Momma's little helper

I love her "help". Doesn't she look proud of herself?
She figured out how to climb onto things last night. No stopping her now!

Is it cold enough yet??

The Northeast has been getting the press recently for the cold and snowy weather. This picture demonstrates how cold it truly is in the great Northwest. This is my bedroom window- frozen shut. There is at least a 1/2 inch of ice on it.
Yesterday the temperatures dipped to -2 degrees. Very cold. And we have pushing 2 feet of the winter whiteness.

Snow Road

We have long ice cycles hanging from the east side of our house. It was 2 degrees while we were out there. BRRRRRRRRR!





Here he was saying... " Take my picture, momma!"
It was so wonderful to get out of doors for even a half an hour.

All terrain riding part 2

All terrain riding part 1

I found something Lucas enjoys doing in the snow! Riding his "motorcycle". I made him a road through the snow. Here he gets stuck. In the next video he gets out.

Book Worms

This is what my kids are doing, trapped in the house!
Lucas loves his book from Usborne. I highly recommend them to all of you with kids.

Lucas learning about Planes, airports, runways, and luggage.

Read to me too, Momma!!

Lucas'ism's

The butterfly sandwich.

My sister-in-law Genni, told me that she uses cookie cutters to make fun sandwiches for her boys. I thought it sounded like a fun idea. When I called Lucas over to look, he exclaimed excitedly, " It's a butterfly! A butterfly is being born!"
Lately Lucas has been asking for his apples to be cut and the core removed. "Cut the Cord, momma." tells me. What hilarious things they come up with.

Winter Wonder Land

I Dare YOU! Well, he dared! I was pelted with a snowball!








































Lucas didn't need much encouragement to lob a few snow balls too. Whew! It was cold. I had Abrianna wrapped in my coat, both of us still in our Sabbath attire. No, the dump truck didn't have a snow man. Just a big load of snow dumped outside my front door.

Imagination

Its amazing to see Lucas imagination emerge. He found a walking stick that daddy carved on the church camp out in September. He told me that he was a buck and these were his antlers. I think that appropriate for this time of year.

Fishy Face

She's making the famous Grandpa Drake Fishy face! (Doesn't that look like him, Aunty Cheryl?)

Motorcycle is fixed

Lucas is thrilled. Daddy being home for now, means his "motorcycle' is finally fixed. He's ready for the maiden voyage with the camel pack. He figured out how to put it on all by himself.
Lucas is thrilled. Having

There is a Friend

Lucas is singing a Steve Green kids song here. There is a friend, a friend who sticks, closer than a brother ( repeat) an f-r-i-e-n-d who stick closer than a b-r-o-t-h-e-r closer than a brother....
He finishes with saying "Hi, Hi Auntie Cheryl!"
Consequently, the fat lip was from a collision with the rocking chair last night. Boy, did it bleed!

Head banger

Abrianna figured out how to bounce the trampoline. Its hilarious.

This video is Abrianna playing catch with mommy. She learned that since yesterday. Fast learner :-)

Here she is! Watch her pull herself to standing. She's been doing this for about 3 weeks. So just before she turned 7 months.

Abrianna Crawling

Sabbath Pictures

I tried to take pictures of my kids in their Sabbath outfits. These are the best ones.



























Hey, Lucas! Whatcha up to?










Sibling Love.

Walker

We just got the walker back from a friend. It was non too soon. She needs help so it doesn't get away. But she loves being up and taking steps. Its amazing how different my kids are and at what age they accomplish things.

I'm crawling!

Abrianna figured out

how to get UP on all 4's

on December 3rd.












Its so cute.

From the top of the world, err

turtle....








to the depths of despair.

He slipped and fell into the water.

How insulting is that??

Grand Country Inn indoor water park

She's not too sure about this slide.



































Scaling the net....



















In the "tube" on the "river" with Auntie Jen.

