tag i'm it

darilyn tagged me, so let's see what i can come up with.

1) four jobs i've had:

• personal trainer at 24 hour fitness
• physical therapy assistant at IHC
• polynesian model at PCC (i'm in hundreds of japanese tourists pictures! haha)
• lori's kitchen food seller

2) four movies i can watch anytime:

• pride and prejudice (6 hour) didn't i watch it with you merilee and darilyn??
• 13 going on 30
• sound of music
• bourne identity

3) four places i have lived:

• newport beach, ca
• laie, hi
• del rio, tx
• beaverton, or

4) four tv shows i love: (this is difficult, seeing as we don't have a tv, but if we did i think i would watch these four. no, correction, i know i would for sure watch the first 2 listed!)

• 24 (i know i would watch these since we watch each season after they are out on dvd in about 4 days staright!)
• the office (watched all of these on dvd, too! hillarious!)
• csi
• probably some hgtv or discovery channel show???

5) four foods i love:

• anything my dad cooks
• sauteed string beans with pork (malia makes the best)
• mitch's macaroni grill bread with his flank steak/lemon chicken
• caramel brownies

6) four websites i visit daily:

• my blog and my friends blogs
• comcast.net
• library website (to make sure i don't have anything overdue, i've been really bad the past few months racking up overdue fines, and to see if any of my requested items have arrived)
• craigslist (not daily, but i do like to look)

7) four places i'd rather be visiting:

• my family in newport beach (i'll be there in 4 days!!)
• fiji
• my sister, if she were in hawaii (she'll be going back in august)
• victoria, bc just me and mitch (i loved that trip!)

8) four people i tag:

• malia
• terri
• rachel
• heidi

hallelujah!

i just checked the weather for phoenix, az for today and tomorrow (we're headed down there today) and the high for today is 97 and tomorrow 's high is 96!! maybe we will be okay. no triple digits! we were worried that our air conditioner wouldn't be able to cool our rig enough in 110 (or higher) degree weather. we may have picked the best weekend to stay in chandler (outside of phoenix). yipee!

they couldn't do it!

so, my dad just called me and the dhl people couldn't get the camera to my parents house until tuesday! that won't work!!!! but what can you do???

however, my awesome dad said i could take his camera to sea world! and though i am a camera snob, my dad's camera is two or three models higher than mine. i just hope it's not too fancy for me to figure out!!

i love my family!!

how could i?

today, we traveled from albuquerque, nm to flagstaff, az. about halfway into our trip we stopped in gallup, nm to make some sandwiches for dinner and for a diaper change/potty break. in the parking lot of the truck stop there was this cute stagecoach that had "gallup, nm" painted on it and the girls were playing in it. i saw this and my blogging brain kicked in and i thought, "that would make a great picture for our road trip!" in that same moment i got this sick feeling in the pit of my stomach, "where is the camera?" i didn't even have to look for it, i just knew that it was not with us in the truck or the trailer. sure enough, after a quick search there was no camera to be found.

sick at the thought that we left it back in albuquerque, i began making phone calls. then, it just came to me. i knew exactly where it was. i had left it in the bedroom that we stayed in at the worthen's house. and, of course, luck would have it, that they left today for a trip to utah. ahhhhh! what was i to do??! i cannot survive the rest of our trip without the camera, i already have over 700 pictures on the sd card and we are only halfway through our trip! i love my camera so much and i would not be able to use anything else! i'm a bit of a camera snob!

thankfully, my sister is living in albuquerque for the summer. so, i called her up to see if she could go into the house using the hide a key and get the camera. her husband was in the area and was able to go by the house and, sure enough, he found it exactly where i knew i had left it.

now that it has been found we need to get it to us before we go to sea world on tuesday. so, tomorrow morning malia, my angel sister whom i love soo much, is going to have to overnight the camera to my parents in newport beach. then, my mom, who is coming down monday to stay with us in san diego so she can go with us to sea world, will have to bring it with her. hopefully, she won't have to wait too long monday to get it from the dhl guy so she can join us.

