Easter 2012

Decorating Easter eggs

Dylan being silly, waiting for our neighborhood Easter egg hunt to start.  The twins had baseball practice before the egg hunt, so Dylan and I got there early to play, while Dave picked up the twins and brought them right before it began

Dylan found a spot where they had hid about 5 eggs all together.  Jackpot!

Scott really did have fun, but this was the 4th or 5th try getting a picture with all the kids (mainly Dylan) looking at the camera.

Look what the Easter Bunny brought us!

Scott and Dylan loved their candy lightsabers that really lite up.  Good job on finding those Easter Bunny!:):)

The Easter Bunny also found these really cool suncatchers where the kids put beads in the little frames and we baked them in the oven until they turned glossy.  The kids loved doing this activity Easter morning before church:)

Vancouver, B.C.

Dave's parents came to visit last week while the kids had their spring break, and Dave took the week off of work.  We thought it would be fun to head up to Vancouver, B.C. for a couple of days.  Our family had been there before with my parents when we were here for our internship in the summer of 2010, but this was a first for Dave's parents.  First stop was once again, Stanley Park and the Totem Poles.

Since it wasn't raining, the kids got to run around a little

Even Daddy got into the spirit of playing.  Although after a while he commented that his stamina has changed a little since he was a kid.  Ya think??:):)

The next day, we went to the Vancouver Aquarium.  And I have to admit, as far as Aquariums go, this was a pretty good one.  We got to see more then sea lions and seals, like this white Beluga Whale.

Ever since Dylan got his little Squirt (the turtle stuffed animal that Scott is holding), he has talked about bringing him to the Aquarium when we went.  He had fun introducing Squirt to all his friends in the water there:)

Close to our hotel in downtown Vancouver, there were these wierd looking statues.  They were done by a guy who showed himself in different poses laughing.  Kind of random.:)

We also headed back to Capilano Suspension bridge.  Here is Scott being silly and acting like he is giving a speech of some sort.   

The only proof we have that I was actually there as well, haha:)

This is a side view of the suspension bridge you walk over

They added a new feature from last time we came here in summer 2010.  This is the cliffwalk, where you are walking on aisles that just hang over the side of the cliff.  And some of what you walk on was clear.  It was a little freaky looking at how far up we were, and being able to see the drop beneath our feet.

This is one of the clear floor overhangs on the cliffwalk

Here is a view from the suspension, of the cliffwalk we were on.  It doesn't show in the picture, but it was quite a huge drop to the canyon and river below.

Dave and Dylan making their way across the bridge.  It sways alot.

We had fun in Vancouver and look forward to when Dave's parents can come visit again!:)

March 2012

To start off our March, we celebrated Dylan's 4th birthday.  He's killing me here, getting older every year. I wanted to make his birthday special for him, so I spent the whole day doing things Dylan loves.  After walking the kids to school, Dylan and I headed over to Bellevue Square Mall to play at their play area that Dylan loves.  Next, we got a yogurt at a yummy self serve place inside the mall.  After that, I took him to the Disney store where he picked out a baby turtle stuffed animal, named Squirt, from Finding Nemo. He loves turtles and loves green.  Then, we headed over to have lunch with Daddy on Microsoft campus.  A little bit after we came home, we went and got Scott and Madeline from school again, and I let all the kids play on the playgroup there for a while.  Then, we went and picked Dave up from work a little early, and headed over to play games at Chuck E Cheese (or as Dylan calls it, Chuck E Cheeze-It, haha). 

After playing games at Chuck E Cheese, Dylan picked (much to mommy and daddy's delight...haha,...do your sense the sarcasm here) to eat dinner at McDonald's. Mommy and Daddy ate elsewhere on the way home.:):)  Whew!  Four different play areas in 1 day! Pretty fun day for a 4 year old!

Then, we headed home to open presents and blow out candles.

