Wee hour fright

Does this guy look familiar?

4:00 am Sunday morning Hilary and this guy arrived at our house. Peeking at this guy through my sleep filmy eyes was a scary experience!! Fitzwilliam was pretty freaked out as well. He was snarling with his hackles up all across his back!

It didn't take long for me to see my beloved Levi under all of that hair, so I pulled Fitz back and let him into the house.

It is awesome to have Levi and Hilary here. They will head on down to Utah tomorrow morning so it will be a short visit. Yesterday we drove up to Spokane to hang with Aaron and this afternoon we plan to kayak around the lake.

Fun in the sun with grandkids

One of the most precious things about being down here in Richland is the proximity of family and the last couple of weeks have been filled with the joyous sounds of small children. Emily came up with the kids and stayed for a week and then she left the kids with us for a week. It was an awesome time full of popcicles, play dough, Dora, Sponge Bob (Luke's contribution), coloring books, snacks and mud. All I can say is, "How did I do this with 6 under 8???"

We loved having the kids here and to have the time to bond with them. Living thousands of miles apart has really not given them much of an opportunity to know us. By the time they left, Esther was calling, "Gamma" around the house when she couldn't see me. It was awesome!!

We have also spent some pretty special time with Elias these last couple of months. Spokane is only 2 1/2 hours away and so we have been up a couple of times and Aaron, Lynze and Eli have been down to spend a weekend. It is so fun!!

These pictures are of Luke and Em's kids at at park having fun together and one I took of Eli yesterday.

Art Critic

They say that everyone is a critic, but tonight Esther really picked up on that role! Emily and Eve drew a beautiful sunflower complete with leaves and vines and Eve promptly sat on it and smeared it with her bootie and then she ran off and got the broom and proceeded to sweep it away. It was absolutely hilarious! Here is Esther sweeping and then a close up of the little stinker!

Sidewalk Art

As you can tell from the above pictures, Emily and the kids are here. We had a fun day at Sakagawea Lake and this evening we spent some time decorating the concrete patio in the back yard. The top picture is of Grandpa being traced, and the next one is Isaac and Eve giving him some eyes. Luke gets traced and there is Eve with the "garden" she made. The last picture is of the tracing of Emily. That's Emily? If you ask me, it looks like the snufalofagus from Sesame street!! We had a lot of fun creating our unique and amazing sidewalk art!

Here is our house. The handsome hunk our front is my brother, Steve.

In the Beginning

New city, new house, new jobs, new ward, new us!!

This seems like the logical time to start a blog. I have enjoyed staying in touch by checking other people's blogs and so I thought it would be good to get one of our own going. Hopefully I will be able to keep this updated and it will be a good contact point for family and friends!

We have been in Washington for 2 months now. We closed on our house on June 14th. It has gone really fast! We are getting moved in. Most of the boxes are emptied and thanks to Scott's inovative shelving in the garage, we are really getting organized! There is still a mountain of boxes (well, it is a hill now) in the garage, but most of that will be gone when we get some bookshelves built.

It is awesome to live so close to the Temple. The neighborhood is quiet and peaceful. There ARE dogs and kids and cars and lawnmowers, but all in all, it is pretty nice. We are close to shopping and the freeway so it is really a quick drive to wherever we need to go!

The house is awesome! I LOVE it! Scott keeps telling people that I picked it out. I don't know if that means that he doesn't love it, or if he is just giving me the credit for our amazing choice! We have had to do very little to it. I needs some paint, but after getting the house in Anchorage ready to sell, we were pretty painted out and decided to defer that for a little while.

I DID talk Scott into changing the wallpaper border in the kitchen. Well, I decided to change it and he liked my choice and when I started peeling away the old border, I discovered that they had painted the walls around the old border and there was a strip of cream paint where the border used to be. We had to buy another can of green paint and Scott graciously painted the strip (The color match was perfect. How amazing is that???) and now we are ready to hang the border. It will look really great when it is done!!

Scott seems to like his job. I think that have really been needing him around here. He is going to get the Power Systems division going !! I am working for O.M.A.C. here as well. It is about 1 day a week so it isn't too bad. I am also directing the Bell Choir at a little private school here. It should be a lot of fun and I am excited to dust off my musical skills and learn a new skill!! Luke starts school in a couple of weeks. He will be going to Richland High School. We are going there today to get him registered.

Our ward is big. Everyone is so nice and they have really made us feel welcome. There is an enormous influx of new people. Sunday there was a list in the Relief Society newsletter and there are probably 20 new sisters! That is in the last couple of months!! We are excited to get to know everyone and to find some kindred spirits!!