Owen turns 2!!!!

Owen turned 2 yesterday. I can't believe it. All of a sudden, he even seemed taller and much more grown up. He has really changed so much in the past few months--mainly with all the talking he's doing. He's picking up new words left and right and just amazes us with some of the things he says. He is such a little man.

We had a party Saturday with family including Grandma Sharon who left that evening to go back to Indiana (we miss her, especially Hannah) and Grandpa Robert and Grandma Pom who came down from Seattle and then spent Saturday night. Grandma Judi and Grandpa Mike and Grandma Carol (we definitely don't have a shortage of grandparents) were here and all the aunts, uncles and cousins. We had a bbq and then just had presents and cake, which Owen couldn't have cared less about. Not really thinking, I made the party for 1:00 pm, right around his naptime, so by 2:00, he was pretty cranky. I tried to distract him with opening presents, which we were doing outside, but instead, he walked over to the little inflatable pool we have where his cousin was playing, stepped right in and sat down and started swimming with all his clothes and regular diaper on. He was a wildman. He was getting out of the pool and running and belly flopping into it. We were just cracking up. Of course his diaper got about 4 times larger--man those things hold a lot of water--but I knew if I didn't get it off of him, it would start to break open and all that gel goo comes out. His brother, sister and cousins opened all his gifts, which he then got interested in because there were lots of trucks and cars, which are his obsession right now. Then we did cake, which he wasn't into at all, so they blew the candles out for that too. After taking another dip in the pool, he then had fun lining all his new cars and trucks up and playing with those for hours.








Dale had to take Grandma Sharon to the airport, but the fun didn't stop because Grandpa Robert and Grandma Pom were here and brought toys and activities for Hannah and Justin as well. They brought an awesome kite, which we flew a little, but it wasn't quite windy enough to keep it up. It will be great fun at the coast. And they also brough a remote control airplane, which Grandpa and Justin had fun playing with out in the field. There were numerous times it went in a neighbors backyard though, and since they weren't home, they had to keep sneaking in to get, which Hannah thought was not a good idea. Hannah and Pom had fun making beaded necklaces and bracelets and paper flowers. It was a fun, although exhausting, birthday party and week/weekend with grandparents, Now, we are back to normal, whatever that is. We are doing the last week of swimming lessons. It was really nice to have Sharon here to help take them to those because Owen is not content to sit and watch them swim. Tonight Hannah and Justin start vacation bible school at our church for a week. The fun just keeps coming.

Almost midnight

It's 1 minute to Midnight on Monday night (Tuesday morning). I'm the only one up and am attempting to scrap. I just finished a page. It didn't quite turn out as I envisioned in my head. I maybe need to go to bed and come back to it tomorrow. Actually, as I look at it again, I think it's starting to grow on me. Anyway, I've been scrapping a little this weekend. Personal Scrapper was having an online crop, and over at Scrapdango, I've been participating in a contest. Here are some photos of the layouts I've done for that and for the online crop.









I even did a sketch for the contest and then the Birthday Boy layout is based on that sketch except I ended up using 4 photos in the bottom instead of 3. I can't even stick to my own sketch. Go figure.

Grandma Sharon is here visiting us now much to the childrens' delight. She came on Friday and will be here until Saturday evening. She will be here for Owen's birthday party that day. It's always great having her. She definitely helps keep the children entertained, so it's nice for Dale and I as well--not that we don't like to entertain our children, but you know...

Other than that, there is not much going on. Hannah and Justin had swimming lessons the past two weeks (every day) and are going to be doing them for 2 more weeks. It will be nice that Grandma can take them this week, and I don't have to take Owen because keeping him occupied around the pool is not fun. It is amazing how much they have learned already. Hannah is swimming across the pool and Justin is so comfortable in water now where before he didn't want his face wet and is starting to swim.

Tomorrow, I actually get to go and use the Mother's Day gift that Dale got me, which was a 3 hour spa package with a 1 hour massage, 1 hour facial and 1 hour pedicure. It will be wonderful. The bad thing about going to the spa though and then having to come straight home (opposed to doing it at a resort where you stay--not that I've even done that) is that as soon as you walk in the door and the kids run up screaming about something, you're suddenly jolted back into reality and all that relaxation goes out the window. It will be wonderful while it lasts though.

