Tulips - in color

Several years ago (almost seven) Billy, Sadie and myself went to the Tulip festival. We went in the early part of April not knowing that we would find only one small patch of Tulips open!

Here is Sadie (five at the time) with the ONE and only open patch of flowers. One thing that makes me laugh is that I had adjusted the camera to take black and white photos once I realized there was nothing open. This is back before we had a digital camera, so this is the only copy we have!

Gotta love this shot of Sadie and Billy in the fields of tulips, nothing open! I do think that if you look closely Sadie is next to one little one that did open, but hard to tell in black and white.

Moving on to color... Last Sunday after church we went up to the Tulip Festival with our dear friends the Cacere's. I had no idea how bad the traffic would be, but it was fun to have some time with all our families together in one car enjoying the ride.

When we got there it was great to see so many of the Tulips open, they were beautiful!


Micah, Sadie, Samuel & Syrah; they were such troopers stopping often at the request of their mama's wanting photos!!

Much different from seven years ago! A little lady surrounded by pink!


Love this shot of all of us; it isn't often that all four of us get a shot together, so I was grateful for the Caceres capturing this!

You can see lots more photos that Katrina captured at their family site, she captured some amazing shots!!

Love this picture of Syrah.


We stopped and had a picnic lunch.


This is the view from above; there are many areas still not open so you still have time to go!! If you make a day of it you can stop by the town of LaConner which is one of my all time favorite little towns to window shop!

Sadie captured this one lone pink tulip peaking out!

On our way out Sadie captured this shot and I just love it! They ask that you not even pick up the petals; maybe this is why, she would have never captured this great shot otherwise.

After the tulips we went to a place that Katrina recommended. They had a small bakery, nursery, store and best of all ice cream that Katrina said was the best (which says a lot because she is not a fan of the ice cream!).

Katrina capturing the beautiful flowers they had in the nursery!


We had no idea that the line for the ice cream would be so long! However it was worth the wait and it ended the day perfectly (well, actually an amazing sermon from church ended it perfectly, but the ice cream ended our tulip trip!).

We had an amazing time and suggest that you look into heading on to the Tulip Festival yourself; I personally look forward to going again, hopefully it doesn't take us seven years!

Welcome Winter???

I wish that I could say my welcome was with joy and happiness, but at this point, it is with reservation and concerns! With the first day of winter upon us today and with a blanket of winter here before the day officially arrived, we were not so excited to see another 6-8 inches today! I truly do not feel the pictures do this story justice. What I do know... everyone that lives in Seattle and the surrounding areas all ready have a memorable winter for 2008!

This is our bird house; with the slope and the wind, this isn't all we have seen, but a great picture!

With the snow drift you can see that our porch is now level with our lawn... there were two steps down!

With many people taking snow days last week and with many who have obligations; I know tomorrow will be a long day for those in the area. Please be safe, keep warm and try (even if it is getting a tad old) to enjoy the beauty of it... hopefully it will be a memory soon.

Pumpkin Patch

Saturday after Syrah’s game we went to the pumpkin patch. Since Sadie was little we have been going to this small local farm. They only open their farm to the public during the Halloween season so it’s quite a treat. This is the latest that we have ever gone to the pumpkin patch and we were surprised to see how many people were there.

The girls got to feed some animals and pet some baby chicken, ducks and bunnies. One of the highlights for me is the fact they had chicks hatching on display… what an amazing process to witness! Also, just the day before we went some new piglets were born!! The mama was keeping them pretty close, but one was out just enough for us to catch a photo.

Once we made our way to the pumpkin patch itself we realized that coming late provides very little choices in regards to pumpkin pickin’ so we ended up at the local grocery store for our pumpkins this year. It worked out great though; there was a huge selection and the prices were great!!! Hopefully we can find some time to carve them before Halloween!

Kicking off summer...

The last weekend in June our friends the Ryan's hosted a summer kick off barbecue. It was a great time of HOT weather, fellowship and yummy food. Here are some of the photo highlights.

Little man Asher enjoying some yummy dessert!

The kids spent most of the day outside in the pool and playing in the yard (it was the hottest day of the summer so far). Logan enjoying her dessert!

Sadie trying to shade herself anyway possible!

