Our Family Blog

Wow! It’s been a long time.

Wow. It’s been such a long time since I’ve posted here. I guess with the advent of Facebook I often find it’s easier to share there as opposed to writing a new post here. I’m going to try to keep this blog somewhat updated though because I think someday it will be a great treasure of wonderful times & experiences to look back upon with my family. I guess it’s like a life experience diary for me, although not very private. LOL!

A lot has happened since I last posted. The most significant was a flood we had at the end of January. The pipe running from the toilet to the wall leaked while were sleeping. We woke to a soaked floor in about 3 rooms and the hallway. There was around 3 inches of ice cold water in our bathroom. Needless to say it caused a lot of water damage. We were forced to move out of our house for a month. It was a totally fun adventure at first which quickly faded to stress and a strong desire to go home. I will highlight some of the really fun parts of the experience though. We decided if we must be out of our house, maybe it would be a great time to go to the coast. We stayed at a great place in Lincoln City called Surf Tides. It had such awesome views as we were right on the beach and when it was high tide the water was at the base of the building. I don’t know if there is anything quite as relaxing as listening to the awesome sounds of the ocean as you drift off to sleep. It was wonderful! I grew up on the coast and I think I will always feel as though it is a big part of me. Every time I’m there I feel as though I’ve come home. Here is the view from our room.

I must make an honorable mention here to Pig N Pancake. I had never been to one of those restaurants before, but we ate there every day. I’m so glad there isn’t one close to us here because I would be a cow. LOL! Breakfast there was sooooo good.

We did a lot of fun things at the coast. We went to the Tillamook Air Museum, the Newport Aquarium and we finished off our trip at the Evergreen Aviation Museum and got to check out their new space wing. It was really so much fun and just what we needed to get our minds off of our flooded home.

Easter this year was definitely memorable. Madison is finally old enough to appreciate things like egg hunts and of course CANDY!!! Her obsession at this point is Elmo and so I created a special Elmo egg for her. She adored it. The excitement came during Easter dinner. Josh and I had his family over and we were cooking a wonderful ham that his Mom brought with roasted garlic mashed potatoes & asparagus. Unfortunately during dinner, potato skins slipped down the sink and apparently past the garbage disposal. The sink was clogged and we tried everything to get it unclogged. In the chaos of it all, the ham overcooked. We did finally get the sink unclogged but unfortunately when we were plunging the sink all of the water decided to come up the pipe where the water from the washing machine drains. Once again, water all over the floor. Fortunately, this was a manageable water mess. I’m glad at the end of the day we were able to chuckle about it. It was definitely a very “Griswald” like Easter.

Jakob has become quite the artist. It’s amazing to watch him grow & develop. He is such a smart and creative little guy. This month I got a letter from the school. A self portrait painting of his was chosen to be hung at the local Starbucks. It was so cool because we all got invited to the “unveiling”. What a fun and proud moment for me as a Mom. The unveiling party was great & complete with hot chocolate and Starbucks snacks for all!

April also brought Madison’s 2nd birthday. I really can’t believe how fast she has grown. She is becoming such a little character. She is already talking up a storm (I don’t know where she gets that…LOL). She can definitely be a handful at times and she climbs literally everything. This girl has no fear. She reminds me a lot of myself which as a mother scares me! What is really funny is her passion for clothes. At this point she will choose clothes over toys. I doubt (and by doubt I really mean hope) that this will last, but it really is funny to watch. She loves to dress herself and will most definitely let you know what she wants to wear. She is famous for taking her arm out of one side of her shirt. I guess this is her “off the shoulder” look. LOL. Who knows, maybe she will be a fashion designer some day.

This year we had her party on the Sunday after her birthday. As a Mom I couldn’t resist making her a cake for her birthday too. So I made two Elmo cakes this year. They came out so well. The first one we made a chocolate cake with a strawberry filling and cream cheese frosting. The second one was the same except Jake & I decided to make a chocolate cream cheese frosting. Good call. They were both great but the second one was AMAZING!!! I got a lot of help and advice from Jake when making the second cake so I must give him credit for how beautiful it was. Great job Jake!

Last but not least I’m going to leave you with a couple of great pics of the kids. They are so wonderful and Josh and I feel truly blessed to have them. They make us laugh and sometimes cry. LOL. They are absolutely magical and I couldn’t have even imagined how much they would enriched our lives. I’m thankful each day to be blessed with my wonderful husband & children.

Hopefully I get on updating this blog more frequently. The less I do it the longer the posts seem to get.