August at the beach & a reminder to myself in the future..

We have just a week left of summer vacation, and thus a week left at the beach for the summer.  Just like last year, I've loved spending August at the beach.  Life slows down a bit, although mostly we just do normal life in a different place for a month.
I've been doing some extra cooking and food preserving for the winter and the upcoming baby this month too.  Here's what I've finished so far:

- 7 quarts & 6 pints of roasted tomato & herb marinara sauce (freezer)
- 2 batches of granola
- 8 batches of blueberry freezer jam
- cooked up pinto and black beans & made up a batch of spicy bean cakes for the freezer
- made up a batch of chicken stock to freeze

For this last week, I plan on making up a bunch of pizza sauce to freeze, and trying my hand at canning up some salsa.  I've never done that, but hopefully I can find a winning recipe  :)

I've also been slowly, very slowly been coming to grips with the fact that I have GOT to slow down and pay attention to my body.  As much as I want to, I can't do everything I want to do and operate life like I'm not 7 1/2 months pregnant.  I've been struggling with severe pelvic/lower back pain at times over the last couple months, and also just being flat out exhausted by evening.  Some of this has to do with having 3 kids to keep up with and take care of, but I think if I was honest with myself, it's more due to doing too much.  I've been cutting things back and while I'm still tired in the evenings, it's not totally painful to stand and walk.  I am a slow learner  :)

And as a reminder to myself in the future, here's what I feel like God has been showing/highlighting to me over the last week or two....

When I over schedule or overdue things, it leaves me too tired to be the parent I need to be. 

Willow's attitude has been getting out of control, and she has been ignoring us when we tell her to do things like "come" or "no".  I realized that I have been allowing myself to be a lazy mom, and have been overlooking things when I should be dealing with them because I've been either too busy or tired.  My first priority should be the kids and raising them, not cooking, my projects, cleaning, rearranging the house, or anything else that captures my time and attention. 

Happy 2nd Birthday Willow!

This summer I've been working on catching up on scrapbooking, and have been working my way through 2009, the year Willow was born.  It brings back so many memories.  It's amazing to me that my baby girl is 2 years old already. 

She was my easiest labor and delivery, and my hardest baby.  She has a larger than life attitude and can be quite stubborn, but is so much fun and brings so many smiles and laughter to our house.  We love you, Willow!

I think celebrating the 2nd birthday is one of the most fun birthdays.  It's the first birthday where they are able to really grasp the concept of "my birthday" and presents.  We celebrated Willow's birthday at our house with my side of the family, and her actual birthday at the beach with Nana and Papa.

 The traditional ice cream cake.  You might notice the candles are missing (yep, I forgot to get some)....we let her take a bite out of the cake instead  :)

 Wearing the adorable dress up clothes from Charity.

 Snuggling with Grammy and the new baby Grammy got her.

 Modeling more dress ups.  This was the year of dress up clothes and baby dolls. 

 She has lots of "help" opening the presents!

 How fun!  More dress up clothes!

Journey has just discovered one of the funnest parts of having a sister.....She gets to play with all the new toys too! 

You know it's summer when....

........you get ice cream from the ice cream truck!





August at the beach - part 1

We enjoyed spending the month of August so much at the beach last year, that we decided to make it a yearly tradition.  This year we have the house rented for a couple of days in the middle of the month, but other than that, we plan to be here at the beach.

Journey 4 1/2, Willow 23 months

The girls and I hanging out together.  I am so thankful to have two precious girls. 

  Mark and Bill have been busy cleaning up the new boat and getting it ready for fishing, and  I've barely seen Aspen since we've been at the beach.  Diana brought William and Adam down for the first 5 days we were her.  They are like the three amigos.  They are busy from morning til night playing in the forest/creek, making forts, riding bikes or on adventures with Diana.

We found a swing set right on the beach.  So much fun!

 My sweet girl.  She's been saying, "Mom, I need to snuggle with you"  a lot lately.  Not sure if she's needing extra snuggles and attention because of the coming baby or if it's just a phase, but I sure do love her!

I love having a firepit right outside.  It's easy to keep an eye on the action  :)

 I think all boys love fires...

Typical slow morning - watching a few cartoons while they wake up and wait for breakfast.

 One afternoon Diana took the boys to the beach.  The girls and I met them after naps, and despite the day being cloudy and cool, all 5 of the kids ended up swiming around in the stream.  It was a mess getting them back home, but they had a blast.  I got some pretty amazed looks as I was herding them all up to go home, lol.  Just me, big and pregnant with 5 kids....

This girl is all personality.  She keeps us laughing (and sometimes frustrates us terribly!).

 Mark's first fishing trip on the new boat was very successful - 15 tuna, 1 halibut and a blue shark too!  Once they caught the shark, he knew he had to bring it home to show the boys  :)

 We took all the kids on a boat ride.  I think out of all the kids, Journey liked it the most.  Literally, the faster and rougher it got, the more she squealed in excitement :)

Summer 2011

I am amazed we are already halfway through our summer already.  One word to sum up the summer this year....BUSY.  Super busy.  I just realized the longest we have been at home is a week since Aspen finished school on June 9th.  We have been on the go constantly.  I've tried hard to just embrace it and go with the flow because I know next year, with a baby things will be much different.

