Portraits

Here is Lily's 18 month picture (a couple of months late).  She hasn't had a picture taken since 11 months.  She is quite photogenic, although the photographer had quite a time trying to keep her from pushing the chair around.  Hunter missed his school pictures, so I brought him as well.  They love to take pictures together.  They are good friends and adore each other.

Lily's current vocabulary:  "go away" (taught by brothers) "thank you,"  "bye" "hi" "mom" "dad" "shoes"  She can sign "hat," "thank you," "please," "more," "eat," "drink," "out," "bed,"  and "blanket"

To see more pictures of these two, click on this link and enter Jennifer Wright under the name.

Harry Potter and Hedwig

Some portraits of my cuties.  Hunter picked the theme this year.  He is, of course, Harry Potter and Lily is Hedwig.  I made both the costumes.  The owl was actually harder than I thought, but I enjoyed it.  I think making costumes is therapeutic for me.  Lily isn't too thrilled with it, especially the hat, but this may be the last year I have to decide what she wears before she insists on being a princess.  She is so cute walking around in the owl costume.  It is stuffed and she waddles around in it.

First Haircut

Lily's first haircut at almost 20 months.  She really didn't have much hair to cut, but she was getting the comb-over effect, with some really long strands on top and nothing under.  I fondly call her my little duckling because she still has that downy fuzzy hair.  My girls were very late to grow hair (and once Megan started growing hair, she discovered the scissors and kept chopping it off.)  The boys on the other hand had full heads of beautiful hair early on.  Hunter had his first haircut at 6 months.  My friend Alethea agreed to cut Lily's hair for me.  She is also Lily's nursery teacher.

Father-Son Bonding Trip

Alex has started a tradition that when his sons turn 12, he will take them to their first priesthood session in Salt Lake City.  Since Dylan turned 12 in August, he got to experience his first father-son priesthood bonding session.  Here they are in front of the grain silos at Welfare Square.

The men in black at the Conference Center in Salt Lake City.


Doing manly, dirty and slightly dangerous things together.

Future missionary ready to serve.

Is it snow?  No, just the Y above Provo.  They climbed there with buddies Harrison and Mark from North Carolina.

Breathtaking view of the city.

Such studs--Dylan and Harrison.

They visited grandma on the way home.

Buried in Berries. What a Jam Jamberry!

Our kids love the book Jamberry by Bruce Degan, but I'd never thought we'd be living it until we moved here. We picked blackberries this year and found out about "blackberry brambles." Blackberries are Washington's answer to North Carolina's kudzu--with a few "pointed" exceptions: yummy delicious sweet berries, vicious jump-out-and grab-you thorns.

This is where we picked our blackberries. It's a house just down the street from us. We aren't sure where the front door is. The kids call it the Sleeping Beauty house. We just picked berries around the hidden trucks. Blackberries grow so fast here.

The end result of our work was 4 pints of blackberry jam, and 7 pints of blackberry pie filling. Oh, a few scars on legs and arms.

We've also been picking blueberries this year--much easier than blackberries.

There is a park in Tacoma that has free blueberries. Volunteers keep it us. They have over 3000 bushes there. You can pick to your hearts content.

We went with Esther and her kids. Lily even had her own little bucket.

Of course she ate more than she picked. She is a blueberry fiend. She loves all fruit actually. I got a water bath canner this year and put it to work canning apricots, peached, pears, applesauce, and pizza sauce (from our own tomatoes.) I worked with a couple of other ladies and on each marathon canning session, Lily helped us out by sampling the produce (and then putting them back in the box for us to find). By the way, never try to put up 240 lbs of pears at once. Believe me, it's not a good idea. Anyone want pear sauce?

Hunter Scores!

Hunter scored his first goal ever at yesterday's game. We are so proud of him! He has some awesome and encouraging coaches this year. Team Fury rocks! I felt sorry for the other team. (Of course we have often been the other team.) It's a good thing they don't keep score at this age. I lost track of their goals.

Happy Birthday Megan!

Happy 15th Birthday, Megan!

My baby is a grown up. Soon (very soon) she'll be driving. We are so proud of her and the young woman she has become. Keep up the good work sweetheart.

