Halloween, what?

My cute little Tigger. Poor kid kept getting too hot.

 It occurred to me that I never did a Halloween post. What? No Halloween!Woops.

 In all honesty, Halloween was not that awesome at our house. Madilyn had the flu which circulated through two more family members before it was done. Luckily we attended a Halloween before everyone was sick.

Ladybug bubble fairy. She left her bubble wand in the car.

My disgruntled pirate. She hates pictures even though when we sit down to look at them she asks why there aren't any of her.

Christopher Robin toting around his stuffed Tigger.

Grant didn't dress up because, well, he was six months old and didn't care.

November Beat Me to the Ground

NaNoWriMo, I am so sorry. It just didn't happen. I started out...mediocre. Madilyn came down with the flu the last week of October, which of course meant that I came down with it the first week of November, followed by Grant, which meant that the first two weeks of November not only did I not get much sleep but I also didn't get much writing done. Then we decided to go to my parents for a week at Thanksgiving. And I had some other things come up that have taken precedence over my creative energy. Add all that up and what do you get?

No finished first draft.

Sad. But true.

I made good progress. Yes. But still no where near being done. It'll happen one day.

Maybe next November?

Doh - I just noticed this is my 200th post. It should have been something better!

NaNoWriMo

November is National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). The goal - write a 50,000 word novel in one month.

Crazy? Yes.

Am I starting mine from word 1? Nope.

I am slightly ashamed to admit that I started to write a novel a few months before I had Garrett. (Not ashamed that I'm writing, but ashamed that I'm still not done with it!) Three years later...I have over 50,000 words but have not completed my first draft. Embarrassing.

So...now that I have 4 kids and unlimited time (please note sarcasm), I have decided to take the challenge. Not to start a novel from word 1, but to finish my first draft in one month. Since technically over 50,000 words should put me near the end it doesn't sound so bad except I'm pretty sure I'm not even half way done. And did I mention it took me three years to write the first half?

As anyone who writes knows, sometimes the first draft can be the most difficult part. At the same time once its done, its only a tiny part of the writing process.

I might look half crazed through the month of November but its time to finish.

Six or a Ladybug Bubble Fairy

Mini cupcakes for Emma's class.

A ladybug cake, no fairies or princess but she still liked it.

We've had a birthday at our house. Our little Emma (Emmalou, Emmybug, Emmy, etc) turned six this month. She wanted a lady princess fairy cake...thats the best I could do. She wants to be a ladybug bubble fairy for Halloween, hence the title of the post.

 Emma is my shadow.

But she is a sweet little shadow. She started kindergarten this year and she's doing great. I'm going to totally and shamelessly brag about her.

Emma could write her name when she was 2. She started sounding out words when she was 3. And now that she's been in kindergarten all of a few weeks she's reading the scriptures out loud with the family. She loves all things girly - pink, ruffles, sparkles, barbies, and dolls - while at the same time she is my scientist.

She is still fascinated with the human body. She got a model of the brain for her birthday and she shouted, "This is perfect for me!" I tried to help her put it together but we had trouble with the bones of the skull once we got all the parts of the brain together. (I'm going to admit that I don't get the appeal but she thought it was great.) The same kit came with a model of the human body that you could take all the parts out and practice putting them back in again. I couldn't figure out why we were having trouble until I realized that we'd put the rib cage in upside down. Thank goodness she's added the solar system to her areas of interest. At least I'm competent in that area.

Love this crazy, quirky girl.

They're sick and I'm tired

Haven't posted for awhile because 3 kids are sick and I'm tired because...well I'm taking care of three sick kids.

In the mean time, I figured out what kind of bird hit the front window. Its the same kind that hit the back window. Apparently it didn't learn its lesson. You can't tell from the picture but its quite large. I've seen little brown woodpeckers before but this is the first time I've seen this kind and they are big. Like the size of a crow.

 There were two flying around the house and this guy hit the window and stayed down long enough that I went out to check on it, at which point it flew away.

