Every year our financial advisor sends us a gift certificate to the same Italian restaurant for Christmas. When we opened this year's card, we realized we hadn't used last year's card. We used both cards this week to go to lunch as a family. The restaurant serves gluten free pasta so we were able to find a couple of choices for Abe and Helen. Here's a photo of Brandan and Gibson.
This was a fun headline to read in the paper this week. Of course, the article is referring to Japan's prime minister, Shinzo Abe, and not our own Abe.
Gib grew some crystals this week from a kit he got from Logan for Christmas. He dissolved the ingredients in hot water while protecting his eyes with goggles.
Gib has also built several robots with his Mindstorm kit this week. Here's a photo of him playing the electric guitar he built. He could play Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and Mary Had a Little Lamb.
Another day he built a scorpion. He could use a remote to make the scorpion move and shoot red plastic balls out of its tail.
Sofi decorated a new T-shirt for herself this week. The front of the shirt has the Chinese character for dance.
The back of the shirt says, "I love to dance" in Chinese and has the characters for Sofi's name in red.
Thursday was Helen's 12th birthday! We celebrated with dinner and cake. Our kids can't watch PG-13 movies until they turn 12 so Sofi took Helen to see Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them for a treat. Helen and Abe have also watched a couple superhero movies this weekend.
Helen is creative, capable, musical, hard-working and dependable. Our kids also get to start doing their own laundry when they turn 12. Helen asked to start doing her own laundry several months ago and has done a great job taking care of her clothes.
Against the odds, our neighbor and friend was elected Secretary of State of Oregon in November. Not only is he a Republican in a state where Democrats dominate state-wide races, he's also from a rural part of the state far from the population centers of Portland and Salem. He invited us to attend his swearing in ceremony which was held on Friday. Since this is probably the only time someone we know will hold an office like this, we decided to make the trek to the state capitol for the event.
Oregon's capitol is topped with a golden logger, a tribute to the past when the lumber industry was the source of Oregon's wealth.
Bas-relief sculptures flank the front steps. Gibson, Helen and Abe are standing in front of Lewis, Clark and Sacajawea. The other side has statues of pioneers, both sides representing westward expansion.
Here are Gibson and Helen by the front doors.
We left our house around 6 am to get to the capitol by 10 am. The ceremony started at 11 am in the Senate chambers and the gallery was already full when time we got there. We were in the "standing room only" area at the back of the gallery. Abe, Gibson and Helen looked over the edge of the gallery as we waited for the ceremony to begin.
This was our view from the gallery.
Standing got a little tedious for the kids so they sat down for one of the speakers.
Dennis was sworn in by one of Oregon's Supreme Court Justices. His wife, Cathy, stood next to him.
We sang Oregon's state song as part of the program. This was the first time anyone in our family had heard the state song, let alone sung it. We think most people do not know the state song since we sang it through 2 times and the second time sounded much better than the first. In this photo you can also see the very ugly Oregon themed carpet in the Senate chambers.
We congratulated Dennis after the ceremony before driving home again.
Here's a photo of Abe as we headed out.
We got home on Friday in plenty of time for our appointment to do baptisms at the temple. Since Helen turned 12 this week, it was her first time to go to the temple. We wish we could have gotten a photo of Abe, Sofi and Helen inside the temple, all dressed in white, but this photo outside is a pretty good substitute.
We woke up Sunday morning to snow! The kids ran out to play which was a good thing since it had melted by the time we came home from church. This is a photo of Jake and Abe with giant snowballs they made.
Gibson made this snowman. Gibson went over after church and retrieved his carrot so he can use it again if we get more snow this upcoming week.
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