Due to poor planning on my part, we didn't have cake for his birthday, but brownies.  Earlier that week, I had made some Lemon Buttermilk cupcakes, so by the time his birthday came around, we were not in the mood for cupcakes, so went with brownies instead.:)

Growing up, we had a family tradition on our birthday where we got to pick one kind of cereal we wanted, which was about the only time we got to have sugar cereal.  So I have kept that up with my kids, and Dylan wanted to try Fruity Pebbles.  The morning after his birthday while I was getting ready, I came down to find he had helped himself to some, and made a mess while doing it.:) 

Also, one day this past month the kids thought it would be fun to form a band.  They sat and played music together while shouting, "I am a Rock Star, yeah!"  They will be selling out venues near you soon!:):)

February 2012

Up next, it's Valentine's Day! Here are the kids dressed in pink and red for the occasion.

Madeline's hair in the shape of a heart.  I thought it turned out cute:)

Since I am in charge of the twins class parties, Dylan gets to come too.  Luckily Scott and Madeline's teacher had some legos for Dylan to play with, and he was so great during the entire party!:)

In February, Madeline was the student of the week in her class, so Dylan and I got to go to the kids school and have lunch with Madeline, and Scott too.  Dylan was soooo excited!

While waiting for the twins at their school, Dylan was pretending he was Spiderman:)

Weird face/smile from Scott

Miss Madeline.  Their lunch room was CRAZY:)  Next time when we go back for Scott's student of the week, I think I will forego even bringing me a lunch.  Not much time to even eat it with all the kids asking questions and stuff:):)

Overall, February was a fun but insanely crazy month (much was not posted).  Thanksfully, not all months are quite like that:)

January 2012

So, it's been a while since I added anything to our blog.  Or looked at anyone's blog for that matter.  But, I still will update when I get around to it.  Today is that day!

So, this is from last Christmas, but due to the picture below, it deserves a mention here.  My friend, Genni, and I headed off to the Woodland Park Zoo with 7 kids in tow.  And yes, the lady at the ticket counter did comment on our kid to parent ratio:) Although, I should note, one of the kids above is Genni's niece, but Genni has since had a baby, so she really does have 4 now, so it all equals out:)

No, your eyes are not decieving you.  This really is a picture of a snake eating a mouse.  Right when we walked up to the snake exhibit, they were getting ready to feed it lunch. (Luckily for us, we had already eaten).  The mouse was already dead when they brought it in, but it was still amazing/disgusting to watch the snake eat the entire mouse.  Quite an education for us all:)

I still remember when we lived in Saettle for our summer interniship, and someone told me that it doesn't snow in Seattle.  I wish I remember who it was, so I could go back and ask if they were crazy.  It might not snow the entire winter in Seattle, but both winter's we have lived here, we have had snow.  At first it is alot of fun.  The kids love to play out in it, and Dave and I love living in a place that does have all four seasons. (As long as the snow melts in a timely manor, that is, haha)

Here's Dylan nailing Daddy with snow down his pants:)

But, Dave got him back:)  All in good fun.

No playing out in the snow would be complete without a snowman

And of course we had to go sledding on our friends street.  How many kids can you fit on a inner tub?!

The snow got considerably less fun when our power went out.  For about 15 hours. And we kept hearing horror stories from people who lived here 5 years ago when the power went out for 5 days.  The temp got down to 50 degrees in our house.  For dinner, Dave got out his little backpacking stove and boiled some water for hot chocolate and instant oatmeal.  The only reason you can see everyone in the picture is due to the flash on the camera.  We had candles around and a fire in our fireplace, but it was pretty dark.  Luckily, we were able to watch a movie on Dave's laptop, before it ran out of battery power. 
A couple of things we learned, make sure all phones and computers are charged up during a time of possible power outages.  By the end of the night, both mine and Dave's cell phones were dead, and Dave had to back the car out of the driveway, to turn in on and charge our phones a little.  Also, we need to get a larger camp stove to cook on.  We were just so excited when the power came back on as we were going to sleep that night.  Yay for heat and power!  In all the years we have lived in snow, this is the only time we have lost power.  It certainly made for an adventure!

