Remember that red vacuum that Ellie so desparately wanted for Christmas? Here we are just 2.5 months past Christmas and she loves it. It's not just something she busts out to play with when she's pretending. Its actually something she pulls out when we're vacuuming, so she can help us. Its home is right next to our vacuum in the closet and as soon as Jared or I pull ours out, there she is with hers. Watch for yourself - too cute!
Wednesday, March 6, 2013
Ellie Reading
Ellie has a couple of books that she really likes. So much that she is now able to read them. Just prior to going to Hawaii she read these two to Grandma.
No No Yes Yes - this is a picture book that Jared and I have come up with words that we generally use to read the book with. I love that she mostly uses what we say but has added her own twist (listen to how many times she says nicely).
Brown Bear, Brown Bear - A favorite. This isn't her best 'reading' of it. Since she can't actually read the words, she needs to turn the page to see the pictures to know what animal is next.
Grandma says that Ellie is really good since she's already reading left to right and top to bottom. Some of the pictures at the end of the No No Yes Yes book are multiples per page and Ellie navigates with ease.
No No Yes Yes - this is a picture book that Jared and I have come up with words that we generally use to read the book with. I love that she mostly uses what we say but has added her own twist (listen to how many times she says nicely).
Brown Bear, Brown Bear - A favorite. This isn't her best 'reading' of it. Since she can't actually read the words, she needs to turn the page to see the pictures to know what animal is next.
Grandma says that Ellie is really good since she's already reading left to right and top to bottom. Some of the pictures at the end of the No No Yes Yes book are multiples per page and Ellie navigates with ease.
Saturday, March 2, 2013
Ryan's 1st Birthday Party
Our baby boy turned 1 on Wednesday and we got to celebrate his birthday in style with a "Little Man Mustache Bash"! Age 1 is a good time for mama's to get to pick the theme of their babies birthday parties, since it will be one of the only times they get their way when it comes to these things. :)
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Mustache Sugar Cookies
Party Favors - Mustache Crayons for the kids
We had lots of mustaches for everyone to wear....
And after awhile they ended up in funny places.
First lick of frosting
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After demolishing his cake
Sunday, February 24, 2013
Hawaii
After 5+ years Jared and I took our first vacation since our honeymoon, discounting any weekend trips. This also includes our first family vacation, with Ellie and/or Ryan. Nana and Pop Pop also came with, which was helpful to have them around to assist with our two crazies!
Our week started off on Saturday with a flight to Honolulu. Both kids were great on the plane. We've contributed this to the fact that we didn't get to sit next to each other on the plane. This allowed Ellie to do what she wanted without being pestered by Ryan. Pretty impressive when people around you give you compliments on how well behaved your kids are.
On Sunday we headed to the Pearl Harbor Memorial. It was super windy so unfortunately they wern't allowing trips out to the USS Arizona memorial. We were there 4+ hours, but it would be incredibly easy to spend 8+ hours there as there is so much to see and do. We wern't able to bring a stroller due to the rules of the memorial, so I packed Ryan around all day. My back was miserable after that!
For lunch, we went to a restaurant at one of the piers called Niko's. It was recommended to Pop Pop by a co-worker. Little did we know that it's actually been featured on Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives! That explains why it was busy at 2 pm!
At dinner, we met up with some friends of Nana's and Pop Pop's who came from Warden on the flight with us. We went to a restraunt called Giovanni Pastrami - sooo good. A random find in Hawaii by our thoughts, but much of Honolulu is very mainland oriented. Lots of high end/designer shops and franchise/chain restaurants. Jared and I had a Pork Ruben which was amazing. I think everyone else had the Pastrami Ruben, also amazing.
Monday we had our flight to Maui. Another great flight by the kids. We headed to Costco immediately after landing and stocked up on snacks, fruit, snorkel gear, etc. So much stuff that they don't carry at the mainland stores like Vasi's Crab and Seafood dip! Tons and tons of macadamia nuts - various brands and preparations. What's really interesting is that their food court has the exact same items as the mainland stores and the exact same prices - polish dogs are still $1.50!! A quick drive to Kaanapali to our hotel - the Sheraton Maui on Black Rock.
For the rest of the week we enjoyed the warm weather, despite the wind. Lots of snorkeling for Jared, Pop Pop and I. We saw several sea turtles and Jared and I even saw 4 spotted sting rays! We had been told that Black Rock had the best snorkeling by lots of friends - that was certainly the case. The boys did trek out to another site and while different, they still thought we had the better of the sites at our doorstep.
