Our 2007 Visit to Santa!

Well- as you can see we had quite eventful trip to Santa this year! I was worried about it this year because Livi has been getting so sad when we go to get group pictures taken. This was during her naptime to boot so it was the perfect storm- that poor Santa deserves a medal! People keep telling me that this will be funny to look at in years to come- I hope so!

Livi is sure growing up though. She is really trying to communicate. She says "Wheeee!" for "please pick me up", "EEEEEE UHHHHH" for "Clean Up!" (we sing a song to clean up and she is saying that to the first to notes of the song), "uh oh" means "Mom, trust me, you don't want to look at what I just did", "EWWWWWW" means ;I have a stinky diaper" or "I am about to have a stinky diaper". She also likes to raise her hand and say "Me!" when Josh asks people "raise your hand if....." And she loves to wave and say "Hi!" to EVERYONE we see when we go shopping. It is so fun to see total strangers grin from ear to ear because of her :-)

Josh and Lauren are SO excited for Christmas. We are going to Hawaii for my sisters wedding on January 6th and I keep asking them if they are excited for that and they say "No, I'm excited for Christmas!" Like they have to choose one or the other. I am very excited though. We just found out that Heidi and her husband and her brand new baby are going to be there so that makes EVERYONE in my family. How fun is that going to be?!?! My sister Tracy is moving to Seattle and I am so excited for that too. It hasn't really hit me yet though, I have been wanting to have family live here for so long- I can't believe it is finally going to happen!

So, I have so many pics that I would like to post from birthday parties and things but my computer is having the download issue again. I have to get it figured out before Christmas and Hawaii, though. I need the memory space!!

Have a wonderful Christmas everyone!

"I hope I hear her wings...."

Josh lost his tooth yesterday. While Paul was tucking Josh and Lauren into bed last night (they are sharing a room right now) they were getting Josh's tooth ready for the tooth fairy. They put it under Josh's pillow, and it was at that moment that Lauren said to Paul and Josh "I hope I hear her wings!" How cute is that! I thought that was a such a sweet way to anticipate the tooth fairy. What a sweetheart!

Lauren's Princess Party!

Our Beautiful Little Princess...
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Probably her funnest birthday cake- EVER!!!


We were so happy to have Grandpa here- he was so proud of his little princess!


Some of Her Hignessess :-)


This is Lauren with her best friend Brooke- if you look closely (click on the picture) you can see that they are both wearing friendship necklaces- so cute!!


Lauren had a great time at her party and keeps asking me if she is "still 4"- Like it is a cool new toy she is going to loose :-) Her most favorite presents were an extensive kids makeup kit from Grandma, Baby Alive from Grandpa and a friendship necklace from her best friend Brooke. I took her to Libby Lu to get her little "updo" for the party and it really turned out cute...

This is definately our birthday busy season with Josh's coming up in 2 1/2 weeks and Paul's a little over a week after that. With the holidays too, we will have lots of fun events to catalog over the next couple of months- so stay tuned!!

Halloween 2007

Hope you all had a wonderful Halloween! The Goates clan had a great time....We had pizza at a friends house and then the kids went trick-or-treating with the dads while us moms held down the fort at home.

Livi just recently started walking so it was really cute to watch her waddling around in her big princess dress. I was surprised that Lauren didn't want to be a princess, but she chose to be a pink power ranger. I think the fact that her cool big brother was a red power ranger might have had something to do with it! :-)

Lauren was in a halloween play at her preschool as the pink power ranger. She did a great job! All the kids had a few lines to memorize (very short ones). When we were watching the play most of the other kids either didn't know their lines or didn't say them so that people could hear- but when our drama queen got up there she belted out her lines- I was so proud! Her teacher later said that Lauren not only knew her lines, she was telling some of the other kids what their lines were!

As for me, I had a big event last night-- MY FIRST PARENT-TEACHER CONFERENCE!! I was so excited! I sat down grinning from ear to ear and told Josh's teacher that this was my "first time and I am so excited" She got a kick out of that and jokingly asked me if I wanted to take a picture or something. Paul is in California right now and was so sad to miss it. But, I gave him and exhaustive play by play over the phone and I think that made him feel better :-)

I had a nice talk with her. She showed me Josh's writing journals and it was really fun to get a glimpse into his world. For a while all his writings were about skeletons and ghosts, then it was soccer games, now its sleepovers with his buddies. He loves to write and uses his punctuation marks and everything. Miss Jackson told me that he was the first one in his class to incorporate quotation marks in his writing- not bad for a kindergartener! She said that he is especially advanced in math and she thinks he will always excel in science- he is always asking how things work and really enjoys that part of the day. So, it went really well and I am so proud of Josh!

