Making Memories

These last few days have been filled with some fun, exciting memory making. 

Waiting.  

Waiting for the Tacoma Link on our way to the Children's museum.

Riding.

Riding on the Tacoma Link was a huge hit!

Painting.

Colson loved the art room on this trip to the museum.  He loved painting!

Creating. 

Both Cannon and Colson enjoyed creating 3-D objects with pieces of colored foam and toothpicks.

Learning. 

Cannon had a dentist appointment and Colson was doing a lot of observing and learning, hopefully making his next visit to the dentist easier.

Playing. 

I enjoy watching and listening to the boys playing together.  I am seeing this more often.  

Watching. 

Colson likes to watch Cannon swim and wishes that he could be in the pool as well!

Anticipating. 

Colson couldn't wait until the Sounder train came.  He shouted, "Train!" when he could see it.  We took the Sounder into Kent.

Exploring. 

It didn't take long for the boys to get wet in the water.  We enjoyed some munchies and walked around Kent Station for awhile.  

Enjoying.

The boys and I waiting for the train back to Sumner.  

Enjoying every moment!

Enjoying

We have been doing a lot of enjoying.

Enjoying the weather.
Enjoying time to play.
Enjoying time to be creative.
Enjoying having Auntie Karin here.
Enjoying riding the motorcycles.
Enjoying a night out without kids.
Enjoying weekends.
Enjoying watching movies.
Enjoying the laughter of little boys.
Enjoying scones from the fair.
Enjoying looking at pictures from last year.
Enjoying reading.
Enjoying the summer time of "looser" routines.
Enjoying the Chevelle.
Enjoying fresh fruit and veggies.
Enjoying imaginative play from the boys.
Enjoying being able to relax.

Cannon tracing around Colson with chalk.

Colson riding his bike at the park. 

Flowers at the farmers market. 

Cannon on his bike. 

Karin riding the motorcycle.

Sebastian and Chris at the races in Monroe, getting ready to
shoot T-shirts.

Enjoying every moment.

Smile

Life is so much better when you have a smile on your face!

Cannon's swimming made us smile today!  He had a private lesson and he was very nervous.  You could tell he wasn't sure about himself and his abilities.  But by the end of the lesson, he was swimming very well on his own and even tackled a fear of jumping in the deep end (into his teacher's hands).  He is still working on taking breaths while he is swimming and continuing to work on getting over his fear of not being able to touch....and what to do...SWIM!!  But there is progress and that makes us all smile.

Colson makes us smile often.  He is constantly talking and at times, showing his sense of humor.  We enjoy hearing all he has to say and love how much he can communicate.  We can tell that he really listens to everyone because of what he says later on.

Tonight, family time made me smile.  We headed out in the Chevelle to see some other hotrods in Puyallup. We had ice cream and walked around looking at old cars.  The boys loved the ice cream way more than the old cars!

Sitting on the back deck, relaxing in the shade and watching the boys made me smile.  Chris and I were talking about the day and the boys, Cannon and Colson were playing with chalk.  It was nice.

Working on scrapbooking and memory keeping makes me smile!  I am editing our 2012 Blog Book and I am loving re-reading all of the posts and seeing the photos that go along with the writing.  This is a great keepsake and so worth the time.

Enjoying every moment!

Sunny Summer Days

We have been enjoying some great summer weather lately and have really enjoyed waking up to blue skies, soaking up the sun, playing outside, splashing in the pool, and just playing!

Here are a few things we've been up to:

Trying to get the toys out of the ice block.  (This kept them busy for a good 45 minutes!)

Hanging out, pretending to be dinosaurs!

Having fun in the water with friends!

Eating Popsicles, enjoying the evening on the back deck.  

Playing with the bike trailer and the wagon.

Playing together with the boats and trailers in the pool....naked.  But who cares!

Enjoying every moment!

Random Photos

Here are a few random photos I came across today:

We saw a fire truck at the library earlier this month.  That was a big hit!