Before anyone thinks, 'wow she must have clean windows for all these birds to keep hitting them', no, the windows are dirty but we have a giant picture window in the living room and the kitchen. Consequently, you can see all the way through the house and out the other window. Thus, lots of birds hitting the windows.

It's a Bird, It's a Plane...



If only I could have seen it!



 No...its definetly a bird. I'm not sure what kind but it hit our living room window hard. We were in the back yard when the incident took place so we didn't actually see it happen. There was no body around so it must have survived.

Any guesses as to what kind? Quail? (We have a family of them that hang out in the yard quite often.) Blue jay? (They're eating all our hazelnuts.)

First Day of Course!

First day of kindergarten! No tears here.

First day of third grade! She's so grown up and loves giving school advice to her little sister.

Oh my goodness, they are so gorgeous. Isn't it also cute how color coordinated they are? Totally not on purpose. I'm just glad they didn't look like they got dressed in the dark.

And this is how Emma usually looks...off in her own little world.

And this is how Madilyn usually looks...Moooooom.

Two kids in school. What?!

I wasn't sure how Emma was going to handle the first day. She's afraid of a lot of things but turns out school isn't one of them. It helped that she had her big sister with her the whole way. The school district didn't have a back to school night so parents were invited to meet teachers the first day of school. Not an ideal situation, especially when you have more than one teacher to meet. But it went fine and Emma didn't even cry when I left. Neither did I.

When I left she was getting her build on. She's going to rock kindergarten.

Trekkin

Enjoyin the ride

She looks so grown up!

What would a post about Northwest Trek be without a Caribou...at least I think its a Caribou.

My mom and dad came for a quick visit for my aunt and uncle's surprise birthday party. We slipped in a trip to Northwest Trek before they had to leave and the girls started school. We saw moose, elk, buffalo, mountain goats, mountain sheep, swans, owls, black and brown bears, beaver, fishers, wolves, bald eagles, and a whole bunch of others I can't remember.

It was fun. Although I'm not sure my dad enjoyed his assigned job - making sure Garrett didn't fall out of the tram. Garrett's a little bit, or a lot bit, like an octopus.

We Were So Young



I know, so sad that I had to take a photo of a photo

 I'm playing some serious catch up on the blog. We celebrated our 10th anniversary a few weeks ago. Originally, we planned to go on a cruise for our 10th anniversary but there is no way we were going to take a nursing baby on a cruise. No sir.

We did get a couple of days to ourselves...and Grant. My in-laws were kind enough to take the three older Nashlings for the night.

ANNNNDDDD I have nothing profound to say. Marriage is everything I expected it to be while simultaneously being nothing like I expected it to be. So I guess 10 years and four kids later and we still like each other. It MUST be love.

Camping on an Island

One of Madilyn's finds as we wait for the ferry.

In general, me and camping are not friends. Our relationship did not start out on a good note and its kind of remained sour since then. Unfortunately, the kids love it and I think it is good family time. Jeremy had to do some work on San Juan Island this weekend. Well...why not a family camping trip at the same time?

Like all of our best intentions and exciting plans, things didn't go as we had anticipated. Because of our own folly we missed the 2 pm ferry, leaving us sitting in the parking lot for 3 hours waiting for the next one. Luckily its next to a good beach. So the kids played in the sand looking for pretty rocks and building sandcastles, while Jer and I tried to hit old pillars with rocks. I was pathetic. At one point in my life I could throw a baseball from home plate on my knees (playing catcher of course) to second base, easy peasy. Needless to say Jeremy won the contest.

The ferry ride was great. The kids thought it was extremely exciting.

We finally get there. Get the tent set up, we all fit in it, great dinner, get everyone asleep. The night was uneventful. The baby only woke up once! Beautiful day. The guys went off to cut wood. The kids jumped on a trampoline, Garrett played with a monster truck in a sandbox for hours. We got to go to a couple of beaches. The only thing that would have made it better was if Jer could have done everything with us.

