School is here

School started today. No tears here not even from Eva. She is the saddest in all of this and we feel bad for her but she will get a lot more time for herself now. Here are some photos from this morning:

Before we left for school
Alexander and Eva
His new back pack and water bottle
(daniel wanted llbean but I wasn't on the ball so next year :) )

playing on the kindergarten playground before school

Saying bye

his new desk areaenough with the pictures already
fine one last one
Eva wanted to take this one.

I saw a friend at the school and she asked me how I was and if I had been crying (Alexander being the first child and all) and I said nope I am in the celebrating boat. I think its because I LOVED school when I was little. I loved every minute of it until my 3rd grade teacher and then 4th grade and on I love it again up until I graduated college. I hope Alexander loves it too. He LOVED shining stars so i think he will be fine. Daniel tells me he hated school. I guess that is why we are in different boats about it. Anyway HORRAY for school. And he teacher looks like a great one again this year. Lots of order.

We are so excited!

Miriam

Jamison

Jamison is going to turn one in two weeks. He hasn't seen many of our families but he is a joy to have around. Here he is.He has changed so much in the last few months.

This little guy loves to smile and laugh. He will eat anything you give him. If he sees your mouth moving or movement in the kitchen he will chase you around until you give him some food. He loves to play with Alexander and Eva and they are often too rough with him. He in turn is rough back. I hope this doesn't last for too long. He loves to snuggle. Much more than Alexander or Eva. He has started using a sippy cup with water. We started him on a regular cup and he can do both as long as you hold it for him. He is a big boy but he still loves to be held A LOT. He is already filled with his own personality and we all love him. Here are some more photos.

This is what he does when the kids are out playing. He can only go outside when I am with him because he loves to eat sand and rocks.

He likes to carry the wii remote around. I really don't know why because if he sees it he will crawl as fast as he can pick it up and then drag it around

His face here is funny its a new expression to me

Here he is whining for me to pick him up he just ate spaghetti.

He is learning to climb up the stairs. I don't like this part of babyhood but it has to happen. He used to climb and cry all the way up because he was scared. Here is an example:



It was funny because he would just cry and cry and keep climbing.
Then he realized he couldn't get off the bottom step all by himself so he started crying because he was scared:

He makes me laugh all day long, until dinner time because then he stands up hanging onto my legs while I am trying to make dinner.

im posting

SOOO the summer is almost officially over, well at least in my book. Alexander starts kindergarten on Monday! We have his backpack and clothes and shoes and we are SET! He is pretty excited about it. I think he is ready to not be at home all day. It is Saturday and we decided to go early and watch while Daniel was a newbie on a balloon crew. It was cool to see and we enjoyed ourselves. Before they got started though there was a rattle snake! The first one I have seen in the wild and so close.

Just a baby but it was pretty well camouflaged so it was lucky we saw it before we were standing on it. They let it go a couple hundred feet away from us. They told us they haven't seen a rattle snake on their ballooning adventures until today! and they have been doing it since 2000!
Daniel got a picture of it. I didn't get very close because well its a rattle snack. Here are some pictures of the morning.

I love that there is a balloon culture here. Its pretty amazing and today we learned many things we didn't know about. Daniel wants to go with them now and try to crew more, sounds like a great hobby to me.

Its been about a month since I have posted. There just isn't time in the day. But I am really looking forward to the new schedule that is coming up! Oh and I put Eva into a dance class and she loves it so far! I bought her a tutu today and she put it straight on and wanted to wear it to bed (I said no) So she will now have something to look forward to and not just be envious of Alexander going off to school.

I am sure I will be posting more now that the summer is over. YAY! SUMMER IS OVER! In a couple of months we will be moving onto wearing more clothes and feeling cold. Sounds good to me. See you later.

Miriam

Have you noticed

That I haven't been posting at all lately? This summer seems to have made me busier than ever in the everyday life. Just taking care of kids and cleaning keeps me busy all day. Anyway here is a little update. Umm I can't remember.

