Bowling night with Mommy (with VIDEO!)

Tonight while Nathan was at church meetings I took the four kids bowling! We had a very fun "mommy date". And I have to say that I have some of the best behaved children ever! I got several compliments about our children.

Who's up first? Nick, then Tiana, then Ben...sorry Andrew, not this time.

Goooooo Nick!
Tiana has a little bit different style, but it gets the job done.
Ben was all about doing it himself, he loves to be "grown up".
The score board from the first game...

The score board from the second game...yes, you see it right...Ben won!

Here is a hilarious video of Ben doing a happy dance before taking his turn to bowl. Funny kid, he had us all laughing, and others were laughing too!

TaeKwonDo

Nick and Tiana have been in TaeKwonDo since January and really love it. We found a place close to our home called Counter Strikes and it has worked out great for us. The kids had a belt test last week and earned their orange belt. The order so far has been; white, yellow, yellow second dan, and orange. They are doing great! They even did their first "sparring" class last week and really impressed the owner! Click HERE to see their photos on his website!

Tiana practicing her crescent kicks.
Nick learning a front roll. That is Jack Burright, the owner, helping him.
In line doing their punches. You don't want to mess with these kids!
Jack is teaching the kids their front flips for the first time.

Skinner Butte Park

On Monday, August 25th, after going to Nathan's office we headed down to Eugene for a fun day at the park. We went to Skinner Butte Park. The kids love it there and have been asking for a while to go again. We met up with my good friend, Liz, and her two boys. We grabbed milkshakes on the way home. It is a 45+minute drive one way, but it was a very fun day!




This is a funny video of Ben trying to climb the slide. He is such a funny kid!

Andrew's hand cast

We took Andrew into Nathan's office so he could get a cast of his hand made. We have done it with all four of our children. I am kicking myself for not getting him in sooner when he was just tiny. Oh well, better late than never!

New Title Banner!

Do you like my new title banner? It is a photo my dear hubby took on a recent camping trip this summer. I just love macro shots like this. Pretty.

Anger Management

On Saturday we went to a "Strengthening the Family" seminar at our church. One of the classes Nathan and I attended was one on anger management. Not because we are angry all the time, but because the class on keeping your kids safe on the Internet was cancelled due the police officer teaching it couldn't come. Plus we wanted to get some tools to use with our nine year old son. Our easy going nine and half year old is starting to experience some pre-teen hormone surges. Fun for us!

So we went to the class and learned a few new things and were reminded of a few old things. Then at our weekly family meeting yesterday one item on the agenda was to discuss these anger management tools. Here is what we taught the kids;

1. Anger is a secondary emotion. When you are feeling angry it is because your mind is trying to cover up what you are really feeling like loneliness, sadness, disappointment, frustration, tiredness, etc. So when you start to feel angry, stop, and think, "What am I really feeling?" and then deal with that first emotion. I am usually feeling tired!

2. Use the "I feel____about____because____." formula to talk about our feelings. This way we are owning our own feelings and not blaming others for it. It also helps us communicate. For example, "I feel overwhelmed about the messy kitchen because it is a lot of work to clean up." Then my family knows to either stay out of my way because I am feeling overwhelmed and need time to complete the task or to pitch in and help me.

3. Our #1 anger rule. The teacher in the class we took said this was their family's number one rule and now it is ours as well. "NEVER touch any other human being when you are feeling angry." Not at home, at school, anywhere. How perfect!

So after our family meeting there were a couple of situations that showed me how much these things sunk in. Here they are;

1. Nick was sitting on the couch in a spot that Ben wanted to sit. Ben was being very difficult last night. So Ben got mad and grabbed Nick's shirt and tried to pull him off the couch. I heard Nick say, "Ben! You can't touch me when you're angry!" Ben let go and just looked at him like, "oh, okay" and sat beside him.

2. I heard Tiana say from the other room, "I am feeling frustrated about Ben because he won't leave me alone." Pretty good for her first try.

3. A little while after that I hear Nick tell Tiana, "You aren't suppose to touch people when your angry (talking about touching Ben), now say you're sorry. She did.

4. Nathan was frustrated with the computer and then he turned to me and said, "the rule says other human beings, but it says nothing about beating the crap out of this computer, right?" It lightened his mood to just joke about it. He brings up a good point, how often do we feel like throwing our computer across the room. I think we should have a ball sitting next to the computer that we can throw, it would be a soft ball so it wouldn't cause any damage, but it would make the sound of breaking glass when it hit the wall! Ahhh. Stress relief!

Andrew and his Daddy

Getting so big, but still so tiny!
Yup, he's a "fist" sucker. And he is very loud when he does it too! This picture was at the Wildcat park.