You're thinking, wow, that sounds like a great camping trip. Oh it was until we tried to go home. We decided to get to the ferry an hour early, park the car in line and go see the shops since the ferry terminal is right in Friday Harbor. We get there and the parking lot is full of cars getting on another ferry. No problems, the attendant sent us to a second lot. Well when the time came to go down to the main lot, they didn't send up an employee and it was chaos. Cars that had just arrived were zooming past people who'd already been waiting, some poor fella in an RV couldn't get out, horns were honking, people were yelling, the guy in front of us wouldn't go. We finally get back to the main parking lot and ITS FULL! Yes all the hubbub and people arriving after us had filled it up. Oh, yes. Anger my friends. This was for the 6:30 ferry. Another didn't come til 10! The attendant, I felt bad for him by now, sent people back up to the secondary lot and said to come down at 6:10. He also put a number on our car so they knew who needed to get on. 6:10 comes along and we all drive down and the guy sends us back to the second lot. Now we're in the back! Argh!!! Can you sense how maddening it was becoming? The kids were confused and tired and wanted to get out the car. Jeremy was driving and was at his wits end.

But we got on the ferry. Phew.

Until then I could see why people would live on such a beautiful island, but sorry dealing with the ferries would be too much for me.

On the drive home Emma complained that her stomach hurt. She's gotten car sick before so I sat with her and she had a bag. Nothing happened. Nothing until midnight when we were at home. Poor thing threw up twice. Three hours later when I finally got her back to bed, Grant woke up twice between 4 and 7.

Really camping, it wasn't your fault that things ended up beyond stressful and I was completely exhausted but you're an easy scapegoat.

One of the beaches, I don't remember the name. Those are the Olympics across the water.

Gorgeous, False Bay were the kids played for a couple of hours.

I didn't get many pictures because my camera was almost out of battery and I was holding Grant most of the time. Every time I tried to take a picture he would grab my camera.

Summer Sillies

Silly faces

My goal this summer is to do as many activities as we (I) can handle. I want the summer to end and the kids to say "that was the best summer ever!" So far so good. Even when we're not out at the beach or zoo or whatever we are full of silliness.

silly poses

silly sand sculptures

Eating blackberries however is not silly. It is serious business.

Mmmm, Otter pops, which Garrett calls 'under pops'



Silly swimsuit dancing



What am I doing while the three amigos are causing mayhem? Taking pictures of or holding this little monster. 5 months old already. When did that happen?

Good Day



Garrett digging with his 'excamater'






















Yesterday my mother-in-law and I took the kids to the beach. It was a perfect day, warm, sunny, slight breeze and there weren't very many people on the beach. Plus, sand dollars were everywhere. I think we brought home at least 50, probably more. You can't have to many sand dollars right?

Grandma Sandi helped the kids build a sandcastle which they were very disappointed to learn would not survive the coming high tide. Some forces of nature cannot be stopped, a sad but important lesson to learn.

It was a great afternoon, which could only be made better by the fact that we went out on Grandpa's boat that evening! Pizza, tiki punch, swimming, water skiing, the works.

It was a good day.

The girls digging for sand dollars

The beloved sandcastle built with Grandma Sandi, ok mostly by Grandma

The kids frantically tried to build a wall so the tide wouldn't wash the castle away.

My little sunbather

Don't let the smile fool you. He did NOT like the life jacket.

Busy, Busy, Busy

 What have we been up to?



Picking Bouquets





Shooting Balloons



Hanging at Chris and Amanda's House

Mini-golfing with Grandpa and Grandma Parsons

Playing in the Lake

Dressing Grant like a Girl

Basking in the Sunshine

Monster Truck Party

Jer's Monster Truck Cake

Garrett and his 'excamater'

We had a crazy July and somewhere between family reunion, family visits, girls camp, and a wedding, Garret had a birthday. I can't believe he turned three. He's wanted a Monster Truck party for months. He was happy with the cake (all Jer's creation), which we had to keep him from destroying with his monster trucks.

The first present he opened was an excavator. Garrett with his tunnel vision didn't want to play with anything else for the rest of the night. It took a lot of coaxing to get him to open the other gifts. Everyone at the party need not worry, he's played with everything and loves it all.

