Allie and Audrey

My two nieces, who I just adore, came to visit earlier this month, along with my sister and brother-in-law, of course. They stayed with us for a week and even though it was a bit hectic in our house, we loved it. Asher got along with them so well, mainly because Allie and Audrey were so sweet to him. We tried to do a lot of activities, though at times it was hard to coordinate everyone's schedules and get everyone out the door.

First night in Portland, at the park.

Watching and playing with fireworks in the backyard.

Allie (she's 6)

Audrey (she's 4)

Are they not the cutest?

Popcorn and a video after a long day

Hanging out in the barn at a berry farm.

Picking strawberries in Sauvie Island (about 1/2 hour from Portland)

Audrey and Asher goofing around

Ruled by Lists

It's a pretty well known fact about me that I can't function without making lists. Almost every morning I write a list of to-do's for the day, and while I do, Asher tries to grab my pen or repeatedly asks me to draw something for him. So a few weeks ago I thought I would solve this problem by explaining to him what I was doing, and to help him remember what was on the list, I drew pictures. Asher loved it and spent the day looking at the list and recapping what we had accomplished (this is the kind of stuff that makes me proud!)

Since then, I've started "drawing" simplified versions of my to-do-lists and my grocery lists when Asher gets too curious about what I'm writing. When Jeff saw one of them for the first time recently, he immediately said, "You've got to put this on the blog!" (probably because he wants everyone to see/know that I'm a big dork). So here is an example.


1. Drink tea (me) and milk (asher)
2. Make and eat oatmeal
3. Get dressed
4. Go get some donuts to take to friends' house (I swear we hardly ever, ever do this)
5. Go to our friends' house for a play date (all the kids, moms, and pets are shown)
6. Go home and take a nap (for the record, I don't nap with him, I just pretend to)
7. Make cookies (I don't think we ever got around to this one that day)
8. Go to the park with Dad when he gets home from work.

His Dad's Boy

Now if Jeff could only get Asher to talk about the NBA with him in addition to shooting baskets, then his life will be complete. (Just kidding, Honey).

Neighborhood Park

We are lucky to live walking distance from several parks. These pictures and videos are from last Sunday at one of Asher's favorite parks; we call it the "peekaboo park" because it has a heavily planted area where we like to sneak around and play "peekaboo".

Hanging out with Dad

These videos are really short but I thought I'd include them anyway.

Trip to Bellevue

Asher and I tagged along with Jeff on his weekly business trip to Bellevue, WA a couple of weeks ago. Bellevue is a suburb of Seattle and it's about a 3 hour drive from Portland. Jeff's schedule is pretty tight when he's there, so besides joining us for lunch one of the 2 days we were there and spending the evenings with us, we were pretty much on our own. The first day we stayed in Bellevue and went to a large, beautiful park and to a bookstore; the second day we ventured out of town to a nearby city called Kirkland where we discovered a lake with a beach area and a quaint town center with great shops and restaurants.

"Rock climbing" at the park.

What is it with kids and playing in sand- they never seem to tire of it.

This is why we live in the Northwest; it's so easy to stumble upon beautiful areas that you never even knew existed.

Sitting in a lifeguard chair near the lake.

Dancing in front of a cow/dog statue in Kirkland