Yard and Garden.

We've been working hard to get our yard looking nicer.  When we bought the house it had been a rental for a while so there was plenty of work to be done.  The neighbors across the street have actually thanked us for making an effort.  Not that the yard was hideous but it was very boring.  

Our garden area,  so far we have strawberries just behind the  wall we built last winter.  These were a Keegans 1st request.  Then if you look closely you can see all our tomato cages, we have multiple different kinds of tomatoes and peppers, both hot and sweet.  

Here's the front, you can see the daffodils and tulips I planted last fall and then all the pansies that I got on clearance from Home Depot.  They are one of my favorites.   

They just have happy little faces

One of my tulips

Cute flower pot on my porch

We also planted some Hosta's in the backyard under the window but I didn't get a picture of them.  

Funny Boy!

We're REALLY residents of WA now

It's really real now, not only did we buy a house, change our drivers licenses AND file our taxes with our WA address, today I went and FINALLY did this....

Kinda exciting!  However, it's funny that something as small as having a nail in your tire could make you homesick. Instead of being able to just buzz on down to Big O' Tires in Sandy, I had to go to Discount Tires.  It didn't feel like "home" sure they were nice and all but it wasn't the same as when you walk into Big O and have almost the entire staff know your name, what kind of car you drive and ask about your family.  Just hoping that our current tires can hold on till we go to UT for a visit.  I'd rather buy tires there.  

Goodbye training wheels

We've tried other times but he would just end up claiming he wanted to ride his scooter instead.  But today we suggested taking them off, and with a little pep talk and 5ish min of help from Josh he was off and away.  

Happy Anniversary to Us

We celebrated our 9th Anniversary with a nice lunch, just the two of us.  

We had seen a nice Korean place that had the tables just like Jon told us about, you cook your own meat right at your table.  Then along with all the other yummy stuff you get with it you make lettuce wraps or just eat it with the kimchi and rice.  YUM

After lunch we went and saw the movie John Carter, it was good, and it was kind of fun to see that we have been to places in UT where it was filmed.  Also, I suspected parts were filmed in NM and I was right, one of the places was Shiprock, NM which we have seen multiple times on our trips back and forth from ABQ.  

It was such a nice day getting to just be with my hubby, he truly is my best friend. 

 After the movie we went and got Keegan and then went out for frozen yogurt at our favorite place. 

Thanks for the last 9 years Josh!

What we've been up to.

We haven't been up to too much, our days are basically the same.  Which is a good thing but it makes for less reasons to take pictures.  

Here's Keegan at soccer, it's over now though.  He had fun but I didn't think it was very instructional

Sorry it's blurry my battery way on it's way out and couldn't snap the pic fast enough. 

One afternoon the sun was out so we went for a scoot to the school to play on the playground

Yesterday afternoon the sun was out again and we took full advantage of it.  We headed to the playground up near the ball fields and let Keegan (and Josh) burn off some energy while I went walking. 

Time for a haircut!  

Keegan and Josh had fun on this thing.  It's segmented and it moves up and down.  Keegan and Josh made their own game of  Wipeout on it.  When Josh's legs got tired they ended up timing Keegan to see how long it took to get across the whole thing.  Fastest time, 5 seconds!

Keegan's Party

Hope you don't read this post expecting pictures because there aren't any.  I had every intention of taking pics so that he could remember his 6th birthday.  However, when your house is full of six 6 year old, an almost 4 year old, two 2 year olds and a 20 mo old plus 5 adults AND a puppy who is locked upstairs in her kennel the noise level is ASTONISHING and quite distracting.  Keegan had a blast and I think the other kids did too.  It was fun to watch them all play together.  He got a lot of fun things, and has been playing with them all since.  Next year I'm thinking having the party outside the house so that I don't have to do the cleanup.

Six!!

Happy Birthday to the cutest little man ever. 

Love you!

Here he is before school  

And here he is trying to show off his shoes that light up.  I couldn't catch the lights but he is super excited.

She likes TV

This is a common sight.  Scarlett likes TV, she watches Wild Kratts with Keegan she also really like watching the Australian Open with Josh and really liked a National Geographic program about bears.  When watching the bear program she actually got up and jumped up on to the fire place (the tv is over it) to get a closer look.  

The Blackout!

