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Summer 2010

I am not sure why we have no background on this blog but after many failed attempts to restore it I have given up, so I have decided to be more productive and write on here instead. I realized that it has been way too long since I have last written an update. The problem with blogging and me is that I write and bunch all at once and then take a break (sometimes a long break) and I am not that consistent. I am trying to get better at writing on here more often.

We have had one of those summers that we would just rather soon let go of. Actually the summer started off really good. It was sunny and hot and we made plans to do EVERYTHING we possibly could. But our plans quickly changed. John's grandma, Jane (pic on the left), died June 4th in the hospital surrounded by her family. She will be missed greatly! On July 14th 12:30 a.m. John's cousin, Loren (pic on the left) died; he was 19. There is still no known cause of death but he died in his home here in Anchorage. He was more like a brother to John then a cousin. Loren was one of those people that could always make someone laugh. He was survived by his mom, dad, brother and daughter. We are still mourning his death; we are very heart broken.

This summer has been very wet. Ever since the beginning of June it has been either rainy or cloudy with very few sunny days in between. It's hard to know that summer is coming to an end with such a wet season. Although the kids are tired of being inside we have been able to stay busy.

On a different note, John got a new job which is starting on Monday. He is a sales representative for Smith and Nephew who specializes in medical devices. He is very excited about this new and exciting opportunity.

John's sisters are up visiting right now and we are enjoying having more family around. Also Levi and Emerson have cousins to play with while John's sisters are here and we are thankful for all the good times the kids have had together and all the good times the adults have had together and all the good times we have all had together!

4th of July Weekend

We had a wonderful time in Cooper Landing (and Seward) last weekend at John's grandpa's cabin. Our friends, Kyle and Natalie, and their son, Kaleb came with us. We drove down Saturday and got set up. As you can see we had to saw our own wood for the campfires. Kyle and John did a great job cutting and chopping all of the wood for us. We set up little forts for the boys to make it easier for them to sleep since the cabin is just one big room. Levi was okay with laying down and going to sleep but Emerson was feeling a little left out especially because the adults stayed up a little later than all of the kids. Everyone eventually fell asleep and although we didn't get good sleep we still got some. On Sunday we drove about an hour to Seward to enjoy the 4th of July festivities and watch Mount Marathon. This is the shortest marathon but probably one of the hardest because it is a mile and a half up the mountain and a mile and a half down the mountain.(The 4th and 6th pictures show the mountain) The first place woman ran it in 51:48 and the first place man ran it in 44:40. This race is fun to watch even though we only really have ever watched the finish. (One of these years we will remember our binoculars). We left Sunday night and headed back the cabin for some dinner and card games. Monday, we woke and got things packed up and headed back to real life. The last picture is all of us standing in front of the cabin and the second to last picture, well, is John having a little fun with Emerson. What's amazing about a child being thrown into the air is that they are so trusting because they have no idea what could happen and Emerson was smiling the entire time! (Sorry this whole thing is underlined, I am not sure what happened.

Fishing adventures!

John got the opportunity to go King Salmon fishing with some buddies. He got to fly in a small airplane down to the Kasilof River and fish for most of the day. These are the two King Salmon he caught. The small one is actually full-size, it is called a jack (I think that is what John said).
We also took a trip as family to the Russian River last Friday and did a little fishing. John and I traded off fishing while the other person watched the boys. As you can see, Levi was literally rolling in the dirt. He had a ton of fun and Emerson did okay too. We went home without any fish. We decided that fishing with kids is quite a bit harder than just taking the trip by ourselves. We had fun though and will hopefully take the boys back when they are a little bit older!

Sad face, happy face!

Levi has been getting more into legos over the past 6 months and today he put together this face. He held it up over his eyes and said, "look mom!" I chuckled as I turned around and saw this staring back at me and then I grabbed the camera!

