The Newaukum River!

Jerry owns 40+ acres on the Newaukum River and he was nice enough to ask us to come and spend the day on the River with him and his family! It was a very overcast day which turned out to be perfect. The kids spent the majority of their time by the water. Taylor picked up lots of rocks. Any that were not worthy of bringing home with us were thrown into the river!

The biggest thing (at least for me) was that your choice of bathroom was the above (the girls favorite!) or an outhouse. Let's just say that I didn't drink ANYTHING the entire time we were at the River. It does sometimes pay to be a teacher- I have gotten very good at holding :)

Jerry showing the girls around the River!

The sun did finally come out later on in the day and Maddie enjoyed dipping her feet in!

Taking a break and having a snack!

This was when we first arrived...you can tell because all of Taylor' s clothes are still on! She is currently going through a phase of letting me do her hair (yea!) and smiling for pictures!

I loved this picture of Maddie! Miss Maddie was asleep within minutes of being in the car! She had lots of fun chasing the big girls around!

Here are a few pictures of the gorgeous area! My favorite was the waterfall. It was hidden around the bend of the river!

Maddie is off to Preschool!

Maddie's first day of Preschool!

In the fall, Maddie will be attending preschool (hard to believe that she is grown up enough to do this already!). The preschool offers mini day camps for the kids to attend during the summer so that they can meet the teacher and spend some time getting to know the kids. Maddie went to her first day camp on Friday. I was nervous about how she would do with the drop off but she went in, sat down where the teacher asked her to and was all smiles from that point on! The teacher seems very nice and Maddie hasn't stopped talking about Miss Sandy! She will be going to two more mini day camps during the summer and will start the regular program in early September. More posts to come on Preschool in the fall!

Miss Sandy had lots of different centers set up for the kids to explore and create with. This is what Maddie created! She was SO proud of her "artwork" that it is now hanging in our kitchen!

Northwest Trek!

In May, Dave and I bought a year's membership to Point Defiance Zoo and NW trek! We decided to take a day trip this week to NW Trek with the kids. Although it was quite warm, the kids, Dave and I had a great time! Pictured above you see Taylor and I making a butterfly necklace in the discovery center. We stopped here last and it was the perfect way to end the day. They had all kinds of different crafts for the kids to make and lots of interesting hands on exploring about different animals. It was impressive!

On the tram ride we saw lots of animals- we were mad that we didn't bring our bigger lens because our pictures would have been much better! I loved this marsh that we passed and if you look really hard you should be able to see a bison across from it getting a drink of water!

We saw lots of bison on our tram ride as well as carribou and moose (I'm getting old- I know we saw some other animals but can't recall them!) The bison were Maddie's favorite. She loved them because they "have a big bummy!"

We enjoyed a picnic lunch and during our break the girls discovered this very large rock. I love this picture because Taylor is wearing my sunglasses and Maddie is totally not cooperating!

One last view on the tram ride....it was really breath taking in person!

If you haven't been to NW Trek I would recommend going soon!

Sweet Peas!

A while back my sister was watching our kids for us for the day and ended up planting sweet peas in egg shells with them. Taylor and Maddie were thrilled to watch the sweet peas grow in our kitchen and then helped me transplant them into a pot on our back porch. I didn't hold out much hope for actual flowers but when we came home from Crescent Bar we looked outside and saw gorgeous sweet peas growing! We picked our first batch and are enjoying watching new flowers appear daily! Thanks Nana for a fun project that we have been able to enjoy these last few months!

The Fit Stop!

About three months ago I finally decided that it was time for me to take time for myself (what??) and try to get back in shape after having our two sweet little girls. My girlfriend had been going to The Fit Stop and was really happy with her workouts and what not and so I decided to go and check it out. I ended up joining the gym and committing to a 9 week (which in the end ended up being a 12 week) diet and fitness program. I can't remember a time when I have been pushed more or a time when I have felt so good about my health and body! I have ended up losing 18 pounds and have dropped 2 pant sizes! And yes, mom, I am DONE losing weight now and my plan is to maintain what I have done! I had to post all this because while we were on vacation I received numerous phone calls from friends saying that I was on the Fit Stops billboard! Pretty cool huh?

Crescent Bar!

We just got back from a week at Crescent Bar! We had lots of fun! Jill, myself and the girls went for a paddle boat ride! Taylor paddled all the way (with help from Jill!)

Uncle Mike has officially moved up in Taylor and Maddie's book! Taylor said to me: "Mommy, now I love Mike. I already loved Jill." Too funny! He spent countless hours with the girls in the pool....he's my hero as well!

