Meet the author!

At the last minute I found out that Laura Numeroff, the author of children's books, will be reading her latest book and signing them at a local book store.

She wrote a few series of books that became well known, "If you give a Mouse a Cookie" set, "What Grandmas Do Best" set, "The Jellybeans" set, and a whole selection of other books.

She read her latest book "Otis & Sydney and the Best Birthday Ever", talked about her career as a writer, and answered some questions.  It was great to have kids meet someone whose books they read and hear her speak.  Everyone had a great time.

Jon found a a book called "Don't Let The Pidgeon Drive The Bus!" on one of the shelves and wouldn't let go of it. He even tried having Laura Numeroff sign it!  What a clown!  I guess I know what I should get him for Christmas...

September 25th weekend

Ah, now that kids are getting older, Tim and I can have an occasional date night.  This Friday we went out for dinner, then to a Mandolin Orchestra concert.

Dinner was not great, sadly.  We went to the same place I once had a meal at, and that time it was pretty decent, not this time though...  Waiter couldn't understand simple questions I was asking and kept telling me something completely irrelevant... I ordered a green curry dish with Thai noodles and I was served a HUGE dish of what appeared to be some green soup.  It wasn't tasty and way way too runny.  Tim's dish didn't live up to his expectations either, he swore he is not coming back to this place.  Overpriced, under-delivered.  Chef Ramsay would shut them down!  I don't even want to know what their kitchen looked like...

On a brighter site, the concert was great!

Saturday was spent taking Jon to his friend's (Jack's) birthday party, catching up on my unfinished crafts projects and trying to clean up the house.  I managed to make a big batch of chocolate fudge before taking off and when I returned I found all the kids (minus Jon who was with me) sitting at the table with an enormous size serving of fudge in front of each...  I guess they liked it.

While Jon was at his friend's house I dropped by the Crafts Warehouse for a beading event and made a couple of free crafts, which gave me some more project ideas. Noooo, I need to finish all the ones I already started!

Later that day my friend Jennifer and I held a photo session for Miranda's senior pictures.  My camera was acting weird and as a result I had some "good" pictures, but nothing "great" (in my opinion, anyway).  Jennifer took some great shots and Miranda is using one of them for the yearbook.  Thanks Jennifer, you saved me!

This is the one.

Sunday was a little slow.  Again, some yard work, a couple of movies to catch up on, cook, clean, wash, the weekend is gone.  Next weekend can't get here quick enough!

September 18th weekend

This weekend we decided to get girls' room cleaned up a bit, so on Saturday we all went to IKEA.  Tim has never been there and kids think the store is fun because you can try all of the furniture on display.  Larissa and I also like the food there, and as it turns out they also have a really good deal on a hot dog meal, which made Gabe's day!

Gabe and Jon picked a dining table they liked and pretended it was theirs.

We found that WiFi at IKEA is no go, but food is still good, especially the desert.

On Sunday I took Larissa and Jon to get fresh vegetables and fruits.  First we put our rubber boots on, since it rained all last night.  Then, I let kids pick their veggies.  Larissa found the largest zucchini ever, I hope she eats it when I prepare it, but I am doubtful...

Then, kids found a "moon with a face" shaped eggplant and just had to get it.  Again, I hope they eat it too...

Next stop, Heritage apple farm.  They had THE prettiest freshly picked apples and the best apple cider ever!  Apples were a little tough though, so I think they need to sit out and ripen a little...

On the way home we stopped at Target and checked out their Halloween inventory...  Kind of freaky, don't you think?

September 11th weekend

And so we are back into our typical routine.  School, birthday parties, homework, parent teacher conferences...

On Saturday Jon was invited to his friend's Ash's 6th birthday party at Safari Sam's.  Since this was one of Jon's two best friends at Learning Years, we drove all the way to Sherwood to spend more time with him.  Since the start of school many kids in Jon's class left daycare and it i not likely we will see them again...

Some playing around, some cake and ice cream and all the kids were wired.  Just in time to head back home.
As we drove past a U-Pick farm we decided to pull over and see what they got.

Turns out, quite a bit.  We only picked a bucket full of veggies, and I am pretty sure we will be coming back next weekend to sample some other things, like watermelons and zucchini too.

As for this week, we will be eating nothing but the freshest veggies you can get ;-)

September 4th weekend - school

What a week!
Just as soon as came back from our trip, we quickly had to get everyone situated with their school schedules, bus schedules, school supplies.

Gabe and Larissa started school on Tuesday, Miranda on Wednesday, and Jon on Thursday.

Of course, it was Jon's very first day and of all the kids he had the hardest time facing the new page in his life.
The night before Jon was all stressing out about not knowing anyone in his Kindergarten class and Dad had to sit him down and have a long talk about making new friends.  Just as he got over that stress, he had to go to school and meet his new teacher...

I bet it won't be long before he is totally comfortable with everything.

On Friday we attended an Ice Cream Social.  Gabe invited himself, under the "alumni are invited" excuse.  I guess that's true, we did see other recently graduated kids there too.

Summer Vacation 2010 - Canada!

 There is simply too many pictures and too much to cover in one simple Blog post.  I will try capturing the highlights...  Miles on my car odometer = 855!

 We took off from Port Angeles, WA to Victoria, BC on a giant ferry.  Day was better than we could ever hope for.  Right before boarding Jon lost a tooth.  His first one!

We spent four days in Victoria and were surprised by how expensive everything was.  Even the things we regularly get were almost twice as much $$.

Our hotel was decent, but there were a few issues with the level of cleanliness... Hot tub was being "cleaned" (and out of order) the entire stay there, steam room had mold on the tile floor, there were tons of crumbs under the chair cushions... Hey, but a fresh bottle of water was given to us for free, daily...

We tried to cover as many exciting locations as we could, but even with the four days in town, just simply not enough time!

Next stop was at Vancouver, BC.  Busy streets reminded me of New York City.  We decided to keep our car in the garage for the three day stay and did all of our sight seeing by foot.

The hotel (Hyatt) charged for everything, from the Internet access to the bottled water int he room ($5 a bottle!!).  At first we were stressing about breakfast, but on the first night we got a formal letter from the hotel, letting us know that because of the scheduled demonstrations early next morning, hotel was providing continental breakfast to all the hotel guests.  Talk about luck!  It would've been $25 a person.

Sadly, on the next day Larissa developed a stomach issues.  She couldn't eat anything, and regularly threw up.  It didn't help that we hiked roughly 8 miles that day.  What a trooper she is though, she kept up with the rest!

 

 Of course, on the way home we HAD to make a stop in Seattle for lunch and see the Pike Place Fish Market.

I even found a Russian Deli and ordered a rather colorful lunch plate with two sides of Borscht (one for me, one for Tim).  It was yummy!