Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Ahh the End of Summer

Well it has been a while since my last post. Let's see.... what have we been up to. The weekend of the 16th the kids had a parents night out at school so Michael and I went out to a fancy french restaurant. Since we have had Ethan we haven't had the chance to explore new places. This was definitely going to be an experience for us. We had the 7 course tasting menu where you are given small bites for each course - a taste - . We also did the wine pairing from the sommelier. We were a little nervous at first because of one of the courses. Our first course was a savory nectarine soup. It was delicious and the wine that was paired with it was great. If you took a taste of the soup before the wine you could totally taste the nectarines but then after a sip of wine the savory part of the soup came out. It was really interesting. The next course was our nervous one. It was foie gras - duck or goose liver. This one scared me, but you only live once and need to go outside your comfort zone. It was good!!! It was small and it was sitting on a apple fritter and had a mushroom on top and then paired with a black currant sauce. I truely liked it. It melted on your tongue. The next course was creamed peas with a yeast cake. Very yummy. Then we had steelhead trout with a delicious sauce. I was nervous about this as well as I am not a huge fish fan especially if it is fishy tasting. This was wonderful - very fresh and no fishy taste. Our next course was the sorbet to cleans the pallet. It was very interesting. It was rhubarb, sour cherry, rose, champagne sorbet. The rose was the overwhelming taste. It reminded me of my grandmothers home because it always smelled of roses. Wasn't my favorite, but it did cleanse the pallet. The main course of rabbit loin stuffed with mushrooms and served with morrel mushrooms on the side in a wonderful sauce (french food is alot about the sauces). It was okay - the rabbit was a little tough for me. Then last thing was a salad. I wasn't crazy about the salad, but that could have been because I was getting full. All of the wine pairings were wonderful. We did have dessert and it was good as well. the dinner took about 3 hours - nice and relaxing.

This last weekend we went down to Portland. The people that Michael works on the second project with wanted to have a company picnic so we went down for that. Jeff hosted the party and wow do they have a gorgeous house. The live in Forest Heights and the house is wonderful and they have a beautiful backyard. Arianna had a blast playing with the other kids and Ethan did well also. We only had one incident where he tried to bite - him and another boy were arguing over a toy. We called it a success for him!

While we were there we also picked up a few more school clothes for Arianna. We went to the Woodburn outlet to Gymboree and got her some nice skirts and a few dresses and new tennis shoes. Ethan also needed new shoes - his feet grew a whole size in a couple of months. He is now and 8XW.

I can't believe Arianna starts kindergarten in a week. I didn't think I would be teary over it, but I am a little. She is growing up fast. We get to find out who her teacher is tomorrow and we are buying her school supplies tonight. She got a really cute sunflower backpack and lunch box. Last week was her last class of gymnastics. She is not signed up for the fall because I don't want her to be too busy. She will have swimming 2 days a week and then she wants to continue to do soccer. She also wants to join girl scouts.

Ethan is moving up to a new class in his daycare. It is a class for 2 year olds and older. This will be a challenge for him - hopefully he will do well. This class has them wash their own hands, clean their plates after lunch, they have chinese class, etc. He has been doing better. He has a lot more words and is trying to put them together. His biting has gotten tons better, but he still tends to do it when sometimes tries to take a toy away or he wants a toy from someone else. It is a work in progress. He has only done it once at his school - so that is good.

This week we are leaving on Thursday to go away for the weekend with Michael's parents. Once last trip before school starts on Tuesday.

Have a great labor day weekend!

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

I love the Summer Olympics!

I love the years of of the Olympics. Needless to say I have been glued to the TV as much as possible to watch the events. Of course the number one thing to watch is swimming, then diving, gymnastics, beach volleyball, track and field, etc. All I have to say is thank goodness for DVR so I can record the events i want to watch when I am not able to watch them live :). The winter olympics in 2010 are going to be in Vancouver and we are thinking of trying to go to some events where vancouver is only a couple hours away. I have always wanted to go to an olympics.

Tomorrow is our Anniversary. It will be 9 years. Luckily this weekend the kids' school is having parents night out this weekend so we get to go out. yeah!!! I am not sure what we are doing yet. We will have to decide today so we can make reservations. I am thinking it might be dinner and a movie maybe.

This last weekend was interesting. Michael had to work on Saturday for a deployment until around 6 pm. we met him at his work and then drove over the mountains to find some clear sky so we could see some of the perseid meteor shower. Luckily there was just enough clear sky that we were able to see some and Arianna was able to see one or two as well which is what we were wanting.

Our next trip is the weekend of the 23rd. We have to go down to portland for a picnic. Michael had promised Arianna a ride in an convertable this summer so I think we will rent one for the day when we are down there. We will see how that goes :).

I am working on getting Arianna signed up for soccer in the fall and then she will continue with swimming as well. Right now we are not continuing with gymnastics in the fall because I don't want her to be so booked with afterschool classes because swimming is M/W and soccer will be on Tues or Thur. The do have classes on the weekends but we want to keep weekends free so we can do family things where she will be in school everyday. So we will see how things go.

I can't believe how fast this month is going. We still need to get Arianna's school supplies and finish getting her some more school clothes. We need to get some jeans tailored for her as they are too long. We also need to get some new tennis shoes.

Well I need to get going and start some cleaning :(

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Camping, Picnics, and Crabbing

Well, it has been a while since I have posted. I need to get more pictures up of our recent adventures. Since my last post we went camping at Ocean City State Park near Ocean Shores. We had a good time. We only went for 1 night to see how Ethan would do. We all had a good time. There beach was about a 15 minute walk from the campground. In ocean shores you can drive on the beach so that was interesting to see. There are also a lot of deer in the area - on the beach, in the town, etc. We were able to bring some gates with us so we were able to block ethan from the campfire. It did get quite cold at night which we were not expecting, but we all had fun.

The following weekend was the Microsoft company picnic. Michael's mom was in town for an appointment that weekend so we left Ethan with her and just took Arianna to the picnic. We had a great time. We had brought chairs and blankets but we never even sat down the whole day. The day went by very fast.

This last weekend we went down to Florence to go crabbing. We went with Ken and Kar-yee and his friend David and Teri and their family and friends. There was about 30 people there as Ken's niece was getting baptised that weekend. The crabbing was very poor. They caught a lot of crab, but they were all too small. In about a month they will probably all be the right size. The houses we stayed at were really nice. If my family decides to come out for another reunion i think we would look at renting these houses. Ethan stayed with Michael's parents for the weekend so we just had Arianna and that was nice. There were some other little ones there that were small and sensitive to noise so I think I would have ended up trapped in a room with Ethan. We took Arianna and some of the other kids Dune Buggying. I had done this years ago on a vacation with my grandma and loved it. Everyone had a blast and Arianna wanted to do it again the next day, but we had to leave. The next time we go down we will do it again.

Arianna and Ethan are both doing well. Ethan is getting more and more words and is trying to say two word sentences. He loves going to the park and climbing and going down the slides. He is such a boy. He loves to pick up rocks and throw them, playing in the sand, etc. Arianna is doing well also. She is coming down to her last month of freedom. She starts school on Sept 2nd. We will be going to do school shopping soon for some new clothes, shoes, etc. In her pre-K class she has been able to go on several field trips. She has loved riding the bus to the different locations. She is growing up so fast and starting to act even more mature, but she is also pushing the limits to learn what they are. We have found a park that is great for her to ride her bike. she is working on getting more confident on the bike so we can start learning to ride without training wheels. We will see how it goes.

Well off to the grocery store!!