Volunteer Lately?

Today the entire finance org at work in Bellevue had a volunteer day where we went out to 3 different areas in groups of 40-50 people to volunteer for the day instead of work. I was at Hopelink in Kirkland and others were at the Ronald McDonald House in Seattle, and the others were at Marymore Park in Redmond (too crappy and cold to choose this place for me)! We sorted 18,000 pounds of food, filled the grocery shelves/pantry to the tune of 4,000 pounds of food in the food bank, stacked and crated this food, and then also bagged oats and rice. Afterwards we had happy hour at the Liquid Lime (a very seedy, surly bar - to me)...it was fun, but definitely lots of hard work lifting and bending...I'm sure I'll be sore tomorrow!! I also had a Mike's Hard Lemonade - Pomegranate flavor.............can you say YUMMY:-)

It was a great day and makes you think about what you can do to help those less fortunate and all of the food wasted because we buy it and the stuff expires; don't send it to food banks; do us all a favor and throw it out yourself please!

AGAIN!!!

Justin got walking pneumonia while Grandma and Papa were visiting. The doc seems to think this is a 1-2 year thing and then it too shall pass...let's hope! He was significantly better today since he was on antibiotics for about 18 hours, but since I was supposed to go back to work today I ended up having to work from home since I couldn't take a sick kid to daycare. He's only on this antibiotic for 5 days and then we go in next Friday for the re-check and for his 18-month check up...hard to believe that it's here already!

Grandma & Papa's Visit

Since Grandma and Papa arrived this past Tuesday night, we've gone to the Puyallup Fair, Spooner Farms, Cabela's, and watched a livestock auction in Enumclaw...I know what you're thinking, but Grandma & Papa are country folks who like to do country things! Jordan had a great time on the rides at the fair and both of the boys enjoyed looking at all of the animals. It was something like mid 80's this past Thursday when we went to the fair. Today we just spent the day hanging out at the house eating the fish that daddy and Jordan caught during our Banks Lake fishing/camping trip. We also went down to the park with the boys so they could swing and go down the slide. They had a great time! Tomorrow, I think I'm taking everyone down to NW Trek for the last hoorah of the summer since Grandpa has never been there...I think he'll like that. Jordan is excited to go, plus I think Tuesday the rain is supposed to be back and then Grandma and Papa leave on Wednesday which is when I go back to work anyways!

I'll update with photos of their visit and the remaining last few days sometime this week...

Banks Lake Fishing Trip - Photos

I already posted a couple weeks back on how the camping/fishing trip went and am just now getting to posting the photos...ENJOY!

Jordan couldn't wait to go out and fish, so they just took the paddle boat out as soon as we got to the spot so Jordan could go out and fish...Philip, myself, and Justin are still on shore. This is Philip's co-workers husband, son, and his friend with Jordan.

This was back at the campsite dock that has access to the lake. We were waiting to go to the prime fishing spot by just hanging out here trying to catch something, which of course we didn't!

Justin didn't go out in the boat (yes, we had a motorboat and not just the paddle boat for all of you thinking about that:-))! He's hanging around onshore playing and climbing on the big jagged rock pile! I couldn't keep him off of it!

Jordan with one of his many fish that he caught this day!

Jordan & Daddy fishing together...daddy's doing all of the dirty work by taking the hook out of the fishes mouth and casting; Jordan was in charge of holding the fishing pole and reeling it in!!! It takes teamwork!!!

Woodland Park Zoo - PHOTOS

There are like over 100 photos from the zoo, but I wanted everyone to get a real good look at Philip's pictures that he takes of the animals with his 'obama' camera...it really makes the pictures look professionally done; he's getting good at it!

Woodland Park Zoo

We went to the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle yesterday. It was our first trip there ever in the 5 1/2 years we've lived here. We decided to go since this weekend was mid-upper 80's and predicted to be the last nice weekend before fall officially starts. Since our Labor Day weekend activities and camping were a bust because we were all sick, we made up for some of it on Saturday by going to the zoo!

http://www.zoo.org/

Of everything they have at the zoo, which seems to be quite a bit since it's on 92 acres...we saw everything except for the mountain goat and the sun bear. We were at the park from 11:30-6p (closing time). I swear we walked like 5 miles...my legs and butt are still friggen' sore today! The boys had a great time...If you ask Jordan what his favorite animals were, he'd tell you the spiders; not sure why he picked them but he was fascinated with the 'bug world' exhibit. He had to go through it 3 different times:-) It was gorgeous weather as I said and we packed sandwiches and snacks so we didn't have to buy anything there and also ended up finding parking right out on the street next to the north end zoo entrance so we got to save the $5 for parking too!! We invited Mary Kay to come with and of course she did...she loved that the boys were having such a great time.

