Do You Swim In A Pool To Keep Yourself Cool?

The kids started swim lessons this last week. Ethan's in level 1, and Alyssa's in level 2, because I wanted their classes to be back to back so we didn't have to be at the pool forever. Stephanie Mano is their teacher. (I've never learned her married name - everyone I know still calls her Stephanie Mano.) She does a fabulous job with all of the kids, and they love it.

Ethan is a fish. While he's waiting for his class to start, he goes in the wading pool and plunges his whole body underwater, and just floats there for a few seconds. The he pops out of the water, takes a deep breath, and does it again. When it's his turn to swim across the pool with Stephanie, the first thing he says is, "I want to go underwater!" The first time he said that was Wednesday, and Stephanie looked so shocked and said, "Ethan! I think that's the first thing I ever heard you say!"



Alyssa loves her swim lessons, but she also loves playing in the wading pool. A couple of days ago, she rallied about fifteen kids together to create a whirlpool. (Come on, guys! We can do it!) And then she started singing. (Let's make a whirlpool, it's not hard. If we keep working, we can do it. Let's go around and around and around..) And when she stopped, a cute little boy said, "Keep singing! We're losing it! We're losing it!" Then, when we were leaving, she was so afraid that the kids left behind would lose heart and not be able to keep the whirlpool going without her.



Marcus was terrified of the swimming pool when we first went there this summer. Now he's climbing into the wading pool by himself, and having a fabulous time.

It's Official

Brian called the Washington State Board this morning, and when he was finally connected to the right person, they opened the envelope containing his Board scores, then took his papers across the hallway to get them stamped. With that small act, he became the newest licensed optometrist in the state of Washington.

Wahoo!

A Couple Comment Kind Of Girl

Usually I get one, two, maybe three comments on my posts. It doesn't bother me, unless I'm real excited about a post, and it turns into a let down when it feels like others aren't as excited as me, and there has been a couple of times I've been jealous of Brooke, because she always has about twenty gazillion comments on her posts. But mostly, I'm completely fine.

So yesterday when I posted our family pictures I didn't expect much, and I hadn't even planned on checking blogs and things until this morning, but when I got on the computer last night after Brian took off to go home teaching, I was surprised to find seven comments about our super cool "pics." Apparently, Megan really did just as fabulous a job as we think she did. I'm ordering the third picture, the one with the path and the trees, from Costco today, and soon it will be up in our entry way. I'll probably get a couple smaller pictures to go around the house, too.

Anyway, if anyone in or around the Tri-Cities is interested, Megan will be living here for fourth rotation next year, so if you want to get your pictures taken sometime between February and May, check out her website.

Say, "Cheese!"

We had our family pictures taken at Pacific University when we went down for Brian's graduation. They turned out fabulous! I love them! Even though Megan sent the cd to us forever ago, it just came in the mail yesterday. I'm trying to figure out which one to print for our big family picture in the entry way. Here's a few of our favorites:

It's Father's Day

(Sorry about the boom picture, Dad. I couldn't help myself.)

• Even though my dad has been cool since being a dad, he was way awesome before he became a dad. He had his pilot's license and raced motorcycles. He has boxes of trophies in the garage from all the races he won. I used to love looking through all of my parents' old things in the garage, and while I didn't "ooh" and "ahh" over the trophies, I thought they were pretty darn cool.
• My dad was one of the first computer/electronic geeks that there ever was. He's super great with computers, and he likes to upgrade them frequently. We were the first kids on our block to ever have a VCR or a video camera, and before any other video game consoles came out, we had a Vextrex. There was that space ship flying game that I loved to play, but could never get past those darn angled tunnels. Dad loves to get the newest gadgets that are available when it comes to phones, MP3 players, cameras, laptops, planners, you name it.
• My dad loves to travel. He also lives by the motto, "home by another way." We used to go to California and back again by way of Salt Lake City, Yellowstone, the Red Wood Forest, the Oregon and California beaches. Our vacations were always so fun, and a lot of times we didn't know which way we were going to go and what we were going to see. Mom would just say, "Let's see where Daddy takes us."
• When Dad used to send us to our rooms when we were in trouble, it didn't matter how long he sent us there for, all we would have to do was wait a minute or two, then poke our heads out the door and sweetly say, "Daaaaad, can I come out now?" and he would let us come out, "as long as we were sorry."
  
• My dad baptised me when I was eight. I remember standing in our living room with him teaching me how to hold my nose when I went under the water. About that same age, I remember him teaching me the box step in our living room, too.
  