A few things about Garrett -
Garrett is his dad's shadow. He wants to be with Jer, know where Jer is, what Jer is doing, and assumes that he should be doing that as well. He's so attached that when Jer is gone for a couple of days Garrett gets frustrated and starts tackling the girls. Mom tries but will never wrestle as well as dad.

He's at that wonderful age where he says hilarious stuff on a daily basis. He's also in that wonderful age when his emotions are kicked into high gear and he isn't quite sure how to handle them. We love our little man. He is full of energy, runs constantly, loves monster trucks, construction equipment, motorcycles, tractors, airplanes, helicopters, and guns. He has brought much joy and laughter to our family.

Boy, we love you!

Grateful

I have a lot of things to be grateful for. But yesterday was a 'special' day. Here's the run down...we have guests staying with us who were gone for the day visiting other family. Jeremy was also gone. So just me and the kids. I decided to be a good mom and take them to Dash Point to play at the beach. It took me an hour to get everyone ready, and 30 minutes to drive out there only to find that the main parking lot next to the beach was closed for an event. The ranger told me I could park in a different parking lot and take a trail down.

At this point my mom alarm went off. I told him I was alone with 4 little kids and wondered if I could make it down the trail. He said yes. I then asked if I would be able to make it down the trail with a wagon. (The wagon had all our essentials.) He said it was a bit steep with a few stairs but he thought I could do it.

Great! We parked. I strapped the baby into the front pack and off we went. The first set of stairs was traversed with little trouble. Then the trail got narrower and steeper. OK, I thought we can do this. Then there were more stairs and curves and steepness and narrowness. By now I can't turn the wagon around, I can't go back and I can't move forward. I've got a four month old on me, a wagon pushing me down the hill, a two year old who keeps slipping, and two very cooperative girls that aren't complaining. I start to wonder which of us is going over the edge first.

The only option I had - keep going.

This is when I start to get grateful. Grateful for people coming up the trail, sensing and seeing my distress and helping me get the wagon down more steps and around steep corners. One woman tied up her dog and helped me down the most difficult part. I thanked them all profusely.

By now I'm sweating and fighting back tears.

The next dilemma, how do I get back to the car? I can't make it up the trail with the wagon.

As much as I hated it...I was going to have to call for help. I got the kids set up on the beach and went to find my cell phone...somewhere.. in my bag...it has to be there right? Wrong. That's when the tears finally came.

And when I found the cell phone.

I called my in-laws and tried to be brave but started to cry when I explained what happened. The kids played for an hour or so and then my mother and father-in-law rescued me.

I am grateful for the random strangers who came to my aid. And I'm grateful for my in-laws who, not once, mentioned that maybe I shouldn't have tried to go down a trail with 4 kids and a wagon.  Even though they had to be thinking it because I sure was.

Family Reunion - Ocean Shores



Bandit our friendly raccoon




Family reunion at Ocean Shores! We had a great house on a canal, complete with a theater room, which made watching Galaxy Quest all that much more awesome. We got our traditional matching shirts. Lime green for the ladies and kelly green for the fellas.  



Don't let the picture deceive you it was 65 degrees and the water was cold!



 The weather was not great. Very typical of our summer thus far, rainy and cold. But my brother's kids hadn't been to the ocean before and a little cold weather wasn't going to stop them.

Riding back to the house.

Family reunions are always full of craziness and I love it! My favorite this year - when I had a panic attack because I thought I had a tick in my hair. I was scratching my head and felt something hard and lumpy. I couldn't get it out and I was terrified to look in the mirror to see if it actually was a tick. So what did I do? Called for my mommy of course. My sister-in-law Holly thought I'd lost my mind because she wanted to help but I couldn't even tell her what was wrong. Alas I found my mom and she checked it. Not a tick. A booger. Saved by the Booger I tell ya because if it had been a tick I would have lost all composure. Never was there a mother more greatful for her child's booger in her hair.

What a smirk.

That's pretty much the face he had on the entire reunion.

Mom and Madilyn

Can't wait till next year!