I LOVE my beautiful girls!!! (Sept 2012)

Just a few pics of my beautiful gals! 

How did I get so lucky?

Our new toy!!! (Sept. 2012)

I did it!!!  I talked Jeremy into getting the kids a trampoline!

Yes, we live in Oregon and I realize that it won't be used for many rainy months, but the kids need some exercise when it is dry.  And they LOVE IT!

 They had to test it out before the safety net was put up, they could wait no longer!  Thank heavens for safety nets though, many of times they would have landed on the ground without it.

 Bare legs everywhere!

 And why not stick a pool with water on top of it and jump the water out!

Mya did not appreciate being splashed though.

Time to play! 

Now if only they would go jump alone and not always require one of us to be on there with them.



Mya turns 2 years old!!! (August 31st, 2012)

It truly is amazing how fast these kids go from babies to toddlers to preschoolers and so on!

It's hard to remember her ever being a baby, she seems like such a big girl now. 

Mya's birthday breakfast: pancakes & milk.  Her favorite!

                                                  Yay!  She's so excited to be 2 years old!

 We had a party with my Grandma & Grandpa Clift and Uncle Wayne & Aunt Stephanie & kids.

 Oh how she loves bubbles!

 She tried hard to blow, don't think it worked though.

 Is that my cake?

 At least she could blow out the candles!

 Yummy!  Homemade cake and homemade ice cream.

 She picked out this computer with money from Aunt Terry and made a little table on a diaper box to sit and play!  She loves her ABC's and pretty much knew them all by sight a month or two after turning 2, and we didn't even try hard to teach her them.

Just another pic of her cute monkey cake!  Turned out better than I thought.

Happy Birthday sweet Mya!

 

Here is were I would do a recap of her favorite things, but since I'm posting this 5 months later I can't recall what she was into then.  More reason why I need to keep up blogging or at least write things down on paper!  It's going to fast!

August 2012

 The girls all dressed up in their gifts from Hawaii.  Ava did not like the coconut bra and would not wear it.  Man do I look dark! 

 Mya just chilling in her shades!

 Daddy turned 35 on August 18th!  Old fart!

I made up a list of 35 things I love about him and some correlating goodies & stuff.

He said Hawaii was his present, so wouldn't let me buy him anything more.

 The August Birthday celebration at Wayne & Stephanie's house:  Jeremy, Mya & David

 She is just so dang cute!

 Our summer just got too busy for any camping trips, so Jeremy set up the tent and camped with Ava in the backyard.  He wanted Mya there too, but thought better of it. 

 Good morning sleepy heads!  Bobby took Mya's place.

I just love how creative Ava is getting with coloring.  It's fun to see what she comes up with.  This is a picture of our family!  Not sure who has the red hair though!

Maui (Part 4)..Road to Hana, or more like death!

Okay, this is my last post about Maui. :( 

Now that I'm posting this 5 months later, I'm so ready to go back!

We decided to brave THE ROAD TO HANA!  Which even if we return to Maui someday, we will NEVER do again.  Lets just call it the road to death, I'm amazed we survived.  It's a twisty, curvy two lane road, where some areas it is only one lane for all traffic.  And you can't always see if someone is coming around the corner when it's one lane, freaky!  The speed limit is around 25 or less, but the natives like to double that and cut around you when it is clearly too dangerous to do so.  And Shanda drove it all, so she wouldn't get sick.  She did great, even with all the pressure from her lovely co-captain! 

 Some of the views of the ocean on our drive.

 We stopped and took a stroll through some botanical gardens, can't remember all the names of these places, oh well.

 And we met a big frog along the way...

 See, it is the road to death. 

We looked down this cliff and there were two cars at the bottom.

Glad we didn't join them!

 Our gang with some Bagrass Trees, also called Painted trees (I think).

 This beach had all black sand & rocks.

 Jeremy, Brian & Shanda

Right after this picture Brian was taking video of the waves coming up and splashing on the rocks, when all of a sudden a huge wave came up and shot water high into the air and soaked Brian.  Haha!

 The hubs & I. 

I forgot to mention that this is the rain forest side of the island.

It would start misting/sprinkling every time we stopped!

 We stopped towards the end of the drive at the Seven Sacred Pools. 

Which I read you could swim in, but I guess they were contaminated or something and so we couldn't.  Bummer!

 Another Banyan tree on our hike.

 Headed into the Bamboo forest...

 More waterfalls & pools that we couldn't touch.

 The guys found a coconut and decided to dissect it...it took them FOREVER!

They had to Youtube how to open the little thing, then when they finally got it, it was nasty tasting. 

Probably over ripe.  They also stole some sugar cane from the field by our Condo and took that home for the kids.  It also was pretty gross.

 Last day of playing in the sand. :(

But my pedicure held up pretty well!

Oh I'm so ready to return to paradise!

Thanks again to Mom & Bill for taking great care of my girls so we could

enjoy this much needed vacation!!!!

Maui (Part 3)...Time to snorkle!

We decided to spend some money and do a fun snorkeling tour.  We were originally supposed to head out to Molokini Crater to snorkel, but the winds were making it to rough to snorkel.  Instead we headed to Turtle Town and the Coral Gardens. 



Trish, Shanda & Brian

Whole group of turtles in Turtle Town!  So cool to see them up close.

Some would just swim right around us.  We were not allowed to touch or chase them,

but they didn't seem to care that we were there.



The hubby practicing some diving.

We wanted to make sure we got some good under water pics,

so we rented an expensive camera to capture it all.  Though I don't think I downloaded all the good ones. 



Time to get out!  After the 1st stop a few of us got a little queasy from the ride. 

Shanda decided to stay on the boat for the 2nd stop.  A few people lost their breakfast over the side of the boat.  I was okay once back in the water. 

Haha!  Dumb picture of me & Jeremy, I couldn't keep myself down long enough

for Brian to shoot the picture.  Too funny.

Shanda & Brian!  The noodles really come in handy so you could just float

around and not have to keep moving your legs.  

Jeremy & Brian.  They had to perfect this shot multiple times!

Goodbye little turtle, it's been fun! 

Actually at one of the beaches we were swimming at towards the end of the week, I saw this big black thing coming towards me in the shallow water.  Then I noticed it was a turtle and it swam right by my legs!  It spent most the day swimming back and forth in the cove we were swimming in. 

Oh I love Hawaii!!!