crazy, crazy! i sure hope it all works out! i could just kick myself for being so distracted to leave the camera, of all things! i mean, up until this morning, the thing has practically grown attached to me!

malia and stuart, you are my camera saviors and i love you so much! thank you, thank you, thank you!! i owe you big time!!

i guess arizona will just have to be a memory in mind and not in picture! i guess i could use nani's $50 digital camera, but like i said before, i am a camera snob and the pictures would not be good enough! but i guess bad pictures are better than no pictures??! hmmm, i'm not sure i am convinced!

so, those of you waiting for pictures will have to wait even longer. mitch, so thoughtfully just said, "sunday would have been the perfect day to download pictures and post them." thanks for that, mitch! just addin' salt to the wound!

learning the hard way

we are staying at a friends house last night and tonight here in albuquerque, new mexico. this morning, nani was playing with a blender that she found in her bedroom. mitch and i both asked her to stop and told her it was not a toy. 2 seconds latter she pushes the button again. very sternly, mitch tells her to put it back where she got it and not to play with it again.

fast forward to tonight...

she finds the blender again and pushes the button. i reminder her that it is not a toy and to stop touching it. this was all happening as the girls were supposed to be getting ready for bed, of which lala was doing very well. so, i was in the bathroom helping lala finish brushing her teeth. we finish and go back into their room and nani hurries out to go rinse and spit. she comes back into the bedroom crying with a bloody finger, "mommie, i'm bleeding. i need a band-aid!"

"what happened? did you scratch it on something in the bathroom?"

"i don't know, it just is bleeding! i need a band-aid!"

"how did it happen?"

"i don't remember! i need a band-aid! it hurts!"

so, we go clean it and bandage it up. nani goes back into her room. i go out into the living room to chat with our friends and i hear nani just bawling in the bedroom. i figure she is just still crying about her hurt fiinger. but the crying continues on and on. lala tells me she wants to go to bed, so i carry her into the bedroom and nani is sitting on her bed looking terribly dejected. she looks up at me through her lashes and bawls, "mommie, i am so sorry!"

"about what?"

"i did something you asked me not to do and i hurt me fingers!"

"what's that?"

"i was playing with the blender and i heard you coming. so, i tried to stop the spinning with my fingers and it cut me!"

ouwwwwee!!

hmmmm!? maybe i should listen to mommie and daddy! what do you think?

lesson learned!

mastercard commercial

monday, july 23

fishing license: $9

container of worms: $5

pontoon boat for 2 hours: $97

hearing your 3 year old praying, "thank you that we could go on the boat today. thank you that we could swim in the lake and have so much fun!": priceless

thirty-four

my dear, sweet mitch turned 34 today! so, in honor of him, i want to make a list. i love lists! this one is for the 34 reasons i loved him then and still love him now! this is for you sweetheart, in no particular order:

1. your laughter
2. i was a better person whenever we were together
3. you were the answer to my prayer
4. you said, "mahina, i adore you!" what girl doesn't want to be adored!
5. when you propsed, you repeatedly told me, "this music box was REALLY expensive!" and the whole time i'm thinking, "so, what, you want to take it back?"
6. you cared about everybody, not just me
7. you had a VERY fast bike and when i asked if i could go for a ride you said, "I only have one rule. you gotta hold on REALLY tight!" and i think i managed just fine!
8. hiking the narrows, canoeing provo river, housebaoting lake powell, camping
9. you were very sly, yet confident; the "unplanned/spur-of-the-moment", that's disputable, first date to macaroni grill, the hand on the leg under the blanket across the campfire from the guy i was dating. boy, you sure know how to send a girls mind into turmoil, i didn't sleep a wink that night.
10. the narrows, "looks good to me!"
11. your testimony that you shared after the lake powell trip
12. your incredible blue eyes
13. you took me to the temple
14. you told me, more than once, "if i were you i'd fall in love with me!" persistence, that is a great quality!
15. you are respectful and honorable
16. you're a funny guy
17. you encourage me to pursue the things that i have a passion for
18. you are an awesome daddy to our three girls
19. you are incredibly patient, such an example to me
20. you think i am funny
21. "it's your face that is funny to me!"
22. you sing lullabies to the girls
23. you go to the gym and workout so you are strong and healthy.
24. you got some big guns! the nurse needs the xtra large blood pressure cuff for you! hehe!
25. you cook dinner every sunday
26. i want to be a better person because of you
27. you can fix anything, and if you don't know how, you will find out how and then fix it
28. you want to buy land and build a house together (hopefully it will be very soon)
29. you ran with me even though you hate running, though it was a bit deceiving ;-), i still enjoyed it
30. you let the girls work with you on whatever project you are doing, even though it would go a lot faster if they didn't "help"
31. you built a crib for nani, a bonus room for our family, a playhouse with a slide for the girls, and a beautiful yard for us to enjoy
32. you have a good sense of humor and patience for my blogging addiction
33. you helped me through three drug free childbirths, i NEVER could have done it without your help!!
34. you are my best friend and i love you!

