Bella, Gabe and Josiah

My friend had surgery again, so her two kids are staying with us, which had been fun. It definitely has made our house fuller…and noisier… But they’re good kids and we’ve had a lot of fun. Monday we dyed Easter eggs. Josy ended up not participating, but the other three had a great time. Gabe was very proud of his special egg, where he painted the three crosses. The next day, Josy got to dye eggs with Cathy and Gabe missed out, so it all evened out. Also, Josy dyed eggs at school on Wednesday, so we have lot of eggs around here… Then the kids all made cars for Awana. Luckily I’d just gotten two very large Amazon boxes for a work project, and they worked perfectly. So we had several days of construction and lessons about knife skills. And now we have two very large cars taking up the majority of the living room… But they’re very proud of them and are having entirely too much fun with them.

Gabe’s teacher sent me this picture that Gabe made at school. I assumed it was a pirate ship, simply because he’s made so many over the years, but apparently this one is a Viking ship. Our last day of ski lessons was amazing! It was beautiful and warm and Gabe made it up the big hill for the first time! We had a fire and roasted hot dogs because one of Bella’s friends was home for Spring Break and she brought the boyfriend who is allergic to cats. So we ate outside. It’s possible that it was a little cold still… He was so proud of finishing his dinosaur puzzle! Josy put the glasses on me and then told me I was cute. I have no words for this. Last weekend, while Gabe was gone, we went up and it was very, very wet. We only made it for the morning because all of our gear was soaked. Sometimes mornings are hard and you need to snuggle with Blanket. We got some more Magnatiles and now we have enough to make a war base. Not dramatic at all… He was so proud of his outfit! His teachers were ve

I’m pretty sure that Gabe just had the best Spring Break ever. We surprised him with a trip to Arizona. He flew down with Gramps and then spent the week playing with Gram, Gramps, Bryson and Knox. They went swimming, went to a spring training Mariner’s game, went to Medieval Times, explored the Children’s Museum, played at the train park and I don’t even know what else. It was non-stop fun. Then to get home, Gabe got to fulfill one of his lifelong dream: flying by himself. Apparently it was a great as he always dreamed of, because he could not stop grinning. But he finally made it home! And now he needs to sleep for a week. Poor kid is wiped out!

Poor String. He is loved to pieces…and he’s quite literally going to go to pieces if someone doesn’t stop loving him quite so much… I’ve done surgery many times. But this time, after staring at him for a while, I decided that I needed to proactively reinforce the entire section. I explained to Gabe that I could either tie another knot or I could spend a lot of time going through every stitch, but it was going to take me a long time. That’s the option that he chose, even though it was rough on him. Look how thin some of those stitches are… It took me a week, but I finally got it finished. And someone was very happy to have String back. Then this one decided that I needed to take a picture of him with his Blanket too…

We had another round of ski lessons yesterday. Unfortunately, it was cold. Very, very cold. Realistically it was just the wind chill. We would have been fine skiing in the teens, but the wind knocked it down and extra 15 degrees and that was too much. Pat and I took our gear, but decided it was way too cold, so we hung out in the lodge waiting for the boys.  A half hour into the lesson, I got a call from a friend that works up there that Josy was in the office. He’d made it a half hour before deciding that it was too cold to ski. So he hung out in the lodge with us. Gabe made it the whole time and didn’t want to quit to come inside. But Pat told him no and as soon as he came in, he realized that his fingers and ties were numb.  We ate lunch and then headed home. Hopefully the weather will be more pleasant next weekend…

When Gabe was a toddler, he was at daycare and either chased or was chased down the hallway by one of the teachers. He fell and landed on his face. He was fine, but his tooth turned gray. But this week, the gray tooth is finally gone! He was so proud!!

We’re back to ski lessons!! The boys are doing great. Gabe has been hitting up the big hill and Josy’s confidence has gotten much better. I’m so proud of them! While the boys had lessons, Pat and I actually got up have a ski date just the two of us! That never happens… Then after lunch we split up and each took a boy. Josy was having so much fun that he didn’t want to stop. And Josy was worn out. He fell sleep in the truck on the way home and spent for three hours…