Fireplace

We made our fireplace into a chalkboard! This is our cheap fix before we replace the fireplace with a wood-burning insert. Whenever we made a fire ALL hot air would be immediately sucked out of the house and so we decided it wasn't very economical to have a fire. All we did was put a piece of particle board in the opening of the fireplace. We spray-foamed it in and waited for the foam to firm up. Then I took chalkboard spray paint and gave the board two coats. If you want to do this I would suggest spraying the board before you put it in your house. We had already fastened the board before we decided to spray it with chalkboard paint. :) Levi loves it and we love that he loves it! :)

Bathroom

The top photo is the way the bathroom looked when we moved in the bottom photo is the way it looks now. This was the very first thing we did to improve the house and I really enjoyed this project. Although all I did was paint and patch some holes, John and his dad put up the wainscoting which was more difficult.

The wall!

The top picture is what the wall looked like when we moved in...it was the only thing in the entire house that wasn't painted "almond". My dad ripped off the panelling and sheet-rocked it last summer. I painted it shortly after Emerson was born. The chandelier I found at a garage sale for $20! I love finding bargains!

Bear Pajamas

I love these pj's. John's aunt and uncle got these for Levi. I have to smile and laugh every time I put these pajamas on my kids. They look so cute in them. Emerson-top pictue, Levi-bottom pic.

Emerson standing

The most coffee a kid should ever have!

Levi's great uncle gave him some coffee. I am not sure if Levi actually likes coffee or if he just liked drinking out of the mug. Nonetheless, he drank it all and was up until 11:30 pm. Ha, not doing that again!

Biggest piece of watermelon a kid should ever have!

Memorial Day BBQ! Levi had the biggest piece of watermelon he had ever had!

Solid Rock Bible Camp-Memorial Weekend 2010

Every year we go down to Solid Rock Bible Camp for their Memorial Cleanup weekend. Although we spend some time cleaning up the camp, we have a lot of fun as well! Levi got to feed a baby goat which he thought was pretty cool. Levi also made a good friend, Danny, (4th pic); they were having fun throwing rocks and frisbees down the hill and then going and getting them. Levi also got to sit on a tractor which pretty much made his day. Emerson got to pet a horse which maybe made his day. :) We always have a good time when we go and it is nice to see friends and relax a bit!

New Siding

Although this siding was put on last summer, I am just now putting the improvement on the blog...better late than never. We have had fun doing so many improvements to our home. One of the things we did was put a sliding glass door on the back of the house which used to be a window. This makes the backyard more accessible. I don't have a picture of the way it used to be, but you can see now what the new door looks like. We are in the process of getting ready to put a patio down in front of the sliding glass door. You can see there are some trees cut down on the left side there. These are the steps to do before we can even start digging up the ground for the patio: 1. Cut down the unwanted trees in the backyard 2. Move the shed to where the trees were 3. Cut down more trees that were behind the shed 4. Start digging for the patio. Yay, it will be so nice to have a patio once it is finally finished!

Our house

I have been meaning to get all of our before and after pics up of our house, but I haven't taken the "after" photos yet. John has worked so hard on this house since almost two years ago when we bought it. I have heard it said that there is ALWAYS something to do on the house and now I understand why; we are always trying to make it our own. We are planning to put a patio out the back sliding glass door, put gutters up, and cut down trees this summer, but we are definitely not doing as much as we did last summer! Praise the Lord! We are planning to do more camping and fishing this summer then last. Pictures to come of our improvements!

Biking and Planting

We have now been biking a few times with the boys in tow; they are fun to have along as they are pretty good riders and easy to pull (at least for me, I am not the one pulling, John is). At first Emerson didn't like his helmet too much, but that was to be expected. Now he doesn't mind but is glad when it is taken off. We biked over to John's grandpa's house yesterday night to get some rhubarb from him for us to replant. I cut up some of the rhubarb today and made some sauce out of it. We also got a peony and some bleeding hearts from John's mom, Paula, to replant which we have really enjoyed having all of these "growing things" around us. John and I also bought two(top pic) new trees (lilac and european elder) and planted them last weekend. Although we do sound a bit "earthy" right now, we have already cut down one and have about 5 more trees to cut down yet this summer in our yard. They block our sunlight in our backyard. We hope to plant a few shorter ones over the next few years.