Well, have to get Lauren to gymnastics now. I will have some fun pictures after this Saturday because we are having a princess party for Lauren's 4th birthday.....

Finally Downloaded Camera!

Yea! I figured out a way to get my pictures downloaded so I am able to include a few pics I was promising...


Lauren just looked so cute for preschool this day that I had to take a couple of pics....


This one was taken at Lauren's preschool field trip to the salmon hatchery. Her absolute bestest bud is Robbie- I love how she is hugging (and claiming) him for all the world to see in this picture. He is actually her age--cute little guy!


This is the infamous picture of Josh's tooth before it came out...It looks like he had already lost a tooth- but he hadn't. Talk about making room!


I just had to include this one. I came home from an outing with the two older kids and found this adorable sight. Paul needed to mow the lawn but he was watching Olivia so he just brought her along! She was having a blast...

Tidbits

Hello Blog Surfers! I wanted to get a post in because it has been a while and I want people to keep checking in! I am having real problems downloading my camera. Every time I try to do it, it starts, then shuts the program down. I wanted to have some pictures of Lauren on her first day of preschool, but I guess that will have to wait till I can figure the camera thing out!

I put a few pictures in that I thought would be fun. One is Josh with his soccer team. Just wanted to give a little perspective of how big he is compared to other kids his age. He loves it-- Whenever one of his buddies has a birthday that is before his, they love to say "I am older than you!" Josh always responds with "yeah, well, I am taller than you!" So he will probably always have that going for him, which is nice :-) He also looks very different now. His front right tooth FINALLY came out. We had to work it a little bit- I can't wait to be able to download the pictures of his baby tooth before it came out. It was pushed so far over, and was so crooked, that it looked like he had already lost a tooth! It would still stick out a little bit when he closed his mouth! He had his pictures before it came out last friday so it will be interesting to see how they come out. I didn't want to give him a complex so I didn't tell him how to smile, but hopefully he did what he did last year- a darling CLOSED MOUTH smile :-)

Lauren is loving her preschool class. They are learning about salmon in preparation for their field trip to the salmon hatchery next week. The salmon are a big deal here in the northwest. There are festivals and everything when they are running. It is fun to see. She told me that the daddy salmon have a hook jaw and a hump back- I love it when I learn from my 3 year old!

Olivia and I are starting a little "toddler" class together with a friend and her little girl this friday. I did it with both Lauren and Josh and it is a great program. It is so fun for the babies to have a different environment to explore- and also to interact with other babies. I think she will love it.

Thats it for now- see ya next time! :-)



I asked Lauren to smile for me and she turned around with this sand-streaming-pose. I got a kick out of it...


This picture was taken by Josh with his camera and I thought it was so cute I had to put it in.


This was taken this summer on the ferry to Port Angeles for a camping trip with some friends of ours- They were literally "happy campers" that day!

Olivia's 1 year pics

Well, I was playing with my scanner and thought it would be fun to post Olivia's pictures! We didn't have much luck with her 6-month-old pics so I was so happy when I saw these. She did a great job! I can't believe how auburn her hair looks...She is definately her father's daughter!

She is also walking across the room and stands up in the middle of the room on her own, but still chooses to crawl to get around. She is so proud when she takes her steps (even when she just stands!) and looks around with a big grin on her face, waiting for a "YEA!" from everyone in the room :-)

Lauren has had her first day of preschool so I have a few cute pics from that I will download next time. Also, Josh's smile is getting funnier every day! His top right permanent tooth is popping out before his baby teeth are even loose! It is pushing two teeth out of the way to get in, so the gap and crookedness of his teeth are getting bigger each day! I hope they hold out for one more week- school pictures are next friday!!

Josh's First Day of Kindergarten!

Today was a day of very mixed emotions- so excited for our sweet boy to begin a new chapter in his life- and yet a little sad that he is growing up so fast! Josh has the option of taking the bus this year because he has to go to Medina while his school is getting remodeled. I asked him if he wanted to take the bus and the "YES!" was almost deafening :-) I then asked him if he at least wanted me to take him on his first day "no thanks, Mom" was the response...So, I told him that I would take him to the bus stop but then meet him at school to walk him to class. When the bus got to school, Josh didn't even glance to see if I was nearby. He had met a little buddy on the bus and they were so excited to run into the school. I followed him, amused to see how much fun he was having, but I wondered what he would do once he got inside the school. He has only been there once and I knew he didn't know where to go. He wasn't too worried about it until he was about half way up the corridor. At that point, it occurred to him that he doesn't really know where to go, so he FINALLY decided to look around for me. I walked him to the classroom (pointing out that he goes to the hall with the eagle on top- hope he remembers tomorrow!) and began the process of snack in this basket, lunch in this basket, backpack in one of THESE cubbies, and a stick in the 'yes' or 'no' can indicating whether or not you are having a hot lunch. I am anxious to see how it goes tomorrow and how much of the process he remembers without me. His teacher seems really great and she sure had a nice classroom. Josh was just fine when it was time for me to leave and I could tell that he is very excited. I am anxious to talk to him about his first day!

