine but doesn't know how to get down besides tumbling, so I was on constant watch to make sure he didn't make it very far. Maybe I should invest in one of those 10 dollar baby fence things for just such an occasion.

The girls all spiffed up eating a quick snack before heading back to take off to the Temple for their Aunt's wedding. Baylee was done and asking for more when I snapped the picture.

It was fun to have cousins around for Ty to play with, EVERY DAY he asks to play with Baylee, Laycee, Jason, Sierra, Elena, Tanner, Dallin, Ashlyn (that he actually says Ash-ILL-in) or Calin (sorry Capri he doesn't quite know you yet) SERIOUSLY EVERY DAY he asks to go to one of their houses or for them to come play at our house. He sure does love playing his cousins!

Ipad Paparazzi Session

Ty has quite the attachment to Grandma's Ipad. He is ALWAYS asking to use it. I usually say no but Grandma is a sucker most of the time. 

This particular session was during Sacrament Meeting at church. He was using her Old Testament Coloring Book App where he chooses the color and touches the space and it will paint the color on an Old Testament themed picture. 

Somehow he decided it was time for a photo session. My mom and I noticed quite quickly but the speed at which Ty was clicking the take picture button was alarming. It was like he was his own Paparazzi. We couldn't handle it and just died laughing. In the space of 3 minutes the kid probably took 100 pictures.

These are the samples that my mom sent me. I don't think he knew he was taking pictures he may have just liked the quiet picture click noise that the Ipad kept making. 

 I was trying not to laugh. Matt was trying to get him to stop. 

 Matt resigned and just started smiling. 

 Matt finally got him to turn the Ipad at least. 

 Eventually. 

 There he is! With the ceiling. 

 Hahaha 

 Oh and of course just the ceiling. 

There were easily about 20 of the almost the exact same picture for each of the one I posted. Needless to say those last 5 minutes of Sacrament Meeting weren't as spiritual as they could have been. Really just trying not to die laughing. 

Just keep swimming

What did we do while in Medford? Why swim of course! I think that Ty went swimming as much as he possibly could. It was really nice that I could put some floaties on him and not have to get in myself for him to swim. I just sat on the swing and watched some days. 

My mom enjoyed people using the pool I think, she hopped in a few times too.

/div>

We had Tanner and Dallin (and Ashlyn but she didn't swim) come over too to play with Ty in the pool. Kelly and I chatted with the girls on our laps while we watched the boys. 

 The three had a fun time swimming with one another.

Matt took the kids swimming quite a few times too once he flew down for the weekend. (Lucky duck he gets to fly all the time, but we've found it's less money to fly since it's only 80 bucks for a one way plane ticket from PDX to MFR!) 

Maylee looks stoic but really she just loved to relax in the pool, by the end of the week she would put her head back and lightly kick around. 

Matt made it into town to see Ty in his last day of swimming lessons. As my Dad put it, "It didn't inspire greatness" the stubborn kid wouldn't even get in the pool. He did okay on Monday, TERRIBLE on Tuesday, Good on Wednesday and No good on Thursday... Ugh it's okay though we worked through it and believe it or not he is a better swimmer then before so he learned some things from Mimi. Plus in the video below you'll see Matt had his own lesson with Ty before he could swim by himself. Hopefully next year he is more teachable and Mimi doesn't have to ask him to get out of the pool for being uncooperative and grumpy.

After the "lesson" was fun time with Dad. Instead of saying Hold on Ty sayd Rode on. Haha

A few years ago Matt's Aunt Mitzi told me the trick to getting your little ones used to going under the water. You just count to three then on the last 3 your blow really hard in their face so they hold there breath and you quickly dunk them. I did it quite a few times with May and she was totally fine with it, in fact the last few times she would be grinning from ear to ear. Matt tried it out with her too. She was a fairly good sport about it I guess not as excited though. 

I think she enjoyed "jumping" into the pool more. 

Looks like she'll be a little fish too along with Ty. Maybe next year she and Ty can both take lessons. We'll have to see. 

E

Look at that face! She was THRILLED to be out of her tube and "swimming" on her own with her Daddy. 

In case you are wondering I did go swimming too, probably 5 times but who is the one that takes all the pictures? Me, so of course there isn't any proof. Promise though, with those 100 degree temps I was in the pool for sure. It was fantastic. I know Ty wishes we had a pool and ALWAYS asks on hot days to go to Grandmas house to go swimming. I tell him it's a long ways, then he asks to have Tanner and Dallin come too. I tell him it's over a 4 hour drive then he says "oh Mom I don't mind..." HA He doesn't mind taking a long drive to go swimming with Grandma and his Cousins. We'll have to plan a swim week every summer I guess.

Matt's Work Party

Fisher had a family day a few weekends ago, they set it up in the empty field right next to Matt's building. Ty was really excited when we got there because he saw some of his favorite things, Lightning McQueen and a Firetruck!

