{Gracias a Dios}: August 2008

Time To Shave?

I love the God given innocence we are created with. It is refreshing to be around my children who don't yet know the cruelty of sarcasm, and mean jokes. This morning I was snuggled in bed with Ryan and Tyler, while Anna was still asleep. I lifted one of my arms to rest under my head, Ryan sweetly sat up and said "Mommy, why do you have man hair in your armpit?" hahaha I started laughing SO hard! I explained that one day, he too would have "man hair" in his armpits and that men have longer hair, while women shave theirs and have short hair. He said "Oh- I can't wait to have man hair! When I get older I will get some." and went back to snuggling. :)

(For those of you wondering, I just shaved day before yesterday...it wasn't THAT hairy!) :)

Cute Kids!

Hi friends~

I haven't posted in a while and wanted to give a picture update of the kids. In a couple of the pictures, Anna is wearing a blue princess dress that was lent to us from some friends. She kept carrying it around and saying 'pretty!' the way Anna says it is 'titty.' :) Ahh, the humor in parenting. haha Ryan and Tyler are great big brothers, they are always watching out for their little sister. Very sweet. :)

Beautiful Anna, she is such a sweet girl.

Aaron and I got to go to a Jack Johnson concert earlier this week- so fun! I will post pictures soon!

The Talking Donkey

We survived our first week of opening our first business, The Talking Donkey. It has been an educational journey with a lot of ups and downs, but we made it! Opening day was Friday, August 1st. Karyn drove up to help me for the weekend so Aaron could be home with the kids- we had a lot of fun working together. We have an employee that works for us during the week, and I work at the stand on the weekends, while Aaron is home with the kids. Every time someone asks "How did you come up with The Talking Donkey?" a pang of excitement shoots through my body at the chance to say it's a story in the Bible. (Eph. 22) It has already been such a great opportunity to meet people from all walks of life and I have really enjoyed the conversations and relationships that have already formed. We are excited to see how God may use us and The Talking Donkey in the months to come, and how He will teach us how to better love others.
This past weekend, I took pictures of friends that stopped by the stand for coffee or a hot dog, we felt so supported by our cummunity. Thank you friends for stopping by!

Breaking Dawn

The long awaited book Breaking Dawn was finally released and I was at the midnight release party! Ashlee and I were surrounded by hundreds of screaming, excited, twelve year old girls, which was hilarious. Ashlee was so patient with me while we waited in line for an hour in the face painting line. :) As we waited...and waited, we heard the hurried conversations from lots of excited pre-teens. Ashlee was thankful that she has boys, and I got a peak into the future with my sweet Anna. :) I finished the book within a couple days (pure exhaustion prevented me from pulling an all nighter) and now I am on the countdown for the movie! 12/12/08!!

Fun At The Beach!

On the 29th, the kids and I joined some close friends, the Muthiah's, in Lincoln City for a night. We hiked down to the tide pools and saw starfish, sea anemones, and hermit crabs- the kids loved it and are still talking about all that we saw. We stayed the night in a beautful beach house that belongs to one of Beth's family members, and played at the beach in the warm sunshine the next day. It was so fun to spend time with Beth and her three kids, unfortunately, the dad's had to stay home to go to work while the mom's and kids got to play. Here are some fun pictures from our trip:

Our hike down to the tide pools.

Beth and Esther.

Made it back to the top!

Sweet Anna chasing the waves.

The kids found some charcoal from a beach fire, and wanted their faces painted. They had so much fun! Thank you Muthiah's for a great time at the beach!

Oh, So Fun!

We're back from vacation...we've been back, but busy. We had a great trip to California to see the Brown's and Hokanson's. We stayed in a cabin on Buck's lake, right on the water. The cabin was so cute, but we only used it to sleep and eat. Most of our time was spent on the lake, wakeboarding, water skiing and tubing. The kids had so much fun learning to tube, drive the boat and swim in the lake. Aaron and I were sore the first few days...okay the whole week...but by the second day we both stood (briefly) on the wakeboard. We had a great time and are very grateful for the week spent with family. Here is the cabin we stayed in:

Aaron and I tubing (before we knew what it felt like to be drug behind a boat at 30 mph :) My best friend.

Tyler holding up the safety flag while someone was in the water.

Ryan driving the boat with Uncle Eric.
Anna snuggling with Cousin Madison.

On our way back home, we stopped in Grants Pass to see the O'Brien family visiting from Chicago. We had a short visit with them, but it was so good to give hugs and play on the farm. Here is a picture of some of the cousins together.