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The Children's Museum

So I need to stop having all these grand plans to update you about ALL the things that have been happening in the past few months, and just try to keep current now. That's my new plan. Maybe I will throw in a few other tidbits along the way too.

We had a long weekend, that was nice since Ian has been gone for a month. Unfortunately Ian had Duty on Sunday, so it was divided a little. (Duty is a 24 hour shift that they have every 8 days and they cant leave the ship.) To make yesterday a little different we went to the Imagine Children's Museum. It was great, we ended up purchasing a year membership so we can now go there as much as we want. It is fairly close to our house, so it will be fun. There was so much to do, and everyone had a great time. Inside they have 3 floors of different rooms in themes such as a farm, bank, theater, airplane, tree house, restaurant and too many other to list. On the roof is a giant playground, a life size chess set, a dinosaur digging area and other things. We were lucky the weather was pretty nice yesterday and we were able to enjoy that part too. Everyone found something they loved.

But you know your kids are growing up when you get in the car and you ask them about their favorite part, and first you have to signal them to take the headphones out of their ears, and then the classic answer, "I don't know." So here's some pictures of our adventures...

A little bit of everything!

There is always so much happening, I just don't know where to even begin. We finished off November with Garrett turning 9 and having 5 friends over to spend the night. Unfortunately none of them gave him ear plugs, so it was long and loud. But oh so fun for him. It was the easiest party ever. We set up a few TV's with different game systems and they either played games or watched movies the whole night. They even got to decorate there own cup cakes. So much for my usual going over the top, the boys loved it.

Thanksgiving this year was celebrated on Friday. Ian had duty on Thursday so we all just put it off a day. But that made for a busy Friday. Of course we have to go shopping insanely early on Friday morning. Now I see why you do the shopping the day after Thanksgiving. But we ended up having a great meal with some good friends and that is what it is all about.

For Christmas this year we were finally able to make it back to Idaho. It was Ian's first time back since we moved from there over 2 years ago. We left Seattle in another 'record' snowstorm and had bad weather all the way to Boise. The rest of the way was nice. Once we got settled in, I think it snowed everyday we were there. It was SO cold. It wasn't much different here in Washington either. Just after midnight on the 2nd day we were there, I got a call from my neighbor, (we live in a Townhouse) She said that water was coming into her house from ours and it sounded like it was pouring in our house. It was. The pipe going to the outside faucet had burst behind our Kitchen wall. 2/3 of our main level had flooded before they could shut off the water. I guess we were lucky to not be home. A few of my good friends and the maintenance workers had to move everything off the carpet and tear the carpet up to dry out the floor. By the time we returned a week later, there were just a few remains that there had even been any problems while we were gone. Besides having to basically move back into our living room and dining room and unpack it all over again. It was probably the greatest way to get an early start to our 'spring cleaning' and the earliest our Christmas decorations have ever come down.

Christmas was fun. We had it in 2 rounds. Once at my parents and then again after returning home, since we didn't want to haul everything to Idaho. Our kids slept in, I think it is unheard of. It was after 8:00 before we even started opening presents. I don't expect that to happen much though. I know growing up we could hardly wait.

January has been busy. Ian's ship left the 2nd week for training down off the coast of San Diego. They were only supposed to be in port down there for a day and the ship broke down so they have been stuck there for almost 2 weeks. We found out today that it looks like it is still not fixed, they are suppose to leave Tuesday. We will see...this is the Navy and nothing is ever guaranteed. I think we all know this by now. We are managing great back home. Garrett is playing basketball, it is his 2nd year and he really has gotten a lot better. He is really good at defense. It is fun to watch. Aspen is still doing girl scouts this year, and they are just starting the cookie season. It is exhausting just thinking about it. But it all helps out the troop, so I understand the need. And they are just about the easiest thing to sell...who can resist them? Cute little girls selling cookies! I am going to be starting working very part time at the local scrapbook store. I am excited, it will be nice for me to get some adult time a little more. It looks like mainly I will be working during crops and just helping out in small ways. So it wont really demand me away from my family more than I can handle. I have a good friend who will be helping out with the kids at times when Ian isn't around too.

Well, that is a little update of most of the things over the last few months. I will start posting pictures soon. To be honest I just barely downloaded them from my camera to the computer earlier today. Everything since about a week before Christmas. That is sad. I am usually more on top of that. Hopefully I can get better again.

10 Years...

Ian and I just celebrated 10 years of marriage. Because of a certain unnamed partners' hunting trip we could only find time for a short get away, but it was so worth it. We drove about an hour away from our house to the cutest little town called La Conner. We reserved"The Garden Room" of Katy's Bed and Breakfast. We have never actually stayed in a real B&B. It was so nice. Because it was a weeknight we had the house to ourselves. Besides the owners who were barely seen. We called them our personal house elves. With quiet knocks on the door we would find surprises like hot cookies and milk before bed. And the Breakfast was amazing. They were called Dutch Babies. I need to find a recipe for them and they could become a new Christmas breakfast around the Warner household. (We need to come up with a new tradition, since the last one involved nuts, so this will be it we decided!)
The first day there we only went out to dinner at a restaurant on the channel, then back to the B&B to the hot tub, and then we scrapbooked in our sitting room for a while. Ian even made a little album of the kids. It was fun. We intentionally wanted a room with no TV so we could just hang out. The next day we just went antique shopping and played tourist. It was right up our alley. In Wisconsin we had a little town we love to visit called Cedarburg, and in California it was Julian. So this is now our favorite place here in Washington.
Of course we were looking for some small souvenir for the kids to bring them home. When we went in a little shop called Crabbies, of course to live up to the name, they had a huge habitat for Hermit Crabs. Ian loved them, Me not so much. Their kind of creepy. But we both decided that the kids would freak out and be so excited. And really could you ask for a better pet. They don't smell, make noise, and pee on the carpet. We got 3 and the supplies to take care of them. The kids love them, To tell the truth, I am starting to not be so scared of them, and they are pretty cool to watch.
All together we had a great time getting away. It was so nice. I still cant believe it has been 10 years. It goes by so fast. I am more in love with Ian than ever. Here are a few of the pictures from our adventure. By the way, I used a program I found through a cousins blog called PhotoScape, you can download it for free. It was so easy to edit the pictures and put in the collage. It was a lot of fun to work with too.
I still have so much to post, our computer crashed last week and was in getting fixed all week. Luckily I had backed up all my pictures and all but maybe 10 songs I had recently downloaded from itunes. It is still a pain now though because I am having to reinstall so many programs to get things running right again. Hopefully I can find more time in the next few days. Since my dearest husband had left me to find bambi's daddy!

