22<-08:00>02/15

A few Phone Pics

5:49 pm by Janelle. Filed under: News

Recently I took the pictures off my phone and since I haven’t blogged in awhile I thought I would put up some of these to document a few of the things we have been up to. I may have to put up a couple posts with these!

Preston came out in this outfit, very red…I think I tried to say something nice about how red and red didn’t really match just because they were both red. A few minutes later on the news they said “today is wear red day for the American Heart Association”  So I went ahead and didn’t care that he wore an all red outfit to school that day…I probably wouldn’t have cared anyway, but I thought that was really funny that it was actually Wear Red Day.

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Ada and Dallin at Old Navy with the closest thing they will get to a pet at the moment.

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Reading at night with Preston:

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I turned one year older!

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Dallin got himself some breakfast…not skipping the caramel and fudge.

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Our Oregon Jigglers on the day of the football National Championships…too bad Oregon lost!

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Preston got a “Hobbes” for Christmas so Dallin had to go buy one with his Christmas money…and Ada ended up buying one too! Now we have three Hobbsie-Wobbsie’s, as Dallin calls them.

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Uncle Erik came into town in January with his cute girlfriend Grace and we had all kinds of fun with them! We went ice skating…which was so much fun! Preston was a pro after just a few minutes! Ada loved it and Dallin loved being pushed on the dolphin sled.

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We also went and picked oranges and mandarins in Newcastle. We had done this a few months earlier during the peak mandarin season, but this time the kids got into it more and I think we had like 20+lbs of citrus!

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Dallin at the park.

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This is kind of blurry but it was the only picture I got of our Christmas Eve smorgasbord. We tried to continue the Swedish tradition, even if we weren’t out with Shaun’s Family…but we probably kept out some key ingredients like pickled herring and smoked oysters…and other canned/tubed fish!

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Dallin and “grandpa George”

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Here is our Christmas day walk down to the American River. We have done this at family gatherings at my grandparent’s house ever since I can remember and I love it down at this part of the river but I have purposley never taken my kids there because of this bridge! If you haven’t heard me mention this before, I am a total paranoid and I picture things happening…like tragic things, and I try and figure out how I will handle it and it usually ends up with me having a panic attack. So, in my mind one kid has fallen into the water and I try and figure out what to do with the other kids so they don’t fall off while I jump in but then my other child is being swept down stream so I have to act fast…and then I get all freaked out and try and shake it out of my head. I know. Not logical. At All….but I can’t help it! Soooooo… the point is, we took them out on the bridge and it was just as nerve wracking as I thought it would be since there is only a loose wire railing. But we all survived!

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The older kids lugged huge rocks out there and tossed them over the side. The splashes were HUGE.

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Babysitting my precious niece!! I sat snuggling her pretty much the ENTIRE time my brother and his wife were gone!

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Oh, and another time I got to snuggle her…took lots of creepy, obsessed aunt selfies with her :) She clearly thinks I am a weirdo.

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And that’s it for now!

22<-08:00>02/15

A Few Haps from the week.

10:44 am by Janelle. Filed under: News

It was a little colder this week than it has been…and I mean cold for us…I was freezing, but it was in the 50’s…soooo not exactly that cold! Most mornings were foggy and wet, but we tried to get out anyway. The kids are out in shorts and t-shirts still…they are crazy. I don’t think they get cold. I asked Ada one day if she wanted to go have a picnic at the Lake and she said she wanted to have one in our backyard instead because she likes our house. It was kind of a gray day anyway so I was fine with that! We took our tent and blanket and went on a “hike” around our yard through the bushes and behind trees and finally ended up back on the patio where we set up camp.

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And we like to color…the little ones like to draw “muscles” which includes scribbling all over their arms. I find them after the muscles have been drawn on most occasions. Ada is also getting really good at drawing other things too…like the Sully and Mike Wazowski pictures she drew for Dallin. She is a mini-me…she loves art. When I was little I would say I wanted to be an artist when I grew up…and I guess you could say that I have!

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And Dallin…he is quite the character with his facial expressions and the things he says!

