Why is going to bed so difficult?

Micah came out LAST night and said to me, “Signe punched me in the eye.”
Me: “Why did she punch you in the eye? Aren’t you guys sleeping?”
Micah: “I guess she lost her temper.”
Me: “Why did she do that? Aren’t you laying quietly in bed?”
Micah: “Uh..oh…well…uh…I guess I was telling her about ghosts and goblins and stuff…”

*Tonight* Micah comes out of his room and says to me: “My tooth is bugging Signe.”
Me (barely containing my laughter): “Why is that?”
Micah: “Because it is loose.”
Ah yes, that explains it.

Josiah misses out on most of it because he is just like his GmaB–falls asleep the minute he is in bed, snores until early morning and then is up with the birds, bright eyed and bushy tailed!

The Getty.

Saturday we loaded up (the WHOLE family, it was sure fun to have Papa with) and headed to LA. After doing some research on things to do, we decided that we needed to check out The J. Paul Getty Art Museum. It is an amazing facility. You park in a ramp (I should say garage, Jer was teased for calling it a parking ramp) and take a tram up the hill to the grounds. The grounds include 5 different buildings with paintings on the second floor of each building. Then first floors have sculptures, some paintings, tapestries, furniture, and lots of other visual arts. It was quite kid friendly (for an art museum). The kids were given clue cards to work on (like a scavenger hunt) and there was a hands on family room. We also rented the audio tour headsets, since that had worked so well for us before. We did a family art-talk too, which was very interesting and helped the kids see things a little differently. We got there promptly at 10am and didn’t leave until 4pm. (The morning was relaxing but by 4 it was crowded!) The grounds are also amazing, there is a cactus garden and no lack of things to look at. The architecture was very fun too. We had a great day! Anyone who wants to come and visit, we’d love to take you! Oh, and it’s FREE!

The boys enjoyed the headphones, but tired quickly. They got a bit bored at times.

Signe on the other hand, would have listened to every single talk if she could have.

The kids in a Rococo room.

The kids are into taking pictures themselves. So we got a mom & dad shot after our sack lunch.

Josiah took this picture when Papa was trying to get the camera back. I guess this is what Papa looks like to the kids.

You can see downtown in the background of this girls only picture.

This is the walkway back to the tram and home.

A whale of a time…

What an awesome experience! The night before a field trip I tend to stress out. I worry about traffic. I worry about traveling by myself with four kids in a super heavily populated area that I’m not familiar with. I worry about missing the group I’m supposed to be meeting. I worry about not finding my destination. I worry about how Kari will do. About losing my older three. I worry myself into a stress case and always consider just canceling. The next morning I am still stressed, but I get up, pack my lunch, punch the address into the Garmin and off we go. I always end up happy that we went.

Today was no different. I was especially nervous because we were heading out on a whale watching excursion. Once you are in a boat in the ocean, there are not a lot of escape options if your 6 month old melts down or your 7 year old freaks out. But we did it. And it was **AWESOME**. We were so lucky to see a mom and baby gray whale. You don’t actually get to see a lot, but what you do see is super cool. And we saw a ton of dolphins. They came up and swam right next to the boat for a long time. They were within in 6 ft. of us. We even saw white sided dolphins, which are much more rare than the common gray dolphin-which we saw a lot of. We saw sea lions on a buoy. The kids had a great time. Kari slept in the sling most of the time and her eating worked out perfect. Traffic wasn’t terrible (it’s never great in SoCal) and we are home again! I’m so glad we went!

I’ll spare you the whale pictures…they don’t really turn out so well. But here are some people pictures!

That crazy crooked tooth finally came out. Jeremiah had the dental floss tied on it and was going to attach the other end to a dart and shoot it out of a dart gun (a variation on slamming the door) but Micah pulled on the string too quickly.

Looking out over the harbor in Oceanside, CA.

Mom and Kari getting ready to go on the boat.

Kari slept most for most of the trip. Being in the sling protected her from the wind.

Somehow Signe managed to score 10 minutes at the wheel. She is turning into a sea-girl!

Signe loved sitting at the front of the boat and watching the dolphins play right under the bow.

The boys enjoyed the dolphins and whales, but the LOVED making new friends.

