Jenna

My sister is going on a mission (for our church)!  My family made the drive up here so we could go through the Portland LDS temple with her before she leaves and so our favorite baby sitter could watch the kids while we were inside.  I'm so glad they came, it was a fun 2 days. 

Look at that blue sky!  I never take it for granted here.

The best picture I got.  My kids aren't good at taking pictures into the sun.

Some other pictures playing around the grounds...

Also, little miss Emry (or Whippy as our friends still call her, which I love) is 9 months old now!  She's crawling, starting to find good spots to get into things, tripping her brothers (she has the goose egg on her head to prove it as one brother landed on her), and smiling.  I swear she's starting to wave and say "hi" too.  Don't have her stats yet, we'll get those a little later.

A Good Weekend

We had a good weekend.  And, so, here's another post with a whole lot of pictures.  

First off, we had our 7th anniversary! When we were thinking about what we wanted to do we both really just wanted to go on a bike ride.  Some nice friends braved taking all 3 kids and we rode our bikes to PF Chang's.  It was super good and then we went on a bike ride.  Eugene makes it very easy to love bike riding.  There are loads of beautiful bike paths.  It was very pretty.  We rode around Autzen Stadium.  We rode fast, we went wherever we wanted, and we didn't have to constantly make sure someone was keeping up or not getting too far ahead at the same time.

It was also the Eugene Celebration parade.  We went to this parade shortly after we moved here 4 years ago and I think we have gone every year since, so I now consider it somewhat of a tradition and I knew we couldn't miss it. It is a very unique parade that makes me laugh and shake my head.     I think I go to it mainly to be surprised by some people's opinions, though I don't agree with most of them here, and to just laugh.  We watched it with friends and had a good time.  I love Eugene, but there is a definite "quirkiness" here where being whatever kind of weird you want to be is embraced.  

Holding hands

 A guy on stilts

A favorite of the boys...monster trucks

Then, of course, there are every kind of bike imaginable that people create

our favorite...

can't forget Occupy Eugene with people dressing up as whatever just because, I guess

The Slug Queen.  From the website: "Officially, Slug Queens are selected on the basis of talent, costume and ability to ad lib witty answers to inane questions"  She was handing out crocheted slug finger puppets

A group encouraging people to stop shaving and grow beards

This one surprised me.  The nudist colony (wearing their boxes) wasn't there this year, but the communist party was...wow.

fairies

tie-dyed men wearing bird costumes

And someone wearing plastic bags to remind people to be more green...I can't imagine how hot he was.

Now that Emry can crawl she tries to join in on the wrestling and tickling fest that inevitably happens when Isaac gets home.  I think the boys look forward to it all day long.

Latest Accomplishment

Yup, she figured out how to crawl!  She kind of got around for a little while by twisting her body while she was sitting and that would somehow move her bit by bit.  We noticed she was getting pretty close to really crawling last week and within a few days has it down like a pro.  Thankfully, though, she's still fairly slow - though she gets faster everyday.  This is a month younger than Kason crawled and two months younger than Asher crawled.  I don't know that I was totally ready for it!  Now, I am vacuuming even more and trying to find the little toys and crumbs before she does, which does get harder with each kid, imagine that! It's too cute to see her crawling, though, and she's happier.

 Now she can get right in the middle of her brothers' games and try to eat their army guy camps.

I've been playing around with the camera and Emry has been my model in the clothes Kellie sent.  So, here's  a  few  whole lot of pictures of her.  I'll never get tired of looking at them though!

 The boys LOVE to ride their bikes.  That's all they want to do.  I love that we live in a place where it's really  pretty safe for them to go ride to their hearts content even if I don't get out there for a minute or if there's some sneaking out involved.  They prefer to ride around and around even to playing on the playground.  We've gone on quite a few little family bike rides and I think it's their favorite activity.  Asher makes quite the sound effects as we go along too.

Summer Times

We have been keeping busy, mostly it's just keeping up with all the things that need to happen with 3 kids.  Here are some more of the fun things we've done this summer. I love summer and I love summer in Oregon.

At the All Comers Meet at Hayward Field.  The kids get to compete in certain track and field events divided up by age group.  This was the 60 meter dash.  The poor boys didn't really know what was going on, they just got rushed onto the track.  Isaac wasn't there, but thankfully our good friends helped me out the whole time. 

Asher checking out his competition with Jim at the start line.

He was dead last.  He kept looking back at Jim multiple times during the race like "where am I going??? What am I doing?"

  

Kason at the start line

The long jump

Softball Throw

The 200 meters.  That's Kason in the gray shirt...in the back.  When I zoom into this picture his face is a mix of emotions from determination, to anger, to despair and agony that he is almost last.  He has a competitive streak in him. He was zig zagging all around kids instead of staying on the inside.  They had alot of fun though.

 Intense concentration to pick up a cracker

After church

Kason has been loving swim lessons and is getting quite a bit better at swimming.  It has been fun for the boys to ride their bikes there everyday while I push Emry in the stroller.

Asher and Emry were great about waiting for and watching Kason.  But, Asher was ready to get in the water this day.

Ready for us all to get in after Kason's lesson.  I'll admit I was slightly proud that I took all three, none of whom can swim completely on their own, into the water by myself.  Granted, Kason has grown alot since last summer and he can usually touch the bottom of the pool and Asher has his floating thing...but still.

8 months old! 

She's getting closer to crawling.  Isaac is ready for her to crawl, I don't know that I am.

She has turned into a major mommy's girl.

She's sleeping alot better at night

She's still as cute as ever!