celebrating birthdays

We met with Tyler, Anna & girls yesterday at Chuck E. Cheese's for a birthday celebration ~ Neil's 7th, Meg's 9th and Eleanor's 3rd.

Eleanor

Audrey & Natalie

Megan

Natalie ~ hard to believe she's already 2 months old!

Neil had his "kid party" with his school friends on June 10. We have his parties early because so many families jet away on fancy vacations the minute school lets out (must be nice!)

Mom, Dad, Larry & Neil celebrating Neil's 7th birthday. Alan was playing in a baseball game that day.

Neil's party was at the Redmond Pool. This pool is exactly the same as it was when I was a kid and it's always a weird time warp feeling whenever we go!

no more pencils, no more books...

Larry and his teacher at the 6th grade "graduation" last Friday.

Officially a Jr. High schooler and ready to walk out the door!

We had a barbecue with some of Larry's friends to celebrate - yes they're excited!

Brady, Alex, Brett

Abu, Jacob, Larry

Neil & Dad with bubble machine

Joe Momma with leftover watermelon

Wade & I were just talking about how cute it is when little babies fall asleep with their arms flung out to their sides. I guess Neil still has a little baby left in him :)

la vida loca

After about 3 weeks of summer "vacation," the boys will probably be so lazy that I'll resort to taking pictures of the pets again. But for now it seems like we are hardly ever home! Here is Alan with his coaches at their year-end party. He got a "Baby Ruth" candy bar for being the only one who hit a homerun all season :) Alan (in red) chowing on barbecue with his fellow A's.

Neil at the First Grade picnic, ready for the 3-legged-race. The little boy in red looks a bit nervous about being tied to Neil...

I don't even know this kid...but he has a brain freeze traffic cone on his head!!

On Father's Day we went to a "Farewell" party for some friends who are moving to Maine. Their son Jack (2nd from Left) is one of Alan's good friends. Here the boys have just finished a cupcake fight.

After the cupcake fight, they gave birth to some balloons, inhaled the helium...

...and sang "Seasons of Love" from Rent. Weird children!

meg's graduation party

Yesterday we went down to Olympia for a party celebrating our niece Megan's graduation from high school. She will be going to the Western Culinary Institute in Portland OR... here she is with proud mom & dad.

Her brother Nick came home from Boston University & brought more reason to celebrate: he graduated as well and will be going to Harvard Law. Don't Brad & Darla look totally depressed at the idea of an empty nest?? Cheer up, guys! You can still send them spending money, and that Christmas visit home will be here before you know it :)

Jackie, a guy named O'Leary, Greg and Grandma Mag enjoy the sun.

Annette & Bill with Derb ~ their kids stayed home, so no picture of Elliott yet. The graduations aren't over yet, though! Nelson's is on Tuesday.

Neil, obviously up to no good.

Alan & Larry. Can't just sit still and smile for a picture, Noooo....

Some little birdies flown home to their nests for the summer ~ Daniel from Western Washington U...

Eric home from Eastern Washington U., and Kelli from UW.

finishing up the school year

This time of year always feels like major chaos, with way too much going on. Here's Neil with his T-ball coach at the season-end party.

It was pouring rain so we missed the last game, but there was a baseball-shaped pinata so they did get to swing a bat! This is the candy-scramble after it finally broke.

Ruby and I picking Alan up after school on Crazy Hat Day.

Larry and his friends love playing the card game Apples to Apples. Fun game!

Wade & Neil went on his class field trip to the Seattle Aquarium last week.

Neil's favorite thing at the aquarium was the jellyfish!

I'm busy preparing for the school carnival on Friday, and Alan is in the middle of the Little League play-off tournaments. Tonight our nephew Elliott is graduating from Redmond High School! Wade is going to the ceremony at Qwest Field in Seattle after work, but I'm staying home with the boys. We were afraid that Neil would either A.) Implode from boredom or B.) Make those around us explode with annoyance. There are 600 kids graduating! Should be quite the event. I forgot to send the camera with Wade :( but will get some photos of the new grad this weekend.

feels like summertime

Thank goodness we don't have a real pool, I think every kid within a mile radius would try to squeeze into it.

Neil finally gets a minute to himself.

Larry on the trampoline. They get some pretty serious flips going on that thing...the other day I had to squash their Wile E. Coyote, Super-Genius plan to bounce from the trampoline into the pool.

Alan *after* his haircut...it still looks pretty long until you see how the back looked in his *before* picture... what was that hairy guy on The Aadams Family show? "Cousin IT"??

memorial day weekend

We took the boys to Snoqualmie Falls today. It isn't very far from our house, but Wade & I hadn't been for years and it was the boys' first time. We also walked down to the bottom of the Falls, which I hadn't done before.

Larry & Alan check out the Falls. I was here with their great-grandparents in the 1980's... looks exactly the same :)

Couldn't resist taking this picture through the fence of Alan catching. It was a beautiful day, and the ballpark is such a fun place to be.

happy 11th birthday, alan!

Alan turned the big 1-1 on Monday! Saturday night he had a bowling party with some friends. Monday we went out to dinner and saw Shrek III. I had this big ugly balloon hidden behind the shower curtain for an early-morning surprise, heh heh.

one busy weekend

Neil and I hiked with my cub scout den on Saturday, up the Little Mt. Si trail. Every review I read about this hike emphasized that it's an easy trail, even for young children. True - it was a piece of cake for our five 7-year-old spider monkeys, but it should be noted that middle-aged women who are out of shape will BARELY make it. Here's Neil at the top, still bubbling with youthful enthusiasm. The boys taking a rest.

A nice view on the way up.

The dads brought energy bars, raw peanuts and raisins, survival knives, matches and first aid kits. I brought these chips...

The walk back DOWNhill was wonderful.

Our young mountain goats climbed anything that was remotely climbable.

Immediately after the hike, I took Neil to his friend Molly's birthday party. The girls are very intently watching the progress of the cake being carried to the table. Larry came too, because the birthday girl's brother is his good friend.

I remember thinking it was so funny as a kid to make a stupid face right before an adult snapped a photo. Karma! My son thinks the same thing is a hoot. Of course, there were no instant online photo albums back then to show everyone how annoying I was. Too bad for Larry and his friends.