Happy Holidays!

Well, that holiday race is over and we can now sit back and figure out where the heck we're going to put all the new toys...  I think I say the same thing every 6 months - to hire a professional organizer or not...  Wow!  What a spoiled kid!  We had a great Christmas thanks to family and friends!  We loved spending time with all!  Enjoy the photos!

Month 54 November 2010

Month 55 December 2010

Santa is Coming to Town!

I am loving this new website called Groupon.com. You can buy gift certificates to different local places for uber cheap. Anyhow, I got one to see Santa at our mall for $10. If you haven't been to see the old man in red lately, the cheapest picture package is $24! So being that I paid this money ahead of time, I was getting Emma on Santa's lap! We went to the mall this afternoon and spent nearly 2 hours in line. The whole time Emma is excited and talking about seeing Santa. The second it was our turn and we rounded the corner, she came to a screeching halt! Literally froze in her tracks. I took her over to him and she was fighting and running behind me. He was so jolly and trying to engage her in conversation, but the only way to get my $10 bucks worth was to have a family shot! The funniest part was Santa insisting that Glenn sit on his lap!

Merry Christmas!

Happy Fall!

Happy Fall! So far it's been great with all of the beautiful leaves and fairly nice weather; although I say that when it was in the high 40's today. That's okay though. Most importantly, we had the best Halloween weather ever! It wasn't cold, it was a bit windy and not a drop of rain! Certainly made it more enjoyable for all!

As for us, we've done the requisite pumpkin patch visits, the group Halloween party, and a trip to the toy store to see Skippy John Jones (very famous kitty cat who thinks he is a chihuahua.) Hope you enjoy the pictures!

OCtober 2010

Fall is here!

Because we have not been so adventurous in the last month or so, we have been lacking in the picture department, but we have made some progress! We introduced Emma to bowling and I think I see a scholarship in her future. You can see by this picture, she actually bowled better than me!

This weekend Emma and I went to meet Skippyjon Jones, a character from a children's book.  He is a cat who thinks he is a chihuahua.  Emma even got his autograph!

After that, off to the pumpkin patch!  We had absolutely beautiful weather and had a lot of fun!

Enjoy!

OCtober 2010

Wild Kids, I mean Animals!

Emma and I went up to Seattle on Saturday morning and came back on Monday morning (this is labor day weekend, of course). Sunday morning, Emma, my mom, and I drove up to Seattle to pick up Angie to spend a few hours at Woodland Park Zoo. On the way, I got a hold of Shaun and he, Jessie and Jessie's two kids said they would join us as well. When we pulled in, we then ran into Angie's good friend Jenny and her daughter Taylor. Kids galore! It was a fun but very exhausting day! I realized that the Woodland Park zoo is much bigger than the Oregon Zoo and I think they feed their animals caffeine since theirs are actually awake and moving around. Well, that is except for their gorillas; we actually witnessed them eating their own poop. Disgusting! Anyhoo, enjoy the pictures. You will see there are also a few pictures from our zoo trip on Thursday to the Oregon Zoo. Can't get enough!

Month 52 September 2010

Busy times

Wow! Let's see if I can go in some kind of chronological order on this one!

The middle of May the fam and I went on our annual camping trip. This year it was at Potholes State Park in Eastern Washington and we had a BLAST! Even though the temps were near 100, it wasn't that bad since we spent our days down my the lake on two rented jet skis. Wouldn't have been the same without those for sure!

The following weekend Emma hosted a tea party with he friends from school. They had a blast dressed liked princesses and sharing "tea" with real china and finger sandwiches! I think the mom's had fun as well! :) The day after the tea party was our 4th annual birthday party with our birthing group. I can't believe how bog they've gotten! What a handsome bunch of little men! Of course they all have siblings now too.