Well, I think I'm going to head off to bed. I am going to leave you with a few parting shots that I took last week when Hannah and Owen were playing together on the slide. Owen discovered that he could walk up the slide and slide down, first with the help of Hanney (what he calls her) and then on his own. Also, Hannah started twirling in her new dress that Daddy picked out at the Gap Outlet.





And I was talking about Hannah and Justin swimming--well even though he can't take lessons yet (by himself anyway), Owen also loves to swim and, at least at this point, shows no fear of water.

Happy Belated 4th of July

Hope you all had a great weekend celebrating our Independence Day (for those of you who are US citizens, which I'm assuming is most who would read this--but you never know). For you Canadians, Happy belated Canada Day a few days prior. Also, Happy belated birthday to Grandpa Harold who was "Born on the 4th of July." He actually was in Canada on his birthday but came home over the weekend from his annual fishing trip.

To celebrate the 4th, we did our usual, which is going to my mom's out in Washougal, where she has a prime spot overlooking Washougal down to the river where they set off a display, but many of the ones just going off everywhere around us in the neighborhood below were almost as impressive. We were pretty much surrounded by fireworks. We bought our fair share--it ends up to be more and more each year. Usually my brother stocks up and puts on quite a display, but he didn't buy any this year, so we had to rely on ourselves for our own entertainment. Really we could just watch what everyone else does and save ourselves some money, but the kids (well Hannah and Justin) love setting them off. They can hardly stand to wait to wait for it to be barely dark enough to start setting them off. Owen wasn't so thrilled with the "Pop pops." He liked the pretties, but not when they were noisy. Once we were done with ours though and just watching the ones around us, he was fine. All in all, it was a good day and a very lazy weekend that followed. Dale did take Hannah and Justin to see Kung Fu Panda on Saturday, which they all enjoyed. Today we started swimming lessons for 2 weeks for Hannah and Justin. Other than that, there isn't much else going on right now.

I have been taking a break from running for a couple weeks to see if my knee can heal more and then I can get back into it. Running the 1/2 marathon a month ago went so well, but my knee was really bothering me after that, so I just decided I need to stop altogether for awhile. It's been hard because every weekend, I feel like I should be out there with the group. Hopefully I can get back into it or else I'm going to have to take up some other endurance sport like cycling--and I thought running shoes and other gear was expensive!!

Here are some pics from the 4th:








Here's one of Owen wrestling with Daddy. Won't be long before he'll be takin' him down.

HAPPY 1st BIRTHDAY to PaperTrunk

My online scrapbooking friend, Carrie Postma, (I've met her personally as well at crops) started a scrapbooking company 1 year ago today called PaperTrunk. She has done so incredible this year, and I know there is more to come. Head on over to the blog at http://papertrunk.blogspot.com/ for some awesome challenges and giveaways. By just posting some comments, you can win some great prizes. I wish them another successful year.

Here is one of my favorite layouts that I did using some PaperTrunk paper:




Also, coincidentally, I had another layout that I did with PT paper published in an online blog, Magazine of Memories, that came out today. Here is the link to that: http://magazineofmemories.blogspot.com/. Scroll down to the Family Fun layouts for my layout titled, "F is for..."

Scrap Retreat

I finally went on a scrapping retreat last weekend. I haven't been scrapping much the past few months with all the running training and recovering from the running training. I just wish I could scrap faster and get more done during a whole weekend, but for me it was successful. I was with my sister, Sara, and friend, Annaliese, so we did tend to chit chat a lot and not be so focused on scrapping. Annaliese even convinced me to go out and do my 8 mile run Sat. morning, although, I don't think we made it 8 miles, but it was a good workout even though it ate up the whole morning of scrapping.