Wildcat Park

On Sunday, August 17th, after church and a good dinner we took the Bloomfields over to Wildcat Park. It is a huge playground with tons to do for the kids. It was a nice family activity on a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

Our day at Enchanted Forest with the Bloomfields!

Our friends, the Bloomfields, came all the way from Moscow, ID to visit! We met them at Enchanted Forest on Saturday, August 16th, for a fun filled day. Here are some pictures from our day. They are not in order, but who cares?!

All eight children at the castle in the beginning of Enchanted Forest. They have no idea what a fun day they are about to have!

Ben, Nick and Tiana had fun bumpin' around in the Bumper Boats.
They took a ride on the very colorful and elaborate Kiddie Train. Hanging out in the Old English Village. There is a really cool water show here. We ate pizza for lunch as we watched the show.
WHOA! What is that big splash?It is Nathan, Nick and Tiana coming down the Log Ride. It was very thrilling and very wet!
Looking for Hansel and Gretel in the witch's candy cottage.

There was a crooked man, who lived in a crooked house...oh wait...that's just Nathan and the kids visiting. Walking through this crooked house was a pretty strange feeling though.
There was an old woman who lived in a shoe, she had so many children she didn't know what to do... here come two of them now! Nathan and Ben sliding down. I love the look on Ben's face. Yes, he did want to go again!
All the children (except Andrew) dressed up and posing with Abe Lincoln.
The day was almost 100 degrees out, but in Enchanted Forest it was so shady that it wasn't too bad. We had a lot of fun. No one got hurt, lost, or sick. With eight kiddos that is a pretty good day!

Ben's last in-home speech therapy

Ben was diagnosed with Apraxia last December and started speech therapy in January. His speech therapist, Domoni, came to our home for his play therapy sessions twice a month. She would bring a huge bag of toys and they would have fun together. She always seemed to genuinely enjoy Ben and gave him, and us, tons of compliments.

He is progressing in his speech abilities, but still has a long ways to go. He primarily communicates through sign language. He is saying more and more words and trying really hard. When he was evaluated he tested off the charts in every area. His IQ, cognitive skills, receptive language skills, etc, were all very high for his age. He simply has a speech disability.

Now that the school year is starting and he is old enough he will be attending a special preschool that has a speech therapist work with the children. He will go to school once a week and is very excited to do so. But that means he will no longer have his "play-dates" with Domoni. So we had our last in-home therapy session with her this month and we were both very sad to see her go. Ben really loves her. Goodbye Dononi...

Ben doing dishes

Ben is growing up! Here he is helping with the dishes. He wasn't even asked! He just brought the stool over to the kitchen sink and started to rinse the dishes as we were loading the dishwasher. He is so cute and so helpful!
And yes, he is in his underwear. As long as he helps with the chores, he can be as comfortable as he wants. What will be funny is if someday his wife says, "I love that he helps around the house, but he does the dishes in his underwear. How odd." LOL!

My 31st Birthday and our 11th Anniversary!

It's funny how as you get older your birthdays aren't as big of a deal. My 31st birthday was at the beginning of this month and I forgot to write about it! How silly is that?! I cannot believe I am "in my 30's". I remember when I was a kid and 30 was "sooo oooold!" Now I still feel so young, what am I saying, I AM young! But honestly, sometimes I do feel old. Maybe because I have been through so much in life already. And then there are other time when I feel like life is just beginning and I have so many possibilities ahead of me. Maybe that is why some people call this "mid-life", as long as I can hold off the "crisis" part for as long as possible. Well, I don't know, it might be cool to get a motorcycle and blame it on the "the crisis". Ha Ha Ha!

I actually had a terrible birth"day" but a wonderful birthday evening. Andrew had his immunization shots in the morning. He was scheduled for his six week shots on the day he had his surgery, but because of his surgery, they didn't give them to him. The next appointment they had after his post-op appointment was on my birthday so we had to do it. Not my ideal birthday having to hold my sweet little baby as he cries and screams through shots. Then spend the rest of the day holding him as he spikes a fever, cries and fusses all day. I had to hold him all day because he was so uncomfortable and would whimper in his sleep, then he would wake up crying if I tried to put him down. It was a very exhausting day.

But then Nathan came home and gave my arms a break for a while. Then he made a delicious dinner of Tikka Masala Chicken and rice. We had Strawberry Cheesecake for dessert..yummy! Then I opened presents. Tiana had made me a pretty flower sun catcher and gave me a matching pencil and beaded bracelet she made. Nathan and the kids gave me an ipod nano and a ipod+nike. I am so excited and have enjoyed using it already. It has a little sensor you put in your shoe and then a receiver you plug into your ipod. Then it tells you how far you've gone, how fast you're going, how many calories burned, your time, and you can even download workouts on there. Very cool tool to get me back into running!

