Visitors to Washington/ 11 Months!

Last week my sister and her husband and their four kiddos came to Washington to visit.  I can’t express how ecstatic this made me as it is getting old to be in a distant land far far away from friends and family. We had a week full of fun and exploration. Devin had to work most of the time but was lucky enough to get an unexpected day off due to some last minute vacation plans made by the doctors. Because Devin wasn’t there for a lot of our activities out and about, it was up to me to figure out how to haul around the two yahoos for all-day outings that would overlap their naptimes and eating times. This was a first for me as I am very anal strict about keeping them to a schedule because once off of the schedule, their eating times and nap times don’t match up with each other. Trouble and chaos follow. I did have a ton of help from my sister, her husband, and their kids who were more than willing to help out but I was trying (and hopefully succeeded) in avoiding using them too much so they could enjoy their family vacation together. And I think it all worked out! 
Here we are at the Ballard Locks, which provides a link between the Puget Sound a big lake.  Super cool to watch the boats come in and see the water level adjust to raise or lower them.  

We also went to a park where the boys experienced their first ride on the swings! They loved it!

The park also had a free petting zoo:
 
We went Strawberry picking and even got to  ride out to the Strawberry fields on a trailer pulled by a tractor.



The strawberry fields were the one place that I really felt like I failed at the single parent business. I was trying to pick strawberries, take pictures, and keep the boys from picking their own handful of ripe (or not) strawberries and eating the dirt clods. As you can see, Nathan got hold of a strawberry, proceeded to pulverize it with his hands (in good Nathan fashion) and then wipe it on his pants. And then before I could stop it, he went on to the dirt clods. However, I succeeded in taking pictures of it:


We ended up with 17lbs of Strawberries and ate every single one of them!


On Devin’s day off, we went in to Seattle and took a ride on a ferry:


And we went to the top of the Space Needle (overrated considering the price! $$$)

We went to the Zoo, and I hardly took any pictures. Lame.

My niece celebrated her 6th birthday while they were here so I decided to try my hand at a fondant cake and it was bit more complicated than I expected (I was addicted to the show Cake Boss and they make it look easy!), and I ended up spray painting the fondant instead of using food coloring (not sure if that was better or harder).. I think it’ll be a while before I try it again, but the taste was yum. One half was white cake with strawberry frosting, the other half was chocolate on chocolate. She likes butterflies and pink and purple, so here’s what she got. It’s a little asymmetrical, but hey, I was going for the asymetrical realism that is found in nature ;)


It was such a fun week to have them all here, and my sister has decided to come back with the kids for two weeks right before we move!  I am looking forward to having some good times with them and having some people to keep me company :)

On June 23rd the boys turned 11 months old! I cannot believe it. I will soon have one year old babies. Insane. Here are the soccer ball pics:
Nathan has picked up waving. I don’t think he knows what it means necessarily, so he’ll wave at us, the lights, at his food, and at the tv. He is getting better at crawling and has even started pulling himself up on to things. Sometimes he’ll still crawl with a pirate peg leg type of crawl, but is definitely getting the “tradition” crawl down. He eats anything we put in front of him and I think he is starting to prefer solids over a bottle. He has his top two teeth in now. At his last orthotic appointment (almost 3 weeks ago), we were told that he will probably grow out of his helmet by his appointment on the July 6th and will either need a new one, or if things look good he’ll be done. I’m thinking he’ll need a new one as his head shape is looking a ton better but I think we have more to go.  He loves chasing after the soccer ball with his brother and loves it when Cameron laughs with him.
Cameron has learned the new trick of clicking with his tongue. Devin made the noise one night while we were eating and Cameron tried it out for himself. I think he was pretty proud when he was able to do it. Every time he does it now he smiles to himself. He is pulling himself up on everything and has even figured out how to climb the stairs.  Cameron loves “helping” putting the dishes away from the dishwasher and has to be front and center any time the dishwasher is open. He is a super crawler and will charge across the floor any time he locks on to a toy he wants. Cameron loves to laugh and will laugh at all of Nathan’s funny noises.