Okay Mom ...

The title of this blog is in response to my mom's facebook message to me yesterday, "It's been a month, update your blog." So, being the sweet and obedient child that I am, I am going to do what I am told :) Love you mom!

We have had an eventful end of April/May. Our family flew up to participate in the final Cascade College graduation weekend. It was a great weekend with many happy "reunions." We were able to catch up with so many we haven't seen for so long. The girls were troopers and managed to enjoy being around a bunch of people they didn't know. I think part of this was due to all the ring-around-the-Rosy that their grandad played with them and their cousins outside of the events!

This first few days of our trip up north, my brother Aaron and his family were also up. Aaron and Amy have 3 kids - Grace is 4, Noraa just turned 3, and Sammy is 8 months. So, all of the girl cousins had a blast together and had a slumber party on the floor of my mom's office every night. Grandad told lots of Betsy stories and the words, "no boys allowed" could be heard at any given point in the day from all 4 girls. There was Princess Polly Pocketing to be had as well as the singing of "I know you, I walked with you once upon a dream" from Sleeping Beauty. Also, Allyson was quite taken with Sammy and wanted to hold him all the time. She has been asking me regularly since we've been back if I have a baby in my tummy. When I tell her no, she replies, "Aww man, mom!" The girls seemed to really enjoy each other and Allyson really didn't want them to head back to California.

Lauren and Noraa both have a May birthday so we had a little birthday party for the two of them. We also got a picture of all the second cousins together - except Grey, but we got one of him with all the second cousins later in the week.

Justin was only able to stay for the weekend, and then he headed back home to work. Then a few days later after Aaron, Amy and family left Tana and Grey joined the fun. We picked them up late on a Wednesday night and Grey was ready to roll as if it were first thing in the morning.

Allyson and Lauren enjoyed playing in a whole different way with their boy cousin than with the girls from a few days before. They had a lot of fun with him. There were lots of hugs, more Betsy stories, lots of playing in Grandad and Granjan's backyard, cars to push around, balls to chase!

One of the highlights of Grey and Tana's visit was a day trip to Seattle with a trip across the Sound to Bremerton on the Ferry. We enjoyed watching the kids on the ferry, feeding the seagulls at Ivar's after lunch, and walking around in Seattle.

Over all the trip was very nice. We saw all of my family and the girls got good time with grandparents and cousins. Here are a few other pictures of the trip!