Lastly, last Wednesday night I got a Facebook post asking if I wanted to run the Hood to Coast relay on that Friday. I have been wanting to do this for a few years now and despite the fact that I haven't been running hardly at all, I said yes! Hood to Coast is considered the "Mother of all relays" and has 1000 teams of 12 people that run from Timberline Lodge on Mt Hood all the way to Seaside, OR (197 miles). Each person generally runs 3 legs at anywhere from 4 - 7 1/2 miles each all the while passing off a bracelet to each team member. This goes on for about 30 hours straight with your time when you're not running, sitting in a van with 5 other team mates and a driver. There is hardly any sleep involved. I can honestly say that I have never gone out for a run on Hwy 30 at 1:30 am! Anyhow, despite the fact that I spent my 30 hours in a van with complete strangers, I had a blast and made some great friends (it also helped that there were 3 nurses and a Dr on my team which came in handy for pain control!) In the end, I was running for a team that had been running and fund raising for a great cause and I look forward to doing it again next year! http://www.ohsu.edu/xd/about/dchf/about/news_7-10-08_ashleigh.cfm
http://manuforti.org/

Month 51 August 2010

July is here and gone!

Ok, I know I have gone against what I said about keeping up on the blogging and pictures, but I have a good excuse; I swear! Well, more than one good excuse since it is summer time and so busy… Well, since the last blog we had 4th of July (we didn’t do anything spectacular or worthy of any fireworks), went to Montana (had a BLAST!), finished our front yard (definitely worthy of fireworks), and had fun at some local parks and Cannon Beach with some friends! As you can see, Emma has gotten a hair cut which her and I both love, but for very different reasons. Enjoy the photos!

Month 50 July 2010

Eventful Times

Emma's had one more birthday, with her friends this time.  We had it at the Children's Museum which shares a parking lot with the zoo.  It was our luck that in between rainy days, her party was on a very nice day which meant that everyone in Portland made the trek to the zoo, therefore filling up the parking lot to capacity.  A special thanks to all of the parents who toughed it out!

Last weekend Angie (my sister for those who don't know) graduated from University of Washington.  We sat in the hot sun for 3 hours watching people in black robes receiving their diplomas, but alas, I did not see her! :(  The next day we had her graduation party.

Enjoy the pictures, there are a lot and many of people you probably don't know!

Month 48 May 2010

Birthdays, Fairs, and More!

Emma is one lucky birthday girl; she gets 3 birthdays!  One with the fam in Seattle, her real b day with her mom and dad, and her birthday party with her friends next weekend!  Anyhow, the pictures from her family birthday have been posted and more will follow over the next few weekends.

Today, Emma and I (Christina, because we all know that Glenn wouldn't actually write this!) went to the Multnomah County Fair.  It was a nice day (rain was expected but we got none!) and Emma had a blast!  The best part of the fair was that it was free - that and watching the dog jumping competition.  Emma and a great time at the petting zoo and on the rides.  This is the first year she has shown interest in them (the rides I mean). 

With all of the presents came some major clean up and organization.  I even went as far as checking out a professional organizer.  At $85 an hour, I decided I would try my hand at it first (and in the meantime, realized I am in the wrong line of work!)  Anyhow, here are the before and after of post-birthday Emma room:


                                              

Slightly better!  Anyhow, here is the entire photo album!  Enjoy!

Month 48 May 2010

Playing Catch Up

The last few weeks have been unbelievably hectic so I am trying to play catch up! Since my last post, we have had a few events of note. First, the day before Mother's Day, Emma was playing around on her ballet barre, attempting some sort of aerial acrobatic move that involved somehow hanging upside down. Either way, she should have used her stunt double because she landed face first and knocked out one of her front teeth. I know I covered this in my previous post, but I wanted to follow up with the fact that her other front tooth was also traumatized (as was her mother and father) and had been hanging lower than it had. We took her to the dentist to say all looked good and that it is a good thing she is tall for her age because she can blend in with kindergartners and first graders now! He also told us to have her wiggle away because her other tooth won't get tighter and we might as well try to get it to come out too. Apparently with baby teeth it is okay to loose them early (although not ideal), whereas if these were her adult teeth, she wouldn't be able to get an implant until she was 16. Being that I don't want to move to Kentucky anytime soon, I think we will get her a mouth guard for the remainder of her childhood years.