On Tuesday we headed to a neighboring city for a luau we heard about from a guy at Costco. It was at a local bar called Life's a Beach and for 10 bucks we had all you can eat dinner. While not a traditional luau it was still great food and Cindy and I had the best Pina Coladas ever - they were obviously made from scratch.
There was a great little shopping village just down the boardwalk from our hotel called Whaler's Village. We spent a little time there shopping and snacking. Ellie helped Nana pick out several oysters at a pearl shop. Boy is she a lucky little pearl picker. Nana ended up with two silver/blue pearls (2nd most rare type of pearl), a huge white/pinkish pearl, and even a 'perfect' pearl. The gals at the shop valued the perfect pearl at $120 bucks, not bad for a $15 oyster!
Our week started off on Saturday with a flight to Honolulu. Both kids were great on the plane. We've contributed this to the fact that we didn't get to sit next to each other on the plane. This allowed Ellie to do what she wanted without being pestered by Ryan. Pretty impressive when people around you give you compliments on how well behaved your kids are.
Ellie and Daddy napping on the plane
Ry and Nana playing on the plane
On Sunday we headed to the Pearl Harbor Memorial. It was super windy so unfortunately they wern't allowing trips out to the USS Arizona memorial. We were there 4+ hours, but it would be incredibly easy to spend 8+ hours there as there is so much to see and do. We wern't able to bring a stroller due to the rules of the memorial, so I packed Ryan around all day. My back was miserable after that!
Tree of Life
USS Arizona Memorial
Names of those who lost their lives at Pearl Harbor
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Map of Oahu and the various military bases
Ellie showing how big the missle is
Navy plane
Ellie checking out the pariscope (it was set up to see the ship in the harbor)
Ellie showing us the controls of a Coning tower (subarine)
Ellie showing her pose in front of the Coning Tower
More goofy girl poses next to machine guns
Submarine in the harbor
Then we headed to a neat swap meet at the Aloha Bowl (Univ of Hawaii football stadium). It was huge and really great prices on a lot of tourist items. Ellie picked out some cute necklaces for her friends at daycare. Again, because we didn't pack a stroller, we packed Ryan around - Pop Pop did most of the heavy lifting this time (thank goodness for my back). For lunch, we went to a restaurant at one of the piers called Niko's. It was recommended to Pop Pop by a co-worker. Little did we know that it's actually been featured on Diners, Drive-ins, and Dives! That explains why it was busy at 2 pm!
At dinner, we met up with some friends of Nana's and Pop Pop's who came from Warden on the flight with us. We went to a restraunt called Giovanni Pastrami - sooo good. A random find in Hawaii by our thoughts, but much of Honolulu is very mainland oriented. Lots of high end/designer shops and franchise/chain restaurants. Jared and I had a Pork Ruben which was amazing. I think everyone else had the Pastrami Ruben, also amazing.
Monday we had our flight to Maui. Another great flight by the kids. We headed to Costco immediately after landing and stocked up on snacks, fruit, snorkel gear, etc. So much stuff that they don't carry at the mainland stores like Vasi's Crab and Seafood dip! Tons and tons of macadamia nuts - various brands and preparations. What's really interesting is that their food court has the exact same items as the mainland stores and the exact same prices - polish dogs are still $1.50!! A quick drive to Kaanapali to our hotel - the Sheraton Maui on Black Rock.
For the rest of the week we enjoyed the warm weather, despite the wind. Lots of snorkeling for Jared, Pop Pop and I. We saw several sea turtles and Jared and I even saw 4 spotted sting rays! We had been told that Black Rock had the best snorkeling by lots of friends - that was certainly the case. The boys did trek out to another site and while different, they still thought we had the better of the sites at our doorstep.
View from our hotel
On Tuesday we headed to a neighboring city for a luau we heard about from a guy at Costco. It was at a local bar called Life's a Beach and for 10 bucks we had all you can eat dinner. While not a traditional luau it was still great food and Cindy and I had the best Pina Coladas ever - they were obviously made from scratch.