here's celebrating my love and gratitude for your wonderful 34 years, of which i have been a part of 8 of them.

catch up, part 3 golfing in 100 degrees

the day after the water park at cherry hill, we had to check out by 11:00 am. so, before we checked out and before it got too hot we took the girls mini golfing at cherry hill. we only had about 30 minutes to do it, so we did about 9 holes. it was funny to watch the golfing styles progress and evolve as the temperature rised and the sun beat down hotter. here is what we saw:

NANI:

the wind up



the follow through



the well deserved and needed break in the shade



notice how red and sweaty her face was?! it was 100 degrees by 10:30 that day!



LALA:

what great putting form!



this heat is just too much for lala



forget the golf club, this rolling thing works much better!



this one looks fun!



maybe it will work better if i get closer!



KAWENA:

now this is the way to go golfing!


i'm happy!



ahhh, the heat wore her out! nice drool!



that's gonna leave a kink in the neck!



p.s. sorry again about the sideways picures!

catch up, part 2 the lazy river

this, by far, was the favorite place for our girls at the water park! cherry hill is a pretty small water park. they pretty much have the lazy river, a inner tube rapid ride, and a kiddie area. again, lala loved the rapids ride and nani just wanted to float in the safe, non-threatening lazy river. we got nani to agree to going on the rapids ride twice, but it was with some protest. the first time lala went on the rapids ride with me, i think i was more nervous than she was, that she might fall out and get held under the water. and sure enough she did fall out of her inner tube, but she came up laughing and wanting more. i swear, that girl is a thrill seeker that has no fear! she adds spice to our lives, that is for sure!



kawena enjoyed the lazy river, too and even took a nap while floating along with mitch and the girls. she was also just as content to sit on the grass in the cool shade and eat grass.

that night we went to visit with one of my old roommates, amanda and her cute family. it had been a year since we had last seen each other and it was so good to be with her again. the girls had great fun playing with her kids and making a mess of themselves playing in the sawdust in their basement that is being remodeled. i just had to remind myself, "hey, we're on vacation! it doesn't matter that they are filthy, they're enjoying themselves!" we stayed pretty late and when we got home that night, nani was exhausted. on her way to the bathroom to get her toothbrush she didn't quite make it and fell asleep on the step.



now, that is a sign of a great day!

note: okay i just looked at my post and my pictures are sideways! ahhhh! this is going to make me crazy! i want my compuer back!! this will have to do for now, i will fix it when i get home!! lame!!

catch up, part 1: arriving at cherry hill

i am beginning the attempt of going back and blogging about our vacation. there was about two or three weeks when we didn't have internet access, so i was unable to post anything about our trip. we had so much fun and so much happened during that time that i want to write about it. the task just seems huge. so, i am going to go back and write about it in little snipits, as time permits.

way back at the beginning of our trip i wrote about how wonderfully our trip started (grizwold summer vacation), well since then things have gone much better!

