25 May 2008

Brandan built this great picnic table for Becky's birthday. It's made from a recycled wood product that doesn't require maintenance. Becky loves to eat outside. It feels like a party and no need to sweep up afterwards. We braved a cold, windy evening to eat birthday cake at the new table.


Gibson took his first steps over a month ago, but he is a reluctant walker. He mainly walks on the sly and will sit down if he sees someone watching him walk. This is his first step recorded for posterity.


It's been very chilly and rainy this week. Helen and Abe took advantage of a little sunshine on Saturday to blow bubbles on the patio.

18 May 2008

Tuesday evening, 2 teenage neighbor boys stopped by our house and offered to straighten up the shaggy edge our lawn. One boy returned with a gas powered edger, his mom and dad and a stray 7 year old boy. Another friend passing by stopped to help. Our family pitched in, too, and we got the job done in about an hour. Pulling up the grass was hard work, but all the help turned it into an impromtu party. We went to bed feeling full of grace and gratitude.


Gibson hasn't grown too much hair on top of his head in his short life, but he has grown a ring of curls around the back of his head. Becky thought they were adorable. Brandan thought "Mullet." He talked Becky into trimming Gibson's hair this week. In the photo, you can see how long his hair would be if it were straight.


Here goes the first snip. Gibson has a sucker in his mouth to distract him from the scissors.


The finished haircut. Brandan loves it, Becky admits he's still adorable, what do you think? Now Gibson has a popsicle stick in his mouth. In the past week he has cut 2 molars and a lower incisor, so he has chewed on everything and drooled constantly.

Friday was 102 degrees! That's 30 degrees hotter than is usual for May. Abe and Helen enjoyed a popsicle in the only sliver of shade in our yard around 1 pm.

Later Sophie and Abe ran through the sprinklers. The weather is cooling off-- it's only supposed to be 65 degrees by Wednesday.

11 May 2008

Grandma and Grandpa came to visit Sunday and Monday. Since they were here such a short time, we seized the day. Grandma and Sophie crocheted together while we waited for Gibson to wake up from his morning nap. Sophie is crocheting a scarf and Grandma is crocheting a baby blanket.


After Gibson woke up, we hiked to the top of Lower Table Rock. We enjoyed the view from the top and the beautiful wildflowers. In the photo, Abe and Helen are showing off their blue tongues from eating jelly beans. They also enjoyed Grandma's tic tacs. Sophie liked orange tic tacs the best, Abe liked lime and Helen liked all flavors. It's a 3 mile hike round trip, so Grandpa gave Helen lots of shoulder rides.


After dinner, we planted our garden. Each of our kids gets their own raised bed to choose what to plant in. Sophie planted marigolds, carrots, beets, beans and broccoli. Abe planted strawberries, beans and flowers. Helen chose to plant leeks and carrots and we filled in her bed with tomatoes and peppers. We're already eating strawberries from our garden, one or two at a time that we divide 6 ways, a tiny taste of spring.


We ended the day roasting marshmallows on the patio. After hiking, digging in the dirt and eating way too many gooey marshmallows, we had 4 very dirty, very sleepy kids ready for a bath and bed.

This is voting, Oregon style. All the ballots are sent in the mail and you have 2 weeks to fill them out and return them. It took us a few times to get used to not going to a polling place, but now we love it. For us, voting is filling out our ballots over lunch, with the voter's guide in front of us, talking over each candidate, trying to pretend we care who the county surveyor is. Becky voted enthusiastically for Barack Obama. Since it's not possible to vote for him twice, she filled in his oval extra dark with her #2 pencil. Hooray for democracy!

4 May 2008

Abe's preschool had a fundraiser at Coldstone Creamery on Thursday so it was our duty, yes our DUTY, to go buy ice cream. It's hard work scooping ice cream for 2 hours and the teachers certainly earned their tips along with sore elbows. On the left is Teacher Lori and on the right is Teacher Corrina. Abe enjoyed raspberry sorbet with m&ms mixed in.


Abe has 5 teachers and Teacher Lori is his favorite. She told him she'd sing if he gave her a tip. He brought $1.02 of his own money to give her and then Teacher Lori and Teacher Janese sang "I've Been Working on the Railroad."


Sophie's school alternates between an art show and a science fair every Spring. This year was time for another science fair. Once again, the school sent home reminders to the parents that the science projects are to be done by the students, not the parents. Brandan and Becky are too smart to try to edge in on Sophie's science plans; she knows exactly what she's doing, thank you very much. This year Sophie boiled various substances in water to see which would produce the brightest yellow dye. Here she is with onion skins.

Here is her completed poster for the fair. From left, she tried seed pods she found on the school playground, turmeric, onion skins and paprika. Turmeric was the obvious winner.

Dan and Linda are visiting this weekend so that Dan could ordain Brandan to the office of High Priest and participate in Brandan being set apart as a high councilor. Linda snapped this photo of our family with our stake president, President Wright, after the ordination.