Pictures

Pictures from August 2007 and our trip last weekend to Idaho:

Thick as thieves

Lydia

and Garrett

look a little bit alike :)

No that is not a new one. Four is perfect.

So I ran across this cute family picture and it gave me an excuse to put Jacque's blog address here at the top:

lovetheharrisons.blogspot.com

Go there and hear see the pics that go with the next blog. She emailed me the pictures so I can put them here, but I cannot get into my email right now . ! ? .

Here are the words, Go to Jacque's blog for the pictures

Idaho!

We took a quick trip this weekend to Aaron's sister Jacque's house. Our niece Alicia is graduating from high school, 6th in her class (wow). So we came for the party. We forgot our camera but luckily Uncle Scott took pictures. (That's right, Scott - Jacque's husband-we have 2 aarons 2 jacks 2 scotts 2 adams 2 tylers 2 davids 2 kevins in our combined families.)
We loaded the pics before the kids set up the slip and slide. Everyone had a blast even though it was a bit chilly. Well Lydia not so much. She kept acting like she wanted to join in fully clothed so daddy sent her down one time. Which was all she needed to realize she might wait until the weather warms up to try that again.
We're not home yet. It is 3 and we haven't started packing. So much for leaving at 2.
Jacque happened to have some other cute pictures of us at Kye and Natalia's wedding last August, so I am including them as well.

Garrett's Birthday

So a couple of months ago Garrett had his third birthday and I was a genius. He insisted upon a chocolate cake (that's what everyone in our family asks for). But I know he does not like chocolate cake . . . Enter the Fat Boy!!! Fifteen of them (they are tall square ice cream sandwiches) on a jelly roll pan, pushed up together with candles on the top looks like a chocolate cake to a three year old. It took me about a minute to make and required no frosting. Although that would be yummy too. I think I got more wows on that one than any birthday cake I ever made.

Monday's Bees Game and other baseball stuff

I have to figure out how to get everything on one blog or post them in order. Monday's Bees game was awesome. Pictures follow. I need to take pictures at the boy's baseball games, but words will have to suffice for now. Caden's team preserved their first place standing in a nail-biter this morning. The Cubs would have moved into tied for first had they beat us. We were down six to nothing and came back to win it in the last inning.

The boys usually play on weekday evenings and this was a makeup game. They are not used to playing at 8 am on a Saturday morning. I attribute the slow start to coach thinking he would motivate them with donuts and rock star. Brilliant. Sugar and artificial stimulants. I got up and made Caden breakfast at 6:30 (those of you who know I am not a morning person will appreciate this.) and sent him to the game at 7:15 with Gatorade, water, and OJ. I am so glad the coach gave the players a heads up on his plan and then my son communicated with me!!

Caden played third. He felt really bad about getting thrown out at home but if he hadn't slid into the catcher, they would have gotten a double play and we would not have rallied to win the game. Go Caden!

Weston's game was not makeup but part of a mid-season tournament. They won because our 3rd base coach is so aggresive ( and brilliant at times). We manufactured runs like no team has ever done before. I think only one of the 11 was due to an actual hit.

Wes got to play shortstop. He had a blast!

I was there.

I love that the kids are getting older. Not one diaper change the whole night!

And nobody spilled anything - honest!!! It was amazing.

Beautiful Family

We are officially Bees Fans

I'll add comments later, here are the pics - the boys threw out the first pitch! And Caden caught a bucket of free chicken. Bees won of course.

Look Deep into My Eyes, Daddy & Me

Lydia, Waiting for Easter

Piano Recital on April 8

Garrett wants me to write in green. So I did get one picture of one big event over the past few months. I had a Celebration for my piano students. It sounds kind of amature when you learn that only two of my students are not related to me. But I choose to spend time as a mom more than as a teacher right now. I will have plenty of teaching hours later but I only get a few more years with little children that are ours to raise, so that is number one.

The students I do have are very talented and we put on a 45 minute recital with only 5 students. And as you can imagine, Weston's pieces lasted about 30 seconds (if that). Caden did well with a few minutes of memorized music and a duet. My three teenagers, Michael Ruesch, Melody Wood, and Faith Yingling filled the rest of the program. We played on a 9 ft Steinway and boy did that feel good!!! The piano does everything you tell it too. Performing on a Steinway is like cruising in an '08 Altima (the nicest car I've had the privilege to drive) when you're used clunking along in an '81 Dodge Aries.

Our composer this time around was Robert Vandall. There are no statues of Vandall, so I handed out composing folders to hopefully inspire us. There is nothing like trying to come up with your own original material to help you appreciate all published composers and understand how music works. I love it!

I love to make my own portrait studio in the living room. I used all our portable lights and the sun, then draped a black sheet over the piano and an old black dress on the floor. The setup looked great, but Lydia was not so cooperative. I need to learn more so I can get better shots. But I probably will just learn about all the equipment I don't have so i think I'd prefer to stay ignorant for a while longer. Like maybe 200 paychecks longer.

Lydia helping me try a reflector.

My 4 Kids

Well, it took me about two hours to get all my pictures off the camera and name them, so here is the one and only you all get to see today. Just Wait, there's more . . . but don't hold your breath . . .

Here are some long overdue pictures. It may not have been worth the wait but we have been filling our lives with lots of great things (except the sickness part was not so great but we're almost all better.) For six weeks in March and April I did Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat with the Empress Theatre in Magna. We had 22 performances and it was awesome. Now baseball season is in full swing and both Caden's and Weston's teams are doing really well. Caden has a gun for an arm and Weston can catch anything (maybe those two talents fed on eachother), and they both get a nice hit about once per game. This league is a lot more competitive than the league we were in next year, and the boys have gotten used to it now and get better every game. It is so fun to watch them play. I don't handle watching them pitch very well - it stresses me out. But all the other aspects of the game are great. Okay, I am going to caption the pics with a little detail here and then load them one at a time for as many as I have desire to do.

Sunday we had the family over for Weston's birthday dinner. Aaron outdid himself by barbequeing ribs, hamburgers, and kabobs all on the same grill and all delicious. We had a kabob bar so everyone could make their own (a great plan in the family of a millions diets/taste preferences). And of course the usual barbeque sides.

There are no pictures of "Joseph" or of re-doing our Kitchen or of baseball (!) or of our new flowerbeds and square foot gardens, which qualify as our biggest time-grabbers and successes of the past few months (of course there are pictures documenting our children's continued health and happiness, which is always #!). I got a reflector for the camera which I tried out on Lydia in the purple shirt, so that was fun. And I practiced for her 18 month prtraits we never did with the black backgrounds.

We did get pictures of Easter and what Garrett wants to be for Halloween (another dragon costume . . . ).