Summers over

Well It's hard to believe that summer has already come and gone. Cory has been busy working Mariner's and thankfully they are coming to an end. It will be nice to have him home again and not feel like a single parent!
A few weeks ago at the end of August we went to the Cougar Mountain Zoo in Issaquah. From the website it looked like a pretty neat place to take kids. We got to see a lot of birds, some tigers, reindeer and lemurs and other small animals. The place isn't really that big and for the time it took us to drive there and the price I probably wouldn't go back. Although they have holiday festivities in December and you get your picture taken with Santa in his sleigh. It
looked pretty cool, I don't know if the reindeer get to be in the picture though which is even better.
Alyssa has been busy with all of her play dates and such. We are getting ready for Halloween. She has two party's to attend so far! I swear she has a better social calendar than I! Anyhow it will be fun and I'm really enjoying it. Holidays are so much more fun with little ones. She is going to be wonder woman for Halloween.
Cory went out quading with some of his friends a few weeks ago and had a blast. Cory's had got a flat tire and so his buddy let him ride his for a little while, which is the same one as his, and here is a video of what happened. If the link doesn't work, just copy and paste it. Enjoy!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lkHBSqDHQ4s
Well if you haven't already heard the news Alyssa is going to have a little brother or little sister! That's right, we are having another baby! We are 14 weeks along and supposedly due April 1 but I'm measuring bigger than expected and no it's not twins, thank goodness! We will know more at our next ultra-sound. I think the due date will be sometime in the last two weeks of March. I'm no doctor but I was there and think I can do the math : ) I've been feeling OK. My biggest complaint is my back bothering. My sciatic nerve is killing me! I ended up going to the chiropractor, which I wasn't a big believer in, but OMG it was the best! It's still bothering me a little but I have another appointment tomorrow. It's so much better than what it was! Along with all my other back/shoulder/neck pain and tightness.
This next week we have several play dates, with Alyssa's play group, G. Grammy, and my friends Dawn, Mandy and her son Owen. Owen and Alyssa are two months apart and are just so cute! I wished we lived closer to them! Hmmmm...what are we going to do about that ;)

Catch up time

It's been awhile since I have posted anything and thought I should do so while I had a minute or two.
At the end of August Cory had a staycation and spent most of the time fishing. That weekend we had family up and took everyone out to the Crabpot on the Seattle waterfront. It's a great restaurant and had a lot of fun, especially since it was a beautiful day. Prior to as we headed into Seattle we stopped at Trophy's and got us all cupcakes for dessert. If you have never had these they are truly wonderful my only beef with them is too much frosting. I'm not a fan. They come in so many wonderful flavors and are honestly probably some of the best I have ever had.
The rest of the week like I mentioned Cory spent it fishing with friends. I was able to go out with him one day and enjoyed it so much. I miss spending time on the water. I miss our bigger boat, hopefully one day we will have another one, but the fishing boat works for now. We caught seven fish that day, got a little burned, and enjoyed the peace. We also headed up to Baker Lake to check out camping spots that we are still trying to make plans to go do. Although it doesn't look like it's going to happen this year : (
Other than that we have just been doing stuff around the house, small projects and such and running Alyssa from activity to activity. I swear that girl has a busy social calendar!
She had her 18 month check up and everything looked good. She got four shots and will have to go back in, in October for her flu shots including the Swine flu. She
weighed 28lbs, which puts her in the 90th percentile but her height she is only in the 50th percentile. Which surprised us but the doctor said not to worry she is def. going to sprout up! She amazes me everyday with the stuff she knows. I will ask her if she has a poopy diaper and she will say yeah and grab my hand or just walk to the stairs to go get it changed. She absolutely loves to read and when we were over at her G. Grammy's she picked up the Newsweek and started looking through it. It was pretty cute. She grabbed it, sat down on the floor, turned the magazine the correct direction and started turning pages. I think she is brilliant but again I'm a little biased. She has finished her second round of swim lessons. I probably wont sign her up again until she is closer to three and than will be able to move on to the next class where they actually start learning skills.
My mom is coming up next week to spend a few days with us and we are going to go see Wicked for her birthday. I can't wait. I saw it in April and it was wonderful so I hope she likes it as much as I do. Than we will head down to Longview for the weekend.