There was a great little shopping village just down the boardwalk from our hotel called Whaler's Village. We spent a little time there shopping and snacking. Ellie helped Nana pick out several oysters at a pearl shop. Boy is she a lucky little pearl picker. Nana ended up with two silver/blue pearls (2nd most rare type of pearl), a huge white/pinkish pearl, and even a 'perfect' pearl. The gals at the shop valued the perfect pearl at $120 bucks, not bad for a $15 oyster!
Ry taking a nap on the beach
Ellie trying on my flippers
Ryan playing at the beach
Ellie building sandcastles
Ellie buried in the sand
Ryan "playing" (aka eating sand)
Ellie did a great job writing her name in the sand
Great view from our drive up north
Egret
Red Crested Cardinal
Monday, January 28, 2013
Post Christmas Update
Sorry we've been MIA for awhile - its been a rough month in the new year. Ryan came down with a cold the day after Christmas. Shortly followed by the rest of us getting sick. And then Ellie got a yeast infection from the antibiotics from her bladder infection and a relapse of her cold. And topped off by my sinus infection this last weekend.
Needless to say we are counting down to our vacation to Hawaii in the middle of February. Here's to hoping we can make it that far without getting another illness.
Needless to say we are counting down to our vacation to Hawaii in the middle of February. Here's to hoping we can make it that far without getting another illness.
Mr. Mobile Man
SO its been a long time coming. I've been super slow to get these videos up of Ryan being mobile. We've had many developments since his first little scoot!
For a little while he tried to scoot one legged....
Then he actually started crawling - no video on this one yet.
And the latest and greatest is that he's walking!
I've also mentioned that he began climbing stairs a while back. And his attempt to go down them...
More Advent Activities
An update on my earlier post of the activities we did for our countdown to Christmas -
We also went to visit Santa at the River Park Square - waited in line on a Friday afternoon/early evening only to have little miss completely freak out when it was our turn. She cried immediately and took off running out the other side. Can't say that we didn't see that one coming - she wouldn't even tell the lady in line behind us what she wanted from Santa. :)
We took our now annual ride on the horse and carriage around downtown. This year it was a lot warmer than last year when we went and there was no line! In fact, we got our own carriage ride! As always we had a wonderful time!
Ellie had a couple nights with Nana (my mom) since we were at my work Christmas party. Their activities included making a button tree, playing with her Christmas sticker book, and watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the animated version). She didn't even get to watch the movie or wasn't too interested in it.
We made Christmas cookies one night, decorated them the next and then got to deliver plates of cookies to our neighbors! It was nice to see the people at our little end of the neighborhood and sad to realize that we don't see or connect with them often enough.
One night we made paper snowflakes - that was a hard one since she's not skilled enough or strong enough to cut all that paper. We'll try that one again another year.
Since it hadn't snowed yet, one of the activities was to make a snowman, but out of paper. She LOVED this activity.
Ellie and I made cinnamon ornaments one night - very cute! She gave some to each of her Nana's and even remembered to tell them that "you can't eat them - they have glue in them".
We finshed up the activies in Spokane by decorating a gingerbread house. I was surprised that she didn't try to eat a ton of the candy - probably because most of it was hard since I bought this one on clearance last Christmas.
We also went to visit Santa at the River Park Square - waited in line on a Friday afternoon/early evening only to have little miss completely freak out when it was our turn. She cried immediately and took off running out the other side. Can't say that we didn't see that one coming - she wouldn't even tell the lady in line behind us what she wanted from Santa. :)
We took our now annual ride on the horse and carriage around downtown. This year it was a lot warmer than last year when we went and there was no line! In fact, we got our own carriage ride! As always we had a wonderful time!
Ellie had a couple nights with Nana (my mom) since we were at my work Christmas party. Their activities included making a button tree, playing with her Christmas sticker book, and watching How the Grinch Stole Christmas (the animated version). She didn't even get to watch the movie or wasn't too interested in it.
One night we made paper snowflakes - that was a hard one since she's not skilled enough or strong enough to cut all that paper. We'll try that one again another year.
Since it hadn't snowed yet, one of the activities was to make a snowman, but out of paper. She LOVED this activity.
Ellie and I made cinnamon ornaments one night - very cute! She gave some to each of her Nana's and even remembered to tell them that "you can't eat them - they have glue in them".
We finshed up the activies in Spokane by decorating a gingerbread house. I was surprised that she didn't try to eat a ton of the candy - probably because most of it was hard since I bought this one on clearance last Christmas.
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