The First Lost Tooth is the Specialest.

Hunter had two gaps this week. One was in the front of his hair--due to a self-inflicted haircut. He ended up with a buzz cut. The second was more painful. This tooth hung on forever. He even had to have a special diet for a few days because everything "hurt his tooth." Alex was finally able to yank it out. He is so proud of his tooth. He put in under his pillow for the tooth fairy and Alex had to pry it out of his hands to replace it with the money. He had an iron grip on it. The tooth fairy decided to leave his tooth for him since "the first lost tooth is the specialest." (note the Fairly Odd Parents) Hunter has been carrying around his tooth all day and showing it off. Isn't he cute?

Smitten in Forks

Last weekend, Megan and I went on a mother-daughter bonding trip to Fork, WA--home of the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyers. We both like the series, but certainly wouldn't have made the trip if it were more than 3 hours away. We did meet some die hard fans there, however--a family from Boston, an 11-year old boy who hooked his mother on the the books, and a couple of young girls from Hungary. Here are some pictures in random order of our trip.

The famous picture in front of the Forks Welcome sign.

Forks is actually named that because three rivers come together there. This is a pic of where the rivers reach the ocean. The town of Forks itself is kind of quaint in an over-commercialized kind of way, but what we really fell in love with was First Beach at LaPush on the Indian Reservation.

First Beach is jammed with tons of bleached driftwood. They made all sorts of interesting and photographical (is that a word?) designs.

Taken through a piece of driftwood.

Some of these pieces of wood were huge--entire trees. In the summer the tide is low and the trees are pretty far up along the beach, but in the winter, the water becomes treacherous with all of these floating pieces of wood.

A look out onto James Island--sacred to the native americans.

Beautiful (and frigid) water.

More scenes from First Beach (There is also a Second and Third Beach, but we are saving those for our next trip).

Get it? Edward doesn't sleep. LOL

The coffee shop where Bella and Charlie eat every week. Megan didn't want to eat there because it looked scary. Heard the food is pretty good though.

The busiest store in town. They have about every item of Twilight merchandise you can imagine. We got Lily a onesie that says "Imprinted" on it. Cute, huh?

Halfway between Forks and LaPush.

Back at the beach in LaPush.

More beautiful scenery. We must have taken a hundred pictures there.

Outside Billy Black's house.

Jacob's motorcycle in front of his house.

The hospital where Carlisle Cullen works. By the way the cafe there is called "Spoons."

Dr. Cullen's reserved parking.

Bella's house.

Bella's truck, complete with photos.

Outside Forks High School. Megan noticed that next year she will also be attending FHS (Fife High School) with the same colors and the same mascot (but their mascot is actually called the Trojans.)

Outside the Cullen's home. It didn't look anything like the one described in the book and wasn't exactly secluded, but I guess the house that really fit the bill, actually burned down in March. Bummer. It must've been the Volturi.

The tour bus.

It took us over an hour to drive from Port Angeles to Forks. By the way, there is nothing inbetween and the two places that looked like they might have restrooms, were closed. Word of advice, use the facilities and gas up in Port Angeles if you go. There was however a beautiful lake--Crescent Lake--that we drove along for a good 25 minutes during sunset. It was spectacular.

More views of the lake.

Sign outside the Dazzled by Twilight store in Port Angeles.

The movie theater (Lincoln Theater) that Bella goes to with Mike and her friends.

Look who we just happened to run into.

The restaurant that Edward take Bella to on their first date after he saves her from the thugs. This restaurant is actually mentioned by name in the book. It's a nice kind of upscale place. I couldn't resist. I had the mushroom ravioli and it was to die for.

Kodak moment.

One of the bookstores Bella might have popped into looking for books on vampires. By the way, Port Angeles is the "big city" to Forks. Interestingly enough the population of Port Angeles is only 19,000. They get quite a bit of tourist traffic in the summer because they are one of the ferry ports to Victoria, Vancouver Island and the San Juan islands. Forks, on the other hand only has a population of 3175--half the size of Milton--but no fast food, or movie theater. Seattle is at least 3 hours away. Don't think I could live there permanently, but it was gorgeous to visit. Next time we'll bring the whole family and camp in the Hoh Rainforest.