Bummer.

Well we had a little appointment at Children's Hospital yesterday for Ry. We've had some ongoing observation of his allergies, tonsils, etc. Basically, he has every ailment Adam has had in the sinus department, and we have taken him in periodically to check on whether or not he is within the range of normal. :-) When we moved in with Adam's parents in April, I switched doctors for the kids. We started seeing a nurse practitioner at UW Physicians and she discovered that Rylan's tonsils were very enlarged and put us onto a regime of no dairy. For some reason she thought his tonsils were linked to some sort of food allergy. TORTURE. Anyhow...long story short, we went back to her a couple of times and then she passed us on to Children's. Their conclusion: time to take the tonsils and adenoids out. While I wasn't overly surprised, I am definitely scared. Putting my little buddy out and then having him stay overnight in the hospital just makes me super nervous. Hopefully I will have time to adjust and toughen up. Surgery is November 12th.

Adam's Out of Town.

Last Saturday, Adam left for a business trip to Vegas. Sounds a little suspicious, doesn't it? Anyway, he drove his truck down, towing a trailer with a glass handling truck on the back! 19 1/2 hours later, he arrived unscathed and is now showing the truck for the Glass Association conference going on down there.


Needless to say, we are missing you, babe and just wanted to post a few pics to show you what we've been up to! See you in two more days!

Gotta love the ICEE.

Sharing is caring!

Bouncy slide with B-man.

Free face painting--Ry=frog, Lauren=unicorn

This bear actually was borderline obsessed with Lauren. I finally had to call her back!

This was too hilarious to resist of Ry.

Feeding the birds with Chase and Auntie Kristen.

Off To Pre-School.

Today was Lauren's first day of pre-school. She is going to this darling school in the basement a church down the road from us. Once you go in the door, you turn the corner and there is this immaculate row of numbered classrooms, all with mini-cubbies and coat hooks for each kid. I died the first time I saw it. Being a teacher, I have a special appreciation for all school type decor, so right then and there, I knew this was the school for Lauren!

I have always been SO excited about the first day of school. Lots of anticipation and preparation...shopping for school supplies, getting the perfect outfit, etc. So I found it only fitting that I put Lauren through the same rigorous training. The big preparations started last night...ironing the outfit, printing off the family photo for her class project, hooking her backpack on the front door so we wouldn't forget...

Poor thing. She is not much of a morning person, so when I woke her up with my chipper enthusiasm, I could tell she wanted to throw her stuffed unicorn at me. Luckily she snapped out of it when Grandma showed up to come with us to school. I could tell she was a little nervous, but she did so well! She walked right into her classroom and got to playing. I was so proud of her. Of course my mom, Ry and I had to spy on her for a little bit, just to make sure she was ok. Then we were off to shop!

About 15 minutes into our adventure, I had the horrible realization that Lauren hadn't gone potty yet! I could only imagine her sweet checkered skirt changed into old sweat pants, with a little wet spot in the baby doll area...Luckily when we returned at 11:45 she was still in one piece--and I noticed on the wall posting that "potty time" is at 10:15. THANK YOU pre-school for being smarter than me.

Family photo for her little class project.

She's still not so sure about this day...but Ry is!

Such a cute little lady...still unsure about school though...

Warmin up for mama

Arrival! Sweet Teacher Gayla with Lauren!

Off to Crossroads

On another note, we headed off to Crossroads mall this morning for a relaxing adventure. We used to frequent this mall often when we lived in Bellevue, because it is perfect for toddlers. They have all of these quarter rides throughout the mall and it is just the right thrill factor for Lauren and Ry--putting their own quarters into the machine and then riding for 30 seconds.

Today was particularly busy, with other kids waiting their turn behind us at each ride. We ended our trip with the mini-carousel--quite the experience. As I was trying to teach my kids to "wait their turn," the mom in front of us gives her kid 10 rides in a row! Thanks lady! Way to confuse my kids about their "life lesson" for the day!

Rylan taking charge on the train.

I think Lauren thought this was a real bucking bronco.

My favorite ride for super cute pictures...the classic car. :-)

5...4...3...2...

Sometime ago we played this game with Lauren where we counted down from 5, and if we got to 1 before she got to us, we told her the room was going to explode. Sounds borderline abusive now that I am putting it in writing, but she thought it was fun and ran screaming to us like she was being chased by a werewolf. Well, Adam and I quickly realized that this was the key to managing her in all situations..."Lauren, back away from the candy....5...4...3.." or "Get in here and put your PJ's on, 5...4...3...2..." Works like a charm everytime. We were starting to think we should write a book or something, but then we tried it on Ry.

Rylan almost laughs at us whenever he hears our silly little countdown. Tried it in Target once and he just sat underneath the clothes rack grinning at me like, "What are you really going to do, Mom?" What a little sheist. I seriously couldn't have earned a cuter, little man than him, but sometimes I wonder how I am going to manage him once he really gets naughty.

Decisions, Decisions

It seems lately that every decision is a difficult one for me. What should we eat for breakfast? What should the kids wear today? Should we make set plans or just go with the flow this week? How much should I work? Where will we move next? Obviously some decisions are harder than others, but it seems that every question requires the same deep, serious thought from me. I feel bad for Adam because we could discuss an idea and feel like we have found just the right path to go down, but bring up the same issue a week later and I have completely changed my tune. Why can't I just have a little faith?

Ever since the rug pulled out from under us in our old house, I realized decisions really require more time and prayer than we had given them before. We really just lived day to day without giving much thought to our long term plans. And then it caught up with us...lots of debt and one move to the in-laws later and things are becoming so much more clear. But now I am overdoing it on the other end. Thus, the new, crazy decision making skills. Will we pull it together in our time here with Nonna and Papi? I really do think so. I just hope that I am able to chill sometime soon and stop making mountains out of molehills. I am making myself a little kooky.

This is "Theerious"

What a way to start my first blog post in 2 years...with a shout out to the Wonderpets. If you were around my kids for more than a minute, you would be using it in your everyday chatter, too! I am serious about getting ito the blog world though. I am always peeking around at other blogs and definitely see the value in journaling about life.

Adam took vacation this past week, so we have been off of our usual routine. He took the kids to the Museum ("Zoozeum") of Flight, we visited our friend and her new baby girl, and also spent the night up at the family cabin in Greenwater. That was a highlight, as we tried out the new cedar, fire-heated hottub. When we first got up there the water was brown!...stained from the cedar I soon found out. The kids LOVED it though, and did all sorts of dunks under the beautifully tinted water! We will miss Daddy-o when he has to go back to work tomorrow!

Rylan with his souveneir from the Museum



Lauren's list of to-do's, which included playing barbies, taking a bath(always good), and picking blackberries




and lastly...Adam's banana raisin cookie creation...

He is quite the chef when he wants to be and apparently I enjoyed this creation a little too much!