After our cruise we took a picture in front of the boat–The Sea Star.

Productive and fun weekend. Check.

Blogging for me ends up being a list of what we have done. Which is just how I operate–crossing off things on my to do lists is my most favoritest thing. Anyone not know this about me? (Note the sarcasm.) Anyways, here is what we’ve been doing.

Saturday we wanted to get out and about but with all the rain we didn’t know where to go. Hiking is out of the question because the “soil” around here is clay and becomes a greasy mess after rain. The mountains were calling to us, but you needed chains to get there. We read later that on Saturday cars were backed up for miles and miles trying to get to the mountains. Some people waited six or more hours to get there, only to be turned back down because there was no room for them. Mountain grocery stores ran out of food, gas stations out of gas…it sounded like a mess. I’m glad we didn’t try it. SoCal is like that…4 million of your closest friends that all have the same idea as you.

So Saturday became project day. Jeremiah and the boys worked on building rockets that Mark and Jill gave to the boys in September. (It was always so dry we didn’t think it would be good to shoot them off, but now we should be safe.) They aren’t quite done, but close. Signe wanted a special project too, so she decided to make lemon poppyseed bread. It was DELICIOUS! We have our own little grove of lemon trees in our front yard, so it was fun to put them to use. (On a side note, we thought they were lime trees this summer….until they turned yellow… who knew!?) I made my first batches of homemade baby food: sweet potatoes and squash. I’ve got them frozen and after we work on avocados and peas for a while, we’ll start the orange veggies.

Sunday we packed a lunch and took off right after church for California Adventure Park. It is across from Disney, owned by Disney (we get in free with our Disney pass) and is mostly rides. We had a good long afternoon and left in time to listen to the disappointing Vikings game. We were mostly bummed for my dad and brother, who would’ve been so excited if the Vikes would’ve won. I didn’t feel like lugging my big camera with–does anyone know where I hid my point and shoot camera??? I’m sure I organized to a very efficient spot.

Working on the rockets.

Handling sharp tools with care and guidance.

The apple and the tree.

Concentrating.

Slobbering on the floor, watching the action.

Always interested in what the big kids are doing.

Micah’s front tooth is *SO* close to coming out. It hangs at a funny angle and it’s driving him (and me a little) crazy!

This picture is mostly for our dentist Aunt!

Food Adventures.

For those of you who are interested, you can check out www.markleonardimaging.com and go to his blog. He took some super cool pictures of the tapas party and put together an awesome slideshow. It’s only a couple minutes and in my opinion it’s very fun!

Monday we celebrated MLK Jr. day by taking a tour of Pat and Oscar’s. It’s a SoCal pizza/wings chain that we happened upon on one of our trips to distant LA areas. They let the kids make their own large pepperoni pizza and stick on the conveyor belt that took it through the oven (and completely cooked) in 8 minutes. Then we toured the kitchen: saw the big cans of tomato sauce etc. in the huge pantry room, the enormous dishwashing machines, the walk in frig with pans upon pans of breadsticks (they make delicious super garlicky breadsticks–kinda like Olive Garden), and the different prep stations. Then we ate our pizza and were done. And it was free! The kids were embarrassed because they had to wear hair nets, plastic gloves and aprons the whole time. I thought they were cute and kicked myself for not having my camera. I lost my little point and click camera (somewhere in my house) and don’t always think to throw my “big camera” in…oops.

Tuesday we fed Kari her first “real” food–an avacado. In reading about making homemade baby food–which I might try, after all I am homeschooling and I live in hippie CA… –I read that avacados are a great way to start. Made sense to me. Kari seemed to like it, so we’ll try it for a few days and see how it goes! The kids were the ones who remembered to take a picture of her first meal, so below are a few shots *they* took.

By the way, we had a field trip cancelled today indirectly due to the rain and will probably be home from park day tomorrow because of rain, but we are in no danger (as far as I know anyway). The kids and I went to the library today and so they are very busily reading new books–it’ll be hard to get them to do anything for another hour or so.

Eventful Weekend.