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I took some engagements this week and they wanted to take them at a place that they had been on a date before and it ended up being right under the Foresthill bridge. I have been over that bride many times and it is SO high! In high school we used to go up there and walk across and I have taken my kids up there but I had never been under it! Looking up was almost dizzying but it was so beautiful and I felt so small! This picture doesn’t really show the enormity of it, but if anyone is looking for a lovely little hike go to the Confluence in Auburn..there is also a fun little (well, big right now in the winter) swimming hole there. I will have to come back another time with the Fam..or at least with Shaun. Parts of the trail were pretty sheer and all I could do was picture my kids slipping off the trail and tumbling into the river below…but that’s me being the super paranoid person I am!

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15<-08:00>02/15

Valentine’s Week

8:55 pm by Janelle. Filed under: News

This week has been such lovely weather! I know we are in need of more rain…and hopefully we get more, but since we are having nice weather…I should probably enjoy it, right? We’ve been spending lots of time at the park, in the yard playing catch (prepping for Preston’s first season of BASEBALL!!!!) out in the hammock…and just enjoying the outdoors. I’m not really ready for it, but spring is pretty much starting here in our area. Lots of blossoms and lots of green everywhere. I’m realizing I seriously love spring and all the new growth and beauty…but I kind if feel like the end of January/beginning of February is a little too soon! This was the first time in my life I have missed snow. I can’t believe I just said that. Well, I will soak it in…even if i feel spring has come a little premature!

Here are some of the only pictures I took on Valentine’s day as well as a few other noteworthy things that went on this week:

Teh kids eating V-day breakfast…which I was trying to make a tasty treat/breakfast but in my opinion they weren’t that good! They were homemade pop tarts with Nutella inside. Maybe I skimped on the Nutella…but I guess they look cute? That’s all that REALLY matters :)

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My in-laws got me an awesome  preparedness gift which we took outside to try out. This little stove is something we can bring camping but also use in case of an emergency…all it takes is a few sticks to get your pot all hot and cooking! We just made some hot chocolate but the kids had fun making it!

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Ada tells me she will be a better cook than me when she grows up…i believe it!

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Ada needed to get updated on immunizations and I told her she could pick any treat when she was done so she wanted a cookie sundae from Chick Fil-A. She was so excited to get shots…I kept telling her it was going to be fast but it was going to hurt…i didn’t want her to NOT know it was going to hurt! She kept thinking of her cookie sundae…and giggling before the nurse came in with the shots…I felt bad that she really didn’t understand that this wasn’t going to be fun, but she was super brave, there were a few tears but she was so happy go to Chick Fil-A afterward.

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This week has been one of reminiscing. For awhile now i have been wondering where all my journals were that i kept as a youth and this week I found them in my parent’s attic! I was so happy to know where they were finally…because it has YEARS of my teen drama in them! Besides the journals I found many other gems from my teen and young adulthood…namely this amazing pink unitard. I had a dress up box in Utah and my roommates and I would dress up quite a bit. This was a key piece in several hilarious memories. My best friend/Roommate was going to be in town for Valentine’s day weekend and we set our hair appt’s to overlap and when i told her I found this she triple dog dared me (yeah, we are still a little stuck in 5th grade) to wear it to our appointment….

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Who am I to turn down a triple dog dare like that?

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So, pretty much, that’s it. We spent Valentine’s day night with some of our good friends and had dinner and decorated sugar cookies with the kids. A good end to a nice week!


10<-08:00>02/15

Um…Hello.

11:11 am by Janelle. Filed under: Janelle

I know not that many people keep blogs anymore…pretty much me included in that…but it makes me sad when I don’t take time to write about our lives somewhere. I have started a “daily journal” Google Doc of just documenting our daily lives…it’s not very exciting some days, but it is life and I want to remember it.  We have so much family and many close friends who are all over the country and seeing as how I don’t post a whole lot on social media I probably should at least let grandparents and great-grandparents (and anyone else who might be interested) know what we are up to and be able to see our kids grow when they aren’t around to see it daily. So, here I am, once again, recommitting to posting a little here and there on this beloved blog of ours!

So, here’s our latest outing…we went out to Folsom Lake between storms over the weekend. The lake is really low still, but so much higher than it was the last I saw it in November! So, that’s good news! Seagulls were everywhere and you couldn’t help but run through the crowds and watch them all take off and fly around you. I was trying so hard to resist the urge but definitely didn’t hold the kids back! As long as they weren’t being mean or trying to hurt them I loved watching the gulls in huge swarms, fly off!

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Someone was a little tuckered out and fell asleep with a Frito in her mouth! Love it!

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