Our House

These pictures will have to be put up 4 at a time, since I'm uploading them a different way than usual.

The front of our house

Our backyard, with the garden off to the left (which has nothing planted in it this year, but hopefully next year it will...)

Our backyard, again. This picture is taken from the back door, looking out.

Our kitchen

Our House, cont'd.

More kitchen

Dining area

Basement living room

More basement living room

Our House, cont'd.

Reuben's room

Basement hallway

Basement guest bedroom

Main floor family room

More main floor family room

An Update!

Hello again! Lots of things have happened since the last post. So much has been going on! We've moved to Canada, Brad has started his new job at the church as an Assistant Pastor, we bought and moved into a new house (we're still working on unpacking), we have our baby due in 2 weeks, etc. Life has been very crazy! I'm obviously WAY behind on posting pictures, so I'll work on catching up. Until the baby's born, at least -- then life will probably be all crazy again! :) But here's some pictures from May, at a seminary event.

I was making dessert for the seminary ball game and cook-out, so December got to lick the spoon

Every year, the seminary does a softball game with the teams being faculty & graduating students vs. the under classman. Brad wasn't able to play this year because he was running the seminary library that day, but it's always such a fun game that I wanted to watch with the kids. The faculty / graduates won!

Isaac watching the game.

Some of the seminary wives watching on the bleachers.

We miss being a part of the seminary community! We loved living in California and miss our friends there very much.

Isaac the Elephant/Bear/Cat/Fish

Here's Isaac practicing the different animal sounds. These are probably most of the ones he knows so far, but he does know a few more like frog, duck, etc. This video was taken on Saturday. Hopefully I'll put up some pictures soon. I just took some more, which were the first pictures I'd taken since the Park Day pictures! Things are a bit busy here, and the picture-taking has gone by the wayside, but I really should try to take some more. I'll update you on life here more thoroughly when I put up the next set of pictures.

Park Day

We're still doing the weekly Park Day, where a bunch of the seminary mothers get together at different parks around town and let all of our kids play together. This week I took the camera with me, so that I could get some pictures since there aren't that many Park Days left of this semester!

Isaac on the play set, quite pleased with getting himself up that high!

December and Samuel on this toy that twirls around and around.

Isaac and a couple of his little friends. Isaac is in the middle of the "spiderweb," Oliver is beside him, and Madelyn is in the navy shirt. Madelyn's mom Joanna is standing there. She's new to the seminary this year. It's interesting to see how Park Day has changed from last year to this year, with many of our friends moving away last year, and some new families arriving for their first year here.

December walking Gracie the dog. My friend Della's mom is out visiting right now, and she brought her little dog to Park Day. Gracie was quite a hit with the kids, and especially with December.

December and Samuel again, and there's Della's mom on the left side of the slide and Della on the right side.

Della's little girl Clara with Isaac. I'm going to miss Park Day after we leave! We've really enjoyed going every week.

April Pics

Here's a picture that Brad took of December on Easter Sunday

Isaac, showing off the Canadian side of himself.

The kids playing some sort of fun game under the table. Lately their favorite thing to do together is make a fort in the living room. They can spend HOURS in there, going camping and doing whatever else you do with a fort. It's so easy to do and keeps them super entertained!

December under the table

Brad practicing his photography skills. It's a pretty shot!

These next couple of weeks are going to be very busy for Brad. He has two papers due and two sermons to give. After that will probably still be busy for him, as the semester begins to draw to a close. Brad's also working on stuff for us moving, so he's a busy guy!

The kids are doing well, too, although Isaac's got some kind of sickness or teething going on...runny nose, cough, more irritable, etc. I hope that it's teething so that it can't be passed on to anyone else! As for me, I've got a doctor's appointment later today, and I think they'll be sending me for my glucose test. Ick. But I suppose it's a necessary evil. :)

December & Isaac Playing

I haven't taken many pictures of the kids lately, so I've had nothing to post. But today I thought I'd take some video of them and put it up, since you haven't seen a video of them for a while! In it, December reads to Isaac and Isaac says a few of his words.

Speaking of words, I think I'll give you Isaac's ten most favorite words. He doesn't say a TON of words, probably only around twenty or something, but in the past week he's gone on a spree and added a few more to his repertoire. I'll list his top ten with #1 as Isaac favorite word to say (and is the one we hear the most often), #2 as his second-favorite word, and so on down the list.

1. Dada (by FAR!)

2. Ball

3. Roar (for any sort of animal, even the animals that he knows what they actually say. Like kittens. He knows that they meow and says a really sweet, soft "meooow", but in general, if Isaac sees a kitten, he says in a real growl: "ROARRR!")

4. Car (if it's got wheels, it's a "Ka")

5. Enh (This probably doesn't qualify as a word, but we do hear it an awful lot. It means, "I want!")

6. Aww (he likes to give hugs and cuddles, and whenever he lays his head on Brad, or December, or I, he says, "awww...")

7. Please (if he wants it, he's pleading for it. Only his "please" sounds more like, "Peeeeeeeeeeeeee-eeeeeeeeeeeeee-eeeeeeee-s!" It's incredibly long.)

8. Bird (due to his beloved hummingbird feeder)

9. Moon (I think this was actually the first word he ever said)

10. Gentle (sounds like, "denn-o." I've been working with him alot on this one, because he's trying to hit his darling sister more often, so we're teaching "gentle")

California Adventure

Last week we went to California Adventure and had a good time there. It was nice having a whole day together as a family. Here we are in the entrance area, before getting inside the gates.

Brad and December on the bumper cars. December drove her own car! With a little of Brad's help, that is.

I forget what the name of this ride is, but you can get the gist of it by the picture. It was a fun one that we all could go on, even Isaac and I!

Us waiting in line for that ride. December was able to go on more rides this year than last year, because she'd grown taller! So that made the day even more fun, to take her on some rides she hadn't been able to go on before.

Brad and Isaac waiting for the ride to start.

We're standing in front of a painted wall that makes it look like the street continues all the way down. Pretty cool!

Sitting in the big cart of the Mickey Mouse ferris wheel. We waited in line the longest for this ride and debated several times whether or not it was worth it for us to keep waiting. But I'm glad we did. This was a swaying cart, which was fun and different!

Isaac all tuckered out after lunch time.

Brad and December waiting for the Jumping Jellyfish ride to start.

There they are, jumping away!

The carousel is a classic favorite of December's.

December picked a seal to ride.

Brad and Isaac picked a goldfish.

We went to a little drawing class that California Adventure put on, and they taught us to draw Mickey! Here's Brad's drawing. Pretty good, eh?! (Sorry about it being sideways -- I tried a few times to upload the picture, and I couldn't get it to flip for me....)

Here's Isaac's impression of Mickey.

And here's December's Mickey!

Baby #3

There have been no belly shots yet of Baby #3 yet, so yesterday Brad kindly took some for me. Baby is due on August 3, so I'm 21 weeks along here, almost 22 weeks. Just over halfway and feeling really good! Second trimester really is the best trimester for me (no first trimester sickness, no third trimester giganticness), so I'm making sure I enjoy these weeks!!