Thanksgiving Daily

I just watched the Mormon message "Thanksgiving Daily." Lately I have been having "thanksgiving daily" for this guy.

Seriously, I don't know if I could do this without him.  He amazes me at every turn.  In the past couple of weeks he has read "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory", "James & the Giant Peach", "Fairies of Beyorn",  and currently "Harry Potter and the Sorcerers Stone" out loud to Zina and Wilson.  When they finish the book they have a movie party for the books that have movies out.  Zina gets so excited to read whenever Mark has a spare moment.

Last night when Zina threw the biggest tantrum of her life (which also happens to be about the 2nd tantrum of her life) because she wanted to read Harry Potter after doing something (can't remember what) that lost her that privilege, he firmly but lovingly stuck with her and helped her through it.  Which is a feat.  Maybe as a female I gravitate to those same emotions too quickly, but I honestly listened in amazement as he helped her through that little episode.  Sometimes I watch him as a dad and wonder if I should take notes. :)

Zina has learned to ride her bike without training wheels because her dad is such a good teacher.  It was so fun to watch them work it out together and then see the satisfaction and joy on her face when she knew she had it.   Which was actually the first time she tried it.  She just had to practice practice after that.   We have been doing a lot of bike rides around the neighborhood lately.  So fun!

 All by herself!

 Learning about the "money" position for her pedals to be in.  So funny, Mark told her that in order to start her pedals have to be in just the right spot to push off - aka "money" position.  Yesterday I heard her shout out, "I started without being in money position!"  Complete trust in that face.

 Off they go!

 I LOVE this cheesy grin. love love love love love it.

A few casualties? Nah, I think she's just taking a rest.

I am already wondering how on earth we made it through the first two years of medical school?  How did I do this without him?  I guess I'll probably remember when that residency roll around.  But for now, we'll just enjoy and be thankful for the time we have.

And just for the record, today we remembered and I taught the kids what it meant to have freedom.  We visited the airport and talked about pilots fighting in a war and sacrificing their lives so that we could go home and ride our bikes in the sunshine.

officially...what?

You know you are officially...a housewife?  a mom? past 25?  excessively practical?

You know you are officially something when you use your birthday money to buy a mop...and get excited about it.  I mopped my floors today and boy was it fun.  I love my new shark steam mop.  

And I love love love my clean floors.  

Thanks for the birthday money.   You know who you are.

Halloweenie Plus

Halloween plus gorgeous weather equals we must wash the van...

or Papa must wash the van while we play inside the van.

Like our new basketball hoop?

Thank you Grandma Judy who found this sweet hoop at a yard sale 

and thank you Mark who has a birthday this month so she could buy it for us!

Our traditional halloween festivities.  Ghost food + candle light + ghost stories =

lots of giggles, singing and fun.

Pumpkin carving!

Wilson was a huge help.  He kept stabbing his pumpkin over and over giving him "scars."

Zina drew the face on her pumpkin all by herself and then Mark cut it out for her.

Somehow I missed getting a picture of both finished pumpkins. oops.

Our Knight in Shining Armor at the ward trunk or treat.

And our little garden fairy.

And Sam was our little pirate.

Speaking of Sam he is at the "getting stuck" stage.  Can you find him?

There he is!  He is trying really hard to get to that ball in the corner.

What a sweet boy.

I love my Sam I am!

And here is the birthday present table I bought myself  3mths early.  I found it on craigslist for $100.  Then I started the sanding, painting, reupholstering, refinishing work.  And boy did I jump in water over my head.  My wonderful husband finished the job for me (a LOT of the job) and it was a learning experience for us both.  We had never refinished anything or reupholstered anything, but I am pretty happy with how it turned out. 

Thanks Mark! I love you.

My husband called me a cheap skate...

So I paid the $5 dollars.

I hate it when ignorance costs me money.

This is a random picture from a while back.  Our ward just got a whole bunch of new people in it from a neighboring ward so I threw a "favorite things" party to get to know everyone better.   I love my calling in primary - but it makes it hard to get to know the R.S. sisters, especially new ones. Anyways, Zina and Wilson loved it.  They spent the entire night "sneaking" goodies away from the dessert table and giggling.  It was really cute.  

Some pictures of the cousins when Kate came to visit with Grandma & Grandpa Thomas.  Poor Kurty really got ran over in this one. They were playing What Time Is It Mr. Wolf.  Except they kept changing it to Grandma Wolf and now whenever we go to play that game Wilson insists on it being Grandma Wolf instead of Mr. Wolf.

Ellie is missing because she was "Grandma" Wolf. :)  Left to right: Kurt, Wilson, Bo, Kate, Zina

To bad this one is sideways.  This is a classic - Zina bossing Wilson around.

Buds. Bo & Wilson.

We babysat one night because Emily had enrichment.  The kids made their own Pizza's and had a movie party with popcorn and smoothies.  There is proof on the back couch that Jade came!!  And Grandma standing in the back rocking baby Isaac.

