Piano Recital

Wilson and Leo have been practicing their pieces for a few weeks and today was recital day. They got all dressed up for the big event.

Leo was first and Wilson was second out of about 20 performers.They were definitely ranked by ability as the last performer played Mozart and Leo and Wilson...didn't. I'm not sure if you'll be able to get the videos to play on the ship, but I uploaded them just in case. The boys did great.

Here is Leo playing Skipping Frogs.

Here is Wilson with Noah's Ark.

Their reward for a great show was root beer floats at Red Robin after. They were in heaven.

Heartbreaker Part Two

Walked in on this scene tonight when I came to say goodnight to Wilson.

"I just wanted to sleep with Dad tonight."

Can't make this sh* up, babe. We have the sweetest kids ever!

Real Snow!

We finally got some real snow here! We woke up Friday to a winter wonderland. It was really pretty. School was canceled and you can imagine the kids were excited.

Leo was cute when he saw all the snow, "Is it Christmas?"

 

We started the day off with some chocolate chip pancakes.

We all bundled up to head out. I had snow pants for Leo and Archie. Wilson wore two layers of jeans and Ivy had some of Archie's sports pants. Putting on gloves took about 15 minutes as usual... 

The boys and neighbor girls were sledding down the big hill.

Siena took Ivy for a ride. She might not look miserable here, but Ivy pretty much hated every second in the snow. I ended up taking her home for a really early nap after about 20 minutes.

Archie, of course, loved it!

He took some sled rides with Leo.

The kids built a pretty good snowman.

And, made some snow angels.

 Leo invented a new technique for snow angeling. I don't think it will catch on.

They definitely needed some hot chocolate to stay warm.

Super fun day in the snow. Not pictured is me in my pajamas all day and a few (okay, many) hours of movie watching. We had fun!

Hopefully we'll get some more snow this winter so you can enjoy it, too!!

Love you!

Snow!

 Well, it snowed here (pathetically, in my Iowa opinion) and the kids flipped out. Here are some pictures of them before school in their jammies and winter gear. trying to play in the snow.

 

They were slipping and sliding on the deck for a bit and Leo thought he need more action so he grabbed a skateboard for the ice.

 Archie got cold so he joined Ivy in the viewing area. Leo didn't bust once! The kids had a lot of fun for about 20 minutes and came in when Wilson pegged Leo twice in the face with his snow balls. They're hoping for some more snow later this week!

Christmas Decorations

 It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas in Silverdale! Man, those decorations were not easy to find in the garage - - but a great excuse to start cleaning it out! The kids and I blasted some beach boys and decorated the tree all morning. It was a lot of fun. We all have our favorite ornaments and the kids surely know yours!

 They are obsessed with the music box from your parents. I sent your mom his picture and she was happy we still had it.

 We got some mistletoe for the first time ever and the boys are having fun running from me when I surprise them under it. Leo especially, as you can imagine, has been terrified of my kisses :) 

I'll see you under it in a few weeks!!

We got some decorations outside, too. I ended up in the tree to get the job done, but it turned out really cute so I'm happy we look a little festive for the neighbors. Tonight, I'm wrapping presents for our kids and family. I will send them out this week. Still need to finish up those Christmas cards, too! Eek, this always happens...

Heartbreaker

"What are you doing, Archie?"

"Waiting for Dad."

Christmas cards

Our Christmas cards came in, so I've been busy addressing and writing little messages on them all. Updating so many of the addresses... can our friends just stop moving already?? 

Thought you might like to see them. Aren't our kids so cute?!?

The boys and I were really laughing at how tall Leo is in the family shot. You look so handsome, babe. xoxo!

Post-Thanksgiving Hike

We woke up to a beautiful day on Friday and went for a hike at Guillemot Cove. We were the first cars there and when we left, there were probably 20 cars there. It was a popular (if wet!) place to be on Black Friday.

The boys were of course in their element and had too much fun getting wet, dirty and finding caterpillars.

Your parents only had small walking shoes on, so Dylan (in your rain boots), these four boys, and I trudged through a small stream to make it to the stump house. We amazingly managed to stay kinda dry.

One of Archie's crazy poses.

On the walk back, we took a service road up since the trails were pretty muddy.

Fun hike!

Thanksgiving

We had a great Thanksgiving!

Your mom cooked almost everything and it was all delicious. They brought up a new roaster as a gift for us and so it was our first time trying it out. Worked great! Leo of course wanted to help.

The kids had fun playing in the house since it was really crummy weather all day.

Here is the Hero Quest with evil Zargon.

I realize now that I didn't get a picture of Archie and Dexter. They were pretty cute playing 'wrestling' and took off their shirts to go at it in the living room. Archie got pinned every time with a big smile on his face.

Here is the table ready to go. Can you see the turkey's hanging from the chandelier? Leo, Eleanor and even Dylan worked on those. We all fit around one table. Ivy napped through and woke up just in time for pie. I believe she did that last year, too. I joked that next year I'm going to put her in a 'My First Thanksgiving' bib.

Caveman Leo ate the only drumstick. I remember fighting with my siblings over the two drumsticks all the time, but Leo was the only one in this bunch that wanted it. He gnawed on it the whole meal. Almost everything on the table was gluten free - tasted great.

The Costco pumpkin pie was really good, but I would argue that the gf pumpkin pie I made rivaled it. I also made an apple pie. The boys loved them all - mostly they just wanted whip cream squirted directly in their mouths. This reminds me of the picture on the Japan Hostess blog I did... remember that?

I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving. 

We sure missed you being there and mentioned you many, many times.

Treehouse!

Or is it clubhouse? Anyway, guess what I put up - - all by myself - - today. Man, was it hard work. I think they look pretty good, though!

 

Here are some views from outside.

 

And, from inside.

 Hooks to keep them in place.

I decided to have the single window swing up instead of out. What do you think?

This one also has a hook.

It took me a couple hours while the littles napped to get them up. I only cursed your name a few times about not doing them while you were here :) Two of the windows stick a little at about 75% open, so I'm going to have Josh come look at them soon... I just couldn't keep waiting to get them up.

Wilson and I spent some time hanging up the clock and posters inside. I also put another coat of paint on the door and put some hooks for lanterns or hanging flower pots on both sides of the front door. I'll get some pictures of those details soon. It's starting to look almost finished!

Love you babe!

Goodbye, Nimitz

 You're off... again! After we dropped you off, we came home for some lunch and naps. The littles were up around 3 pm so we took off for Port Orchard to find your ship. It was pretty easy to see as soon as we hit the water. The kids were super excited that it was so close. We caught up to it and found a neat little park area to watch it go by. It was really moving at this point. Did you see us waving??

We watched the Nimitz go by and were saying 'hi' to it. After it got past us we started to say 'bye.' Archie got real concerned. When your ship when out of view, he lost it. I think he thought the ship would start heading toward us and you'd get off or something? Anyway, he could not be consoled, poor guy.

A kid who I would guess was about 10 years old came up to me as we were walking away and asked if my kids' dad was on the ship. I said yes and he thanked me for my service. I've never been thanked before so I said I'd pass it along to you and that you'd really appreciate it. His dad chimed in that he wanted to thank me, too, and it was sweet...

At dinner tonight we were talking about you and I said, well, it's pretty cool that Dad gets to sleep on a ship tonight. Everyone else is just in a boring old house. Wilson said, well, Archie gets to sleep in one, too. We all thought that was pretty funny.

Here is Archie in his bed. 'I'm on the Nimitz!' 'Ivy's on the Nimitz, too!' So cute...

Boys were pretty cute in their matching PJs.

Love you, babe.