• My dad is a very hard worker. After moving to Washington, while we were getting settled, he was working two or three jobs sometimes. He also works really hard on the house and yard. My parents always have a project going on. They have completely transformed their house from having hairy wallpaper and so many things wrong with it that would leave Dad scratching his head and saying, "Why would anyone do that to a house?" to the beautiful home that it is now. My parents remodeled the storage room by the garage to be a huge master bedroom, and he put in the fireplace while my mom was visiting me in Oregon. The fireplace turned out absolutely beautiful!
• My dad is a bigger guy. When I was in high school, a couple of times I put on one of his shirts and a pair of pants with pillows stuffed in it and walked around, pretending to be him. He was always a good sport about it.
• My dad doesn't swear or curse. His choice phrase is, "Oh, fiddlesticks."
• When I was a Merry Miss, Brooke Harker and I sang a song at a talent show to pass a requirement off for our Faith in God Award. We saing, "My Daddy is My Favorite Pal."
  
• My dad was the worst with our names growing up. The kids in our family are Christina, Michael, Philip, Carrie, David, and Kimberly. So many times he called me, "Chrary," and he called Christina "Cariss." We were a little older when Kimmy came along, so I don't remember how she got mixed into our names. When he wanted one of the boys, he'd say, "Philip-Michael--David! Whoever you are, get over here."
• There was a time when I was in high school I heard someone say something at church that upset me. It was right before sacrament meeting, and I was planning on walking out to go cry in the bathroom if necessary, but when I reached the back of the chapel, I found my dad there welcoming people, and he gave me a big hug and took me to the bishop's office to talk to me.
  
• My dad loves to listen to Paul Simon and James Taylor. Those were the tapes we'd listen to when we would go on vacation, and to this day listening to anything by those two artists makes me want to jump in the car and drive somewhere. I remember a time our car was broken down somewhere while we were on vacation and the kids spent the time waiting for the tow truck trying to remember the words to the James Taylor song about all your ducks being in a row. (In line, in line, it's all in a line. All my ducks are in a row-ooh-oh-oh. They do not change, they do not move. They have no where to go.) I think that's the only reason I have that song memorized.
• Also, whenver he travels, my dad has to have his traveling hat. The hat of choice has varied through the years, but it's usually been some form of a fedora. Sometimes it's normal ones, sometimes it's Indiana Jones ones bought from Disneyland.
• Speaking of Disneyland, my dad loves Disneyland. Now that all the kids are out of the house, my parents have been able to go about once a year when they take my grandma down to California for the summer to visit her other family. They actually went a couple of weeks ago, and when I asked them to take lots of pictures for us to see, he said that they don't take pictures because they want to just have the memories in their heads, and since they're getting older and can't remember things like they used to, it means they get to go back more often.
• My dad says, "perdy" instea of "pretty." When I went to my first Homecoming dance I was still a bit of a tomboy, and my dress was the plainest dress in the world, I didn't do anything special with my hair, and I didn't wear makeup yet, so I had just a tiny bit on. But despite all of that, my dad said that I looked "real perdy."
• My dad is great with cars, and I still go to him if I need help with one of our cars. It's amazing to me how he can just turn on the engine sometimes and know exactly what's wrong with the car.
• I love my daddy. He is always willing to help whether I need him for advice, information, or just to have him listen to me when I'm excited about something and Mom's not available to talk to. I'm so glad to have him as my dad!
  

Life is Cake

And we all know how much I love cake!

I feel tremendously blessed right now.

Yesterday was a little rough, what with the kids literally tearing the house apart, complaining and whining that there was nothing to do when I sent them outside to play, and not eating their lunch but complaining of hunger all afternoon. And don't let me leave out the part of yesterday when Marcus took off his diaper downstairs when I was cleaning upstairs, and rubbed his bum all over the place. Imagine his cute little bum from the picture I posted yesterday, and then stick his cute little smile on him, and then imagine him running from surface to surface in the living room, shimmying his poopy bum on the couch, on the rug, on the stairs....and then imagine me coming down because of all the ruckus I heard and completely losing my cool. That's when I sent the kids outside, and after I got out the carpet cleaner and the fire hose to clean up the living room, I gave up on cleaning the house and sat down to read "Wuthering Heights," which did not do a whole lot to improve my temperment. Seriously, what was Emily Bronte drinking when she wrote that?

