They Call it Global Warming

Over the last few years there has been lots of talk about global warming.  Typically they talk about all the negatives associated with it, but right now what I know is that we have had an extremely mild winter and this past week felt more like May than February.  If that is a consequence of global warming then bring it on.

Due to all the sunny days, the goal for the week had been to spend as much time out doors as possible.  We have taken several walks, gone to the zoo with cousins, gone to the park, and just generally played outside and soaked up the vitamin D.

We spent so much time outdoors that by the time Saturday rolled around and I ask Merrick what he wanted to do, I didn't even feel bad when he wanted to go to the Children's Museum (a mostly indoor activity).  Of course the museum was a big as usual, but the kids particularly loved the temporary circus exhibit.

Looking ahead there is still a lot of sunshine to come, but I know sooner or later the rain will return.  Until then you can bet we will be loving every sunny minute.

V-Day 2015

Yesterday was Valentine's Day, one of my favorite days of the the year, and surprisingly a day that I love even more since having kids.  Last year we started a family tradition of a scavenger hunt where each stop tells each child something we love about them, gives them some candy, and directs them to the next clue.  At the end they find a small present that we have gotten them.  While I thought it might take a few years to catch on, when Merrick woke up in the morning he started asking right away if we were going to do it.  I guess I accomplished my goal of turning it into a meaningful tradition.

This year Merrick had to wait a bit for the hunt because Carrigan slept in, but we kept him happy with a special trip with Mommy to buy everyone Valentine's Day doughnuts.  The hunt itself went just about flawlessly until the end when Merrick was searching the whole room for their gifts while CC just sat on the footstool that was holding the gifts.

The other highlights of the day were a family bike ride and Merrick telling me I was the best mommy ever when I told him I was making them heart pizza and Valentine's (pink) applesauce for dinner.  Actually Valentine's Day is the perfect holiday for Merrick because he is naturally very affectionate and loving.  He was even the first one to tell me "Happy Valentine's Day" when he jumped on my bed very early in the morning and shouted it mere inches from my face (he had also apparently already rushed in to tell Jeremy who was in the bathroom).

Eventually the kids did go to bed and Jeremy and I had a chance to celebrate on our own with some Thai take-out and apple cider.  Jeremy broke is cardinal rule (established after our wedding) and bought me a purse and tickets for a date night to the Portland Underground tour, which I have always wanted to do.  I got him tickets to go with his friend Matt to see two March Madness tournament games.

It was a great day all around.  I guess I should not speak for the rest of the the family, but I know I sure felt the love.

Let There be Light and Goodbye Nana

This week, after a nearly two month visit, Nana went home to India.  It was really great having her here and we all miss her already.  Not ones for an uneventful goodbye, we decided to spend her last afternoon here hanging a new light in her entry way.  Jeremy had already hung new lights in the kitchen and dinning room, but since there are 17 foot ceilings in the entry, this change was not an easy task.

Brendon and our family friend Rob Reed came and braved the highest heights (and it turns out Brendon does not do so well with heights).  My mom, Rob's wife (Lora-who does the preschool with me), and I played assistant, running tools, paint, light bulbs, towels, etc, up and down the ladders.   It did get a little precarious at one point and we all stopped to say a prayer for safety, but within about 2 hours it was all done.  It think both Rob and Brendon were glad to have their feet on the ground again.

A few other things before I bid you ado for another week, Jeremy has a really big second interview for a job this week so we would appreciate any thoughts and/or prayers on his behalf.  The other thing is that since no blog would be complete without some pictures of the kids here are some from our adventures this week.  Merrick got a little creative with the track for his cars and Carrigan got a little creative with a highlighter.

Everyday Us

I was thinking over the last few weeks that while I do my best to write on the blog every week and feel I do a pretty good job recording the activities and events of our life, what I seem to miss out on is the cute/silly/smart things that the kids do and say everyday that I am sure I will forget over time.  This week nothing major happened and I started wondering this morning what I was going to blog about and then it occurred to me write about some of those little things that normally get passed by.  So with out further ado, here they are:

Merrick- I have been commenting lately how Merrick is like one of those HUGE dogs that thinks they are a lap dog.  He is SO tall, towering over everyone his age, but he is my little snuggle buddy.  He always wants to climb on me, sit on my lap, and cuddle.  He is also super sweet with his sister.  Just today at church he would pull something out of my bag to look at, CC would scream "Bubba" (Brother) and rip it out of his hands, he would just let her and move on to something else.  He also loves to draw her pictures of doggies lately (something she is always asking for).  The only time I ever have to get after him about how he is interacting with his sister is when he is over cuddly/smothery which she tends not to love.  On a side note, I just had to take an hour break from working on the blog because he was trying to give her hugs and accidentally pulled them both off the couch, injuring them both.  Sometimes he loves her a bit too much.

The other thing that I want to mention about Merrick is his curiosity.  You can't just tell him a story because he will have a million follow-up questions about tiny details (what color of car where the people driving? what was the weather like?, etc.).  I think the best way to describe it is that he has this ability to look at things from different angles and I think that is unique for his age.  A few weeks ago he had gotten a new toy and we needed to pick up some "C" batteries for it and I had told him I would get him batteries when I went to the store the next day.  Before going to the store, Jeremy and I finished the process of buying his car.  When I told Merrick about the new car he asked me how much it cost.  I told him a lot, but he kept pressing me for the details.  Eventually we got down to the heart of the matter when he asked me if we would still have enough money left over to buy him batteries.

