Girls at Play...

Andrew went hunting, so Savannah and I decided not to spend the day alone at home, and went to Fir Point Farms. They're having their pumpkin / harvest celebration, so we went to see what was going on. Our first stop was to go on a hay ride. It was probably more fun for Savannah than for me, but we had a great time.

We were able to see a lot of fun things - and do some fun things, but it truly would have been better if Andrew had been there.

By the way... this is me at 22 weeks pregnant... over halfway there!

This was stop number two... amazing to me how brave this little punkin has gotten - not only did she want to pick the caterpillar up, she thought it was cool when it started walking up her arm. We actually saw this guy at the pumpkin slinging area where Savannah did her best to pull a slingshot back and shoot a pumpkin out into the field. It didn't go very far, but she had a blast trying! I'm not sure if she liked the caterpillar more than the pumpkin though...

This was our third stop... this pumpkin was the grand-daddy of them all weighing in at 1150 lbs. Savannah is so short compared to the pumpkins! But... it was sure fun to see them and to know that they would make good pies... carving would be a moster, and so would baking, but imagine what you can do with 1200 lbs of pumpkin???

Fir Point farms has a slide into hay... Savannah came down so fast the first time that I didn't get to take her picture - so I had her go down again.

More things we did this summer...

Playing in the warm sand...
letting Dad catch her as she comes off the slide...
At the beach with Kennedy...
Let's do that water slide again, Dad!

Things we did this summer...

for those of you who have been patiently (or not) waiting for some more pictures on our blog... I've finally gotten my computer to the stage that I can add photos without taking up too much room. And I've been able to play with the pictures to make them better too.

It's taken time, but here they are!

It's Pumpkin Smashing time!

Actually, it's not the parking under it that's the problem. It's having a crane lift that giant pumpkin 150+ feet in the air and then dropping the pumpkin on the parked van that's the problem. This particular pumpkin weighed between 7 and 8 HUNDRED pounds... I asked if they'd somehow weakened the structures on the van before dropping the pumpkin - the only thing that was done to the van was glass removal. Sure am glad this isn't MY van! I wonder what the insurance company would say about his kind of an accident?

It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown...

this is what happens when you park under a giant pumpkin...

All by myself... no body else...

This was Savannah's idea to go all by herself. She decided that while it was fun with other people in the tube, she wanted to try going all alone, as long as Andrew promised to drive slowly. He did, and she did just fine... in fact, I think she really wanted to go all by herself so that I would take her picture all by herself; as soon as she started to go, she started hollering, "take a picture, Mom!" and as soon as she saw me put the camera down, she was finished and wanted to come in. She did NOT, however, want to be dumped out of the tube and into the water. Can't really say that I blame her...

Boating at the reservoir

Here are some of our adventures on the boat! Savannah is all wet because she chose to move the inner tube while Andrew was trying to tow her in... she ended up in the water. The life-jacket didn't seem to help her feel better, we listened to her - "save me! Save me!!!" before she was finally able to realize that she wasn't under waterAnd here we have the beauty of the reservoir in Washington... it was wonderful. Mt. St. Helens in the background even let off a little steam for us! The weather was perfect for tubing - anyone else want to join us next time??? Linda

Heartbeats...

One little heartbeat at a time... We had the wonderful, miraculous, awesome experience of being able to listen to the baby's heartbeat. What a miracle that is! We're in the 11th week (better than the 11th hour, I suppose) and I've learned that I can't eat meat any time after about 3 in the afternoon... tonight's dinner consisted of French Fries and gravy...

more news as it evolves!

Boating on the Willamette

Last night we took our boat out for a jaunt. We had great plans to go tubing, but the tube didn't want to spend all that much time on the water, and decided to shred itself to get out of having anyone on it. In fact, our good friend Dave, was on the tube at the time that the tube bailed... he got wet. I'll post pictures tomorrow - I forgot to turn the camera off and the battery needs to be recharged. Needless to say, the night was gorgeous, the company was great (Savannah and Cal are still insisting that they're married... we'll see how they feel in about 12 years...) and the boat ran very nicely, thank you.