on day 3, thursday july 12th, we finally pulled into the cherry hill rv resort in utah at about 11 pm. we were exhausted from driving ALL day, and i mean all day (we left at 7 am), from pendelton, oregon. mitch waned to get an early start to try and make it to kaysville that day/night, and to bet the heat. so he got up at 6 am and hooked up the trailer while we all slept. he pulled us out at 7 am, while we still slept. the girls didn't get up until 8:30 am. we had some breakfast in the trailer while mitch drove. things were going pretty well until the trailer started warming up (we can't run the ac while driving) and we began to drive through the curvy mountains. i was the first one to start feeling a little queasy. about 5 minutes later i hear, "mommie, my tummy hurts!" from nani who had been laying down at the dinnette. i inform mitch, via the two-way radio, that we are going to have to pull over and move us up into the truck. however, being that we were in the mountains, there was nowhere to pull over. so mitch let us know that we had to keep driving until the next off ramp.

meanwhile, i go digging through the cupboards in search of some good "just in case" bowls for nani and me. i grab a stack of 3 bowls, keep one for myself, give one to nani and the third one i just leave on the couch next to me. so, there we are, nani and i trying our best to keep our breakfast in our stomachs, kawena, thank goodness, was sleeping, and then there's lala. i look up to see her with the extra bowl on her head as she says, big grin on her face, "look mommie, it's a hat!" i guess she got the iron stomach! i tried my best to encourage her joyful discovery, while trying my hardest not to vomit on her.

i am happy to report that we didn't see our breakfast again that morning. once we were up in the truck, in the cool air conditioning, able to look out the front window, we felt great! we reached our trip high that day of 106 degrees, so it was agood thing we were inside the truck and not the trailer. it was a hot day and a very long drive, but the girls were troopers and incredibly great travellers! i credit part of it to the portable dvd players we got right before we left on our trip. they are heaven sent, especially since it was against the law to ride in the trailer while in idaho, utah, and new mexico.

it was such a relief to finally reach our destination that night (we were supossed to have arrived on wednesday afternoon. we had reservations and everything), and we looked forward to the activities planned for the next day....

the cherry hill water park!!

trip quotes and such, thus far

on day two of our trip:
nani: "daddy, i have a secret for you."
mitch: "what's that?"
nani: "i'm not having very much fun on our trip."
mitch: "ahhh, why is that?"
nani: "because i am always sweaty!"
it has been in the high 90's and low 100's our whole trip! so, that night mitch took the girls to the indoor pool at the casino hotel by the wildhorse rv park we were staying at. she's had fun ever since!

on day four while eating breakfast right before going to the water park:
lala: "we've all got sooo much to do today! go swimming, go down slides, and do the dishes."

during our lunch break from the water park, we noticed that the grapes had fermented in the heat of the previous days long journey!

today, day six:
nani: "daddy, there is a small motherboard in this dvd player."
boy, that made mitch proud!! his six year old knows what a motherboard is and can recognize it in the dvd player!

lala (during her second potty stop of the day, 20 minutes after her first potty stop):
"mommie, i pushed out ALL of the water so daddy won't be mad!"
10 minutes later we hear from the backseat: "i need to go tinkles, but i can hold it."
mitch and i just laughed. at least we don't have to drive to the nearest gas station, we can just pull over on the side of the road and go in the fifth wheel!

the grizwold's summer vacation

greetings from the very hot city of moab, ut. can i just say that i have been anxious for an internet connection since day one! mitch says that i have been twitching for the lack of the means to blog. well, i chose this rv park because they have free wi-fi internet and here i am. i can feel the twitching beginning to subside!

grizwold family vacation?? for those of you familiar with the grizwold family, national lampoon's christmas vacation, will know what i mean. well, things didn't get off to a very good start and on the night of the second day mitch said, "i wonder what will go wrong tomorrow. i'm beginning to feel like the grizwold's."

as you read on my last post, we left a day later than we had originally planned because of all of the house preparations. not only did we leave a day later than planned we also left several hours later than we wanted to. we were supposed to leave at 7 am on tuesday, but ended up pulling out at about 3 pm, only to have wait in line for 45 minutes at the dmv to get the fifth wheel registered. before leaving, however, we discover that the batteries were dead on the fifth wheel. so, after hooking up to the truck, mitch had to manually crank the electric jacks in 103 degree weather. "i'm sure glad i just showered!", he said as he cranked away, while sweat dripped from his head.