Here are what the streets looked like, thankfully we know how to drive in the snow and most of the  others who don't stayed at home.  

And here is the freezing rain that caused the blackout, it took down trees all over the city which took the power lines with it. 

We played TONS of this and also Chutes and Ladders which if I never had to play again  I'd be happy .

Since we couldn't cook we went out for dinner and what kid doesn't like free ice cream

Here was Scarlett's favorite spot, she would lay as close as possible  literally almost touching and she would stay there till she got up panting needing water.

We were luckier than most, since we're a happy campy type family I was able to save almost all of our food using our cooler and we didn't really have to use candles because we all have headlamps.  And while I could have cooked on our camp stove it was just easier to go out or eat sandwiches.  I will have to say it was kind of fun for the 1st day or so but after 4 nights we were kind of over it.  

We decided to build a new snowman in our own yard now that we had enough snow.  

With beach rocks for eyes and a kazoo for a nose.  

SNOW!!!!!

We've got SNOW!!!  Now, it's not like the huge storms we are used to growing up in Salt Lake and it's not like "The Storm Of The Century" that we had in Spokane but we've been told this is the most snow seen in the Oly area since the 1940's  

I think it's our fault now that I think of it, we moved to St. George and then had the "100 Year Flood"!  Spokane, like I said, the most snow they had had in 106 years.  Vancouver wasn't so bad, ABQ last year had the worst cold weather they had experienced in a very long time, shutting off natural gas to thousands of homes.  AND NOW  HUGE snow in Olympia!  

Because of this I got up at 5:30 a.m. and headed out the door to Wal-Mart.  If we were going to get out there and play Keegan was in need of new snow boots and winter gloves.  He had been making due with his rain boots but this called for more.  So by 5:45 I was the crazy Utahan shopping for snow gear, there was 1 other customer in the store.  I had to get out there on the roads before everyone else tried to do the same. 

We got up early this morning and hurried and ate and then got out there so we could be the first ones to make tracks in the new snow.  

Scarlett is loving all the snow, she wasn't quite sure how to use the bathroom though.  

Loves to run in the snow, and look goofy doing it. 

Josh and the dogs jogged all the way across the church yard and then ran back.  

No explanation really, cute boy, cute dog

More of that cute boy of mine

Little birdie prints on our porch when we got back. 

With a carrot for his nose

Keegan and Josh went across the street to the church and used their snow to build a snowman.   They actually got to build one that is taller than Keegan. 

This one is for "Pa" he wanted to know where the church across the street was.  So.....this is the view out of Keegans new bedroom window and just to left, you can see that in between the trees that are directly to the East and the end of the townhouses is a little break, all that snow right there is on the grassy area behind a Lutheran church of some kind.  Also, if you look closely  smack dab in the middle there, you can see Keegan's snowman waiving to you.

Here are some pics for those people (Pa) that kept telling us that it was sad that Keegan would never get to see snow.  It's been snowing on and off for the last day and a half.  

He could not wait to get outside and play in the white fluffy stuff.  He's trying to catch the huge flakes on his tongue but keeps getting them in his eye

You can see the size of the flakes on his jacket.

Mr. Blue Eyes

The trees across the street to the East.

We moved to the front yard where the snow on the grass was "safe"

so pretty these are the trees to the south in that big grassy church yard

And of course when we got in we needed a nice mug of hot chocolate 

Lazy Day

Keegan and I had a lazy day today.  We may have spent our day in our jammies but we actually did  stuff.  

We added a second coat of paint onto Keegan's red wall, touched up the areas that the stupid painters tape took with it.  AND, I managed to let Keegan help paint.  It nearly killed me to hand over a roller full of red paint to a 5 year old but, I survived and so did the carpet.  

Then, we grew  Underwater Magic Rocks

Thanks to Aunt Mimi

 10 minutes later they were growing....

 THEN....We made cute little heart shaped crayons.  They will go on cute little valentine cards for Keegan to take to school.  Now I know it's only January but I was just to excited to try something I found on Pinterest a long time ago.  Keegan actually really enjoyed peeling and breaking crayons.  

Then, not as exciting or as pretty I did manage to make myself vomit by cleaning the shower drain.  SERIOUSLY the grossest drain I've ever cleaned.  I'm still sticking to the claim that it isn't all mine.