Having given that crazy introduction, I've got to say, yesterday was rough, but today is wonderful! We had breakfast when the kids woke up, did a little bit of summer school, put together a cupboard from Target to give us a little more storage in the kitchen, and the kids have just been dancing in the living room while I've been doing the dishes and such.

I know that life has it's ups and downs, even in just the day to day life. Yesterday was hard, but today is great. That's normal. But even though we've had our share of hard times, I feel so lucky to have had not so many hard times as we probably deserved. We've been extremely blessed and fortunate to have had the opportunities given to us to be where we are now.

In the words of TAMN, right now my life is a kick-A fairy tale. I have three beautiful children who are smart and funny and so fun to be with. We have a cute little house to live in, and even though it's not "ours" when I want so badly to own our own house and get settled for good, it's still a very nice place and most importantly, right now it's home. Our home. Best of all, Brian is with us. I still get a huge kick out of the fact that he's around for good. And he has a job! In this economy, when people are getting laid off left and right, and huge companies are shutting down, I am so thankful that we were able to come right out of school and have him start working. He got his first paycheck yesterday, which he was told that people usually frame, but he's so excited and so gung-ho on paying back our student loans that he says it's going straight to the bank. His Board scores were posted last week, and he's called to make sure everything has been turned in to get his license, so pretty soon he'll be doing what he loves: seeing patients and helping them out.

I love how Brian came home yesterday and rescued me, both from the kids and "Wuthering Heights" by picking up some pizza from Papa Murphey's and taking us to the neighborhood pool. I love that tucking in the kids last night included me holding each of them while singing a song, instead of the two-hour marathon tuck-ins we used to have. I love that Marcus is sleeping through the night! I love that it's summer time. I love how Ethan says, "zzz" instead of, "vvv" so he watches "moozies" instead of movies, and I love that he "ludz" me. I love that Alyssa is growing up and starting to help me with so many things without being asked: the dishes, making beds, taking care of her brothers.

I just love life right now, and I'm so thankful that everything is just. so. wonderful. I love it.

Just Goin' Through Last Week's Pictures

I cannot help myself when it comes to nudey pictures of my kids. Those buns are just too cute! Last week I left Marcus in the tub- Actually, let me back up even more...Last week I left Alyssa in charge of the kids while Brian and I went out to mow the lawn. Marcus sat on the dining room table so he could watch us through the window. When I came inside, I was greeted by the sight of Marcus with no diaper, peeing very proudly, all over the table. So I stuck him in the tub while I cleaned up the mess downstairs, but when I came back to the bathroom, he and all the water were missing. Apparently, he had drained the tub and climbed up on Alyssa's dresser to watch Brian as he finished up with the mowing. I love how there's bubbles clinging to his legs and the dresser where he climbed up.


I've been wanting to go running in the mornings before Brian leaves for work, but didn't feel it was very safe to go alone. I thought about getting a buddy, but then I saw a pair of roller skates at my sisters house, and decided to give those a try. I figure I could skate faster than someone trying to run me down. Who knows? I've only been once, because I've been going to bed too late, and it's hard to get up at five in the morning, but when I did, it was so worth it. The river was beautiful! (Jamie, you're probably wondering what the count is, so I'll tell ya - zero falls.)


I spent a wonderful Friday at a Stake activity for Achievement Days, and came home to a couple of surprises in the fridge. The flowers are gorgeous, and yes, the chocolate cake is gone by now.


Ethan wanted his picture taken in the fridge.


Alyssa got her very first bike last week. We checked on Craigslist and bought it from a very nice older couple in Pasco. The man was even helping Alyssa adjust the seat to her heigth and teaching her to get onto the seat. We were lucky to find a perfectly "matching" helmet at Walmart, and then we spent the afternoon practicing. She'll be zipping around the street on her own pretty soon!


We also went to the park last week when Marcus took too late of a nap to go to bed at a decent hour. When he woke up at sevenish and we knew he wasn't going to go to sleep soon after that, Brian told everyone to get in the car for an adventure, and he took us for Slurpees before going to the park.


Alyssa made a "best friend," named Anna, and they had a wonderful time together. It amazes me how fast kids can make friends, and they act like they've known each other for ever. I need to be more like that.


Ethan climbed the rock all by himself, with no help at all.


All of the older boys, who were struggling, were amazed at how fast and effortless he made it to the top.


When he got to the top he was jumping around so much it was even worrying Brian, so I climbed up to supervise.


Brian climbed the rock all by himself, too, and all the teenage boys who were struggling were quite amazed. (He went up this front side, which is nearly impossible, unless you have the long arms of a very tall, super strong man.)