after registering the fifth wheel, we headed off to camping world only to miss the off ramp. once there, we purchased 2 new batteries. the girls and i, then, sat on a curb in the hot parking lot (remember 103 degrees) eating melted snacks, while mitch installed the batteries.

with that task completed, we took off in the direction of I-84 right after 5 pm, which, of course, is rush hour, and yes there was an accident which slowed things down considerable. we finally just gave up on our original plan of stopping in pendleton and pulled into an rv park in the dalles at 8 pm. for those of you that don't know where the dalles are in relation to beaverton, it is a whole, whoppin' 90 miles away! we spent the next 2 hours organizing ourselves, since the night before we just put our things in the trailer not having time to organize them. because it had been a record breaking hot day, the trailer was about 95 degrees inside when we got in. after hooking up to the electric and starting the air conditioner it finally cooled off to a comfortable temperature by about 11 pm.

the next morning, after driving about 100 miles, mitch walkie talkied me in the back, "uhh, i'm pulling over. there's something wrong with the brakes." the brake light and the abs light on the dash were both on and the brakes were feeling weird when mitch pushed down on them. so, on our second day we made it to pendleton, or. we called the dodge dealer in pendleton to see if they could take a look at it and the said the soonest they could see us was the next day at 3 pm. ugh!!

with some faith and prayer and a mighty miracle, the next morning at 7 am we pulled out of the rv park in pendleton with both brake and abs lights off and a perfectly functioning truck. that day was extremely long! we had to make up for lost time and by 11:30 that night we pulled into the cherry hill rv resort in kaysville, ut, where we had reservations for wed. and thurs. night (we obviously had to cancel the reservations for wed.). since then, our luck has changed!

our girls have been amazingly good! thanks, in part, to a wonderful little device called a dual screen dvd player that we bought for the drives through idaho, utah, and new mexico where we cannot ride in the fifth wheel. we've enjoyed some miniature golfing, a fun day at the water park, a night at the pool, and good visits with friends in utah. things are looking up!! and tomorrow we arrive at mitch's grandma's cabin in colorado for an extended stay. then on friday, i will pick up my sister in albuquerque to drive her up to stay for 5 days with us at the cabin. oh, i can't wait to be with her again! we plan to go baoting and horseback riding while she is with us! fun times!

and we're off! a day later than planned, but, hey, we are on vacation, who's in a hurry???!!

r and r here we come!!

the sign

the sign is officially up! the girls and i just watched as they put the for sale sign up in our yard! this is really happening!

random late night ramblings

why am i still up?! one might think that i would be off in dreamland since this week has been a whirlwind of cleaning, and painting, and boxing things up, and trips to the newly acquired storage unit, and trips to the dump, and more cleaning, and dejunking, and late nights trying to get it all done before we take off on our trip.

well, since yesterday was sunday, a day of rest, that is what i did all afternoon. i laid down for a nap at 2:15 and the next thing i knew it is 6:15. WOW! did that feel awesome!! so, now i am too rested to sleep. i have a hard time getting to sleep on days when i get the luxury of a nap. but i'm not complaining (talk to me tomorrow and i may feel differently when i am trying to pack up the rv and make sure the house is in perfect order. i may be tired then!)

what better thing to do than blog when i can't sleep at night! so, this may be a rambling blog, but my brain is fried from all the work we have been doing.

i was thinking today, during my waking hours, how much Heavenly Father has blessed us this week. the week has been crazy and hectic, no doubt, but there have been many little things that i know have been because He is watching over us. here are just some of the little blessings that i have noticed this past week:

• kawena has been an excellent napper. she usually is a great napper,but she has been taking exceptionally long naps this week which frees up my time to do more
• the girls have gotten along really well and have been able to entertain each other throughout the day. they have required less referring and supervision than normal
• our neighbor, elizabeth has invited nani and lala over to play several times for several hours at a time (boy, how i'll miss having you down the street!)
• we got the last available storage unit in the size we wanted at the location we wanted
• the weather has been beautiful for being outdoors
• we've been able to do a lot more than i thought possible on very little sleep
• sarah smith invited us over to their home for a "have a great time on your sabbatical" bbq, which meant i didn't have to make dinner that night
• the house is looking great
• the girls have been extremely understanding and patient with us as we have spent most of every day busy doing our things and not playing as much with them as we should
• we called a landscaper on friday to see if they could landscape a small section of our driveway and amzingly they were able to come by on saturday to get started
• we had a broken window that needed to be fixed and they said it would not be done until monday, but it was finished on friday
• we killed another mole in the trap, that makes two total. the little buggers
  

last sunday, in preparation for the week mitch and i made individual lists of what needed to be done before we could list our home and before we could leave on our trip. those lists have not been far from our grasp all week! well, today as we reviewed what was left to do mitch asked me, "do you think we should frame these lists as a reminder that we should always keep our house seller ready? that way we don't have to go through this again next time!" well, we won't be framing them, but we will definately keep them as a reminder of the things to do on a regualr basis and we will refer to them often! i wish our house had looked this good all along! i used to make fun of people when they would fix their houses up all nice right before they sold it. i always wondered why they didn't do all the fixing up at the beginning so that they could enjoy it more! well, now i joke with mitch because we became one of those people i made fun of!

======================================================

kawena has begun to pull herself up on things this week. mitch had to move her crib mattress down for the first time on tuesday because she was starting to pull herself up everytime we came in to get her out. here are some pictures i took tonight of her fine tuning her newfound talent:

okay, well i am going to try and get some sleep now. i am beginning to feel a little sleepy.

welcome to our beautiful home!

welcome to the virtual tour of our home! i know many of you have been to our house, but for those of you who never have, this is a glimpse at our "heaven on earth" (from the hymn, "home can be a heaven on earth". some days it is heaven and others...well let's just say we try!)! we love our home and will be sad to leave it. when we moved in, our plan was to live here for 5 years and we are coming up on 7 in this house! it is time to move on.

move on to what? you might say?! well, that is the big mystery. we are taking a HUGE leap of faith in putting our house on the market without any plans beyond selling it. but we both feel that everything will work out. we know that selling right now is what we need to be doing at this point, and we know that the rest will just fall into place.

so, come with me for a walk through or lovely home...

we will start at the logical place, the front yard and the front door:


come through our front door into our great room (let me tell you, it is "great", look at that view! and we love the vaulted ceilings with the skylight. when we moved here to oregon i was VERY concerned about the grey, overcast, drizzly weather. so, when we were picking out all of the carpeting and counter tops, etc. [it was new construction when we bought it] i wanted EVERYTHING to be light and bright. so, as we "walk" through the house, you'll notice the carpet is white, there are a bunch of windows and skylights! light and bright was the goal and i think we accomplished the effect quite well!):

the view from upstairs:

from the great room, i'll take you into the breakfast nook:

*side note: i just need to brag about my husband. when we moved in, the nook had carpet in it, ummm hello!!?? why do they think carpet is a good idea in an eating area??? i'll never know. anyway, sure enough after two kids and several years we had chocolate milk stains and popsicle stains and spaghetti sauce stains, and...and...well, you get the picture! so, last year, my mr. handy husband tore out the nasty carpet and put in this beautiful hardwood floor! much more practical and easier to clean up after the inevitable spills! i love you mitch!

and into the kitchen:

now, down the hall into our favorite room of the house, the bonus room. we estimate that we spend a good 70% of our time at home in this room.

the reasons:

• it has the toys
  
• it has the computer (we don't own a tv, so this also doubles as the dvd player)
  
• it has a view
  
• it has a wood burning stove for those 9 months a cold, rainy weather. it is by far the toastiest room on the winter days!
  
