Can He Build It?

Yes he can! McKenzie and Ben are so happy to have their very own park in their backyard, thanks to Daddy. What started with the idea of building a slide into some of our existing landscape and keeping it simple has turned into a dream play toy for the kids that is tucked neatly into an unused space in our backyard by our woodshed.

When Matt started the project and was leveling the ground he told McKenzie what he was doing. She said, "let's build it Daddy".  Then he told her he needed wood and she said "let's go to the store and get some right now". She was a great project manager keeping Daddy moving on this project.

Here's McKenzie looking through the binoculars back towards the house from the lookout.

From the lookout looking down on McKenzie climbing the slide. You can also see the rock wall that lets the kids climb up the front of the structure.

Ben and McKenzie climbing up the ladder which we weren't sure Ben could master. Ha ha, of course he can easily climb a ladder. Unfortunately, Ben also has no qualms about leaping from the top platform down onto who ever is below. He has no concept that someone might not catch him.

McKenzie happy playing on her park.

Look out below! Ben doesn't slow down, he just runs right off the end of the slide and keeps going.

Never A Dull Moment

Two weeks ago we took our annual summer trip over to Chelan with the whole family. As usual Chelan didn't disappoint when it came to fun activities. We found our first adventure on the trip over.

We were able to meet up with Aunt Renee and our second cousin Karen who was down visiting from Canada and had been over to visit Grandma and Grandpa C. Who would have thought you could have so much fun at a rest stop on a rainy day. We gathered at one of the picnic tables to stay out of the rain.  McKenzie had a bouncy ball from a birthday party with her so the kids took turns bouncing it between the table and the picnic shelter roof which often caused it to fly into the path of cars arriving at the rest stop. The kids had a great time watching all the adults run wildly after the ball as it bounced madly about.


We had no sooner arrived in Chelan when Grandma and Grandpa C had us off on our next adventure, which was a BBQ at some of their friends' house. We literally didn't even stop at their house just met them along side the road and followed them to the BBQ. It was a great night for a party and McKenzie met a new friend there. This girl is going to be a zoologist or something I think. She was so interested in this praying mantis and even held it in her hand so gently.



The next morning Grandpa C put his boat in the lake and we cruised up to the State Park for some swimming and lunch. Both Ben and McKenzie loved to drive the boat with Grandpa C. This was Ben's first time on the boat and he was loving it!



We had lunch at the State Park, which has an amazing little snack hut whose menu offers every imaginable kind of food. I ordered the nachos and was sharing them with Grandma C.  Ben was walking around on the picnic blanket and I said he's totally going to step in the nachos. No sooner had I looked away to take a bite of an onion ring that Matt handed me, when Ben did step right into the nachos. But it got much worse from there, the last thing I saw before I closed my eyes was him slipping and going down in the nachos. It was far worse than I had imaged it would be. Poor little guy might never live this down.


No trip to Chelan is complete without the boys pilgrimage to Walmart. Each time they go they find some amazing merchandise that we can't live without. This trip they scored big with lovely dew rags for everyone. Better than the New Years trip when they came back with black full face ski masks also know as robber masks. Here are a couple of great dew rag shots - maybe I should submit these to http://awkwardfamilyphotos.com/ . Nothing says class like a kid or a Grandma in a dew rag.



After all the fun in the sun Ben started to get really tired and found any opportunity he could to take a quick snooze so he could keep up.


He was even kind enough to take a pretty good nap at Slide Waters so the rest of us could keep having fun on the slides.


McKenzie enjoyed her trip to Slide Waters last year but this was the first year she could really do more on her own. She was able to go on the river ride and all of the big individual slides by herself. She loved it .  At the bottom of each ride she said, "Let's go again!" and headed back up. Matt's favorite ride is the gunny sack race slide. He, Uncle Eric and my cousins Don and Chad were having races down them not to see who could go the fastest but to see who could go the farthest. Matt has been able to hit the far end several times and there is usually some little kid there who thinks it is awesome. This years little kid did not disappoint. When Matt got to the end of the slide he yelled, "muy rápido, muy grande" over and over.



We did some celebrating for Grandma C's birthday which the kids always love. Here's Ben giving Grandma some loves. Or maybe Grandma is loving Ben and he's loving his Hippo. Either way they are cute.