Happy Summer!

I picked up Marcus this morning and thought,
"I love the way kids smell during the summer time,"
because I do.

Settled

Life is getting so good. It's wonderful having Brian living with us again. He's so cool, and the kids and I are getting a huge kick out of having him around. He started working last week, going into the office to help out with paperwork, organizing, and phone calls, and this week he's going to learn their computer programs and billing programs, and whatever else is involved with that. He checks almost every day to see if his Board scores are posted, because that's when the application for his license will go through, and soon after that he'll be able to start seeing patients. I think he's enjoying going in to work every day, and I'm sure enjoying the fact that it's creating a normal schedule for us to settle down to.

I went to an orientation meeting for the parent-teacher co op (Mid-Columbia Partnership) that we're participating in next year. They gave us the information we needed to enroll in classes and answered any question we had. I'm so excited to be homeschooling next year. The people at MCP are amazing. The women involved are such great examples to me of the good mothers can do both at home and in the community. There was one lady who teaches a couple of science classes each week, and helps out with other things, but the rest of the time she's busy homeschooling her two boys. All of these women seem very professional and accomplished to me - accomplished meaning both that they're educated and that they're doing so much good. Yet they don't let that professionalism get in the way of being a good mother. And with everything they do, they don't try to pretend that they have it all together. They're very real. I'm hoping that the opportunities we find at MCP will be great for all of us. I believe they will be.

Brian and his parents have been working very hard on getting our yard put together. (I've been helping a little bit, but mostly I've been on crowd control.) Right now we're living in one of the Jacks' rentals, and it has a huge, funny-shaped yard that they divided up to plant a huge garden, lovingly referred to around here as, "the farm." There are 80 (80!) tomato plants, sun flowers, raspberries, squash, um...and more stuff which I can't remember right now. They have some things at their house, waiting to be planted, and I'm not sure what's gone in over here, yet. I do know there are tomatoes, though, lots and lots of tomatoes. They've also been hard at work getting a fence put up so the kids don't run off when we play in the back yard, and soon they'll put in grass. That will be superb!

On Saturday I went with my mom and little sister to shop for wedding things. (Yep, Kimmy's getting married.) We first went to her fiance's back yard, where the reception will be held, then to all of the craft stores for ideas and supplies. It was fun to get out with them without the kids. I actually left the kids with Brian. (See? I mentioned we were enjoying having him around.) And he, being the brave soul that he is, decided to take all three of them to the mall. Wow. I was impressed. He even got Alyssa a manicure and pedicure, and she's been showing everyone the flowers on her fingernails ever since.

And today something wonderful happened: I took a nap. Brian and I took turns, and even though he normally sleeps straight through to the next morning when he tries to take a nap, I managed to get him up after a few hours so I could take my turn. It was wonderful.

Graduation Vacation (The Real Deal)

The day of graduation was one of the most gorgeous days we've ever seen in Forest Grove. One of the speakers said it perfectly that it was a "no weather day." Not too hot, not too cold, not windy, not rainy - just perfect. It was a wonderful day.

We left early so we could have plenty of time to get good seats for Welcome to the Profession. While we were waiting for that to begin, Marcus and I walked the aisles of the auditorium to keep him busy. Marcus spent about a half hour flirting with everyone's grandmas, and he got multiple requests to "take him home with me" and one to "eat him up." No kidding. What I didn't know was that Ethan spent that half hour squirming in Diane's arms, kicking the people in front of them, so a little before the program started, Diane offered to occupy the boys somewhere else if we took lots of pictures for her. It was so nice to be able to watch everything without kids to take care of.


Here's Brian receiving his hood from Dr. Smythe. She's also the one who spoke to us. She gave us an idea of how much work the graduates did over the last four years by dividing up the time they've spent in optometry school. According to her calculations, Brian spent 1,710 hours in lecture classes; 690 hours in labs; took 72 midterms, 35 written finals, and 5 lab finals; passed at least 35 mini-proficiencies and "that one big gigantic one," the 21-Point; and spent 1,960 hours in clinic. She also figured out that he paid about $30 an hour to be able to do all of that. Brian even got specially mentioned when she told the graduates how to receive their hood later that afternoon. She was the one who put the hoods over their heads, and since she proclaimed that she was "vertically challenged," most of them would have to stoop down to be more on her level, but "Casey and the two Brians" would have to kneel down to get their hoods put on.
-


The is almost the entirety of the graduates. Matt Watson was in Utah, because his wife was very close to having a baby, and there was another person that Brian said didn't come, because Saturday is their Sabbath. The three on the front right are the valedictorians. They gave a wonderful speech together where they started out by saying that they prepared two speeches, and even as of that morning they couldn't decide which one to give. So they left it up to their class to decide by turning to them, holding up the speeches and asking, "Which is better, 1 or 2?" Yeah, around here, we think that eye doctor jokes are pretty funny.

