Fire Department Annual Safety Fair

Jacob and I attended the annual safety fair at the fire station today. Andrew wanted to come too, but he was too sick to leave the house, so Emily stayed home with him. Jacob had a great time learning about fire safety and trying out some of the firefighters' equipment.
Jacob was a great shot with the fire hose.
They had several fire and police vehicles on hand for the kids to see. Here Jacob is standing next to a police dirt bike. He also got to sit in the police car.
One of the coolest vehicles was the firetruck. It was full of cool equipment and gadgets. They also had balloons, snacks, and a bouncy house. Here Jacob is getting a firetruck painted on his face.
Jacob got to meet Smokey the Bear, who was there to promote fire safety and the prevention of forest fires.
The firefighters demonstrated their life-saving tools by ripping apart an old car. They pulled off the doors and then cut off the roof.
Jacob had a great time and didn't want to leave. --Kelly

Easter Morning Family Photo

I enjoy coordinating my family's clothes for church as often as I can, and Easter is no exception, so I set up the tripod to capture the darling outfits I bought them this year. I handed Andrew the camera remote to take a few family pictures. He enjoyed the responsibility. When I uploaded the pictures to my computer he announced with excitement, "Those are my pictures." The majority of the pictures turned out silly, but I love them all! --emily

Enjoying the Sun

After dying Easter eggs with Grandma and Grandpa Mark, we all decided to get out and enjoy the sunny weather. We headed over to Coulon Park to have some fun on the waterfront.

Our first stop was Ivar’s, where ate fish n’ chips while watching all the boats.
As I walked down the dock with Andrew, people kept asking if we were twins.
We had gotten the boys new Spiderman sunglasses earlier in the day. In this picture, Andrew is lifting his sunglasses to get a better look at the boats.
Jacob and Andrew had fun digging in the sand on the beach. Jacob met some other boys who were also digging. He helped them dig a big moat and let it fill with lake water. He had so much fun he didn’t want to leave. --Kelly

Coloring Eggs

After the neighborhood Easter egg hunt, we went to Grandma and Grandpa Mark’s house to color Easter eggs with the cousins. This is another one of our annual Easter traditions.

Jacob found some alternative uses for the wire egg dippers. They make handy eye glasses. . .
. . . they can also be used as antennas.
The boys did a great job with the dye. No clothes were stained this year.
Andrew took a break from coloring to sample one of the eggs.

It’s always fun to celebrate holidays with friends and family. --Kelly

On An Egg Hunt

One of our favorite Easter traditions is the annual neighborhood Easter egg hunt held at Azalea Park. Our friend started this tradition a while back and facilitates the activity each year.

The weather was so nice we couldn't help but just hang out! Jacob was playing on the play equipment. Andrew sat in the bark eating his candy and organizing his eggs.

Jacob and Andrew had a great time hunting for eggs and basking in the sun.

After our walk home we sat in the front yard and Jacob showed me his egg contents. This egg was his favorite. It had a small fuzzy chick in it. --emily

Zoo

Jacob’s pre-school class took a field trip to the zoo. Andrew and I came along for the fun. The boys had a great time running around with their friends and seeing all the fun animals. The weather was nice so lots of the animals were out basking in the sun. It was a good day for the zoo! Jacob’s favorite animal was the Jaguar. Andrew’s favorite animal was the penguins.

Jacob was a great tour guide on this adventure. He did a great job reading the map, figuring out where we were and how to get to the next spot. Kelly enjoyed hearing about the boys' fun adventure that evening. I’m glad Jacob’s pre-school teacher plans such fun activities for the kids. --emily

Train Dinner with the Mayor

Snoqualmie city mayor Matt Larson treated the many city volunteers to a dinner aboard the Northwest Railway Museums’ antique train last week. Since I am on the Parks Board for the city, I was invited and got to bring the whole family. It was fun to be on the historic train again and see the beautiful sights of our city. We enjoyed mingling with some of our friends and neighbors who were also on the train. Mayor Larson was kind enough to pose with our family for this photo. --Kelly

What the Hail . . .

This week, Monday April 18th, we has two hail storms in one day. The first one was an afternoon hail storm with small bits, but the end result looked similar to this picture that was taken after the evening storm. The remnants of this storm were melted in less that thirty minutes. The second storm was in the early evening with thunder, lighting and quarter size hail. Roof tops were still covered in the morning because of the evening temperature drop.

Welcome to our Northwest bi-polar spring.

We are ready for some real spring/summer weather. --emily

T-Ball

Today was Jacob's first day of T-Ball practice. We walked to the field near our house to join the team for practice. Jacob was a little nervous at first, but warmed up quickly. The coach was such a nice guy and did a great job of explaining things to the kids.

Jacob enjoyed hitting the ball. He had great form and hit the ball almost every time. Today they started with whiffle balls and ended with a hard balls. Jacob had good confidence in this because Kelly and the boys often play a mini version of baseball in the alley. It was fun to see Jake relate this as a similar thing and use his skills today.

The kids also learned fielding skills today. They had a contest to see who could throw the ball the farthest and Jacob won. They also had a team race to see who could run the fastest around the bases two times and Jacob came in second. Jacob had a great time playing today and I had a fun time watching him. I Love that in this picture Jacob is chewing on his gum like a real baseball player. --emily

Tulips

This weekend we have our grandpa in town and he has always wanted to go and see the tulip festival up north. It is still a little early in the season, but we decided to go and check it out anyway. Grandpa is only in town for a couple of days, so Saturday morning we woke up and got dressed warmly in hopes that we could see some tulips before the weather was too wet and cold.

It was a bit muddy! But it was great fun for the boys. Andrew kept slipping in the mud and catching himself with his hands. Kelly had him rinse his hands in the deep muddy water to get clean, or less sloppy muddy! Good thing I brought a change of clothes:)

The flowers were amazing!

All the reports I read online said it was still a little early for tulips, but I am glad that we made the trip. If we had waited, we would have missed the daffodils! They were worth the drive. Grandpa enjoyed all the amazing flowers too. I am glad we went while he was in town.

As we were driving to find some good food to eat we came upon a field that had 10,000 white geese in it! Not that we counted them. What a amazing sight. There must have been something delicious in that grass. I was even brave enough to go in the field with them to take pictures. Yes, that is a big deal! When I was a little girl I was bitten on the bum by a goose. I blame it on the terry-cloth shorts I was waring at the time. Wearing jeans today I thought I would be okay. Sure enough I survived!

We ate dinner at this yummy restaurant, changed the boys into their jammies and headed home for the evening. It was a perfect day trip. I love a good day trip! --emily