Linda

Our House... on the corner of the street... our house.....

it's a really great place to meet!

It has been suggested that people who have never been to our house, or don't know what the house looks like (or haven't heard that we live in the purple house...) might like to see photos. So... here's the front of the house. There's not picture of the garage, because the photo was taken before we actually closed on the house, and I seem to remember doing a "drive-by" photo shoot. We do love the house though, and we've been able to make some floral and other adjustments to the front of the house. For instance - we now have a white picket fence to accent the rest of the white on the house... we have air conditioning!!! something i'm quite certain I would NOT have been able to live without during this heat wave that we're having; and we no longer have a bug problem. That was taken care of shortly after we moved in.

So I heard today that it takes 5 years to become completely settled in a house once you move in... I'm not sure I like that thought, because I'm sure we won't be in this house for that long, but at least I'll not have to unpack all the boxes! I mean, really... if it takes 5 years to undo all the boxes, might as well just unpack the necessary ones and either get rid of the rest, or store them until you get into a permanent spot, right???

Oh well. The inside of the house is coming together... we just ordered some doors to help keep the heat out of the upstairs, and we'll start (I use the term "we" very loosly, since Andrew will, I'm sure, do most of the work) doing the inside remodel sometime... I'll post pictures as they come available.

Linda

Water, Water, everywhere...

Andrew, Savannah and I just spent a MARVELOUS weekend in Utah. Savannah especially enjoyed the day that we spent at 7-Peaks water park in Provo. It was a great day. The sun came out long enough for us to spend all day at the park, and we all got a little more color.

It was fun to take Andrew's sister, Rachel with us. We all enjoyed splashing in the water and generally being able to spend time together.

I wasn't allowed to go down any of the water slides - something about not letting pregnant women do that kind of thing... and it didn't bother me AT ALL! I have no desire to be thrust under water not knowing which direction is up or down... Savannah didn't seem to mind at all though. After going down the big water slide with Dad, she decided that she was ready to go down "all by herself". Imagine my surprise when she really did!!! Her favorite part of the day was either the lazy river, or the water slide, depending on when you ask her. The answer is always different. If we ask her if she wants to go to another water park, her answer is ALWAYS - "lets go today!"

She spent most of the drive back from Utah sleeping off the effects of playing in the water all day... a relief from her incessant questions...

Took lots of pictures, but they're all film - I'll post some when they come back from the printers!

Enjoy the day!

Savannah and her "husdband" (best friend, really- Cal)

Wish on a new Stahr...

Yep. You did read that right! Looking for a new Stahr to arrive in Canby sometime in February. We've been told either February 21 or February 24 (really sometime that week...).

And for those who are curious, we have this fairly strong belief that there are two true surprises left in this world - so we're leaving the finding out to the birthday celebration. If you're one of those who doesn't like waiting for that surprise...

Savannah's reaction? "I want a baby brother! No... I want a baby Sister! I just want both." Since she's been telling everyone anyway, we'll wait to see if she really can predict things like that - although we have decided that having twins wouldn't be a bad idea - lots of work, but nothing that we couldn't handle.

So... we'll keep you posted!
Linda

P.S. Here's some of those photos you've all been asking for!

just another day in Canby

Life is good.

No... Life is REALLY good. We're finally getting settled into our new house - the rooms all have things in them (not that the things in the rooms are unpacked, but hey - there's time for that still, right?)

Andrew and I are settling down to married life - and Savannah is finally starting to not be such a Mommy's girl when she first wakes up! For instance - tonight she fell off the bed. Yeah. And it was a grand thunk when she fell too. Gave her a nice bloody nose (pink pajamas turned red - it was a gusher!) And she went right to Daddy when Mom had to clean up the mess. We're still working on some other minor things, but she's a good kid. And she's learning rather well.

So I thought I'd just start this whole thing out - watch for photos and updates later! By the way - if anyone wants to see wedding photos and doesn't know how - contact me... I'll clue you in.