We are still alive...Happy Fall!

To those of you who keep asking, "Where are the new photos?" I apologize. It seems it took a bit longer to get settled in our new home than I expected. In addition, this fall we have gotten more serious about homeschooling and that has taken way more effort than I anticipated. It is wonderful but my days are definitely busier. We love our new home. Zack loves his new job. The kids are enjoying riding bikes and have become real North westerners. The rain doesn't bother them a bit. They are playing outside nearly every day.

Instead of trying to start where I left off I decided to skip a head and give you a glimpse of our life here in the rainy northwest. Yes, it really is rainy. I really don't remember it raining this much when I lived in Seattle. But we are in the right place any enjoying making new friends. During one of the dry days (less wet days, rather) we managed to take a hike at Mt. Rainier.

After hiking for about 45 minutes everyone voted for snack time. We pulled out our lunch and had a picnic near the look out for the Nisqually Glacier (which we couldn't actually see because it was cloudy). But it was still beautiful!

This is another look out of the terminus of the Nisqually glacier.

Ash and the beautiful NW mountains!

Alex and his raincoat which never got use in Colorado.

When Gran and Papa came to visit it was Harbor Days in Olympia, We took them on a short cruise of the sound. Everyone really enjoyed it. This was taken on deck.

At Harbor Days they had the ship that was used in Pirates of the Caribbean. The kids loved being on a "Pirate Ship" which was really a replica of a ship used during Revolutionary times.

Family shot on board.

Getting a pumpkin here was a bit of a muddier experience than we are used to. I had to wash everyone's shoes when we got home. Everyone insisted on getting their own. Amber's was the biggest. We never did get around to carving them.

Here is our scary alligator. He packs a pretty mean "ROAR!"

For Halloween this year, in addition to the alligator, we had Spiderman, a Bride, and a Pink, flying unicorn.

That's it for now. I need to get dinner cooking. We love and miss you all!
Alida

Trip to Rocky Mountain National Park

On Memorial Day we had the chance to go and visit Rocky Mountain National Park. It was spectacular! The kids were great. What a wonderful experience it has been to live in Denver for a year. Speaking of that, we move in just a few days. Here we come Olympia!

By far, Alex's favorite part of our hike was the snow on the ground. He enjoyed skating down the snow for quite awhile.
Zack and his kids with a beautiful view. They love their dad!

The Queens of the Mountain!

Our only family shot this year. Not bad, only two people not smiling...This is why we gave up on professional photographs years ago.

Ash and Mom got to hike by ourselves for awhile. Ashley really enjoyed watching the ducks on the lake.

Amber enjoyed skating down the hillside on the snow with Alex.

What a view! We got up pretty high... I think it was 12000 feet.

Amber girl and the mountains. Two of my favorite men.

What a happy kid. All you need is a little snow, a lot of time, and some warmer weather.

I got to carry Caleb. He was a great sport.

Trip to Bald Mountain

Over Memorial Day weekend we had the chance to go hiking up in the Rockys outside of Boulder. We went on a great hike called Bald Mountain (thank you Murricanes for the suggestion!). It was a really fun day.

We, of course, had to start the hike with a snack.

Then, after hiking for 20 minutes we had to stop for snack time.
Our snack spot included a great place for rock scrambling and Caleb wasn't about to be left out.

Help! They are falling off a cliff!

The Caleb Climber. "Yeah, Mom, I can do it by myself."

Ashley was more into snacking than she was climbing...

What a beauiful rock queen.

We almost lost Alex...or is he just messing around?

Going up?

Finally at the top!

Zack's Trip to Vegas

Zack recently took a trip to Nevada and was able to spend some time visiting with his sister, Jenny, and her son Josh. Here are some pics of their visit.

Josh and Zack got to enjoy some tree climbing...

Jenny, Josh, and Zack

Off to Olympia!

Wahoo! Seven more weeks in Colorado! We are so excited to announce that it is official: we are going to be settled in Olympia, WA. Zack is excited about the job, the kids are excited about the new house, and I am excited to not move again until the kids are in college. 10 years of marriage and 10 moves is enough for me. We are enjoying our last few months in Colorado and trying to get everywhere we haven't been yet. It is so fun to be somewhere for only year because then you are forced to explore. We have actually had quite a bit of precipitation in the past few weeks and it has been so nice to see things green again. Here are some spring pictures.

We visited two historic farms with the Hawkins and the Collis families. It was great fun for all. We even got to try real hot cross buns and learned where they came from.
I let the children decorate Easter eggs on their own. I didn't realize until too late that they were decorating their hands instead of the eggs. It took 20-30 washings to get the color to fade from their hands. They didn't seem to mind. Great fun was had by all. :)

Queen Ashley.

We recently took a trip to the zoo with the Hawkins Family. Alex asked if he could take a picture of me. In fact a few pictures in this set were taken by Alex.We loved the gorilla so much we did a who series of pictures with him. (Alex, Amber and Elliot)

Amber has found her first true love. It all started when they realized they were both four years old. Elliot is a wonderful friend they have decided that they will probably get married. I did almost flip when I saw them holding hands at the zoo.

Ashley kept us on track by finding every animal we saw on her zoo map.

Amber and Elliot were inseparable.

Alex taking a short rest at the zoo.

The girls taking a break from wrestling with Dad.

Alex took a picture of Dad filming the girls dancing.

Caleb got himself into Amber's suitcase quite gracefully but had a bit of trouble getting out.In fact, we often find him climbing into things. Caleb is now an avid stair climber.

Caleb's big accomplishment this past week was learning how to climb up the stairs at the park and go down the slide all by himself. You can tell that he feels quite old and quite proud of himself.

Ashley at the park in her new dress that she got for her birthday. She LOVES dresses. I can't believe she is three!

Amber climbing around.

Alex our monkey.

Caleb now gets to play in the backyard with the big kids. Often Ashley or Amber will push him around in the car. He loves it.

We recently went to the White Fence Farm where Amber was the first kid brave enough to let the HUGE cow eat from her hand. Look at the size of that tongue!

Amber and Caleb have formed quite a bond sharing a room. He just loves her.
So one day I came out of the kitchen and found Caleb cleaning up Alex and Amber's mess in the playroom. He managed to put all of the blocks away except four. We now use him quite often to clean things up. Will he always be this helpful?

Our church recently hosted a pinewood derby. Alex had great fun making his car with Papa and then we raced it. Here is Ashley's car...it didn't get raced it got eaten.

Alex was up against some pretty big competition. We missed the announcement that there were no rules. Some of these cars were pretty weighted.

None the less, we had a marvelous time. Alex wants to add some weights to his car now.