The last couple of weeks again

I have been slow at posting things just because we have been so busy. Cory and I went to the Kenny Chesney concert with some good friends of ours and had a blast. We actually had other friends going as well and we ended up all sitting in the same section which was a miracle itself. The show was perfect and so was the weather. Alyssa stayed at home with her Grandma Gail who came up to watch her and hang out for a few days. The rest of the weekend we spent hanging out and bbq and heading to one of our favorite places The Locks. It had been Seafair and we love to watch all the boats come through. I think it brings back a lot of memories for Cory growing up and gowing out with his grandparents on their boat.
During the extreme heat we had we kept pretty cool. Alyssa played a lot in her pool and outside and we held up upstairs since that's where the air conditioner is at. Best purchase we have made. We ended up getting it a few years ago and it's definitely paid for itself! Anyhow one afternoon Alyssa and Harley were being very moody so I packed them up in the car and we went for a drive in Skagit/Snohomish County. It was very pretty because thunderstorms were coming up and over the mountain and the sky was beautiful. It was still 100 degrees out but nice, it reminded me of all the time I spent in Eastern Washington.
Alyssa had another birthday party to go to. Her friend Caden was turning 2! He had his party at Willis Tucker Park and we played on the playground and spray pad. It
was a blast. Alyssa liked the spray pad but I don't think she likes getting her hair wet, she gets a little upset when that happens. It was a great time to see them and to celebrate. We are so lucky we have so many great parks around us and we have had a perfect summer for trying a lot of them out.
We went to the Children's Museum in Everett yesterday with our play group. It was so much fun. What a great place for children of all ages. Alyssa had a blast. The museum is set up with rooms inside in a special theme with all different kinds of things to do. Alyssa loved the water room, of course, and loved the wall to push the pins through. I pretty much let her run around and do whatever she seemed like she wanted to do. It was fun!
These next couple weeks we have a lot going on as well. With playgroups, outings, Cory's vacation with fishing, Grandma Gail coming up to hang out and baseball games we are going to be very busy!
Update on Alyssa. She is doing great! Starting to talk a little bit more, she now says, mommy, daddy, harley, night night, hi, yeah, and baby. I continue to work on other words with her. She has her 18month check up in two weeks and at that point will find out weight / height. She will try to wink at you if you wink at her but she can't do it and closes both eyes, it's very cute! The little girl is also becoming very sassy and a drama queen! Hopefully that all ends soon.

Having fun

This was done a few weeks ago but I forgot about it and came across the pictures. Alyssa found the Kleenex box in our bedroom and decided to have a little fun with it. I heard her doing something but just thought she was jabbering while coming down the stairs so I didn't think twice about going and seeing. When I saw her finally at the bottom she had the box with her and got up and ran and tried to hide behind the table. Silly girl!

One busy week after another

This summer has been flying by! I can't believe it is almost August. This last week was Harley's 4th birthday. I can't believe how old he is. I watched the movie Marley and Me and that dog sure reminded me of Harley in a lot of ways and made me realize just how much I love him! Gave me a new appreciation for him since watching it which I'm sure Harley is enjoying! We celebrated Harley's birthday by getting him some cookies, a toy, and a walk that morning.
The following day Alyssa and I headed down to Vancouver, WA to go to her cousin Nolan's second birthday! He is turning into the cutest little man! The party was great, as always, and we enjoyed lots of good food and company. Alyssa seemed to be enjoying herself for she didn't nap at all except maybe 45min or so. Alyssa found Nolan's other grandmothers, Maureen, purse and took her cigarettes out. She decided to start chewing on them. It didn't seem to bother her too much and I'm not sure exactly how much she even got in her mouth but it was kind of funny and the purse got put away. Thanks Maureen : )
We ended up staying at a Hotel and swimming that night. We had a blast. Amanda, Nolan, and a friend of Amanda's from high school came over and we went swimming for about an hour or so. Afterwards Alyssa was exhausted and went straight to bed after her bath.
Yesterday Nicole came over and hung out with us for the day. We went to Mukilteo and went to the park by the water. We ended up not staying too long because surprisingly it was a little chilly. Both of us were starving so we headed into Snohomish and went to the Pie Shop and had lunch and pie. Yes, I had pie too. I actually bought one and have been eating it! Sorry, Mom! After Alyssa's nap we went up to Lavender Hills Farm right up the road from us. It's such a beautiful place. Alyssa ran around and I bought some lavender.
This next week is going to be busy as well. Alyssa's swim lessons start up and she has them twice a week through the end of August. She has a birthday party to go to on Wednesday, another children's concert and possibly Jetty Island. I'm still a little undecided if I'm going to go or not.

