Phew! It's dusty over here!!

I think it's about time to dust things off over here!!  Stay tuned...you know all 1 of you....Mimi.....

Sweet September!!! Where did the time go!??

Wow, September just flew by didn't it??

Our September started off to Island Park and Yellowstone, we got to spend a week camping with my mom and even Paul came up for a few days

We did drive into the park one day and walked around a few of the pools  here is one of my favorite pics from the trip

 While camping we just had fun relaxing and being outside, we love camping so it was fun to be able to go at all.   Even though we missed the Viehweg week in August we still had a great time.  However as we were driving there I thought it was kind of funny we were going to be leaving our VERY green forested  home here in Olympia to go to a different less green forest, usually isn't it the other way around?  Anyway....Josh was happy to get to fly fish which was really what the whole trip was about.  

This little girl was such a trooper, she did her best to tolerate the drive home, we did all of it in one day....that makes for a VERY long day in the car.  

Keegan actually missed the 1st (half) week of school so the night we got home from camping (really late, almost midnight) we threw the kids into bed and hurried and unpacked the car so that we could get up bright and early for Keegan's 1st day as a second grader!!  I can't believe I have a second grader!!  As you can see in the picture, his walking shoe for his cast is covered in duct tape....We found out that it only takes 8 days for a young active boy to blow out his walking shoe so we got resourceful.....

After spending 4 weeks in a cast that included playing and sweating outside everyday and a week long camping trip this kid needed a new cast, even if it was only for 10 days.  The office at the childrens hospital was great and so helpful.  They told us in the begining that they fully expected to do at least 1 cast change if not 2.  So with only 10 days to go he got this new lime green beauty. He liked this since he could now have the kids at school sign it.  Funny little boy came home the first day with nothing but girls signatures.  

 September also means salmon fishing, this year has been a bit tougher than the last.  There are a lot of......interesting red neck hill billy's here in WA.  Josh is having a hard time enjoying fishing with people who have no manners so we end up going way up stream from them where we found fishermen who don't wear camo everything and some even have shirts with collars on them.

 Also in September, this girl officially decided to start walking EVERYWHERE.  Instead of just a few wobbly steps then back to crawling, her preferred mode of travel is walking.  you can often find her doing laps around our island or....sitting IN my dishwasher.  If she hears me open it up she comes walking as fast as her drunken sailor legs can take her. 

 Because I was soooo excited for Fall some friends and I got together to start on some Halloween decorations, I had a ton of jars that my mom brought so we decided to put them and Pinterest to good use. 

 Finally, Josh got his electric piano.  We sold our real piano in January and had just been holding out till Costco got theirs in stock again.  Josh is happy and so is Carleigh, she quickly learned that #1 she can pull herself up onto a chair #2 she figured out how to turn it on and start playing and #3 falling off the chair is no fun..

A fly by of August

So...August started off with this..

A trip to the pediatric orthopedist at the childrens hospital in Tacoma.....

And a cast for the last month of summer vacay

He apparently has something called Kohler's Disease (don't worry it's not catchy)  It's what they call it when the navicular bone for some reason temporarily loses it's blood supply and becomes fragile and collapses on itself, then it heals and should be just fine.  However, when the pt in question is a VERY BUSY 7 year old who never holds still it may not ever get a chance to heal if he never sits still.  So as the dr put it, the cast was a way to immobilize a bone on a kid who can't be immobilized.  Once his foot wasn't able to bend or flex the pain was gone and he was free to do whatever he could figure out how to do with a cast on.....which was anything and everything.

 The windows at the Childrens Hospital in Tacoma were Carleighs favorite part..

 We also had visitors in August!!!  Mimi and Dan came for a visit, the weather was perfect and we spent as much time as we could exploring, and well, I made Mimi carry our "little but heavy" cutie as much as I could get away with.

 One day we went to Burr Foot Park and hiked down to the beach we got to watch the sail boats and collect some shells

Keegan and his cast at Tumwater Falls park with Dan and Mimi

We also spent one day going out to the beach.....what a fun day that was...... It started with Carleigh crying the ENTIRE 90 min to the beach, I thought I was going to have a stroke!!  Once we were there and she was able to get out she was as happy as a clam!  Mimi and Dan thought it would be fun to see the lighthouse and climb to the top so while they climbed the kids and I took pics and just had fun outside.  After the lighthouse we drove just down the road to the beach, I like to think it was fun, I had fun, C had fun and even Keegan with 15 bags on his cast had fun......  Washington beaches are so much different than in Cali, Mexico or the Carribean I hope they had fun seeing ours.  

 And last of all, this little one got more brave and towards the end of the month started walking a few steps at a time.  She also realized she could reach all of her brothers legos.....this will be fun....

July in an instant

In July we had some fun visitors from SLC.  Thanks Paul and Tari!!  While they were here Keegan got spoiled as usual, we went to the beach, the farmers market, hunted for geocaches.  We watched fireworks from the roof (not the visitors or Carleigh) I was certain that I would need to call the fire dept and their ladder truck to get me down!  Going up was easy, coming down.....not so much.  The roof suddenly became much steeper that I remembered.  We had a friend put together some fun summer activities for anyone who was interested, one was a scavenger hunt and the other was just a day at the park blowing HUGE bubbles.    Carleigh was a busy girl who loved going outside as often as I was willing, she tears apart the house in a blink of an eye and loves her brother the best of all of us  Keegan rode his bike and played outside for as many hours a day as he possibly could, he played soccer and had games every Saturday.  It was then that I decided I needed to get his foot checked out since he was still limping from a bed jumping incident.  Took him in to be check out by his pediatrician and those x-rays came back looking normal....but not really.....

Photo Overload

Just thought I'd load some photos that I've taken recently.  

This was on the last day of school, it's crazy to think that on the first day of school Carleigh was soo tiny.  She sure loves her brother.  

So far this summer Keegan has spent as much time as possible outside riding his bike or scooter, he'll stay out for hours. 

I took all of these tonight because the sunlight was so pretty, so I told my Super Assistant (Keegan) to get some shoes on and off we went.  

 Here's what she does when you ask where her nose is

It quickly turns to this.

And here is my wonderful assistant at work, Carleigh was escaping the blanket so he put her back in place.  

She's trying to escape again, but those blue eyes!!!

 Here she is laughing at her silly brother, he's always been the best at getting her to laugh or smile. 

This is now what she does when you tell her "No" she does this slow motion blink, it looks like she's already starting to bat those long lashes of hers.  

Moving On Up!!

 I can't believe it, another school year has come and gone!!  We now have a 2nd grader in the house and he couldn't be more excited!! He loves school and his teacher.  He's very excited that he gets to keep his same teacher and class for next year.  When I've asked him if he's excited for 2nd grade he always says yes.  He's excited "because 2nd graders are so much cooler than 1st graders" and his other response that still has me laughing is "Yes, because now I'm a year closer to college"  I'm happy to hear that he plans on college, just laugh because he just doesn't get how far away that still is.

Sept 2012                                     

June 2013

Little Monkey Man

Keegan loves that he can go out an play in the front yard or at the park, one of his new favorite things is to climb our tree.  He's turning into a regular little monkey. 

Cake and Toys

ONE

Can you believe it??  How is she already ONE?!

Here are a bunch of pictures for the family.