From Relaxing Exhale to Deep Breath

The past month has been the long, slow, relaxing exhale of having Tyler off of school responsibilities and deadlines and class time and commuting. It's been nice...sooo nice. Every day I get to count on him walking through the door to play with the kids and/or help with dinner. Every night we've had time and energy for pillow talk.

We've gone on dates and spent good, quality family time.

We've done a lot of family walks and blackberry picking (I made jam, Ty made the best cobbler I've had in my life!)

We've given the Ev Man lots of kisses as he's fallen and bumped his head over and over again. Dude thinks he should be pulling himself up on everything but doesn't have the stability/stamina to make it safe to do so.

Oh my goodness...what a lover!

We've danced and sung our hearts out to the Mamma Mia! soundtrack (watching Kelly sing Super Trooper is a total delight, so do yourself a favor and take a gander at the video below)

We went camping and hiked on the Dungeness Spit. This was actually hilarious. It was a beautiful, warm sunny day as we set out. I grabbed the kid's jackets just in case. What I should have grabbed was long underwear and parkas. We got out on the spit and the wind was blowing, like, 30 mph. The kids were freezing! They were crying/whimpering the whole time and their noses were running like hoses. We had planned on trekking out as close to the lighthouse at the end of the spit as we could (5 miles out and 5 miles back) with the kids strapped to us in various contraptions, but only made it about a mile and a half out before seeking refuge from the wind behind some logs and having a snack. We took a video of the joy because it was so funny to us..."We're making family memories, kids, this IS fun!" :) Tyler and I kept laughing about it (when we weren't telling the kids, "Okay, that's enough crying!")

Still gorgeous, albeit cold...the scenery AND the ladies :)

Super Dad! Oh, those freezing cold little legs.

Refuge! Kind of. We couldn't really escape the wind.

This is the perfect picture...that's what Kelly looked like the whole hike. I can't look at it without chuckling.

Looking back down the Dungeness spit to where we began...

Someday we'll make it to the lighthouse..."But it [was] not this day!" (name that movie..."But it is not this day!")

*Sigh* I love the Pacific Northwest

We had a fabulous visit from Ty's wonderful parents. Sadly, I did not take many pictures...but we did a ton and had such a great time. I am extremely lucky to have the best in-laws that I love to be around! Max and I both cried when we dropped them off at the airport. Come again soon, Maggie and Papa Mick!

Doing a Princess puzzle with Papa Mick

We went on a Locke cruise and saw the house from Sleepless in Seattle

At the top of Mt. Walker in the Olympic Mountains...view of the Hood Canal and our peninsula (Kitsap) behind us

We took family pictures (our walls will finally reflect that I've given birth to three little people - Kelly was Everett's age in our last family picture.) I'll post those later.

We've gone as a family to Max and Kelly's swimming lessons.

This is where Kelly spends the whole lesson - by herself on the stairs. Oh well. She practices her kicks and sticking her face in the water by herself.

Max LoVeS it! His teacher, Mike, is great.

The Seattle Mariners may have lost to the Red Sox on Wednesday night, but at least we were there to cheer them on with our foam fingers, kettle corn, cotton candy, and hot dogs topped with cream cheese & grilled onions (sounds scary, but is soooo good! Thanks for the tip, Jennifer!) *There was a smudge on our lens, but we didn't know it...annoying*

We had to run - through the rain - to make the ferry on time...Tyler and I were so wet!

This week has been the deep breath of anticipation (read: slight dread) for the craziness that awaits us. Tyler's taking three (count 'em - THREE) classes this semester instead of the usual two. We want this MBA business over with before next summer instead of at the end of the summer, plus the third is a class he is quite interested in. So sacrifice is the name of the game, folks. You may need to remind me of this in about a month when I wonder why in the world I would have agreed to something so ridiculous; three days a week of the kids not seeing the dad may get a little ugly. The third class is at the UW-Seattle campus (he usually goes to Tacoma), so he'll be hopping on the ferry one day a week. And you do know that he works full-time as well? And did I mention that I am taking two classes this semester instead of the one I'd grown accustomed to? Maybe they should do studies on people that live at sea level; it's got to be the air or something here that makes us do crazy things.