That afternoon the university held commencement for all of the graduate programs, where they had their hoods put on their shoulders and received their diplomas. The reception they had for lunch was pretty crazy with the kids running around, and I almost opted out by missing commencement to take the kids back to the hotel. I figured that the Welcome to the Profession was more intimate than commencement was going to be, and I was glad to have been able to see that. But Brian talked to a few people and found out that they were going to have a room available for people with kids to watch commcencement on a big screen on the wall. We were planning on using that only if the kids were having a hard time, but when we checked it out before things started we found that it was so much cooler than the huge, hot gym, so we stayed there the entire time.


I'm glad we did, because we were able to see the graduates while they paraded through the hallway to get to the gym.


And I was able to stand in the doorway as Brian was going up to the stage and was able to get some extra pictures. I was also able to give him a quick kiss as he was on the way up to get his hood and diploma.



















Brian's aunt and uncle, Linda and Ron, came down from Seattle for the occasion. (I didn't get a picture of the two of them together.) We had so much fun with them, and we're so glad they could come. Ron is hilarious! When we were waiting for Brian to finish, I was wondering out loud when the exact moment was that Brian became a doctor. Was it when he flipped his tassle from right to left, or was it when he received his diploma? I wanted to know, because I was wondering if the kiss I gave him was the first kiss he received as a doctor. Ron said that he thought it was when he got his diploma, then he joked that he actually gave Brian a big kiss as he was coming off of the stage, so he was the first one to kiss Brian as a doctor. (By the way, Ron, Brian says it's when they flip the tassle - so there.) In the red box is a camping stove. They must have gotten the memo that we want to go camping a lot. We're excited, thank you!

Brian's parents gave him some business cards. Pretty cool, huh?

Anyway, we're all very excited.

Can you tell?

Graduation Vacation (Portand)

We went to OMSI with my sister and her family. The kids had a bunch of fun with their cousins, and Brian's parents came into town and met us there as well. One of the best parts is that we saw the Gennings there, who we had wanted to get together with during our trip but weren't able to get ahold of directly. It was great to see them, too!

Ethan kept moving those steps around so he could see all of the animals. My niece, Megan, is the one loafing in the stroller.

Merian, Alyssa, and Emma were buddies. (Ethan was my buddy.)

Ethan is cutting a paper cup to stick over an air vent to see how high it can fly. Brian and his dad were very good at this.

Marcus loved the preschooler room.

On Sunday we went to the Portland Zoo, and had a marvelous time. It was the warmest it's ever been at the zoo. Normally we have to bring our jackets, even when it's hot in Forest Grove, but it was beautiful and sunny the whole day.

The Ferocious, Yet Happy Alyssa

All of the kids were able to feed the goats:

Brian's dad even got in on the action. The goats were all in the barn when he leaned up against the fence outside to look at the map. After a minute, the map started moving, and then half of it was gone.

I love the sea lions! Ethan had a great view of them -he's right in the middle.

McMenamins Part 2

And here's some random pictures of them any I took of all the paintings in the hallways:

This was almost directly across from our room. I'm not sure if it's supposed to be a specific person or not, but I think it's fun, because it's about Pacific University, and it even has a pair of eye glasses painted into the detail above it. (A lot of the paintings have something to do with the picture painted on the wall around it, which is cool.) The man is holding a Boxer, which is Pacific's mascot.


Just some more cool pipes. They're everywhere!


The detail around this picture is beautiful!

Here's another Pacific University one, because of the blind pig and the Boxer. You can read the caption underneath if you blow up the picture by clicking on it.


This is actually a carving, not a drawing or painting. They have a couple of these throughout the building, and they are amazing.


This is of our dear Walker Brothers. It was painted by Lyle Hehn who, "created this bizarre scene of the Walker Brothers Old-Time Orchestra amidst floodwaters in the Masonic Home attic." The Walking Tour packet describes this painting as "off-center inspiration."


This is a mosaic you see going up the ramp to the Compass Room. I can't find the description anywhere in the Walking Tour pamphlet, and I wish i knew what it was all about.