Colson having fun at church on our way to pick up Cannon from camp.

Cannon pretending he is driving a hot rod.  Love the hand out the window!

Turning the throttle down on the quad so Colson wouldn't go so fast.  

The boys helping us shovel rock. 

Enjoying every moment.

Birthday Celebration

We have been looking forward to Evan, Morgan and Riley's birthday party for a long time and today was the big day!

Evan turned 4.

Morgan and Riley turned 1.

It was a great afternoon and it was all about the kids.

They played and played and played.  We had to stop them to eat.  We had to stop them to sing Happy Birthday and eat cake. We had to stop them to do the pinata. We had to stop them to open presents.

It was so much fun.

Cannon and Colson loved riding around in Evan's electric car.  Cannon took everyone for rides.
Cannon loved jumping on the trampoline.  Colson wanted to jump, but couldn't keep his balance with other kids jumping.
Colson loved playing in the sand box and kept busy for a long time.
Cannon liked playing in the water, sliding down the slide into the pool and spraying others with water.

It was VERY hard to get them to leave!

Enjoying every moment!

A New Account Owner In The Family

That would be Cannon!

Today Cannon opened up a savings account in his name and deposited $75.00 of money he's been collecting.  He was very excited and felt proud that he got to sign his own name.

Cannon brought in his "Cash Can" and immediately set out the coins that he rolled as well as the dollars he's saved.

Hopefully this will be the start of a good life lesson on saving money!

Enjoying every moment!

Splash!

On our way back home, we stopped to watch the drag boat races in Lowell, Oregon.  After watching a few rounds of qualifying, we took the boys to a small indoor water park in Springfield, about 20 minutes away from where we were staying.

It was a huge hit!

Cannon loved every bit about it but really enjoyed the wave pool.  He liked riding the waves back in and kept asking Chris to take him farther out in the pool.

Colson just loved being in the water.  He liked the waves splashing up on him and he really liked the kiddie pool, made just for toddlers.  He got in and immediately starting to "swim" using his hands to pull him around.

What a great find and it was just what we needed to cool off and have some family fun.

Enjoying every moment.

Stop Number One

Our first stop on the way to Northern California was at the Evergreen Aviation and Space Museum in McMinville, OR.

This is where the Spruce Goose is kept.  It is a massive airplane and it's hard to believe that it even got off the water.

Cannon and Colson had some fun playing around in the room set up for kids.  Then I hauled them around to look at he planes outside.  This was only kind of fun for them!  :)  

Cannon and I also got to enjoy the cool playground the museum has while Colson napped.

Enjoying every moment.

Where's the Big Trees?

As we were getting ready for our trip, we read some books and looked at a few short videos on the Redwoods.  So on our drive to Northern California we kept hearing, "Where's the big trees?"  

We saw a lot of big trees on our adventures in the Redwood Forest.  They were truly amazing.  The enormity of some of them left us speechless.  All you could do was just stand there with your mouth open.  

Here are some pictures of the "big trees"....

This is one of the first "giants" we came across.  It was on the path to the gondola at Trees of Mystery.  

This tree was at a stop we made off of the Avenue of the Giants.  This was also where we saw the "Immortal Tree" which had been through flood, fire, and lightening and a loggers ax...and it was still living.  

Here is one of the first trees we came across on another hike in the Founders Grove.  

This was the "Champion" tree, standing about 375 feet tall before it fell.  It fell in 1991 but the enormity of it was still there.

This tree was hollowed out by fire.  We saw a number of trees like this that had been burned in the center but have continued to grow. 

Of course, we had to stop at one of the drive-thru trees.  Cannon had to fold in the mirror on the passenger side so it would fit.  

Some more images from our hike in Founders Grove.

Our trip through the Redwoods was awesome and something the whole family enjoyed!  Lots of wonderful memories!

Enjoying every moment.