On Mother's Day, I took Emma, Glenn's Mom and my niece Daeja to the Doll House Tea Room for Mother's Day tea. It was a really cool set up that included dress up complete with jewelry, hats, shoes, etc for adults and kids alike; hair and make up for kids; and tea and sandwiches for lunch. The girls had such a great time and I even dressed up in some old prom dress!

Another recent discovery was Emma's love for Lady Gaga. She informed me the other day that she had to send an e mail to LG to invite her to her birthday party. If only I was that rich! While doing her business on the toilet the other morning, she was singing "Paparazzi". She also loves "Bad Romance". I'm not sure that this is the best role model given some of the content of her songs, but they are catchy to say the least!


Signing off for now, I'm sure there will be lot's more to write soon!

Last Monday Emma did a face plant on the playground and knocked her two front teeth loose and had an impressive scab under her nose. Yesterday (Saturday), she was playing around on her ballet barre and fell on her face on the living room floor knocking on of the front teeth out! After a lot of scary blood and a call to her dentist, all will be all right. Her dentist said that she just sped up the natural process of tooth loss and that the tooth fairy had clearance to land.

This morning Emma woke to a new book and a $1 coin; she was a little concerned though because she didn't hear the tooth fairy's wings last night.

Vacation

Vacation planning is on and it looks like Disneyland is the destination - a little over a year to go! Plan is for next May and the condo is already booked! Yippee!

Ag Festival Day

Thanks to a co-worker, I found out about a great event called the Ag Fest down in Salem at the state fairgrounds. Emma and I headed down and we had a blast especially her, the animal lover. The first barn we came to was full of animals, all available to pet. We got to see and pet sheep, llamas, lambs, pigs, cows, ponies, miniature donkeys, chickens, and baby goats. We even got to see sheep shearing! Emma's favorites were the baby goats and "the sheep getting hair cuts". We took a hay ride pulled by 2 draft horses to the next barn where we got to plant trees, tomatoes, sunflowers, and marigolds and got to take them all home.

This was quite an event and was worth the 45 minute drive! We will definitely be looking forward to this again next year! Here is the link the April album with pictures from today:

042510

Another Day

Emma is very much into dresses right now. She will NOT wear anything else. On Wednesday I made her wear stretch pants because she had yoga class, but man was it a nasty fight. I promised her that when she got home, she could put on a dress. When I came and picked her up at school, she informed me that she had to use the restroom. She came out wearing nothing but her shirt and underwear! She was ready to put on that dress!

When I went to pick her up yesterday, the daycare director stopped me and told me about a little incident. Apparently Emma got paint on her skirt, so they wanted her to change into her spare clothes. In her backpack was jeans and a shirt. She threw a fit and went into the bathroom and wouldn't come out for like 40 minutes! She even missed recess! It sounds like they eventually got her in her clothes for a short period of time and they were able to throw her skirt in the washing machine and get it washed and dried for her so she could put it back on. I'll tell you what, I am not sure there are enough dresses in the world for this kid!

Swimming

Emma graduated to the next level of her swimming! Next session she can begin Water Safety 1; what a superstar! Two weeks ago she swam the width of the pool by herself. I got a video of her tonight and here it is:

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

I'm also catching up on my pictures and here are two albums (March's you've already seen some of the pictures, but the program puts them in there anyhow because of date):

Month 46 March 2010

And April:

Starting Again

So I started a blog about a year ago and I made all of 2 posts and then kind of forgot about it. Since I am not doing so good at e mailing very often with updates, I figured I would put them in here. So here we go:

Emma has developed into quite the drama queen as you can see from her video. She sings and dances whether we are at a restaurant or even the zoo! Puts on quite the show for her adoring fans!

We are also going through a phase where she will where nothing but dresses. No pants, shorts, capris, and sometimes even skirts for this little Princess! Make dressing in the morning a little hard!

Developmentally she is doing awesome. She knows her letters and numbers, can wrote her name, and can write some words if we spell them out to her. Compared to some adults I know, she should be off to college! :)

My Drama Queen

Photo and video editing at www.OneTrueMedia.com