• it's huge

*okay, i must admire my husband, yet again! when we moved into the house this bonus room wasn't here. through this door was the garage, the garage with a 20 foot ceiling. yea! total waste of space! so, my wonderful husband got this great idea of putting a floor halfway up the garage and actually using the space as a bonus room. so, my dad, who is an architect drew up the plans. the week nani was born, mitch took time off from work to "help" with the baby, but he actually started working on building the bonus room above the garage. thanks to help from tutu man (architect) and grandpa (electrical engineer) we finished the room in a little over a year, adding 400 sq. ft. to our home!

and the view from the bonus room window!! love it!

now, let me take you back through the kitchen and nook, out the sliding door to the back yard:
notice the lovely, blue hydrangeas! (my new favorite flower, see my 100)

we take great pride in our backyard because we put about 2+ years of very hard work into getting it how it is right now. when we moved in, as with most new construction, the backyard was not landscaped. in our case, that meant that our backyard was a steep slope covered in ivy and blackberry bushes. fun! it remained that way until after the bonus room was complete and i believe we started chipping away at the yard before lala was born, back in 2002.

first, we ripped out the ivy and cut down three trees. then, we brought a back hoe into the back and moved the dirt from one side of the slope to the other, that way, we could terrace it so it would be flat. next, we had to build three retaining walls. i got very strong that year carrying the 100 pound blocks from the front of the house to the back of the house! last we did the landscaping.

as a special treat for the girls, last summer mitch, along with help from grandpa and tutu man, built this cute playhouse for the girls. it was built complete with a back deck and a yellow slide (funny thing about the slide: we were too cheap to pay the extra $100 at home depot for the longer slide a whole extra 2 feet. let me tell you, that is one fast and STEEP slide. we've had several kids, unknowingly, fly down that thing and never want to go on it again! hmmm, wonder why!? our girls have figured a way to slow themselves down and they love it!).

and the steps down to the lower yard:



phew! we made it. i didn't take you upstairs because that is just where the bedrooms are. actually, here is a picture of nani and lala's room, it was super fun painting it, though, it took some persuading to convince mitch to let me do a purple room! on the border i wrote "happy" words and drew little dragonflies and flowers. then i made a quilt for each of them with dragonflies and flowers that matched the colors on the walls:

so, there you have it, our little piece of heaven.

we signed the papers with our realtor on saturday and the for sale sign is supposed to arrive tomorrow. then on tuesday, as we are, hopefully, pulling away in our rv, she will put it on the market. we're praying for a quick sale!

i will keep you posted as things progress!

fun with fireworks

we are able to take a well deserved break from our home beautification projects to enjoy good company and some fireworks this 4th of july. our neighbors, the dimit's, invited us over for a bbq and fireworks.

our week has been filled up with pressure washing the house, roof, gutters, walkways, and windows on the outside, and scrubbing, touch-up painting, cleaning out closets on the inside, all in preparation to place our home on the market to sell. on top of all of this, we have been trying to get ready for our sabbatical trip which we have pushed back til tuesday, instead of monday. our poor girls have been so good about entertaining themselves while we have been busy, busy, busy. we look forward to pulling out in the fifth wheel in a few more days and leaving the house behind to, hopefully, sell! we finally decided on a realtor and she will be coming over saturdayy afternoon to sign papers and take pictures of the house (i hope to get some pictures of the house, so stay-tuned for a "virtual tour" of our home), then it will go on the market monday!

this is the reason i am so late posting these pictures from the 4th of july, i really should be sleeping right now, but i wanted to post some fun pictures i took on wednesday night. i've never been able to get very good fireworks pictures. i need to learn how to use my camera better for those types of shots. i did play around a bit and got some pretty cool shots. so here are some of my favorites:

sparklers are always a favorite. they were always my favorite as a kid, that and the snakes!

kawena is getting a different perspective on the fireworks, here. in fact, the fireworks didn't even really phase her. she wasn't scared, but she didn't seem overly impressed either, just a bit indifferent. however, it was way past her bedtime, and she kind of skipped her afternoon nap. she was a trooper, though!

evidence that i was there, just kickin' back, relaxing, and enjoying the show!