We did try to get a good family photo but with so many squirmy bodies and the sun in our faces we did what we could. At least we're all in the picture.


On the ride home we discovered another fun stop for the kids, it was a trail head parking area that had just what we needed for our little potty trained girl who never needs to go until she really has to go. After we took care of business we got to explore this caboose which was a lot of fun for the kids. They are restoring it there so maybe someday it will be open for people to go inside. I'm sure we'll be stopping now and then to check it out.

Hot Fun In The Summertime

We have been taking full advantage of all the fun summer has to offer lately. Since it seems like we never stop moving unless we're sleeping updates have taken a backseat to fun lately.  So we'll be getting the Readers Digest version of the past couple of weeks to get caught up. Here's our list of the hot fun things we've been enjoying lately!


1) Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. Here we have more than a dynamic duo and less than the fab four so we must be left with the three musketeers or three stooges.  Larry aka Claire, Mo aka McKenzie and Curly aka Olivia. These three girls are going to have some fun growing up together. Ben opted not to be in the photo despite McKenzie's efforts to corral him.  There was way too much pink going on. McKenzie is three, Claire is two and Olivia is 22 months.


2) Zoo Carousel. The kids and I spent a great Saturday morning at the zoo. Despite all the animals we saw the favorite attraction of the day was the carousel. Ben was so proud of sitting on a horse by himself like a big boy.



3) Nature Lover. Leave it to my girl to love a crow. At least this one was just a statue. If there is one thing I do not love it is birds. Please don't let her want pet birds in my house someday.


4) Go Cougs! Technically I think that may be a snow leopard but to me it looks a lot like a Cougar. We have to find WSU pride on the West side wherever we can.



5) Daddy's Girl! These two love their weekend breakfasts together. McKenzie will eat egg after egg as long as she can put the pepper on. Definitely takes after Daddy on that one.



6) Twins! Thankfully for everyone the kids are not conjoined twins.  While it seemed like a great way to save energy by only pushing one swing no one involved was happy for long.


7) I can do it! This is one of McKenzie's favorite things to say lately as she is "doing" things. We explored a new park by our house and she loved climbing all the way to to the top on her own. Love this picture because it shows off all those shiny teeth.


8) Dunking Your Preschool Teacher. We went to one of McKenzie's friends birthday parties recently.  It was amazing, they had a bounce house, a hot dog machine, the ice cream man came but the best part of all was that their preschool teacher came and was in the dunk tank. Ms. Lauren rocks! Here's McKenzie getting her turn - she loved it.



9) Splash Park! There is a fantastic splash park for kids near our house and we spent a nice Sunday morning there with the kids. Here's Ben planning his strategy for what to play with next. Unfortunately for us it was the sand box.

Settling for a Moment

A few weeks ago I was wondering where those lazy days of summer went and we finally found at least a moment of lazy summer time poolside at Grandma and Grandpa Z's house.


Here's Benny stopping his constant motion for a brief cuddle with Daddy. Moments without movement are very rare for him at this stage so we'll take them anytime we can get them, even if it means cuddling a baby fresh out of the pool.


The kids are really loving the water again this summer. McKenzie can swim the whole length of the pool holding onto a water noodle.  It won't be long before she's swimming all over on her own. I can't wait to see McKenzie in that stage where kids love to dive down and pick things up from the bottom of the pool. That would come in handy since Ben's favorite pass time at Grandma and Grandpa Z's is throwing thing into the pool.



Looking forward to more water time and maybe even some lazy moments this weekend visiting Grandma and Grandpa C in Chelan.

There's A New Sheriff In Town

Two weeks ago Ben started at McKenzie's school with her for two days a week. McKenzie was so excited for Ben to come to school with her, she asked over and over again if she could hold his hand. Unfortunately, Ben's technique for not dropping his lunch box eliminated that option.


Whenever Ben wants to carry something on his shoulder this is how he walks so it won't drop. It's quite funny but I'll definitely be looking into a backpack if he doesn't figure it out soon.

Ben did great on his first day and was all smiles when I went to pick him up. I took him out onto the playground to get Kenzie and when she saw us she yelled to her class, "everybody look here's my brother Baby." Her teacher said she had been talking about him being a big boy and coming to her school. Hopefully she'll introduce him as Ben and not as Baby when he gets on the school bus for kindergarten someday.