Christmas 2011

Christmas morning started for us at about 7:00 am, when I first heard stirrings from the children.  Scott was the first one up.  Then I found out from my dad later (who was sleeping on Dylan's bed under Scott's on the bunk beds), that Scott had been up since 5 am, and couldn't go back to sleep.  Scott knew he should stay in his bed, but got so bored sitting up there in the dark that my dad said he could tell he was almost in tears.  So, like the good Grandpa he is, he handed Scott up his phone for him to play Angry Birds on.  And got us all a few more hours of sleep.:)  Thanks Dad!

Well for a few months leading up to Christmas this year, Dylan had been asking for this Rock n Roll Mickey.  He was excited to open it and finally get to play with it:)

We got Madeline her own apron to wear when she helps mommy in the kitchen, and some blueberry muffins to make for Christmas morning.  She was so excited.  And she is such a good helper to mom:)

Scott is just a "little" excited here, haha.  Grandma and Grandpa Harker earned major brownie points with this gift.  He had been begging asking mom and dad for this Lego set for months.

They also got Madeline this fun little piano that has songs from our church preset on it.  She loves to feel like she can play songs on the piano.  Someday we will get a real piano....someday:)

Sharky also joined our family this Christmas.  This was a gift for Scott, that took Dave and I about 3+ hours on Christmas Eve to put together.  He is a helium balloon that "swims" through the air via a remote control.  We made Scott open this one last.  We hid Sharky in Dave's office and let Scott open the remote control. Dave then used to remote to have Sharky "swim" out of the office. The kids were so excited to see it.  I have posted two short videos below that are hilarious!  Sharky is pretty fun.  He lurks around the house and sometimes will come sneak up on you while you are just sitting in a room.  I wonder what our neighbors think, watching this shark balloon floating by the windows.  At night we do have him sleep in Dave's office with the door shut.  Don't want to wake up in the middle of the night with him floating over you!

Scott and Madeline got Dylan this little Batcave, and he loves it!

And Madeline got a little princess castle for all her Disney Princesses to play in.  The kids got some other great toys that they love to play with.  Thanks to the Grandparents and aunts and uncles for all the wonderful things!  We had a great Christmas, and one of the few that we have actually celebrated at our place. 

Don't forget to check out the videos below, they are really short:)

Christmas Cont. (Videos of Sharky)

Sorry this video is sideways.  Can't figure out how to turn it.:)  But this is when the kids first saw our new "pet"....and it took just a few seconds for Dylan to try wrestling it to the ground, haha:)

Here is a video of sharky in action.  And the dramatic scream in the background is from none other then Grandma Sue.  She really should be in a horror movie:)

Bellevue's Garden D'Light and Christmas Eve

We had heard from a few of our friends in Scott and Madeline's 1st grade class that the Botanical Gardens in Bellevue did a Christmas Lights thing in the evenings in December.  For the Garden D'Light, they use lights to create flowers and outside scenes. We decided to check it our and we were not disappointed:)

This was a pretty cool scene with moving lights to make it look like a water fall.  I will post a video below this post of it.

The seven of us

This dragon had smoke coming out of his nostrils

While my mom was here, Madeline wanted to have an activity for just us girls.  What better, then a pedicure?! So the morning of Christmas Eve, we took off and got one.  It was Madeline's first, and she loved it.  She just better not get used to it:) 

That evening, the kids decorated their Gingerbread House, but it had problems from the beginning....

And soon looked like this.:)  Not the most successful house decorating this year:)

One other thing to note, my mom got both of my kids hooked on Angry Birds, which they had never heard of or played until Grandma Sue came:) Scott and my mom had nightly Angry Bird dates where they would meet and play by each other, haha.