some things that i am grateful for this fourth of july are:

• beautiful, sunny weather
• seeing the girls run around in their swimsuits playing on the neighbors slip and slide and then later in the afternoon playing in the pool at our other neighbors house
• a very, very hard working husband
• getting our house all cleaned up and appreciating what a beautiful home we have
• a yard with green trees, green grass, and colorful flowers
• a wonderful realtor
• seeing the american flag blowing in the breeze
• elizabeth, who has had our girls over to play everyother day this week so they can have fun while mitch and i work
• patient girls
• our freedom
• kawena's smile and noisy talking
• climbing into bed at night after crossing many things off on my list of thing to do
• anticipating 8 weeks of having mitch around and not having him go to work
• making memories

pump it up!

today we were invited to a pump it up playdate. i had never heard of it before, but boy was it a blast for the kids. for those of you, like me, who have never heard of them before, pump it up is a company who has wearhouse's with a bunch of big inflatable slides and bounce houses, etc. for kids to play on. you pay a fee per child and they can go play for an hour at a time. when i learned what it was i thought it was an ingeneous idea! what child doesn't love the big inflatable toys at the carnival!

there were about a dozen friends there playing around and us moms just socialized. it was a great time for all! here are some fun pictures that i took of the kids:

it was hard to get the girls in focus because the slides were so steep and they were just flyin' down them!

maia's face pretty much sums up the general emotion shared by all of the kids. they were in high, bouncin' heaven!

even the mom's were having a great time!

these last two pictures are my favorites. these past few days nani and lala have been getting along very well and they are being extra nice and sweet towards each other. these next two pictures show that sweetness. i love it so much when my girls consider one other friends.

they were both thirsty so they went together to get a drink.

i snapped this picture as the girls were climbing the steps to the top of the slide,
this hand hold just about melts my heart!!

pretty singing voice

mitch told me a funny story about lala the other day that i wanted to put down in writing. i tell you, that girl is a hoot to have around, but she can also be a challenge. (the hoot, definately, makes it worth the challenge, though!)

it was mitch's turn to tuck the girls into bed and they asked him to sing songs for them. lala told him that she wanted him to sing "lullaby" (that is what we call "mary's lullaby" from the children's hymnbook). then she thought for a moment and said, "but you have to have a pretty voice to sing it daddy, and you don't have a pretty voice! so, you can't sing it!" so, he didn't sing it because she wouldn't let him!

9 WEEKS!!!!!

well, last friday was mitch's last day of work for 9 WEEKS!! how awesome is that? we are beside ourselves with joy! he doesn't start his 8 week sabbatical until july 9th, but he decided to take this week off too! we have lots to do before we leave for our adventure on the 9th. so, while we are extremely excited, we are also a bit concerned that we won't get everything done in time to pull out in the rv.

you see, we are putting our house on the market to sell. i am excited that we won't be here while it's on the market because then i don't have to stress out everyday about keeping the house clean enough to have someone come over at a moments notice to walk through our home. it will be one less thing to add to my already hectic days. we have been meeting with different realtors and hope to have picked one by tuesday. then, it is just a matter of cleaning up and getting a storage unit for some of our stuff and making it look fab-u-lous! the input we've had so far from realtors is that it looks great inside and out , and it will sell (but don't you think they tell that to all of their prospective clients?? hmmm??) it makes us relieved that we don't have to do a total overhaul to get the house show-ready, but we still want to finish a few things before we leave.

it's kind of sad to be selling our first home. i mean, when we moved in we had no children, now we have 3 little girls! we have put soooo much work into making this house our home and we love it! but when we bought it we told ourselves we would live in it for 5 years and we are coming up on 7 years now. it is time! sniff-sniff!

so, if you know anyone that is wanting to buy a beautiful house on a green space (super private) in our area send them our way!! ;-) i had to put in a little plug!!

anyway, we are all very excited to have mitch around for 9 weeks of no work (that's job work, we'll be working around the house for the next week, but after that....relaxation and building memories here we come!!) and all play! we look forward to the 9th of july. woohoo!