Auntie Mary Turns 88!

On Valentines Day, my family took a trek up to Parkdale, OR. If you don't know where that is, you're missing out! It's just up the hill from Hood River. I have lots of extended family that live up there and own orchards of pears and apples.

Anyways, the whole reason for our trek was to celebrate my Great Auntie Mary's 88th birthday. In asian culture, the number 8 carries great significance. I guess it's supposed to be lucky. So an 88th birthday is quite the big deal.

It was a really fun day! I met distant cousins I'm pretty sure I've never seen before. And my extended family got to meet my children and husband!

When we got there they were making mochi. (A sweet rice cake.) This was something I've never participated in before, and it was SO much fun. I've eaten mochi my whole life, and heard lots of stories about making it. It was great to finally be able to get in there and learn to do it with everyone!

During a lul in the afternoon, I took the antzy boys out into the orchard so we could run off some energy. They had a great time running through the rows and rows of trees.

We came back inside just in time to see Auntie Mary blow out the candles on her cake! All in all, it was a really fun day and we had a great time catching up with family that we don't get to see that often.

What I've been knitting...

Most of you know that I love to knit. After I was finished knitting all the Christmas presents I'd lined up, I was thrilled to be able to knit something for fun. And at my leasure! The first thing I made was a teddy bear for Ethan. It was surprisingly simple to make. It's a sock yarn teddy bear and I knit him with size 2 needles. Ethan loves him!
Of course since I made Ethan a toy, I had to make one for Daniel and Taylor! They both picked a snake. It was REALLY simple! Knitting in a circle for 22 inches! The snakes are also made with sock yarn and on size 2 needles. They all get carried everywhere we go.

Dinosaurs say "RAWR"

My twin sons, Daniel and Taylor turned five just after Christmas, so we threw a birthday party for them last Saturday. I don't like to throw your conventional Chuck E. Cheese or McDonald's parties, so a home party was my solution. I struggled with a theme though... then it hit me... DINOSAURS!!! The boys LOVE dinosaurs!

I found two different dinosaur cakes that were absolutely fabulous! The one on the bottom actually jumped out at you and roared!

We decorated "dinosaur eggs", (egg shaped sugar cookies) and we had an excavation in our garage. I burried (with Eric & Jacki's help) piles of little toys in sand and stuck a small paint brush in the pile. The kids brushed off the sand and found all their toys! They loved it!

I had a lot of fun planning it all! When all is said and done, Daniel and Taylor loved their dinosaur party and will hopefully remember it for years to come.

BTW

Hey, followers! I wanted to let you know, as you've probably figured out already, that I changed the name of my blog. I'm not planning on doing another year of photos every day. While it was fun, I think I'd much prefer to have a blog that I don't feel pressured to write on everyday. I'll still post fun pics, but not everyday.
Thanks for everyone who supported me through the last year. I made it! I missed under 10 days too!

12/31/09

This was the first year we let the kids stay up until midnight. They had so much fun playing with their friends. When it came time to celebrate the new year, we gave them each something to bang on, and took them outside to make some noise and light some sparklers. This is them just before the big moment.

12/30/09

Today in my 9th anniversary! Eric and I always share a bottle of champagne to celebrate. This is my attempt at an artistic pic of my pretty glass of the bubbly.

12/29/09

It actually snowed in Portland today! I love the snow, mostly cuz I never have to go anywhere. We played outside all afternoon and into the evening. I built myself a pretty respectable snowman too!