Dallas and her daddy, Mat - showing off their ICE!

All the grown-ups enjoying dessert and fellowship around the Ryan's new table!!

The popsicle man came by and as we all got a cold treat - the problem... it was so hot they were melting faster then we could all eat them. Micah and Samuel with their popsicles!

Perfect picture for the end of the day "I'm all sticky!" says Syrah.

Are you kidding?!?!?!

Snow in April??? Not just a dusting, but a full on BLIZZARD!!!

It started snowing here this afternoon, but nothing was sticking... just coming down. Then about 3:30 it really started coming down. Even the cat is confused by the timing!

This is our new high living room window - from the view in the living room you can see HUGE flakes coming down.

This is at about 6:30 and it's still dumping. Looking forward to knowing if this goes into the night!

This has been one of the strangest seasons here I can remember... it snowed the day we got our keys and it was late in the year then; that was almost a month ago!!

Welcome Spring!!!

Spring is one of my favorite seasons. I wanted to take a moment to enjoy the first signs of Spring I have noticed in my days.

Along my daily drive there are tons and tons of these blooming tree's. The girls and I marvel at them every day!! Love them!!

Reasons I love Spring:
~~~Sun peaking in through the blinds in the morning~~~

~~~Sound of birds welcoming the day. Something about listening to these birds makes me feel as if each day they start in song and song always makes me think of praise, great reminder to me each day to be thankful for the day behind and the day ahead~~~

~~~Smell of rain after a few dry days~~~

~~~Start of new life, the trees in bloom, the flowers pushing their way through the dirt~~~

~~~The smell of fresh cut grass (sorry for those of you who have allergies; I grew up with a major grass allergy, but have been blessed enough to grow out of this and now am grateful for this smell)~~~

~~~Capri pants, these are one of Sadie's favorite pants and she is always excited when she gets the okay to wear them again~~~

~~~Open windows, I love cracking the window open and getting some fresh air~~~

~~~Longer day light~~~

~~~Spring cleaning (which took on an entirely new meaning while packing)~~~

~~~Starting fresh… Spring always feels like a fresh start and ahead our family is looking forward to a "fresh start" in so many ways~~~

~~~Time in the park, this time of year we try to start spending more time at the park~~~

What are some of the reasons you love Spring?

It's March

Syrah has a coloring calendar; each month is a new theme and she colors it and we write down important dates to remember... birthdays, events. She often asks several people to help her color her month and she is pretty specific on which part she would like your help with. I love March, I am looking forward to Spring and we have tons of time this month with family and friends!!

Snow Day!!!!

This morning I woke up at around 3a.m. with the excitement I remember from when I was young... I quickly got up and went to the window; peeked out and knew... today would be a snow day. It was beautiful and I peacefully went back to sleep. When I woke the girls up, both of them were filled with joy to know they got to spend the day together playing in the snow. I had to capture a few pictures on my way to work:

I love the trees in the snow; there is nothing like it!!

I loved the fact that the sky almost mirrored the fresh snow! We had a beautiful blue sky today!

Syrah was being pulled in a sled by her cousin Ryan and as you can see - she was loving it.

Sadie and her cousin Nicole made this huge fort today; they rolled up huge snow balls and then lifted them onto eachother and packed them in. As you can see there is built in seats!

Here is Sadie at the corner of her fort - look at the size of that snow ball! She is a proud girl!!

Let is Snow (well, on weekends!)

We were blessed with some beautiful snow this weekend... I love the snow as long as people can remain safe! It came down for hours and it was fun to just be driving home and see people sitting in their windows enjoying the beauty of it!


Don't they both look so happy to see the snow!


With snow comes a chill - the faces say it all!

Fall time Fun

The weekend after we returned from Disneyland, we headed off to the pumpkin farm. It was only days until Halloween and we had not yet even shown a hint of Fall in our home. We went to a very small local farm that only opens for pumpkin season. The girls had a great time feeding the chickens, petting the goats, being able to have hands on time with some very tiny chicks, ducklings and a calf.

Syrah likes the BIG pumpkins, but with only days left in the pumpkin world, the selection wasn't great!

Sadie was having a great time in the pumpkin field!

Our Beautiful Girls; we sure are blessed!