Bathing Beauty

Everybody Loves a Blue Eyed Girl

Curiosity

Life is Good

Faraway Look

Our trip home

5:00 AM ( 3:00 PST). Melody banged on the camper door." We need to leave by 5:30," she said.
5:17 AM kids and bags loaded in the truck and we're on the road. We stop to fill the truck with diesel- 1/8 of a tank won't get us the hour and a half to the airport.
6:50 AM. Unload the kids and bags. Hug mom-in-law goodbye and lug all the above into the airport checking all three bags and two car seats.
We sit in the chairs eating breakfast burritos made the night before and watching the TV. Long delays in Chicago it says. All the while its been spitting snow outside.
7:50 AM. We're on the plane. But we aren't taking off. We wait. The air traffic controller in Chicago won't let us leave due to the glut of delayed aircraft there. We finally depart at 9:20. This is the time we were supposed to be landing in Chicago.
11:20 AM. We're at the Chicago airport. We try to press our way through the crowds to make it to our next plane. We are supposed to be boarding this very minute.
11:30 AM Our plane has been delayed until 11:50. There is no gate number for boarding. We make our way to the "intersection" between "H" and "K" concourses.
11:46 AM. The plane has been delayed until 12:30 - still no gate assignment. We eat our leftovers from the Macaroni Grill and talk.
Finally a gate assignment. We quickly hurry with our protesting 2 1/2 year old towards K-19 " There's People Comin' !" He doesn't want to walk. "Carry me!" He cries.
At last, we've made it. The flight has been delayed until 12:46 PM.
12:46 PM We board the plane. The kids fidget. A pilot gets on the intercom to tell us that they are trying to locate our flight crew. Are you kidding? How do you lose one of those?
We have a flight crew "dead heading" with us to Seattle. They run the checks. Finally we learn that our flight crew is stuck on a plane trying to deboard. They are waiting for an available gate to get off the plane. The steward fills cups with water and orange juice to give to the frazzled passengers.
Eventually the powers that be decided the best option is to have our "dead heading" crew take over and fly us to Seattle.
2:35 PM. We are taxing down the run way. The Captain says our flight will take 4 hours and 10 minutes. Adjusting for the time change, we will be landing at 4:45 PST. Our connecting flight is to leave Seattle at 3:30.
Shortly after take off, both children have a melt down. How can you blame them? They have been traveling for 12 hours. After 5 minutes of crying the mercifully fall asleep. Peace for the next hour.
Several hours later, Rick leave to use the "little boys room". Right after he does, Lucas begins to wail, " I got to go pee!!" I take both children to the back of the plane. I assume that Rick will be the first one out of the bathroom. Wrong! So, into that tiny stall go Lucas, Abrianna, and me. Mission accomplished. We go back to our row.
The rest of the flight is uneventful. The stewardess gives Rick a number to call as soon as we land to rebook us onto another flight into Pasco. About the time the captain turns off the seat belt sign, Lucas has to go again. Juice is a wonderful way to keep a kid quiet but not so great for a newly potty trained preschooler. This time I was able to leave Abrianna with daddy. When he was done he told me there was pee on his underwear. Sure enough. And on his pants as well.
I did have a pair of dry underwear for him. His other clothes were in the checked baggage. Oh well, he didn't care that he walked all over Sea-Tac in a turtle neck, socks, shoes, and Lightening McQueen underwear.
5:00 PM My kids were able to play in the play room for about a half an hour while daddy straightened out our flight and bought supper for us.
6:10 PM. We have our boarding passes and Rick decides he has to go again. Lucas tries to follow daddy. When I make him stay with me, he starts crying and screaming. For those of you who haven't potty trained yet... Crying almost always precipitates a need to pee. Off we go the the bathroom again. Abrianna in a back pack, Lucas screaming from fear that he can[t hold it and me trying to manage both children and all the carry on luggage. We made it.
When we were making our way back to the gate, Rick saw us and asked where we'd been. Did he really need to ask?
7:30 PM We land in Pasco. PRAISE GOD! The end is in sight. I stay with our kids and the luggage while Rick retrieves our car from long term parking. A nice lady ( with a broken arm) offers to help me wrestle my 2 car seats, 2 kids, and 3 suitcases to the curb. Thank God for helpful sympathetic people.
8:00 PM Homeward bound.
9:00 PM. We arrive!!! Our 18 hour trip is done!

Stow away

Peek A Boo! I see You!























Hi MOM!

Lessons in politeness

I try to teach my boy the social graces of politeness. This morning he accidentally pocked me in the eye. I explained to him that its polite to say "I'm sorry" when you hurt somebody like that. Well, he said, "I'm sorry." So I said, " I forgive you." To which he parroted, "I forgive you." "No, that's what mommy says after you say you're sorry." "I forgive me" was the cherubic response.

More Fall Pictures

Silly Kid!

More Fall Pictures

Maybe he'll be a preacher?























Hmmmmm... What's that?













Friendly Boy

Awesome Abrianna!

I'm shocked! My determined little girl crawled up onto the trampoline by herself!! I think she's trying to keep up with big brother. But she's only 6 months old. I think Lucas was 9 months old before he tried that. She also stood up while hanging onto the edge. WOW!

Sabbath afternoon nap

Lucas needed a nap. Of course, he didn't want one. So I told him to lay on the couch and rest. At first he wanted to be wrapped in momma's coat "like a little baby." Then he unwrapped himself, climbed under the cushion and went to sleep. What a blanket!

A fall day

Cool Dudette

Ready and raring to go! I love this jean jacket and the sunglasses. Only one opportunity for a picture. She decided that the glasses were not cool and pulled them off if we tried to put them back on.

Tryin' to stand

My baby is changing so quickly. She's now interested in pulling herself up. Not really good at it yet.. But she gets an A + for effort.

Creativity

The First 7 Years has inspired me to try to cultivate creativity in my son. We made play dough last week. This has kept him entertained for hours.
He's learned to make "snakes." Today he told me that he was making sand dunes and mountains.
This creation was his own ingenuity. I'm not sure what it's supposed to be... But it looks really cool