One other note on this subject, he loves animals and loves to learn facts about them.  Last week when we went to the library he insisted on getting a non-fiction book about wombats and he is already planning on getting one on platypuses on our next visit.

Carrigan- In many ways Carrigan is the exact opposite of Merrick.  She is not easy going, on the contrary she usually know what she wants and how she wants it.  She wants to eat her banana but only if the peel is still on it and if it sits out too long she deems it an "ucky nana".    Sometimes this is challenging, but in other ways it is easier because you never have to guess what she wants of how she feels about things.

She has become such a talker, almost like my little parrot, repeating everything I say.  Every night/nap time I sing her "You are my Sunshine" on repeat.  She has started singing along singing "sunshine away" over and over while I sing.  The other day I was counting to see how fast Merrick could do something.  I got to seven and stopped, only to hear her say "eight".  Her increased vocabulary is also helping with with the stubbornness mentioned above, she is learning to say "please" and "sorry".  I have to say my favorite things she says these days are "hold you mommy" and "love you"....I hear those a lot lately.

The last thing I want to mention about CC is she really likes routine and consistency.  If you look let her look at pictures on your phone while you change her diaper, you must do that every time from then on.  If you draw her a picture of a doggy while you are coloring, you must do that every time you color (see above about Merrick drawing her doggy pictures).  My mom is still visiting and few weeks ago my mom showed Carrigan a video on her phone of my niece Isabel (Bay-bel as she is most often called).  CC quickly began referring to it as the "Bay-bel show" and anytime now she see my mom's phone will begin asking for the "Bay-bel show".

Well this post may have been boring or uninteresting to you, but for me it is the little things that my kids do that makes me love them the most.  I am really grateful to put just a few of them down before they are gone from my memory forever.

It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood

This week had a few highlights.  A few of them had been in the works for a bit, like Jeremy starting his new job and my mom deciding to stay for an extra week and a half (she would have gone home today otherwise).  Other highlights came as a bit of a surprise, like a weekend that was just about as beautiful as possible for January in Oregon.

Friday was rainy so who would have guessed (maybe people who watch the news) that Saturday and Sunday would be clear and warm with a high of about 60 degrees.  We decided to take advantage of this beauty and spend as much time outside as possible so we took a couple of bike rides as a family.  The first day we rode out of our neighborhood to the elementary school Merrick is scheduled to go to (we got him registered for kindergarten this week) and rode around for a bit.  The problem is that there are not many paths we can take out of neighborhood that aren't too hilly so for our second ride we decided to test out our new car carrier.  Being that it was our first time setting it all up, it came together pretty quickly and easily.  We also learned that we could collapse Carrigan's trailer to fit it easily in the car.

I am sure that this weekend was just a blip on the radar and there will be many rainy days ahead.  But, Spring will come soon enough and now that we know we can load up our bikes and trailer, there are all kinds of adventures that lay ahead.

P.S.  This is totally unrelated, but too cute not to report.  At preschool we talk about the weather every day.  Lots of days we decide it is partly sunny.  This week one night it was fairly cloudy and Merrick looked up at the moon and asked me if it was "partly moon".

New Year, New Job, New Car

Just a few weeks ago I posted about our hope for this to be the year Jeremy lands his first attorney position.  Well, it happened a little quicker than we had anticipated.  Monday Jeremy had an interview with a company called Epiq Systems and by that afternoon they had offered him a job.  They had wanted him to start this past week, but since we were still a one car family (more on that in a sec) we just didn't see how we could make that work.  So, tomorrow will be his first day as a full fledged attorney.  There are some cons to this job that make it less than ideal and not a permanent solution, but we'll save that for another day.  Today we are just thankful for this stepping stone in his career.

That brings me to the other exciting piece of news for the week, we got a new car.  Now, when I say "new" when referring to one of our cars I usually mean "new to us", but this time I mean new, new.  We did a test drive yesterday of the 2015 Toyota Corolla and yesterday evening they delivered ours to our driveway.  When it pulled in it had 22 miles on it.  The guys who brought it said it had never even been test driven and it was as close to a brand new car as you can possibly get.  We are loving it already.

As Jeremy is fond of saying lately, "things are looking up for Millhouse".  In all seriousness though, we are feeling truly blessed and are so excited about what the future has in store.

Vacation (All I Ever Wanted)

I want to thank the Go-Go's for the blog title for tonight (and now I have that song stuck in my head).  Anyway, I know I said last week that I was already behind on reporting events of the year, but again they will have to wait.

Jeremy and I just rolled in from our first weekend away since Merrick was born.  My mom was kind enough to watch the kids while we went out to Seaside, on the coast for two days.  I am not really going to report too much on it, mostly because I am still on "vacation mode".  I will say it was not the perfect getaway, we did have a small run it with the law (that's what we get for driving a Mustang) and a brush with food poisoning.  It was, however, a good break and a nice recharge and it set a nice attainable standard for future getaways.

Well that is all for tonight.  More later.