We are thankful for the Segos

It's true. We are so thankful for the Segos. What great hosts to have us over for the second time in a month, and the second Thanksgiving in a row! We love going to their house. Paul's sister Heidi is one of my favorite people ever. Benjamin adores his cousins (especially Lane and Breton). Rhett gets to chase the cats. ("DAH!" says Rhett, because basically any animal with any amount of fur and four limbs is the same to him as a dog.) For us, it's an all-around good time.

We need to start remembering to actually use the camera we bring with us. We didn't take any pictures until the day we left. I guess that means we were too busy having a good time. We had a nice Thanksgiving meal, but other than that I don't remember many particulars of the visit besides our Black Friday shopping.

Some of the stores we intended to visit opened so early that it didn't make sense to go to bed. So we stayed up. Paul headed over to one store to secure a laptop for Heidi around 2 am and shortly after that Heidi and I started off our shopping at Toys R Us, which we entered and then exited shortly thereafter on account of the massive line that wrapped around the store and which hardly moved at all. Then we found some good deals at Old Navy, walked into Kohl's and out again for the same reason we did it at Toys R Us, and finished up at Target before meeting Paul at the computer place. I think I finally went to sleep about 8 am on Friday. And I'm still feeling it. Later Paul went on a bike ride with Landon, which was really nice for him, and Cara and Lane got to stay up to play games with us. The Duerschs are big on the game Rook, which I had never heard of till I met Paul.

So no pictures until Saturday, but they're of the sweetest nieces and nephews and these kids really made the trip so fun!

Allie and Cara and little Will

Will is just the sweetest baby!

Lane (aka Awesome Cousin of the Year) put together this sweet "trailer" for Lightning McQueen! He pulled Benjamin and Breton around the yard in it and they just had a ball!

Sweet Allie, who gave us this nice Thanksgiving card:

We feel so blessed and grateful to have family members close by for holidays like this one and other fun and special times!

Apple Turkeys

Paul's sister Marianne had the fun idea to make turkeys out of apples with her boys. When Benjamin saw the pictures on her blog he didn't want to do anything else the rest of the day but make apple turkeys. So after a trip to the store where Benjamin hand-selected an apple for each of us, we spent our Family Home Evening making these guys:

(Can you tell which one is Pauls??)

One of the poor birds got carved in the end.

Delicious!

Thanks for the fun idea, Marianne!

Weekend with the Segos, part 2

I finally figured out how to transfer the pictures from my phone to the computer! Such a happy day. With my old phone I couldn't move pictures directly from the phone to the computer. The only way to get them off (so said the Sprint Store guy) was to e-mail them (like I was going to pay for that). My only regret about that set-up (which still stings a bit) is that the first picture taken after Rhett was born (while Paul was in Bellingham and my in-laws were on the way to the hospital) was on that phone. A nurse took a picture of Rhett on the scale for me. I had really wanted to find some way to get that one picture off the phone, but after several baths in baby saliva my phone gave up on me. Even though I know it's not a big deal, it still bugs me a little.

Anyway...

I actually did take some pictures while we were in Richland! These are all from Saturday at the park when the kids played in the Family Friendly Soccer league that their way cool mom and dad created.

Here's Allie (in the middle) during her soccer game

The little boys played at the park while the big kids played soccer. Benjamin followed Breton around almost the entire time, wanting to do everything together.

This is how Rhett figured how to go down the slide all by himself. He thought it was pretty fun. I was pretty impressed with his fearlessness. Later he went down a different slide that had a bigger drop to the ground and he fell on his head. It wasn't so fun after that.
(I don't know what the deal is with the sound on these videos. Anyone know about this stuff?)

Afterwards the kids (and Paul) had fun in a leaf pile. Here are Paul and Lane ready to drop leaves on Rhett (which he thought was so fun)!

A weekend with the Segos

Last Friday we headed down to Richland, WA, to visit with Paul's sister Heidi, her husband Landon, and their kids Cara, Lane, Allie, Breton, and Will. We also got to hang out with Grandma Duersch, Alene and Kelv, and baby Camden who all came up from Utah for Will's blessing.

Of course, we brought the camera but didn't take any pictures. Too bad. My favorite parts of the visit were watching Allie score two goals in her soccer game (and winning!), making salsa and guacamole with Alene and Heidi while talking about good books, watching the video of Cara in the play Pirates of Penzance (in which she did awesome!)... to name a few. We always love visiting with the Segos!

Thanks, Heidi and Landon, for a great weekend!

Honesty

I heard Rhett crying in the boys' bedroom today. I went in to investigate and found Rhett sitting on a pile of Matchbox cars next to a toppled over set of shelves. Rhett has been known to climb onto said shelves, so I said to Benjamin, "Uh oh, did Rhett fall?"

His reply:

"No. I threw a car at him."

Glad he doesn't think to lie yet.