However I do have some photos I took today and yesterday. Here are Jamison and Eva in their church clothes:

Jamison is wearing his new tie

Then Eva got a new dress. It has three layers of organza and a little petty coat underneath

I just loved it. New yesterday. Then when she got home from church it had this huge rip in the organza which can't be fixed. This is why I generally don't get nice things for little people. Oh well though she has plenty other dresses (the luck of being an only girl)

On to brighter funnier things. Jamison is 10 Months old. He is cute. I like him a lot. Today after church I put him in the high chair and threw him a nectarin. Now I used to do this with Alexander and Eva when they were little and they would put bite marks in it and thats it. I was wandering around the kitchen doing things and just glancing over. It looked to me like he was just putting bit marks in.
Then it was gone so I figured he dropped it on the ground. I looked around the floor and found this:
He at the WHOLE thing, then I gave him another and he ate it all too! At least its fruit and not fruit loops. Then he needed a new shirt and I grabbed one of Eva's shirts that she wears to bed to put on him IT FITS!:
I couldn't believe it! Then I took the shirt off and put it on Eva (same day same 10 minutes) And here it is:

He is a big growing boy who eats two nectarins in one sitting and now he fits his sisters shirts!! I was laughing a lot when I saw that. It made my day. Oh and these made my day too:

I got them yesterday and I love them. Blue velvet with ruffles! I just measured and they are 5 inch heels!! However the front are tall too so they were ok to walk in.

Thats all for now, I have to get back to the kids and husband and all that.

Miriam

Our mini vacay

We met up with Kristen and Geoff in Cortez Colorado for the weekend and it was pretty fantastic. We got to see Mesa Verde! I would not recommend the tours for kids under 5. This is not because of all the ladders and steep stairs and such, its because they are constantly stopping and talking and the kids don't want to sit there and wait for them to start walking again. Here is the view from across the canyon of the place we toured (cliff palace)


Then we waited for the tour guide to tell us all the reasons we shouldn't do the strenuous hike. Here are the ONLY pictures I took of people the whole trip!

Here are Alexander and Ethan checking out the far view. It was great that we could see Cliff Palace from the trail head. So if you don't want to hike all the way down you can just walk to this point to see it all.
More waiting
An interesting point about the hike is that the stone stairs you walk down are all pre osha so you get a good idea of why stairs have to be a uniform height. They were very steep and you got a surprise everytime you stepped down. Here was the first ladder to climb. The kids all did really well.

As soon as we got up the ladder we were to stop and listen to the ranger talk about the history of the Aztecs that the anthropologists have assumed from their remains. I felt like I was standing on a cliff ledge and Eva wanted to walk back and forth luckily we made it through without her falling off.The kids were all listening and being good tourists. Notice Eva all the way up the top looking for the next place to go.

The view from the tour stop


Then we stopped right in front of the ruins for a while while the tour guide informed us. Then we walked a little higher and stopped again. Eva kept throwing sand and all kinds of things. Then it was time to go and we ran for the exit. Here was the way out

Here is the view of the way out from across the canyon. Pretty steep. I didn't realize how steep it was because I wanted to get the kids out of their as soon as possible.


The view down to the Palace from the exit

We were going to do the Balcony tour but there was no way the kids could do it after the previous tour. It was actually my sanity I was worried about so Geoff and Kristen and Jerry and George went on while we did the scenic drive. We stopped and looked at the balcony from the side of the road:


Then we saw the fire temple:And many other things. It was pretty amazing to see all these houses all over the cliffs. There were so many stops and you could see their windows and doors carved out. Its amazing to think how much energy would need to be used just getting from place to place. It was such a fun mini vacation. It was great to see Geoff and Kristen and we were even lucky to see Kristen's sister's family and Her parents!

Here are some elk we saw on the way home:

I took hardly any photos which was disappointing but I would love to do another trip like this! You just can't beat a 3 and a half hour drive to visit family and see a national treasure!

Miriam

The little monkey

It has started

Post # 400

We have been very busy with everyday life around here! I haven't posted in a long time because I rarely get on the computer these days. Only a month and a half left of summer! Well it was fathers day a long time ago and Daniel got his favorite gift to date

Here he is enjoying it




We haven't been doing many projects, just regular home maintenance things like adding fans and doing an overhaul on the evaporative coolers. Its gotten pretty warm here so going outside for projects is not that fantastic! Daniel put more seed on the grass out back so the patches will go away and the flowers he planted are getting big. Jamison is getting more adventurous by the minute. He crawls and now likes to stand up on furniture. He is officially 10 months old! Before we know it he will be a year. The last year has flown by quickly. Eva is doing very well with potty training, now I just have to get her to go on the big one. Being in New Mexico is great although being surrounded by 8 wild fires (I think that is the accurate count right now) makes the air kind of gross. I must admit we are in need of a small vacation. Luckily we are getting a 2 day one coming up. Anyway that's all for now I must go get cereal ready.

Miriam