Cole's Birthday Party!

Happy 2nd Birthday, Cole!!!




Yesterday, we had so much fun celebrating Cole's 2nd birthday at a bouncy place in Black Diamond. Cole is the son of a friend of mine and is only 3 days older than Hunter! It's so nice to have a friend to talk about what stages we are going through with our rapidly growing toddlers!

The kids had so much fun playing on the bouncy toys. Hunter really liked going down the big slide... over and over again!









My biggest complaint... I have yet to meet a bouncy slide that wasn't nearly impossible for an adult to get up. I mean seriously, look that these steps! You can barely get your big toe to grip, let alone a good majority of you foot!! (Thank you, Jesse, for capturing my struggle :P )




After playtime, the kids gathered in the party area to eat cake and watch Cole open his birthday presents! I couldn't believe how old Hunter looked sitting at the little kid table all by himself, just going to town on cake and juice! He even went straight for the party hat and immediately put it on his head.




We had a great time and hope Cole had a wonderful time at his big party!!!

Weekend in Portland

So, yeah, I've been a very bad blogger, I go through these spurts sometimes when I just don't feel like blogging, and this last week has been one of those. Bear with me.

Jesse, Hunter, and I had a wonderful couple of days in Portland a couple of weekends ago. The weather was amazing!!

We hit the road early on Friday morning so that we could get down there in time for a 10am appointment to get our new canopy put on the truck. I'm really glad we got a canopy, it will be really useful for transporting the dog, Jesse's hunting gear, and to be able to keep things dry in the Seattle rain. While Jesse waited for it to get installed, I took a little walk and found a place to get a manicure. :)



From there, we headed to the Oregon Zoo! We had a pretty good time. But, I have to admit, I don't think I am much of a zoo person. It always seems like a great idea to me to go to the zoo, but once I am there, not so much. Oh well, I think Hunter had a good time seeing the sun bears and the elephants.





After the zoo, we went drove downtown and checked into our hotel. We tried to get Hunter to take a nap... with no luck at all. So, then we headed out. We walked around downtown for a bit and then had dinner at our favorite place... Buffalo Wild Wings! Mmmmm.



Hunter was pretty tired, so we did what all great parents do, we ordered him his first sugar loaded shirley temple. (sense the sarcasm?) Oh boy, did he love it. He was drinking it so fast that we decided that we needed to dillute it with water. While he was busy consuming hundreds of grams of sugar, Jesse and I indulged ourselves, with boneless wings. Jesse is all about the caribbean jerk, but I swear the mango habenero is the way to go!!

The next morning, we woke up to Hunter in our face, yes, he had crawled out of the pack n' play and made his way to us! We got ready and then headed downstairs and had some yummy breakfast. We love the Hilton breakfasts! :)

Then we decided to spend the day at Oaks Park, it's an amusement park down on the Willamette River, it was so much fun!!!

We got there about an hour before the park opened, so we spent that time walking on the beach, skipping rocks on the water, and then walking back through the woods.









After our nice walk, we headed to the rides!! Hunter LOVED them!

Our Family Weekend

Jesse's homecoming was perfect time, right at the beginning of a four day weekend! The only thing that I really wanted... was to have no set plans. I'm kind of funny like that sometimes, I don''t really care if we ended up doing things everyday, I just didn't want to feel obligated to do anything we didn't feel like doing.

And that is exactly what we did. Hunter didn't wake up until between 8:30 and 9:00 every morning! That is unheard of for him, he's usually up by about 7am. It was nice to be able to lay in bed and relax with Jesse every morning before we got sucked into the crazy life of being parents to a toddler.

On Friday, we started the day out with lunch at The Rock, a wood fired pizza place up the hill from our house. I can't really remember what we did the rest of the day... I mostly remember the important things, like eating pizza. ;)

Hmmm, now that I sit down and think about doing a recap of our weekend, I really can't remember what all we did. So, I'll have to skip to Sunday, when we went to church and then our friends Zack & Sarah came over with their two little munchkins to hang out. Sarah and I even snuck out without any kids for a little shopping trip!

Monday, we went to the horse races for about an hour and had fun watching Hunter pet the horses and place in the bouncy toys.

That's about it... just full of relaxing, laughing, enjoying our son, sleeping, and perhaps some typical post deployment bickering... and perhaps some other marital activities. ;)

And now it's time for a photo dump...

Alaska Trip Part 2

So, I only shared the pictures from the zip line trip earlier this week. So, hold on tight, you're gonna get to see the rest of the pictures from our Alaska trip.

We left last Wednesday night, right after I got off work. Hunter was so excited to see the airplanes while we waited to board the plane.





The airplane ride turned out just alright. We got lucky and had an open seat between us and an older lady. Turns the lady was very sweet and has several grandchildren and great grandchildren. That turned out to be nice because Hunter decided he loved her and kept trying to lay down his head on her lap and cuddle with her. She loved that he loved her! Thank goodness!

On Thursday, we hung around the house, and then walked around downtown with Marlene. We did some shopping and enjoyed being on the waterfront. Marlene took this photo of Hunter and I with a moose in one of the shopping areas.



Marlene and Jim, who we stayed with, have a BEAUTIFUL house right on the ocean. Check out these views from their deck.








On Friday, Hunter and I spent the day together walking around the town. We walked through Creek Street.



Then we did a little more shopping. I found him the cutest Alaska Airlines airplane in the toy shop downtown. It lights up and moves across the floor. He loves it!

Later in the day, we went on a little drive out south and admired the beautiful eagles that flew overhead.

Hunter Loves Summer

Hunter has really discovered a love for playing at parks. He didn't start walking until the end of July last year and so last summer he wasn't getting around real steadily. This year is a whole different story. He climbs, swings, and slides like a champ.

On Saturday, he actually got to go to two different parks. He had a great time playing with his buddy been earlier in the afternoon.












And there is your fix for the week of Hunter pictures :)

Father's Day

Hunter and I went over to my parents house on Sunday to celebrate Father's Day with my dad and the rest of my family. We had great food and company, if only we could say that the weather was awesome as well. Oh well, two out of three isn't so bad.

Hunter loved playing outside with his two cousins, Grace and Gabe, and his Uncle Eddy! Grace and Gabe are SOOOO good with him. I've never seen older kids love to be around a little kid so much. They were so patient with him and included him in everything they were doing. I could tell that Hunter was so happy to be spending time with them!









Hunter found his Uncle Brandon's catcher's helmet from PLU and decided he wanted to wear that one. :)

Summer Fun

Yesterday, Hunter and I went to a birthday party to celebrate his friend, Ryleigh's 3rd Birthday! Hunter had lots of fun playing with the kids!




I was unprepared for there being a kiddie pool at the party, so Hunter got naked and joined right in! :)







Pete cooked up some yummy burgers and hot dogs.



But, I'm pretty sure the kids were way more interested in playing in the yard than eating.





Hunter REALLY liked Ryleigh's new bike! He followed her everywhere she went with it.



But Hunter's patience expired soon afterwards. He really did not want to share Ryleigh's new bike with her. So it was time for us to leave. His tears in the car could only be consoled with... fruit snacks. Go figure.