Just after max visited for a week in june, the boys and I were invited to a dairy farm with some friends. we drove way out west not knowing what to expect. Not sure how I got lost, since it seemed like only one road and tons of grass, but I did. Before long I figured out where I was and found my way to Spokane's Family Farm.
upon arriving we had a little lunch on some hay bales.


The Woman who runs the farm took us all on a tour and showed off her sweet kid loving animals. Here's a donkey, he even followed us around after all that petting.




Asher and bub braved the crowd and looked for eggs in the chicken coop. no luck.


This beautiful rooster was standing guard nearby. isn't he gorgeous?


Next were the horses. Everyone was feeding them and by the time it was our turn, the horses were full and uninterested. I this one felt sorry for my boys as he came over and politely nibbled. Asher was a tad unsure, so he only held out on blade of grass in an effort to look less desirable. this only made his fingers look yummier, and the horse gave them a taste. Asher wasn't bothered much, just annoyed his fingers were "wet".


We saw some cows out to pasture, and this is where a few were coming over to say hi.
asher was saying "gwoss, smewlls gwoss. jus gwoss"


And here's our last photo. After this was taken the boys had a melt down and we left shortly after. the tour was great, but a lot of it was eduacational for the parents benefit, and the kids got tired. this was taken in the milking area. Bright said "there's lotsa tubes and stuff"

June happenings

I know, once again I have let this blog go un-updated and I feel awful. mostly because it's max's way of keeping up with us. Consistency is not something I am very good at.

June was a month filled with happenings! The boys and I moved into our new home, though it was without max (and our household goods!) we were still very excited.
I picked up some temporary furniture, cooking utensils, and such from ikea and goodwill. I was loaned several other items from family and good friends, so I was able to set up house in a campy sort of way.

Max cam for a short visit in early june. we packed as many visits with friends and family as we could, and made sure to have some quality "us" time as well.
here is bright playing with one of his besties, Maddeck, Kyle and Laura's boy.


We all spent a day shopping for a bicycle for Brighton. he had a good time picking out his new bike and Toy Story helmet and knee pads.
Here he is trying it all out for the first time.


We have a huge field on the opposite side of the street from us belonging to a middle school. Max and the boys decided to play some ball.


Asher found a box, and played in it. he's like a kitten that way.


We also took trip a down to Riverfront Park in downtown Spokane. the squirrels were hungry so we obliged.




They also have rides there. here were are excited to ride. aren't we cute? and naive?


And this is when I imagined us all falling to our deaths.


a 2 year old in a rickety old ferris wheel chair with no seatbelt, flailing around in the air.not the greatest idea I've ever had. I must point out that we stayed up there while loading other passengers, so my little mind was going nuts for the longest 60 seconds ever. the did let us out, but not before "letting" us go around 2 more times. nice.

An end to a wonderful day. My loves:

Cornish (courtney's) BFA Show 2010

MY SISTER GRADUATED FROM CORNISH!!! YAY! I am so proud of her and how her art and vision has evolved over the years. She is SO amazingly talented and I love her eye for simple meaningful moments in our lives and being able to capture them.
Her Show was Friday night May 14th, 2010. Elizabeth and I decided to take a trip to Isushi and chat until it was time to go, it was a fun date. we were able to chat one on one which is unusual since we usually have kids all around. The Show was in Seattle at the schools studios, which is just a building with 3 wall spaces for "studios". They transformed them all into a beautiful gallery setting, upstairs the walls were light blue, white and grey, downstairs was same, but then in an offshoot room was the "black room". It was THE place to be showing, it was the most gallery like of the whole place and very professional and nice looking. Court was in the further end of the room. Since it was black and anything besides the art was not well lit, it was quite hard to get a good photo of people. I managed to get some blurry ones, so you'll be able to get the feel of her space. here's the best one I could manage of her in her space.


Here's her pricing list, comment book and business cards. Also a sculpture piece (camera with moss) which I love and am VERY tempted to purchase:



This is the best photo I could get of her whole space:




Here's me checkin out the light table she built:



some cool peeps:



This piece was done with smoke on paper. Pretty amazing up close.



This piece was made up of tons of different angles of people's bodies.



these drawings are made of just graphite pencil on paper, and they're about as tall as bright is. really awesome.



besides court's stuff this might be one of my favorite pieces in the whole show.



Even Jim showed up!



My final sentiments:

Bright's Birthday party!

Yesterday we celebrated bright's 5th birthday. He requested a few different presents for his birthday: Legos, robots, and buttercups. sweetie pie.
He ended up getting many legos and a few other great presents. As he opened each one he was so happy and excited. I was proud, there was not one "next" or "oh, it's just ____".
He requested a wallace and gromit birthday, with a wallace and gromit rocket cake. I had my work cut out. I love cooking so this was more of a fun challenge than work, so I really enjoyed it. it definately looks homemade, but Bright was so excited as he watched it take shape, he kept saying "yay! look at my cake!"

Here's the Rocket cake:



I also attempted a treat that I have made ebfore just in another shape for his 4th birthday (robot heads) and he loved them so much he asked for them again this year. I decided to make Gromit heads made from Oreo truffle center with white chololate coating and tootsie roll ears. it was time consuming, but super fun and rewarding to see my result.

ta da!


once everyone arrived we all sat outside because it was SO gorgeous! I was so happy to have a nice day with the kids playing outside, and all of us parents watching and chatting. it was so relaxing.
here's a group shot (nathaniel, jonna, elizabeth, ross, toby, coco, brian, hayley, and stella's hair in front of coco)



The kids all had a fun taking turns riding the sled behind the buggy and chasing the sled (you can see asher waving from the seat with grampa, that's what he did the entire time, waving and yelling "HI!!"). Rainy got on the buggy on her own at one point, and Ross took goldie on it for a short time.



we all sat chatting about nothing inparticular when suddenly one of the chickens decided Toby's head would be a good place to roost for a moment. Toby didn't think so.