A long overdue update!

I realize that it has now been 3 weeks since I last posted. While Ian was deployed I found that I usually would post late at night when I should have been sleeping. Lately I have found more incentive to go to bed early. Thus the lack of posting! So now I am trying something different... Posting during nap time.

A LOT has been happening in this short amount of time, and we are all just enjoying being together. One of the first things that we did a few days after Ian came home was get Aspen a hair cut. She has been wanting to donate it to Locks For Love for months and I kept promising her that we would cut it after dad came home. And she kept me to it. Unfortunately when we got to the salon they said that Locks For Love was no longer accepting donations. But we were still cutting it. We also saved the braid and will be sending it to a different company that can make it into wigs. Aspen loves her new hair style, and so do we. She looks so much more grown up.

Before

After

Also the USS Abraham Lincoln returned to home port here in Everett, WA. We didn't go to see. I was actually grateful to not have to be a part of the mad house. After 10 years in the Navy, we have never actually had a homecoming on the pier yet. Maybe sometime in the next 10 years we will. This was a picture my friend took, I always love the look of all the men manning the rails of the ship, waiting to get off and see their families.


Garrett also played in his last football game of the season on Saturday. They played the #1 team in the league, Burlington. They were undefeated. It was a great defensive game and at the end of 4 quarters the game was scoreless on both sides. Burlington got the ball first in OT. They ran in a touchdown and scored an extra point (in Pee Wee's the extra point is also on the ground and 2 points is scored by kicking the ball. Since it is so hard for the little guys to kick the ball!) Next our team got the ball, and on the forth down a kid from our ward caught the ball in the end zone and scored the touchdown. So we were down by a point. But we have a great kicker. So we went for the win. The ball barely made it over the uprights, it was the greatest win in the history of football. I am certain. The other team will still go onto the playoffs and I am sure do great. Our boys don't get to go to the playoffs, but at least they know that they beat the best team in the league. It was so exciting. They will all be talking about it for the next year.

Garrett with the Coaches

Garrett, Justin, CJ, and Blake

They are all in our ward and make up half the Wolf Den at scouts. I am sure the den leaders will be grateful the football season is over. They had to make the meetings later to accommodate these stinky and rambunctious little guys after football practices!

I still have a few other things that I want to post. Maybe later. But this is all I have time for now. Thanks for checking in on us.

Thursday Night

It started just another Thursday in the Warner Household.

We were coming home after another late night of Football and Cheer practice. After I pulled in the driveway I noticed my friends Janelle, Cynthia, and Jonathan (Cynthia's Husband). This was my first time seeing Jonathan, since he had come home the night before. He is also on Ian's ship but was able to take leave from Hawaii. So I was welcoming him home, and obviously not paying that much attention to why they were all outside at that time. Ian had walked up behind me, with a dozen roses in hand. I was in shock to see him standing there. I think, NO, I know it is the best surprise I have ever had. Everyone was in on it, Ian thought he was so clever. I am so happy to have him back home. It still almost doesn't seem real, but then, it also feels like he never left too. We all stayed up way too late last night exchanging gifts, talking and of course cuddling up on the couch watching the University of Utah game that I had on my DVR from earlier that evening. Which they won, in a nail biter. It was great to be cuddled up with my husband for a good football game.
Here are a few pictures Janelle took of us last night. The poor babies in the car you can see them looking out at us wondering what was going on. And Aspen had walked up to the front door and missed it all until we finally realized it and went to her. She just ran down the sidewalk into her daddy's arms. So we missed that on camera.
I am pretty tired right now, and just rambling a lot. It has been a whirlwind of a day! I also want to get back to Ian. We have too much cuddling to catch up on. I will write more in a day or two when I can think more clearly. I just wanted to let you all in on my good news!

MRSA again...

I had to go and say that nothing really new was happening. So now I just jinxed us. I had to take Tilden into the Dr.'s today. He now has the MRSA infection. It is miserable. It is on his chin. It is very painful for him. I guess by this point I am becoming an expert on it, and I can catch it fairly early, before it gets too bad. But it still takes time for the antibiotics to work. I still dont understand how 'they' can say that it isn't contagious. When 4 people in my family have had it, plus my niece who was visiting me the month of June. When Lydia got it a couple weeks ago, the doctor insisted that no amount of lysol and disinfecting your house can change the outcome of who will get it. But from my own personal research on the internet, I have found that it is very common for families to continually pass it around. Talking to my mom today, she said that an elementary school in Idaho Falls had been closed because so many students have had this infection also. I also have learned that this infection is actaually new to the medical profesion over the last 3-5 years. So I am sure there is still a lot more research before they can understand it.

Either way. I am tired of us getting it. And I am sorry for my poor miserable little boy.