We stuck with most of the little kid stuff but they also had a character drawing fellow there drawing families (the line was far too long), a face painting station (Ty wasn't interested), a Balloon animal person (we got a Spiderman guy for Ty which popped shortly after so I threw the rest away when he wasn't looking) and even a Reptile guy there with snakes, lizard and spiders (We didn't spend much time over there totally creepy in my opinion.)

They had it catered nicely, with family friendly BBQ. We ate then we went over to the slide.

 Neither Ty nor Maylee had much trouble finding the fun in it right away.

 Matt even went quite a bit to help with Maylee who couldn't quite get up to the top on her own.

After the slide for a good 30 minutes we waited in line for the kids to ride in the Firetruck! They had an Ambulance there too for the kids to see while waiting to ride. They took the kids around the Fisher Campus (which is fairly large) and even let one kid ride in the front and blow the horn, whew that was loud!

 It was a SUPER hot day (like high 90's which again, is really hot for Vancouver) Ty's face gets really red when it's hot and he runs around a ton. Maylee not as much as Ty. We made sure they drank plenty of water to stay hydrated. 

They had a great time riding around on the truck. The Firefighters even got a legitimate call while out on the ride and had to stop to make sure everything was taken care of before they continued. 

Right afterwards we left Matt home to work the rest of the week and drove down to Medford. It was a PERFECT way to wear out the kids for the little over 4 hour drive down. They both slept over half of the trip which was great for me.

It was a fun day at Matt's work and Ty keeps asking when we get to go back to Dad's Work Party (actually for a while there he kept calling it Dad's BIRTHDAY party, wow that would have been quite the birthday party!)... a year seems so long for a 3 year old to wait. 

Cannon Beach

Two weekends ago was a scorcher. Here in Vancouver it was supposed to be 99 degrees, which is supposedly hotter than it's been for 2 years. Matt and I got to planning wanting to take full advantage of the heat we figured a good outdoor swimming pool would be perfect since Ty was starting swimming lessons the following week. 

We finished our Saturday chores and got everything ready to go. We got to the pool at about 11. No one was in the pool and the doors were locked to get in... weird. So of course I called Suzanne to use her Iphone and find me a number to call to see what was going on. She text me a # and I called. Yeah, the ONLY outdoor pool in our entire COUNTY on the HOTTEST DAY in the last 2 YEARS was only open from 2-3:30. That has got to be one of the worst times for kids too. PLUS for us to go it would have cost about 20 bucks, to swim for an hour and a half. 

Needless to say we quickly changed our plans. We decided to go to the beach, yeah it's a good 2-3 hour drive depending on traffic, but we were fairly close to ready we just needed to grab some camp chairs a little bit more food and our umbrella. 

We headed out about 45 minutes later. The drive was awful, it usually is and Matt forgets each year just HOW bad it is, but we made it. 

Ty was THRILLED. The weather was PERFECT, mid-80's gentle breeze. 

Maylee didn't really know what to make of the sand when I put her down in it, but she quickly acclimated and decided she rather enjoyed it. 

The water was no Southern California water, we're talking so cold that if you went in it for more than 30 seconds you were numb... but all of us enjoyed running in and out of the waves anyhow. 

Maylee didn't like the waves at all at first, probably since she got way more wet than the rest of us. If it was up to our ankles it was up to her knees. 

Eventually she liked them and as you can see Ty was completely enjoying himself. 

Hey look I made it in a picture too! Not my favorite being UBER pregnant and all, but still a cute family beach picture. 

After playing in the waves Matt showed the kids how to dig in the sand and make castles. 

I think I take boring videos after watching this one. 

Making castles

That is the famous Cannon Beach rock, I bet it has a name, like Cannon rock or something but I am too busy lazy to look it up. 

May likes to hold Matt's hand everywhere they go, she is finally just tall enough that Matt doesn't have to bend over TOO far to hold her little hand. 

Ty kept trying to build sand castles back by our chairs, the concept of wet vs. dry sand was beyond him. He was okay just digging though after a while. 

I am such a lucky mom that (for the most part) our kids play well with one another. They sat and played for quite some time right in front of Matt and I while we lounged in the sun. 

Maylee was a girl on a mission most of the time getting right where she wanted to be. 

Maylee squealed a ton in the sand. I tried to get video this is the best I got. 

Near the end I told Ty I wanted one last picture, he said no way and started running away from me. 

I think we spent a good 3 hours at the beach and drove another 2 and a half hours home. Usually the rule for Matt is if we spend more time driving to and from vs. how long we are actually there than its a waste of time... but he made an exception for the beach and it was a good one. I have NEVER seen weather like that at a Northern Oregon Beach and I don't know if it will be duplicated for quite some time. We're all ready looking forward to our Cannon Beach trip next year.