Kangaroo Farm

So a week ago Alyssa and I went to the Outback Christmas Tree and Kangaroo Farm in Arlington. It was a fun day. I wasn't sure exactly what to expect there but was very amazed at all the animals and how we got to feed and pet them. Alyssa didn't do much of the feeding because she kept trying to put it in her mouth! The only animals that we weren't allowed to pet or feed were the ostriches and the mini pony, named Oreo, because they bite.

There were no baby kangaroos that we got to see because the one that was there was down in the pouch of the mama. There was a baby donkey which was so cute. Alyssa like always loved the goats and enjoyed petting them.

After the tour we took off, while the rest of our group hung out and and had a picnic. It was very warm out and Alyssa was ready to head home and take a much needed nap!

If your ever in the area this is somewhere I would really recommend going. There are so many different kinds of animals there. There are lemurs, llamas, alpacas, osteriches, kangaroos, turtles, peacocks, roosters and chickens and horses just to name a few!

Sprinkler fun

The other day Cory and Alyssa were outside hanging out while I cooked dinner. Cory had the sprinkler on watering the lawn. Alyssa was running around and decided to go up to the sprinkler but as the water came towards her she ran away. This became a fun little game for her with the sprinkler winning.

A lefty and Recess Monkey

So this last week Alyssa and I have tried to get back into the swing of things and back on our schedule of things. One of the things that I have been working on is getting her to walk on the grass. Yes, that's what I said grass! For some reason she hasn't liked it but the other day she decided it was OK and took off on it and I haven't been able to stop her since!

We were at the store the other day and I bought some color crayons because of all things I did not have any! So we came home and colored. She enjoyed it. She would color, put it in her mouth and color again. What I found the most interesting though is she will pick up with either hand but if it's in her right hand she will than switch to her left and color. A possible lefty, just like her mom!

Today we went and saw a local band called Recess Monkey. They are three male teachers who got together and now tour around putting on shows for kids. It was a fun time. Alyssa especially liked the hokey pokey when she was jumping or I was helping her jump. If anyone is interested here is their website: http://www.recessmonkeytown.com/ It's definitely worth checking out if your in the area.

Next week we are going to an ice cream parlor and tour and the Kangaroo Farm. She also has two birthday party's to attend in the next two weeks as well as her swim lessons that start back up at the end of this month. What a busy little girl!

The week leading up to July 4th

On the 4th of July Alyssa returned from spending a week in Longview with both sets of Grandparents. Although Cory and I had a busy and fun week we sure did miss her and were ready for her to return home! She had a great time spending time with family and going to the parks. It was really hot down there which she probably didn't enjoy too much but she got to play in the pool that her grandma had bought her. Along with getting spoiled by everyone else...I think she has a couple people wrapped around her finger.
Earlier in the week Cory and I headed back down to Sand Lakes Oregon to ride the quads again with a good friend of ours. It was fantastic! I love it down there and can't wait to go back. We were down there for two and a half days, the weather was great but extremely windy. When returned home Cory and I spent two days golfing, dinner out, a movie, nice weather, and some quite time alone!

On the 4th of July we had some family and friends over and had a great BBQ. We had salmon and a country boil, which consists of potatoes, corn, sausage, and shell fish. Also several salads and fruit which was all wonderful. We all headed out front around dusk and started watching the neighborhood fireworks show. We than watched the Tulalip show and the Everett show since we have a great view of the sound from our house we can see them clearly. We are pretty spoiled because we also get to watch the fireworks from the Aquasox stadium as well! I doubt we will ever go anywhere to watch a show again, especially since we don't have to fight any traffic or crowds.

All in all it was a good, fun week and I'm sorry to see it come to an end!