We got to the RAM steakhouse for dinner at about 7p and left there at about 8:20. We ate outside because it was such a wonderful night, PLUS with the party of five we would've had to wait 20-30 minutes for inside seating and instead got seated in 2 minutes:-) We ended up being out of the house from 10a until 8:30p; it was a very long day, but was definitely fun and well worth it! I'll be posting pictures shortly once Philip gets them loaded...(tonight hopefully)!

I LOVE my 'Tinkertoy'!!!

What more can I say:-)

It's Labor Day...

...and boy do I feel like I've been 'laboring' this weekend!!! I've been laboring 1/2 the weekend cleaning up vomit and washing linen over and over and over and over...(you catch the drift?) Philip and I took Friday off to go camping...that never happened because Justin woke up Friday morning vomiting and into Saturday. Who wants to be stuck in a itty bitty trailer confined with vomit and germs, so we decided to stay home. Jordan picked up the bug and he started vomiting with Justin on Saturday; I then picked up the bug on Sunday and started vomiting, and Philip got a different version of the bug on last night into today......It was the kind of 24-hour bug, thank goodness, but we never got our last long weekend out in the camper before we have to put it away for the winter; well I guess there is always next year.

Jordan and Daddy did get out on Sunday to see the movie Ponyo and get Jordan's haircut...what did I tell you; Philip goes on his own and Jordan's hair is getting shorter and shorter with each visit:-) It looks really nice though as you can see below!




I finally ventured out of the house today (actually Justin & I did)...I hadn't been out since I took Jordan to daycare on Friday morning. It was definitely more of a laid back weekend except for the being sick part of course:-( When Philip went back Friday afternoon to get Jordan, daycare was scrubbing the entire building down...I guess a lot of kids got this bug and either weren't in for the day, had to go home, or were getting sick; hopefully with the long weekend we should all be good to go!

Philip (with Justin's help:-)) was able to put the last piece of new office furniture together this weekend as well. Thank goodness Justin was there to lend daddy a hand cuz I'm not sure he would've been able to do it by himself:-) Justin always has to be in the mix of things!

Out of the path of being sick...

We seem to be over the sickness that the boys have had starting Friday morning...seems to just have been the 24-hour bug. Thank goodness we've still got 2 days left until we go back to work on Tuesday!

Boys on the swings...

Here's a couple of pictures of the boys on the swings last weekend. The temperature was something like 80 degrees and sunny! This weekend, we are barely 70 degrees and there is NO sun:-(

Last weekend of the summer...what a downer!

We didn't get to go camping this weekend because Justin is sick and is throwing up...Jordan actually got sick this morning and now he's throwing up too!!! OMG, when does it ever end? I'm hoping Philip and I don't come down with it too! Philip actually has had a migraine since yesterday afternoon so he's laying down too with the boys. All 3 of them are in the living room lounging around & napping. I couldn't imagine being confined in such the small space with kids barfing everywhere and it being cold and rainy outside too...I guess it happened for the better since this weekend on the WA coast was going to be very cold and rainy!

I spent my vacation day yesterday cleaning up vomit from Justin since he can't use a bucket like Jordan and did he every just walk and puke everywhere!!! I'll need my carpets cleaned AGAIN! I just had them cleaned a couple of weekends ago. Obviously we've got no big plans for the remainder of the long weekend except to relax and get everyone better.

Happy 9th Anniversary to us!!!

Today is our 9-year wedding anniversary! It's hard to believe it's been 9 years already! We plan to take a long trip for our 10-year next year before Jordan starts Kindergarten, but we haven't decided where we are going yet. I'm thinking somewhere in Europe or Australia:-) It's going to be a different country; that I'm sure of...it's time for us to get the alone time away from home, work, the kids, and responsibilities. I'll let you know once we've got it planned on exactly where we are going for sure.

We've been together for 15 1/2 years....wow, now that's a long time!...and seems longer when your write it down:-)

Justin - 17 months old today!

It's hard to believe he's another month older already! Time is sure flying...he now stands up while he walks up and down the stairs, says a few more words (five, nite, bye, hi, mommy, daddy, Jordan, up, down, cup...), AND the big thing is that he now feeds himself with forks and spoons! This just happened over the course of the last week where he really feeds himself everything that is on his plate whilst barely spilling anything:-)

They grow up way too fast!!!