March & April

 

MARCH:
 

Not a lot of pictures for March (in fact, just one), so I can't remember all the fun times we had. 

It was a very rainy, gloomy month. :(

Catalina went to Camp Casey for 5th grade camp. She spent 3 days on Whidbey Island, and had a lot of fun, but this is the only picture I have, saying goodbye to her at the school.

APRIL:

End of March and into April, Nathan and the kids went to Arizona for Spring Break.

Ammon was most looking forward to seeing his best friend from school, and they started off the trip going to the Phoenix Zoo.

Catalina was shuffled around to a few of her friends houses, but the only picture that came back that was digital format was this one of her at the top of a grapefruit tree in Sharon and Steve's backyard. 

 

Catalina did get a beautiful photo album from her friend Grace's mother, with the girls playing with Grace's goats, horses, and chickens. Catalina loves that photo album, and I will keep that in mind for future trips.  

Sharon & Steve's Grapefruit tree

Back in Washington

Catalina LOVES seafood (but not fish), so we tried out cooking Octopus at home. 

We went to Dash Point Park on another beautiful sunny day.

Guard Dog Sosuke, did not like people, dogs, water, sand, or getting dirty.

Socialite Ponyo did enjoy people, other dogs, water, sand, and getting dirty.

 

Catalina found a snake on our front step coming home from school, so naturally she picked it up to show us. 

We camped at our local Lake Park for their annual Fishing Derby, to kick-off fishing season. 

Sam, Maren & Kids joined us. 

There was a train running all day, and if the kids didn't get a seat, they would just run along side it instead.

Lot's of fun activities for the kids.

Practicing a song to upload to Nathan's blog, you can hear it here: http://creativefiresongs.blogspot.com/2012/04/song-8-catch-and-release-alright.html  Sam wrote the lyrics that are fitting to the event we were at.

 

It was great to gather around a campfire with a guitar and Nathan & Maren harmonizing. 

Morning fishing, didn't catch anything.

A fellow fisherman wanted to demonstrate his skills on guitar, he was pretty good.

Only Rainbows After Rain

It has been almost 6 months since my last post, so I am going to try to catch up with monthly summaries. 

 

January - post snow storm:

We utilized our community indoor pool to get some energy out, feel some warmth, and for Ammon to be able to play with his friend from our temporary residence in Auburn.

February:

 

And as soon as the sun was shining again, we went to Discovery Park in Seattle

There was some great forest hiking, and a beautiful sunny beach with lots of rocks and shells to collect.

Ammon was a Firefly in the school play "The Secret Garden"

Nathan's sister Jeannette came from Arizona for a 10 day visit, and his brother Jared and family came from Spokane for the President's day weekend. 

Hiking the Cedar River Trail, and collecting walking sticks.

While Jeannette was here, we stayed in a tree house hotel.

 

Nathan & Denise's tree house

 

Jeannette, Catalina & Ammon's tree house

Jeannette & kids tree house on inside.

 

Another awesome tree house that the guests let us tour.

 And we did a very quick, and cold glance at Snoqualmie Falls. It was too cold, rainy and windy to stay and hike. 

State of Emergency

Ice covered tree by the front window

I'm going to start at the end, then go back to the begining, like a good indie film.

These are pictures from this morning.

Ice covered trees and bushes with branches steadily breaking off, and snow and ice falling from the trees creating an eerie background noise since yesterday morning.

The roads are treacherous, and it's no fun to play outside because it is so icy, and a tree could fall on you.

The governor has declared a state of emergency, most places are shut down, and people are just not leaving their homes if they don't need to.

The kids have been out of school all week, because of road conditions and power outages.

Luckily we still have power. Cell service is in and out, so leave a message or text, because we are not getting many incoming calls.

Now...
Back to the beginning.
Before the snow, the weather was nice enough that the kids pulled out the bikes for the first time since AZ.
It was awesome. A nice preview of what's to come in the spring.

The kids started Han Mu Do, a martial arts that our neighbor teaches twice a week in a studio nearby.

And then our perfect 3 days of snow Monday through Wednesday with lots of sledding, snowmen, snow ball fights, etc.

Nathan

Phoenix coyotes hat :)

Our dog Sosuke is staring out the front window

 
And now, flash-forward back to present.

We are stuck inside, Nathan home from work, after 3 days of dangerous and time consuming commutes, and trying to deliver mail on icy roads. We are now just waiting for the rain and 40 degree temperatures to melt all the snow and ice so we can get back to daily routines.

Washington 2011

On the ferry fall 2011, kids + friend

2011 was a crazy year for our family. We moved from Mesa Arizona to Auburn Washington in August, then to Maple Valley Washington in December.
I am going to try my hand at blogging to keep our family updated on pictures and major events.

After a tumultuous 5 months in a rental in Auburn, we exercised our tenant rights and moved out. We chose Maple Valley as our new town due to the great schools, and relatively short commute for Nathan to work.

We moved in the week after Christmas.

New rental. Perfect garage for Nathan's bike collection.

Back of house. Love that it looks like Amtyville in this picture.

Front room

Dining room

Living room

Kitchen

Stairs & entryway

Before moving, we celebrated Thanksgiving at Sam & Marens. Super yummy.
And we decorated gingerbread houses at our place while AJ was in town.
Awful, I did not get a picture of Ammon's gingerbread house. But it was awesome, and delicious. 
It was guarded by lots of Cinnamon and gummy bears, and sharks.
Then we hosted Christmas dinner at our almost empty rental in Auburn.

Ethan's Gingerbread house

 

Catalina's gingerbread adobe.

Discovered Fat Burger. And that Catalina's temporary hair dye is more permanent than temporary.

Discovered Ammon can look like Beiber.

Christmas was larger than anticipated due to many gifts in the mail from grandparents and Aunts.

Christmas was in the old rental home. It was really weird to have just our little family unit for Christmas day, and no driving around town to visit family. We lost power for about 4 hours, just after we had opened all the gifts. It worked out well, because we just took a post-chaos nap. We then spent the rest of Christmas day with Sam and Maren.

I love the Queen of Clean!

Hat from Grandma Heather.

Hair flower from Grandma Heather.

 New Rental January 1st 2012!

Back porch of new house, off to walk the Cedar River Trail.

Back side of secret gate that leads from our back yard to...

...here.

...then to street, that leads to trail.

Cedar River trail, 1//4 mile from our home. And the kids looking very 21 Jump street on the bridge.

Different day, different place. But so pretty. Dash Point Park sunset in October. It was so nice to see the sun and sky.