Brothers

This picture depicts how rough Levi has been with Emerson lately. As you can see, Emerson takes it well! Today Levi bit Emerson's finger and Em screamed very loud. Most days Levi just hits Em over the head with a toy or shoe or something. Even though I know Levi loves Emerson, he still likes to be the bully when it comes to his little brother. Even though we do discipline for hitting/biting etc, I still do not see a decline in Levi's bullying behavior. I wonder if he will ever stop trying to beat his little brother up, but in my heart I already know the answer: no! The day Emerson can fight back will be a surprising one for Levi!

Levi and Emerson

Levi and Emerson enjoy playing together as long as Emerson isn't touching Levi's toys and Levi isn't grabbing Emerson's toys. Needless to say, we are learning lessons in sharing in this household. The boys also love playing outside together, especially swinging. Our backyard is completely fenced in, so we allow Levi the freedom to be in the backyard by himself (with us watching) and he enjoys this for about 15 minutes and then he wants John or I to play with him. I've noticed in the last few months though that he has gotten better at playing by himself and keeping himself occupied. If Emerson and I go out to join him on the grass, Emerson usually just ends up eating grass and the other day he even found a moose turd and was about to put it in his mouth-eewww! Luckily mama saved the day and took it away before it made it that far.

Emerson-8 months

Emerson will be 8 months next Saturday! I am 99% sure he will be crawling by then. He is scooting with his toes and forearms and got his knees under him about 5 times yesterday. One thing he just started recently is giving open-mouthed kisses. I love it! He will even pull my head toward his and open his mouth on my cheek and just smile. He planted one on Levi today and Levi couldn't stop laughing! Emerson has about 10 foods (pureed) that he eats regularly now. He likes everything but the avocado, which may change since I just introduced it yesterday. Since yesterday we started teaching him the word "no". He takes a liking to computer cords mostly, but I am sure there soon will be other things we won't want him to get in to.

Bikes

John and I have been wanting bikes for awhile now and we were able to get a really good deal at REI so we went and bought ourselves some bikes! We are very happy with them both and have done a little biking without the kids. We do, however, have a carrier for the kids that we can pull behind one bike, so we will take them along one of these times. We just got Emerson's helmet in the mail the other day. I tried it on him and let's just say he wasn't so thrilled about it being on his head-he will just have to get used to it. :) On the other hand, Levi LOVES his helmet and would wear it everyday, everywhere if we let him. :)

7 months!

Here are Levi and Emerson, (Levi is the top, Emerson the bottom) both 7 months! They definitely look similar but they both have their own look. I can't believe how much both have grown up. I keep looking at Emerson and seeing a different little boy each day. I can tell he wants to be doing what his older brother is doing! Emerson is sitting without support. He is scooting quite a bit and is very determined to get what he wants so I wouldn't be surprised if he is crawling within the next month here. In addition to that, he is a squirm-bug!! It is hard to hold him in our arms these days, which is why we have a jumper for him-he LOVES it!

1st Dentist Appt.

Levi had his first dentist checkup today! I was pretty nervous for it, not that his teeth are bad, but I thought maybe he wouldn't want to lay down in the chair or worse yet that he wouldn't even open up his mouth. I need not have worried about it, he did great. The hygienist was amazing with kids and Levi did everything she asked of him. I was so proud of him for cooperating and for having a big smile on his face when we were leaving.

Uncle Brad

This is a really late post, but my brother, Brad, moved up to AK at the end of January! We are so glad he is here! Andrea, his wife, will be moving up at the end of March. As you can see Levi has thoroughly been enjoying Brad's company! He loves his uncle "Bad". With all the males in the house I am feeling a little outnumbered-hurry up Andrea!