All the kids had a blast in the pool together! Lucky Darci got to go in every time....one benefit of having older kids :)

Here is the whole gang in the pool! Emilie, Taylor, Maddie and Johnnie Boy (Maddie's nickname for him)

I tried to blow this picture up but will have to work on that! This would be the four of us inner tubing together! The girls to our amazement got behind the boat and did this! They had a ton of fun! I still feel a bit sea sick from all of our laps around the river!

Just back from a fun trip on the river!

The girls made a fort each day on the deck!

Maddie girl enjoying time on the aqua sport!



Maddie and Uncle Paul!

We also did a lot of jet skiing! Here are the girls and Dave back from one of their many trips!

Barbie Pool time! John LOVED the Barbies....hmm...I think we drew his name for the Christmas exchange....Tim- a pink or a purple dress for his Barbie? LOL!!



Cocktail hour! Popcorn and Sprite!

Uncle Richard, Uncle Brent, Uncle Mike, Uncle Paul and Uncle Tim (did I miss any of the men??) went golfing one morning and surprised the girls with this Hannah Montana Pinata when they came back! They had it hanging up from a tree when the girls got back from the beach. We had a fun night of swinging the bat! Thanks boys!

One of my favorite pictures! It was so nice to see Dave be able to relax on this vacation! He only has 2 more weeks of vacation and it's back to the grind for him. We were able to use the boat every day and we both water skied almost every day. Fun!




We went to a really nice beach one of the days we were at Crescent Bar! This was the first vacation where the girls played together and by themselves- yea us! They loved the river and played in it each day!


Taylor has always been a beach bum! She spent a lot of time looking for rocks to keep and even found a few shells!

Ahh...you gotta love Nana! She spent countless hours with the girls and here you see her enjoying a much needed break from being a mommy! Dave found this great Margarita mix in a bag that Nana thought was super tasty!! :)

Maddie officially LOVES the sand and water! A huge relief to mom and dad! She has become our little dare devil! She loved going extremely fast on the boat and the jet ski and was the first to want to go on the inner tube! She spent the majority of her days at the beach!


Johnnie boy was a huge hit with my girls- especially Maddie! Anywhere John went, Maddie went. I think John thought she was pretty great too- he always had a huge smile on his face when she came around!

As you can probably tell, we had an AMAZING trip over the mountains! Being able to spend a week with my entire family was truly priceless for me! It doesn't happen very often anymore and I love them all to pieces so having that time with them meant the world to me!

5th of July!

If you haven't guessed yet, we have been a bit busy! Since Dave only has the month of July off we tend to pack as many things as we can into the month and we haven't wasted any time in doing lots of fun things so far! On July 5th we packed up our suitcases, the boat and a ton of food (off to Crescent Bar after the BBQ) and headed to Camano Island for a BBQ and swim party with Dave's family. Roger and Lynette have a great community pool where they live and all of the kids had a blast swimming together! We enjoyed a yummy a BBQ dinner and had birthday dessert for Uncle Matt! We always enjoy our time with the Myers clan and hope to do something again really soon! (Lynette, wild waves sounds fabulous!!) I didn't take very many pictures but got these two that I couldn't resist posting!

Tay, Drew, Abbey, Maddie and Zack!

Lukey-Boy! Can he get any cuter??

4th of July!

HaPpY 4th Of JuLy!

Our 4th of July was very mellow this year seeming how we did the majority of our celebrating on the 3rd. We got to sleep in and then spent most of the day enjoying the beautiful weather, cleaning the house and packing for Crescent Bar. We spent the evening at Dave's mom's house with everyone and enjoyed some great food, sparklers and pop its! We told the girls that there wouldn't be any fireworks on the 4th of July because we had already seen them on the 3rd...they believed us and were in bed by 9! How long will we be able to pull that one off? 2 girls loving the sparklers!

2 VERY tired girls watching their cousin Kit do fireworks!

3rd of July!

Every year in Boston Harbor they have a huge fireworks display and the entire community gets really into the whole thing. People have huge parties, the roads are blocked off and everyone is out cruising around the neighborhood into the wee hours of the night. Last year we spent the 4th of July in Florida and missed our first 3rd of July in the new house so this year we decided to invite friends over and have our first "big bash" in the house. The evening turned out to be a fun one! It was a hot day and all the kids (around 25 or so...) played on the slip-n-slide until the sun went down. They were all amazing- no tears, no arguing! We ate lots of food (and lets not forget to mention we drank a little bit as well!) and shared lots of laughs. Around 10 p.m. the entire group headed down the street to watch the fireworks. It was an all around great, fun day!

***For some reason the pictures aren't dragging like they usually do...now they are all stuck together! Ugh.