Spring!

After being stuck inside all week with rainy days, I thought I’d remember sunnier, beautiful days earlier in May by posting some pictures of the fun we had!

The boys planted my vegetable garden with their Papa:

Our Wisteria was beautiful in its first year of flowering (it took six years, that’s some patience for you)!Ben and the boys had several firepits and s’moresh (as the boys pronounce it). What a wonderful tradition for the boys!   Sam, Seth Seth

Sam My peony also bloomed for the first time ever. I love it! And I hit 24 weeks in my pregnancy. I’m feeling better and enjoying the extra energy of the second trimester! (The shed in the background was Ben’s project of last summer/fall. It’s an amazing addition to our backyard landscape!)

Playing with our Plato Cousins

Sam and Seth LOVE their cousins Miriam, Aidah, and Clara (now baby Edmund too, but he doesn’t get in on much of the fun yet). All the kids play SO well together and it’s a delight to watch them get along and enjoy each other. I had the two oldest girls last month for an afternoon while Clara had a doctor appointment up here in Portland. It was our first really warm day, and the kids got to play with water which they thought was awesome. Although, you can tell by these shivery pictures, it was chilly getting wet! Sam, Aidah, Seth, & Miriam: “Brrrr”

Clara May turned three a couple of weekend ago and we traveled down to celebrate her day with a rainbow birthday party. It was a special treat because my parents were in town as well. Katie and Nick have a beautiful backyard where the kids can play, while the adults watch and chat in the shade. Katie made this amazing rainbow cake—gluten and dairy free too! Me and the birthday girl My mom and baby Edmund All the kids LOVING the rainbow cake! Isn’t he adorable! Miriam reading Clara’s new book to Seth and Clara Aidah cracking Seth and Sam up while reading to them (yep, she’s 5 and reading!) Such a sweet picture of the three of them! Baby Edmund steals the show with these final pictures…

San Diego Trip, Part 3

With Legoland, Sea World, and the zoo behind us, we had one more evening and almost a full day to enjoy San Diego (we didn’t fly out until 6 on Wednesday evening) . One of my favorite memories of the trip was dinner on Tuesday night. Earlier in the week while we were driving somewhere, Ben saw a sign in the window of Tony Roma’s that they have a deal on Tuesday nights where you can order 1/2 lb of ribs for $9.99. The boys LOVE ribs, so we thought this would be a fun surprise for them. Like any good family with growing boys and a pregnant mama, we order each ordered a plate with 1/2 lb of ribs, wondering if we’d ever be able to finish all the food. Would you believe that both Seth and Sam ate all of their plates by themselves? Yep. I really wish I would have brought my camera to capture the before and after of this meal. Before: a plate piled with ribs and a corn cob. After: a completely empty plate and two boys covered in barbeque sauce. Hilarious! I can only imagine when they are teenagers!

On our final morning, we all headed down to the beach by our house to play. Thankfully, it was our first clear and sunny morning. There was barely any wind and the water is SOOO much warmer than the Oregon coast! Seth and Sam had a blast playing in the water! I LOVE the joy on their faces in this picture! Seth, Sam Silly boys

We had to check out of our house by 12, and didn’t have to be at the airport until 4, so visiting the USS Midway Aircraft Carrier was the perfect way to spend our final afternoon in San Diego. We were all very fascinated and amazed by this museum and had a wonderful experience there! The boys loved looking at the jets and helicopters; but even more so, loved sitting in some of them and pretending to fly. If we would have let them, they would have spent hours pretending to be pilots in each of the aircrafts. Ben even took them on a pretty intense flight simulator and they loved that as well. If you are ever visiting San Diego with little boys, please don’t miss this museum! It was so well done, clean, and tons of friendly and helpful staff. I give it five stars. Sam

Seth Copying the manikin

The screen where I could watch them in the flight simulation Least to say, after flying in a jet for the first time in their lives, and visiting the aircraft carrier, Seth and Sam are completely obsessed with jets and flying now. It’s been so fun to hear them talk about our vacation and pretending to do various experiences we had while in San Diego. We are so thankful that we went on this vacation together!

San Diego Trip, Part 2

Day 3 of our trip we went to Sea World. It was such a wonderful experience (especially compared to the craziness of Legoland!) First of all, we went on a Monday, so it was not at all crowded. Secondly, our house was literally 5 minutes from the park; so we were able to go for a couple hours in the morning, go home for lunch and a nap, and then return rested for the afternoon.

We LOVED the shows at Sea World. First we went to the Orca Whale show. I have always loved whales, and have been blessed to see them a couple times in the wild, but have never seen them jump out of the water. And, of course, that is what they are doing the entire show. It was amazing. There also was a baby orca that was really fun to watch. Next, we went to a dolphin show. It was a bit more theatrical (costumes, music, etc.) which Ben and I thought was pretty corny, but the boys loved. They’ve been pretending to put on dolphin shows wearing “bird costumes” and singing and splashing in the pool since we’ve been home.

Some other favorite Sea World memories:

-Putting our hands in the dolphin water and Ben getting his fingers nipped.

-For Seth and Sam, riding the kiddie rides

-Petting the manta rays

-Seeing the flamingos, sharks, and turtles

-Using special money Papa and Titi gave the boys to buy a souvenir at the end Ben and I especially loved the shark exhibit, although as I told Ben, it only reinforced my extreme fear of them while snorkeling! It was way too hard for the boys to stand on the moving walk way and look at the camera! Such a cute picture of Sammy Sammy and his penguin he bought

Day 4 was the San Diego zoo. I had read a lot of reviews of the places we would visit previous to our vacation, so I was prepared (and a bit intimidated) by the amount of walking that we would have at the zoo. However, it really wasn’t bad, and the foliage surrounding the walks was absolutely amazing! We only visited the animals we really wanted to see, and were ok not visiting the ones that we see frequently at our Portland zoo. Here were the highlights of our zoo visit:

-Seeing a peacock in full plume as we entered the park. Peacocks are Seth’s favorite bird.

-Watching a wolf on it’s daily walk with the zoo keepers across the rode. Yep, just on a leash being walked like a puppy dog.

-The boys seeing a camel for the first time.

-Seeing a ram running back and forth in it’s exhibit ramming it’s horns on various objects.

-Ben loved watching a jaguar pacing by the fence literally a couple feet from our faces. We definitely never want to see one of those in the wild!

-Unfortunately the three animals we had really pumped up to the boys were a bit of a bust: the kangaroos were missing, and the pandas and koalas were big, fuzzy sleeping lumps. The boys still state that they were their favorite animals to see.

-The gorillas were awesome!

-We saw a male lion gnawing on a big bone. Once again, do not want to see that in wild!

-Going on the sky tram together.

-Having a nice gentlemen offer to take a family picture for us at the end of the day. It’s the only family picture we got on the trip, and it actually turned out pretty good!

Jaguar—good thing the fence was there! Small red panda…at least he was awake! Seth, Mama, Sam Daddy and Seth Sammy and Mama Great pic of the boys Yah for a family picture!