Friday we took off for LA, near the campus of USC, and the California Science Center. It’s a free science museum with a TON of hands-on learning fun. We didn’t leave until 9:30 because I wanted to avoid traffic, but downtown it doesn’t matter, there is ALWAYS traffic. So we got there in time for an early lunch in the park next to our parking lot. After we got our picnic going I looked around and realized we were having lunch with 7 of our homeless friends. Interesting (as the kids would say). We enjoyed the museum but I was getting antsy to leave before rush hour so we cut our time short. The hour trip home took over two hours! It was intense. I’m so thankful for our dvd system and a good baby!

Friday night Papa woke up to an earthquake. The rest of us are super bummed because we slept through it. Jeremiah said he saw the lamp shade on his nightstand shaking at 4am. He was pretty excited about it.

Saturday we spent cleaning house and getting ready for a tapas party. Mark had a great idea to get together his foodie friends and so 3 couples came to our house with their special Spanish tapas dishes. The food was amazing. The conversation was super. The wine was great. Jeremiah and I are still smiling today, we had such a great time.

Today we had church and spent the afternoon playing in the park. We played soccer, frisbee, and did the mentos/coke thing again (but a little better!). Sundays are great!

California Science Center

Micah’s turn to pull the “trigger.”

Signe…

Josiah.

I tried taking a picture of Kari while I was “wearing” her and got this shot. It shows the two red lines where she bumped herself by rolling over and over and into the footstool in our sunroom.

Big events.

Well, the weekend turned out to be a big deal around here. Kari started it off by giving me a full nights sleep for the first time ever (she slept from 8pm to 6am–YAY!). Jeremiah thought I should feel wonderful and although it *was* awesome, it takes more than one night of sleep to recover from 5 months of sleep deprivation. Oh well, this too shall pass–they don’t stay little forever–which is both good and bad, right?!

Friday night we were trying to decide what to do with Jeremiah’s whole entire weekend off…we were thinking desert/hiking, aquariums, tourist traps, etc. We decided to go to Knottsberry Farm, but the more we researched, we decided just to head for Disneyland and forego Knotts this year. The kids were already in bed, so they didn’t know about our plans. We woke them up at 6:30 and said we needed to hit the road for a big day of…SHOPPING! Man were they disappointed–angry, frustrated even. To say they were not impressed would be an understatement. When we got to Anaheim they started asking about Disney, but we told them there was good shopping in the area too…it wasn’t until we were walking into the park that they really understood that we were surprising them. Even after we were in the park Micah kept asking if it was REALLY Disneyland. We hadn’t seen the castle yet, so he wasn’t convinced. We had a great time, we took things slow and easy because we knew we would be getting annual passes (if you go more than once they pay for themselves for SoCal residents). It was a good day, the kids loved it.

Today we did our Mentos/Diet Coke stunt. Josiah got it as a Christmas gift and it was time to experiment. For those of you that don’t know what it is you can see demos on youtube. Mythbusters on youtube explains the science behind it (nucleation I think?). It was a little bit of a bummer because Jer accidentally pulled the trigger early. He got sticky in the process, but it was still fun.

Mom and kids, hands in the air! on Splash Mountain–a favorite ride.

We didn’t stand in line for pictures with other characters, but happened upon Woody and Jessie? so snapped a quick picture. Micah wasn’t interested.

Kari did pretty well–although she didn’t quite sleep as well last night as the night before.

Loving up Papa!

Obligatory Small World ride–a little disappointing because the Christmas theme was still up.

The highlight of the day was when Signe (in this picture) and Josiah got selected to be Jedi knights in training.

They even got to fight Darth Vader. They can show you the fight routine they learned.

Here is the Mencoke explosion in our front yard.

As promised.

Here are some more pictures from our holiday season. This week has been good, especially because I think we are getting Kari into a good sleep schedule. She is in her own room now, the three older kids are sharing one room and we have our room to ourselves again. We still have a room reserved for guests, so buy those plane tickets!

Oh and isn’t it funny how things have changed? Signe and I were talking about the changes in technology today and I was telling her that when I was her age we didn’t have cell phones. She said, “Well what kind of phones did you Have?” I explained we had ones that plugged into the wall etc. She says, “Well what if you wanted to go somewhere?!!!” Unbelievable in her mind…

Signe and Maddie cuddled up together reading after a good night’s sleep.

Mark has lots of company when he surfs the net at our house.