There have been many different beach trips, Twin Lakes, a trip to Diamond Lake (for Aspen - we went to the beach with Ryan & Christina and Bill & Diana), and a kid-free trip to Catalina Island to celebrate our anniversary.  We have now entered August and are here at the beach to stay for a while.  Our plan is to go home for at least a couple days in the middle of the month while the house is being rented, then go back until Labor Day....and school starts....and our fun comes to an end...  Okay, not really.  I'm sure we will be ready to get back home to real life by then  :)

On top of being on the move constantly, I am in full on nesting mode when we are home.  Every time I'm pregnant, I get the urge to redecorate, and this time is no different.  We are moving Willow to the guest room, the guest room to the office in the basement, the office upstairs to the dining room, and redecorating the babies room for our sweet boy on the way.  Whew!  Get all that?  Oh, I also ordered some new furniture for our family room, and have been redecorating and rearranging other furniture around the rest of the house to get ready for the new stuff.

I am repainting at least Willow's room and the babies room (and want to repaint our family room as well, but Mark is trying to talk me out of it.....so that's a we'll see at this point, lol).  I've been feeling crafty so I've been having fun making mobiles for the baby, and butterfly mobiles for both the girls rooms as part of the decorations for their new rooms.  It's been fun, but I'm glad to get away to the beach for a while.  It forces me to slow down, hang out with the kids, and listen to my body.  (And plan out my time very carefully for the next time I am home.  Shhhh, don't tell Mark!)

I am 27 weeks pregnant, and definitely feeling it.  Seriously!  How is it possible that I still have 1/3 of the pregnancy to go???  It's not easy being this big with 3 kids to care for, but I am doing my best to enjoy it and am really looking forward to meeting our sweet baby boy in November.  I feel him moving around a lot, and can't wait to hold him in my arms. 

Each of the kids has been able to feel him moving and kicking.  It's fun to see their faces light up, and I think it makes a new baby more real to them.  I'm especially excited to see the girls with him.  I think they are really going to love it.

Well, that's been our summer so far in a nutshell.  More to come later  :)

Catalina Island

Back in June, we celebrated our 12th anniversary.  We were in Twin Lakes, so didn't really do anything to celebrate the day.  Fast forward to July, and with all our weekends at the beach and fishing season in full swing, we still hadn't got around to celebrating. 
Finally, we realized we really needed to get something planned!  Mark planned a quick get-a-way trip for us to Catalina Island for 4 days.  Diana was able to take the kids for us (huge thank you for that!!!), and we took off the last week in July. 

I have to say, the trip came at the perfect time for us.  We hadn't realized how exhausted we were, and spent our time just enjoying being together and relaxing.  The only thing we scheduled was a couples massage.  The rest of the time was spent eating, walking around town, hanging out on the beach, resting, and eating some more  :)

We are usually the tourists that have to do all the "stuff". Snorkeling, renting scooters, boats, bikes, jet skis, whatever. This time, we literally did nothing. And completely enjoyed every minute!

 This was our beautiful hotel.  We saw very few, if any new construction type buildings on the island.  It was mostly Spanish and some Victorian architecture.

 There were also very few normal sized cars on the island.  All the locals had their own golf carts - some of them tricked out, lol!

 26 weeks pregnant

I brought a couple books, and the "eye candy" you see here enertained Mark.  The harbor was filled with probably up to 100 boats, mostly yachts anchored up and coming and going.  That, and plans for his new boat  :)  Yes, just a week before we left on our trip, Mark put an offer on a boat moored in Newport Beach.  On our trip down, he drove up to see it while I went back to our hotel in San Diego to relax.  

Twin Lakes 2011

We started our 8 hour drive to Twin Lakes at 4am.  We were amazed at how well Willow did traveling for so long.....knowing her and how things often go  :)

Journey and Ava (4) loving the short ferry ride across the Columbia River.  Almost there!

Bill and Diana brought Luke along to play with Aspen.   They had a blast.  It is truly boy's paradise here.  Fishing, fires, catching bugs and crawdads, bike riding, fireworks (with the guys) and lots of freedom.

Aspen is really developing a love of fishing....and making his Dad very proud!  He has even learned to like fish tacos.  A true miracle indeed, lol!

The little girls - Zoe 19 months and Willow 21 months - learning to navigate the very steep spiral stairs in the house.  As long as they went one at a time, there were no major accidents.

We had a mix of weather.  Everything from rainy, to cloudy to sunny and warm.

Ryan and Zoe on the ski biscuit.  She was the only one brave enough to try!

After the boat ride, the kids did a little swimming.

 WOW, it's cold!  Not that that deterred them....

Mark and Willow on her first canoe ride.

Typical mornings - doing a little coloring or watching a show while waiting for breakfast.

Even I was able to do a little biking with everyone.  

Off to the candy store with two excited girls in tow... Almost a daily thing :)

Showing off her candy - a definite highlight for the kids of the trip  :)

 On the days that weren't so nice, the boys entertained themselves with making fires and lighting off fireworks.  Here Mark talked Aspen and Luke into dying their hair with the smoke bombs.  The guys just couldn't help themselves with the Indian reservation fireworks a 10 minute drive away.  There were A LOT of fireworks lit off during our stay!  Poor Willow either was super sensitive to the sound, or got some fire crackers thrown at her.  Either way, she really hated them by the end of the trip!

 We couldn't get the kids to try the ski biscuit, but they all loved this thing  :)
It was a blast watching them all have so much fun on it.

Aspen really loved going with the guys "hard core". 

Snuggling with my girls while watching the boys on the tube.

The boys haul on the last day.  They brought them all in by themselves.  Aspen would often take his fishing pole and cast off the docks in the afternoon.  He caught quite a few fish that way, and was so proud of himself  :)