Here are the layouts I did:

I survived Helvetia

What is Helvetia you ask? Well, it is the Helvetia 1/2 Marathon in Hillsboro, OR. It was on Saturday and the next phase in my training for the Portland Marathon in Oct. This is the first race event that I have done, although my race was only with myself--I certainly wasn't in it to win--just finish. It actually was a great day for me. I was nervous and had lots of butterflies the night before and morning of, but I got a good breakfast and got myself going. My friend, Heather, and I got to Hillsboro Stadium where it started around 7:00 AM, got into a big photo of the Portland/Vancouver Fit running group--not that you will be able to see us, waited in the long line of women to go to the bathroom, checked our bags with stuff we didn't need during the race and made it over to the crazy starting line where we just happened to run right into some other friends and off we went on our 13.1 mile journey through the countryside in Hillsboro. I was worried because I kept hearing about how hilly it was, but the hills were not that bad. There was one pretty good one, but after 6 miles, we were pretty much done with the hills. It was a beautiful sunny day but not too hot until toward the end when it got a little warm. We started off at a nice easy pace, which was pretty much the pace another friend, Rachel, and I maintained the whole time while Heather took off after a couple miles. She had a little more ambitious goals than we did. I had hoped to finish under a 10 minute/mile pace which would be 2 hours and 10 minutes, but for some reason thought it would take me more like 2-1/2 hours to finish. I guess I just wanted to keep my expectations low, but I felt really good the whole race. My hip really started to hurt toward the end, but I kept it going and even sprinted it to the end into the stadium where Rachel and I crossed the finish at 2:07:19, which is a 9:43 pace. Dale and the kids were there waiting for me along with my friend Heather, who finished at 1:5006 (You Go Girl!), and her husband and kids. They were all surprised that we had gotten there so soon. Dale didn't get any very good pics of me coming in because I caught him off guard. I was glad that it was over but very happy to have that first big event under my belt and to feel so good. I was sore and tired afterward. I discovered chafing in places that I didn't think would chafe. My back even felt sore and still does 2 days later from the packet of gel blocks (for refueling) that I had in the back pocket of my running tights. I am still dealing with some issues with my foot hurting, but it didn't feel bad during the race, and my knees have been tons better. Dale asked if I could've kept going for another 13.1 miles like I will have to for the marathon, and the answer on Saturday was, "No," but there is still a lot of training left to do, and I am more confident now that I can do it.

Me running into the stadium with Rachel.

Me happy to be done.

Two victorious Heathers.

Happy belated Father's Day to all fathers out there. It was a very lazy Father's Day here. After getting up and actually being able to go to church with the family (usually I am running and Dale gets the kids ready and I meet them there--although he does better getting there on time than when I'm with him--I'm not much help with the kids and just take longer I'm afraid), I was extremely tired and dozed on the couch. We watched Tiger make a putt to force another day of golf for the US Open and Dale watched the NBA Finals, hoping the Celtics would close it, but they couldn't. We are not Laker fans here. Well, I've got water boiling to cook pasta, so I better go.


TTFN, Ta Ta For Now

Rough Night

I was up late last night with Owen who was coughing and coughing. Poor guy. It's now 10:30 AM and he is still sleeping. I should be doing the same. Luckily I didn't have to teach aerobics this morning at 5:30 AM. Tonight, Dale will be on duty if the same thing happens.

It's another rainy, dreary day. Definitely doesn't feel like summer vacation starts next week, although it is supposed to get nice at the end of the week. Hannah's last day of school is next Wednesday when they only go for 2 hours. Not really sure why they bother at all. She's not real excited for school to end. She will really miss her friends and teacher. This Thursday she is doing the talent show at school in which she will just be doing her dance from her ballet recital. Speaking of the recital, it was on May 31st, and she did so well. She definitely knew her dance. In fact, her teacher would apparently tell the other girls to follow her. When she missed one of the rehearsals, the girls said they were all messed up. Here are some photos of her in her costume. Her class was Spanish chocolates. She was just glad that for the first time in four years, she wasn't playing the part of some animal,although she was adorable in all of those. She finally got to wear a pretty dress, although I'm sure brown wouldn't have been her first choice for a color. She looked cute enough to eat.







Well, Owen has woken up (still coughing a little but, thankfully, in good spirits), so I better sign off.

TTFN, Ta Ta For Now