Josiah is showing off a bubble sticker that says, “I’m a hungry dinosaur!”

Josiah at a Rose Bowl Parade float–I think it was an Anaheim float.

We took this picture for Grandpa Terry–it’s a barnstormer biplane!

One of my favorite sights was these Rose Bowl volunteers. They were dressed in white tuxes with red accents and the coolest hats!

Signe, my princess, in front of a float with a giant flowery crown.

Can you see all the people in the background? And we got there early to beat the rush!

Sledding near Lake Arrowhead in the mountains.

Josiah’s turn.

Micah’s turn.

Kari stayed warm next to mom while the kids enjoyed the snow.

A week to recover.

The kids are out playing in the yard (it’s small but functional) because it is a beautiful 70 degrees today. Jeremiah heard on NPR while he was driving to work yesterday that Grand Forks hit a record low of 35 below…we aren’t missing that! I am inside trying to recover from the holidays and get my plan for the next couple months of field trips etc. We have done much, but there is still so much to do!

We were sad to see Tennille and Charity go, but the last two days of Teal’s visit we packed a lot in. On New Year’s Day we went to the San Diego Zoo, Point Loma and Coronado Island. The next day we went to the day after Rose Bowl “backwards” parade–where the floats were stationary and we did the walking. It was amazing to see them up close and personal. Then we dropped Teal off at LAX and headed up to the mountains where we met some friends and enjoyed a bit cooler climate. The kids even got to go sledding on Sunday! They enjoyed seeing snow (even if there wasn’t very much) and we hope to go back up after a big storm later this winter. Pictures of the backwards parade and sledding will come when I get to it…hopefully soon.

Tennille took this last picture of 2009!

Swimming on December 31st! The locals thought Teal and kids were crazy, but it wasn’t too cold!

Aunt Teal had such great ideas for taking fun shots.

Kari is still all smiles, despite her first cold virus.

We took Teal to the tidepools at Point Loma in San Diego on New Year’s Day.

After Point Loma we drove out to Coronado Island and Teal had fun taking pictures of the kids.

The sunset was the most amazing thing.

It was the perfect way to start the new year.

Since Teal had the camera, Kari and I made it into a shot!

Brother and sister!

A family pic.

Another family picture…with the Hotel Del in the background.

Aunt with her niece and nephews!

Christmas

We are enjoying December in SoCal. Santa left a little snow on the carpet (two footprints even) by the tree and in front of the chimney. I’m not sure how he landed on the roof, but the packages still made it. The turkey was great, the lefse was awesome (if I do say so) and spending time with family was the best!

Tennille got here late on the 23rd. She will be here until the 2nd, but Charity will leave the 30th. Those two are die-hard shoppers, out trying to find all the Christmas deals today. Last night we took them to Rancho Cucamonga to see the most lit up neighborhood ever. They close down the street to traffic, sell tamales and hot chocolate and go over the top with Christmas lights. One house even uses special paint (and repaints every year) to make their 150,000 lights shine even brighter!

I’ll let the pictures tell the stories.

The kids had a PJ Day this week and enjoyed wearing jammies ALL DAY. They did change into different jammies a couple times, like after they played soccer outside…

Tennille practiced on Signe–she had a tooth that had been loose for a L-O-O-O-N-G time and it needed to come out. Signe was a trooper–her dad was more nervous.

Santa put toothbrushes in the stockings — he must’ve wanted to impress Tennille.

Signe on Christmas morning.

Looking at one exciting new toy on Christmas morning.

Kari showing off the headband Charity and Tennille gave her for Christmas.

I don’t know why the kids were standing in front of a yucky metal pole when there were so many beautiful lights to use as a background–but anyways, hopefully you get a hint of the amazing lights.

A group picture in front of the palm-apple.

A shot of one of our very favorite displays in the Christmas neighborhood–a palm tree lit up to look like a giant pineapple (the universal sign of welcome, right mom?).

Mackenzie & Signe!

Playing on the Leonard’s new drum!

Kari & Maddie–we are watching the Leonard girls while their mom & dad are enjoying a day at Magic Mountain.

Maddie is listening to one of the kids’ new discmans, a Christmas gift from the aunts. They have been a BIG HIT with the kids (and the grownups enjoy the quiet!).