Our anniversary was also this month. We have been married for 11 wonderful years! Nathan and I went to the "Get Smart" movie at the fancy PIX Theater here in town. The Pix was built in 1892 and started off as a Livery Stable! We had dinner while watching the movie. Pizza and Dots ice cream, plus the old popcorn and soda standby. The movie was really funny and we liked it.

Andrew tagged along this time, but we told him that next year he would have to stay with the sitter.

On a side note, I went to the doctor today for my back. It has been giving me a lot of trouble and I have been in a lot of pain with it. I have tried Chiropractic, massage, hot tub, ice packs, as much Tylenol and IB as I can legal ingest and it isn't getting better. My thoughts were that after nine weeks of bed rest I just need to strengthen it back up. But it was pointed out to me that since our insurance deductible is paid for this year I might as well get it checked out in case it is something more serious. But thankfully my doctor agreed with my assumption and it is just weak from bed rest and pregnancy and I have to do certain stretches and exercises to strengthen it. If I do not feel better in three weeks I will let him know and he will do x-rays and see if there is something more serious. I haven't been able to run as much as I like because it hurts too bad, once I get this back strengthened up I should be able to start running and feeling like my old self again. I look forward to that.

Tiana's Extreme Room Makeover...on a budget!

Tiana wanted a room make-over because as she said, "I've had this room since I was in preschool, can I have a big girl's room now?" So we found a king sized duvet cover and pillow shams at a garage sale for $5 that I cut up and sewed to make a window treatment, twin size duvet cover, pillow sham, and recovered a stool for her desk. We also found three cute Strawberry Shortcake posters at the Dollar Store. The rest of the "decor" was just reused stuff from around the house. Tiana picked out a "bubble gum pink" color for the walls. I think it turned out adorable!

Tiana had so much fun painting the room herself! I did the cutting-in around the edges, Nick painted the corners and one wall and Tiana did the other walls. And then she helped put everything back and "decorate". We moved her to the top bunk and put her desk and things underneath for an office, she calls it her "Secret Lab". Not sure where she gets that but I think it is so cute! She loves her new room! We did this all in one day, yesterday! I am still scrubbing pink paint off of me!

Tolman Reunion at Anthony Lakes

We went to the annual Tolman family reunion at Anthony Lakes August 8-10th which is in the mountains near LeGrande, Oregon. It is so beautiful there and we love to see all the family and enjoy the wonderful joys of nature. Here is some pictures to share from our fun experiences...

Little Andrew meets his Great Grandma Clara Tolman for the first time.

Nathan roasting some hot dogs for our first dinner. When we got there they had just had a huge thunderstorm pass through and our site was a bit flooded. We set up quickly because of threatening rain. It ended up not being too bad. The rest of the weekend was very nice weather.

Ben pitched in around camp wherever he could. He was so serious about helping gather this firewood that he wouldn't even look at the camera for the picture!
We brought our dog, Crystal, with us on this trip. Ben liked walking her around the camp, although I am not quite sure who was leading who.
I brought up a lot of scrapbook paper and supplies to make paper bag brag books. They are very fun. The project was a big hit with some of the aunts and cousins. Here Tiana is helping Grandma make hers. Ben is, of course, right in the action too.
Andrew supervises his Mommy and Daddy as they prepare dutch oven chicken enchiladas for the traditional dutch oven pot luck. They sure were delicious! Our new favorite recipe!

Nick found a new friend, a salamander he is holding.

Just a few of the Cousins. They had so much fun together!

Uncle Dave put together a "Survivor" style blow dart game. Very creative! We all had fun trying our hand, er...lips, at this fun game. Ben didn't know what to do, but he had fun looking like he was doing what the big kids were doing. Tiana did pretty good here...

Nick won the first round in his division... look at those cheeks!

Nathan and Perry (his dad) went head to head in a round. It was close, but Perry won this one in the end.

I took my turn too, it is harder than you think to aim this thing! Maybe next time Uncle Dave will add sights!

This is picture of Nathan and Ben fishing in the canoe in the middle of the lake with Gunsight mountain in the background. So beautiful!

Ben sure takes after his daddy, what a catch! Trout for lunch!

Grandpa and Ben are at the lake looking for something... what could it be?

Oh! They are looking for Nathan and his cousin, Randy, who were in the lake scuba diving! They saw LOTS of fish. Randy said, "A thousand fish down there and I can't catch a single one." Ha! Ha! They also found, and brought up, a lot of sunken "treasure" including oars, anchors, a fishing pole, fishing hat, unopened pop can, and other fun stuff. No, we did not drink the pop!
Nick and Tiana had fun in the water as they waited for their daddy to resurface. "Brrr, it's cold in here!"

Andrew sure had a good time and the reunion and is excited to go back again!