After a while we hung the #5 pinata, and all the kids took turns hitting at it. It took all the kids taking 2 turns to get it open. The funniest to watch was Stella, she was so un coordinated: hitting at the air and almost hit some of the kids! most of the kids just found it right away and just whacked away. finally I just took the pinata and poured out the candy. they ran around crazy trying to find it all.



After that we played outside some more then had cake and opened presents. Coco's camera has the rest of the photos, so it will be a bit before I can get those. Bright was so grateful and happy the whole day. it was really nice to see all the kids get along so well and have a fun time. Honey, You were missed for sure. there wasn't 5 mins that went by without me wishing you were here to snuggle with under the tree, or to listen to your funny conversations with Ross and your bro, or to enjoy our sweet little bub together. Can't wait to see you.

MONSTER TRUUUUUCKS!!

Bright is in love, with monster trucks. His first love is Thomas, and all things automobile related. But when it comes to trucks, Monster trucks rule. I mean, it was like a natural thing; one day when he was nearly 2, we saw a book at the library and he was instantly drawn to it. From then on it was a love affair, talking about them playing with them, making the hot wheels get smashed by them. It seems he (and most boys I think) was hard wired to like them. For me, I don't see the draw, big truck HUGE tires, ok but not a big deal. Where's my nail polish and USweekly?

When he had just turned 4 we saw a show advertised, but I was still nervous to take him. I knew it would be loud, and I was worried we would spend lots of money and he'd want to leave just after it started ( a' la circus show 2008 where he got worried with all the people around). This year I felt he was old enough to be SO excited and into it, that it would over shadow his fear of the crowds or nervousness with the potentially rowdy crowd. Now Max and I had originally wanted to make this a family outing, but then somehow the Air Force got involved. So it soon became a "date night" for me and Bright. we went to Dinner and had onion rings (his request) and chicken and BBQ sauce. I later realized the dinner we had was ALL too fitting for the evening we were about to experience.
I dropped of Asher at the neighbors house and Bub and I headed out. The venue was only about 5 mins from our house, wich was perfect since it started pretty late. There were a lot of kids there, but WAY more adults than I expected. we sat next to your typical Monster truck patron: older man, lots of hair, hell's angels type, double fisting coors next to his old bar fly "gal". To complete the look: leather vest, black jeans and "vest" t-shirt dispite the sub zero temps outside. So I decided to get into character as the bubbly ex cheerleader mom, how could he hurt me then? He, of course could not be more nice or quiet.
Bright was so into all the things happeing down on the track. We got there with enough time to find our seats and sit for about 10 mins before the show started, any earlier than that and it would have been miserable (for me) since he asked when it would start aabout 1,000 times. just before the show we bought some Dippin' Dots Ice Cream (freeze dried) and a big foot t-shirt. Bub said it was the best thing he's ever seen.
once the show started he was very quiet and just took it all in. which I know as a very good sign. it means he's soaking it all up. we stayed and watched until intermission (9pm) and then left. here's a few highlights:

BIG FOOT!!


the cutie pie wore his ear muffs the whole night, he was so excited to go he wore them in the car on the way to the show :)



here's one from the wheelie contest:

Ahh, innocence...

This morning Bright and I did his school work, and afterword he wanted to keep writing letters and make words. He was pretty much just writing random things here and there, you know, nonsense words; laughing as I tried to read them and how funny they sounded. "BAE" he giggled at. Then he wrote one that was actually a word. As he wrote it, I watched..."B"...."O"... ok, what's he writing..."O"...oh no, don't do it bright...



We both laughed really hard at this. Then asher ran around the kitchen yelling "booooob! boooooob!"

Asher's Birthday

Asher is 2! He's knee deep in defiance and tantrums, and we couldn't love him more. his favorite phrases are "hold mama" and "ree ree hung-ee, mama" (really hungry) and of course, "no" is a favorite. Time outs are becoming more of a common thing and he's very dramatic when he is angry, often throwing cars down on the ground, and screaming through a clenched jaw (red face and all). surprisingly he's good at sharing, as long as you give him a minute to part with the toy (a hug and kiss for the toy)
Favorite past times: playing cars and trains, what else? he's typically obsessed with Thomas and friends, something bright passed on. His favorite toy is his "lady" train whom he calls "own lady" because it's his own.
For his birthday we decided to do a small family thing on the actual date, then a friends party on saturday. He's got a few friends from the church nursery, and both studies I go to, so I thought he'd have fun having them on his turf.I made cupcakes and adult type appetizers, we had balloons and streamers (most of which were ruined or on the floor by the time friends came over) and his new veggie tales cd was playing.

before i show pics of the party I wanted to share these photos. there's a ton. but they are all a physical expression of what (I think) is in a toddler's mind. These were all taken in about 1.5 minutes while he sat in his high chair, post-cupcake.

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So that's our stinker. those photos pretty much sum up each and every day for me. A rollercoaster of epic emotional feelings. can't wait to share them all with you when we come "home".