Happy Birthday Daddy

Luckily for us - Travis was home for 18 hours during his New York trip and his Aregentina/Chile trip so we could celebrate his birthday with him. The kids are LOVING birthdays; cake, candles, presents. They are already telling me what they want for their birthday cakes for next year!

Wyatt and Teagan both set the table themselves for Daddy's birthday cake. And they are such great helpers these days...they want to help with everything. Even if that means blowing out Daddy's candles, Wyatt wants to help!

Pumpkin Farm

This year we went out to Wheatland to go to Bishops Pumpkin Farm for our pumpkin outing. Wow is all I can say. This place is HUGE. There was so much for the kids to do - we could have been there all day. Here are Teagan and Wyatt posing on a pumpkin. No one tried to pee on a pumkin this year - so that was one big difference between this year and last year!

They do "pig races" at their "Porko Arena" every couple of hours. It was pretty funny.

Here is the family waiting on the pig races....

We also met up with Doug, Iliana and Baby Kelsey for her first pumpkin outing!

And the kids with their very best pouty faces because waiting for the pig races was starting to get a little bit - scratch that - a lot irratating! Don't you just love the big pouty faces?!

But then they finally started! It was pretty funny. The audience each had a color section and we got a corresponding pig to cheer for. Ours was the Blue Pig - and he won!

This was a huge slide in the center of it all that the kids HAD TO GO ON.....!

It started to rain after this - just our luck! The first rain of the year happens while we are at the pumpkin farm. But we had fun and will definitely go back next year - during the week next time - but this place was fun!

Star Chart

We have been so frustrated by the negative discipline options: also known as "time-outs" or consequences (you do this and I will take away X) because they just were not working for us. So Travis and I decided to go the other way and reward them for positive behavior. After our discussion I jumped online to google away and found great research for reward charts that are very similiar to what the Super Nanny uses. I clicked away...and a couple of days later the oh so clever "star chart" had arrived.

If I could think of a way to mimic the sound effect of the coulds parting and the sun shining that you hear in movies I would...but that is all I can think of to describe the sound when we pulled these charts out! The kids were soooo excited. So each week we velcro on different positive behaviors that we want to work on, and at the end of the day the kids get to put the star on that specific behavior if they earned a star for the day. Let me tell you: it works.

This is Teagan when she earned all of her stars and she got to go pick out her reward the very next day. She picked a stuffed animal lion that we saw in a local kids store. She named him "Cheeto" and she is exremely in love with him...and we are are extremely proud of her.

A couple of days later Wyatt completed his chart and the next day he went with Daddy to pick out his reward: a skateboard. Yes. He is 3 years old and was dying for a skateboard. Lord help us!

Ahhhh....Moment

So we had a "ah....." moment recently in our household. Travis has been traveling quite a bit in the last two months for work. In fact, this entire month of Ocotber, he will only be home for 4 days. The kids keep asking "where is Daddy?" and so I tell them on a business trip. Which when they say it sounds like "Biss-ness twrip". Then I tell them where he is, which comes out as "Ka-Go" and "Duh-Lass", etc etc.

They also ask if Daddy drove his car there or he took an airplane. Then when we see an airplane in the sky they ask if that is Daddy's airplane. I usually respond with "I am not sure if that is his or someone else's daddy is in that plane...."

Then the other day Travis as acutally home for the weekend and we were in our room with the door open to the patio outside. The kids were outside playing and all of a sudden we hear Wyatt hollering: "Bye Bye Daddy!! I wuv you!! Wuv You Daddy!!! Bye Bye!" and he was waving his hand high in the air yelling up into the sky. Travis and I exchanged curious glances and then went outside to see what was going on....?

Well Wyatt had seen a plane flying over head and decided that one was Daddy's plane!

We just looked at each other and smiled. Such a cute kid.

Monterey Weekend

We decided to take the kids down to Monterey for the weekend and hit up all the popular tourists spots. The Aquarium is certainly stop #1 on your agenda in Monterey. They do a great job of having lots of "hands on" activities for visitors. This was a wave that washed over the glass wall every 10 seconds or so. We literally stood here for 10 minutes. The kids just loved this...over and over...

This is one of those fish that is flat. Very weird.

They do such a nice job making all the exhibits so realisitc and incorporating so many of the natural elements to the exhibit.

This is what the picture looks like when you take a flash photo into one of the giant shark/fish tank aquariums. You can't see anything!

They had so many kid friendly spots.

Two peas in a pod? Nope. Two peas in a clam! (I crack myself up!)

The flamingos were a big hit - Teagan's favorite. Wyatt's favorite was the otter exhibit.

This is the downtown area. It was nice because we stayed just blocks away - so we could walk to everything.

This was us having breakfast in our room before heading out for the day. The kids were introduced to Frosted Flakes for the first time - like it was for me as a kid: an instant favorite!

This was the little beach just a couple of blocks from our hotel. The aquarium was cool and all, but all these kids wanted to do was go play on the beach.

Not more than 5 minutes into this peaceful scene...as a parent you finally get that "Ah...." moment after packing everything and everyone up, walking to the beach, laying everything out, and finally sitting down. Then Teagan goes out to get some water and down she goes! She got swept up by the little waves and into the water she fell. Totally drenched and miserably cold. So Daddy fashioned his extra shirt into a cool little outfit for her to wear. We thought it was genius. Teagan was not thrilled. So I took her back to the hotel and gave her a warm tub and some new clothes.

From the minute the kids and I saw the "surrey" we wanted to do it. Travis was very hesitant. I don't think it ranks very high up there on his "cool bike" chart. But he was a good sport and pedaled the family around for a solid hour.

We pedaled out to Lovers Beach.

This was us walking home after dinner. Travis and I had a stroller race - up hill - four blocks - back to the hotel. The kids were totally into it - telling us to run faster. Of course, I won. Didn't I Travis?!

6 Years Already???!!!

It was our 6 year wedding anniversary so we decided to pack it up and take the kids back to the scene of the crime! We went to Squaw Valley = and it happened to be Saturday October 2nd the actual day. In the Village it was Oktoberfest. Travis got to drink beer in preparation for the big Oregon Ducks vs. Stanford game (that is why the kids are wearing their ducks t-shirts!) While there was not a lot for the kids to do at Oktoberfest - it was still a fun weekend. The leaves are starting to turn, and we got to experience an amazing afternoon thunderstorm with big rain that makes everything smell so good.