That Sat. we hit up the state fair.  There was a animatron dinosaur exhibition that all the kids really wanted to see.  5 & under was free so we opted to send all six kids in with one adult.  Mark was the lucky one. :)

Isaac & Sam - 6mths

These are random pictures that Mark took.

The many poses of Wilson. 

And no I didn't leave any out. 

I couldn't.

He put his pajama shirt on himself.

Sat. night we picked Aunty Liz up from the airport for a surprise visit.  We were SO SO excited!

I love having family in the same country as me!

We did a lot of relaxing at the pool

And chatting

And Aunty Liz tended while Mark and I went on a anniversary/happy birthday to me date. 

Yes, I turned a whopping 28!

And...we've been married for 6 years.

And we've been so busy that the 16th and 19th came and went in the blink of an eye.

So this might be the best documentation those special days get. 

Love you honey!

(and being 28 is great.  I thought all year that I already was 28 - it's nice to actually be how old I thought I was....)

San Francisco

Here we are beginning our 15hr drive to San Francisco.

Happy....

Sad...

Sleeping...

Coloring

The bay bridge

We headed up to San Fran. because Mark was attending a Osteopathic Medical Conference where he presented his research from summer 09 with Dr. Gonzalez.  They gave him a $500 stipend to pay for the trip.  So we left Sat morning early, spent Sunday, Monday, in San Fran - left Tuesday morning for LA. spent Tuesday night in Perris CA, and then drove home Wednesday afternoon.  Are we crazy?  Yes we are!

The reasons behind our madness:

1. I've never been to San Francisco

2. They paid for it.

3. Elder Keeler needed someone to pick up his bike and boxes so he wouldn't have to ship them to Canada.

4. We got to see said Elder Keeler and give him a BIG hug before he flew home....TODAY!

And I am proud to say that this trip gave us good memories instead of frustrating ones.  

Although it is probably a matter of attitude.

For instance.  We finally pulled onto the Bay Bridge to head over to San Fran at about 6:30.  

We had no idea weekend traffic could be so bad and we found ourselves saying, "Why on earth do people live here?"  Bumper to Bumper traffic with signs up ahead saying TOLL BRIDGE $5 cash only.

Well, we knew there was a toll bridge, but in our country bumpkin ignorance had no idea it was cash only.  We did not have any cash. 

So we pleaded ignorance and first-timers and tried to look really sorry.

He let us through and we haven't yet gotten a $60 ticket in the mail. Phew

There were a few stressful/hilarious moments when we were scrounging around for any cash and came up with $1.25.  

And the best was as we were inching forward as slow as molasses there came a little voice from the back seat...

"I need to go potty mama...."

"Which one Wilson?"

"Both"

Fabulous.  Wilson for the record did an amazing job of holding in his "potty."

We pulled into our hotel at around 7:30.

Our trip was successful largely in part because on Sunday at church I ran into Juli ZoBell Miller from the farm down the road growing up.  She fed us dinner, gave us trip advice and played with us.  Awesome aewsome.  She told us about Bakers beach where we enjoyed a beautiful day playing in the sand and water until Zina was running away from a wave that was bigger than we all realized. She tripped fell down and starting rolling back with the water.  She wasn't submerged but it freaked us out to see her rolling back towards the ocean and not be able to get up.  Here comes my heart attack!  Mark and I were both running over to her and Mark grabbed her.  I don't think she would have rolled all the way out but it was scary.  She jumped up (soaked through and covered in sand) and said, "I'm okay, I'm okay, I'm not even cold. I'm okay, I'm not scared."

Bakers Beach

The fog is slowly lifting off the Golden Gate bridge.

RUN!

After being saved from the ocean

After we changed into dry clothes we headed back over to walk across the golden gate bridge.  We didn't even get half-way before Wilson said, "I have to pee!"  But we got some good pics and had fun anyways.

This is Wilson saying, "Arr!"

San Francisco in the background.

I just loved Wilson on Mark's shoulders leaning over the bridge....

After the walk the kids were tired and hungry so we headed down to fisherman's wharf and found a cozy, warm, little restaurant that overlooked the harbor, and ate fish and chips.

Then we toured around fisherman's wharf.  Wilson was excited about this real live submarine.  We were bummed that we were to late for tours inside.

We let the kids pick out some way over-priced candy...and then headed back to the hotel to get ready for departure the next day.  

Someday Mark and I will go back without kids and enjoy so many of the things that we missed, but we really had fun seeing what we did!  

We are really great at planning things because the next days drive found us smack dab in the middle of LA rush hour.  8hrs found us finally in Perris, CA where Mark took the kids out in the parking lot for "races" after being in their car seats all day.  I may or may not have been very grouchy at this point.  Thank goodness for Mark!  They caught a lizard which the kids loved.  They were SO excited to show me.

And, drumrolll!! The main reason we even attempted this crazy trip was to see Elder Mark Keeler. Zina was so so so excited for this.  She did a lot of hugging with arms and legs wrapped around Uncle Mark.

looks good eh?

We love Uncle Marky

Racing (classic uncle Marky face)

twirling

hugging

It was definitely worth ALL 28 hrs of driving!