Cannon Beach

Wow- I just had a very hard time choosing the pics to add for this post! There are so many great ones! We had a wonderful time with the Hawker clan and we were reminded that we need to do this often! It was our first time to Cannon Beach and we loved it. The cool weather was very welcome and the kids (and adults!) had a blast flying kites! The wind was so perfect that we basically just had to let go and it would fly into the air! Paul bought a serious two-string-with-handles one that we were sure was going to kill us all. When this thing came crashing down it sounded like a plane going down! Josh loved it- he did a pretty good job handling it on his own too! Lauren had a great time getting a ton of attention especially from Grandpa. She begged to ride with him EVERYWHERE we went. It was fun to see.

We had a great time going on the rides (tilt-a-whirl and bumper cars) in Seaside, collecting sand dollars on the beach, enjoying Grandpa's awesome cooking, and staying up late playing games. It was a blast- I can't wait for the next trip!

Livi's Birthday

Olivia's Birthday was so much fun. For the first time, we were able to have an outdoor party at our house! Livi is our first baby with a summer birthday and we love it. We set up the slip-n-slide and swimming pool, brought out the bikes and playsets, and had a great time. We are at the end of a cul-de-sac with no homes across from us so we pretty much claim the "circle" to ourselves. The kids were able to play and play while the adults got to visit. One interesting thing was Livi's reaction to her cake- she poked her finger in a little bit, but never dove in like Lauren did. She did like tasting the frosting on her fingers, though. She is still only walking behind a push toy. I was hoping that she would be walking before our camping trip next week so she isn't crawling in the mud- but no such luck! :-) She is a constant reminder that kids are on their own schedule and we don't have much say in it!

We had a wonderful trip to Cannon Beach with Grandpa Hawker and the rest of the Hawker clan a couple of weeks ago- I will download pics from that next time..

Fourth of July 2007

We had a wonderful 4th of July this year...first of all, it was our sweet little Olivia's first birthday! She is such a joy, and definately her own little person. She is standing for a few seconds, but that is about it. It will probably be another month before she is walking around. She just barely started crawling normally a few weeks ago! Grandma Pam made cupcakes to give to the kids when we went to see the fireworks and they all loved that. I think that will be a fun tradition for us.

Speaking of the fireworks, they were amazing! A friend of ours just bought a beautiful piece of property in Hunts Point, just a few minutes from our home. It is 1 1/2 acres of flat grass right on Lake Washington. Beautiful. The barge that shot off the fireworks was right in front of us. We had an absolute blast. The morning of the fourth was fun too, we decorated Josh's escalade and rode in our neighborhoods childrens parade. At the end, there was music, hot dogs, and strawberry shortcake. We missed it last year because I was in the hospital with Olivia so it was fun to be able to do it again.

We had Olivia's party last night at our house and it was so nice. But, more on that next time (after I have downloaded the pics).

Here We Go!

Wow- I am a little nervous about this! Maybe I won't tell anybody about it until I am sure that I will update it on a regular basis....hmmmmm :-)

This whole concept is completely new to me- but what a great idea! It is such a fun way for family and friends to check in on each other when they have a minute. I know that I have sure had a lot of fun looking at the blogs of some of my oldest friends! What is really fun is when people have links on their pages to the blogs of people that I know and have lost touch with. I feel like I have gone to a little high school reunion!

Here is a bit of info about our kids (the main reason we are doing this- they change every day!) :

Joshua Paul was born in November 2001. He is an absolute joy. We have yet to find a kid who is his age who is as tall as him so it looks like he will follow in the rather large footsteps of his dear old Dad :-)

Lauren Elizabeth joined the party in November 2003. Yes, it would seem that November is a really good month for us (or rather, February) :-) She is our little spitfire and has a personality and smile that light up the room. She is going to be an absolute blast...

Olivia Katherine was born on the Fourth of July (2006). She is an absolute replica (except for the fact that she is a baby girl) of her Daddy and can rarely be found without a smile on her face. Seriously, she is ALWAYS smiling. And it seems to be contagious! No one can look at that sweet little girl without grinning from ear to ear. :-)

Our lives are so blessed by these three precious souls. We are so grateful for them, each other and all of our dear family and friends. I think that this will be a fun way to keep up with each others lives and I look forward to getting word that more of you have begun a blog of your own!

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