Wedding

My favorite quote on our trip to Michigan was from Isaiah as we walked onto the airplane. He turned to me and said, "Mom, this smells like germs." I'd never heard it put that way, but I couldn't disagree. As I said in the last post, we went there for a wedding. Here are a couple photos at the reception...
With Grandpa:

And Grandma:


Uncle Eric and Aunt Autumn:

Being ushers:

And brothers:

Celebrations & Farms

We went to Michigan this past weekend for Steven's cousin's wedding. While we were there, we celebrated Isaiah's birthday with Steven's family and also took a trip to the local farm.

Potty Trained

It happened before my eyes. I had put Adriana on the toilet a few times before bed or baths and rewarded her with candy when she actually put something into the potty. I wasn't very serious about anything, but she decided that free candy was way too good of an opportunity to pass up. So last month at ripe age of 21 months, she potty-trained herself. I was too busy with trips to jump on board, so I left her in diapers. Three weeks ago we officially made the transition to "Princess Panties", and we work diligently to keep Cinderella dry. My apologies to all the jealous mommies that want to hurt me right now.
In other news, my sister Christine announced on Mother's Day that my kids will be getting another cousin. You can imagine how thrilled we are. Can anyone say "newborn photo shoot"?

Soccer

The soccer lessons are over, and Isaiah thoroughly enjoyed them. He took it very seriously and thought he was the all-star player and the teacher. Obviously our humility training is far from complete. Elijah and Adriana enjoyed our soccer times almost as much as Isaiah. Elijah can't wait until his turn on the field.
Here are a few shots. Note the position of his tongue in the first two shots, and you can tell that we have our very own little Michael Jordan of soccer.


With his friend Jack:

Tea Party

For all my faithful blog readers that caught my Atlantic/Pacific mistake at the beginning of the last post, I plead exhaustion and an 11:00 p.m. writing time. Another one of our adventures near the PACIFIC ocean was tea time at the Windsor Tea House. Caroline and I put the girls in matching dresses and used our cameras more than the tea pot. Adriana and Elaina seemed to know that they were doing a "big girl" activity and, besides stuffing their faces with sugar cubes and breaking a goblet, they behaved beautifully. It was such a fun, girly time!


Enjoying sorbets in a lady-like fashion:

And not so ladylike:


Afterward we walked around, our girlies looking like little models; and the mommies looking like the paparazzi.

Our Oregon Trails

Our girl trip was wonderful. My girlfriend Caroline treated us like a queen and princess and we made so many memories.
Our friends live where the Columbia River meets the Pacific in the town of Astoria, Oregon.

If Astoria sounds familiar to you, this photo of the local jail might jog your memory. Astoria was the location for the movie "The Goonies."
Elaina and Adriana played wonderfully together minus some sister-like fighting at the end of the trip. At first, Adriana was bit more enthusiastic making a new friend.

Adriana favorite part of the whole trip was playing with their pet bunny Chloe. The girls probably brought poor Chloe near a bunny version of cardiac arrest as they chased him around shrieking at the top of their lungs. Each morning the first words out of Adriana's mouth were, "Go see bunny?" As she chased him around, she shouted, "I wanna' bunny!"



During the first day, Caroline took me for a walk on the pier. You can see the sea lions lining the dock as they sunned themselves.

This sea lion reminded me of my children as he loudly protested his photo being taken.

Caroline and the girls:

Everywhere we drove, there was so much to see. We drove through the Cascade Mountains and along the Pacific. It was beautiful!


Adriana enjoying the view:

My favorite day of the visit was "beach day". We went during low tide and saw all kinds of neat sea-life. Always up for a photo-op, we changed the girls into matching tutus...beach and tutus just screams for a camera overdose.

To end the weekend, we spent the night in a gorgeous hotel that was designed to look like an Old Hollywood hotel. While Caroline and I oohed and aahed over the decore and the service, the girls had fun climbing on the mini-bar and testing out the matresses.