Christmas 2010

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! Here are a few new photos from December.
We had a blast decorating sugar cookies with our friend, Naomi. Well... most of us decorated anyway. Some of us, like a certain unnamed 2 year-old, only consumed the cookies or enjoyed pounding them until they were just bits of crumbs.

Cookie decorating station.

The Dahls hard at work.

I could not resist a photo of these two. Elsie went upstairs and came down totally decked out in ballerina stuff. She even added the pink bow herself. Noah spends most of his day in these cowboy boots that are about 2 sizes too big for him. He even wears them to nap and bed. I did have to make a rule that he wear socks with them. They were starting to stink!

This is a sword Weston bought for Noah for Christmas. I was proud of Weston for using his own money to buy gifts for his family.

Noah was certainly into opening gifts this year. He got in trouble more than once for sneaking and opening other people's gifts in Spokane.

Here is Elsie with her princess shoes and wig. We bought the girls princess outfits for Christmas, complete with shoes and long, braided wigs. The only problem with the wigs is Joy thinks they are some sort of animal. If the girls wear their wigs around her she jumps up and attacks their heads.

I posed Elsie for some photos in Spokane. She's just being silly here :)

This girl wins the prize for fake, cheesy smiles.

Pretty photo of our soon-to-be 6 year-old.

Sisters in plaid.

Cousins in plaid. Baby Vera is 5 months old now! She is such a happy engaging baby. We are all wild about her!

Kyle and Haley bought Noah this cowboy outfit for Christmas. He loves it!!!

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Recent Happenings

The other day I asked Weston and Grace to finish pulling and wash the carrots from our garden. I couldn't figure out what was taking them so long. There were more carrots than I realized, but they were also being very detailed with their washing and drying. Notice the drying system they came up with.

Unfortunately, the carrots were getting dirty again from the dirt on top of the wood. Oops.

Today Mike helped me finish up some homeschooling I didn't quite finish this week. We are studying the history of the United States and are at the Revolutionary War. The kids made their own tricorn hats and goatees. I don't think the Yankees wore goatees, but the kids looked cute anyway! They even practiced their marching to "Yankee Doodle Dandy".

Watch out Redcoats!

Noah came in from playing to say "hi" to me the other day. I'm not even sure what to say to this one. I think you can tell he's got an older brother AND older sisters :)

Dahl Family Photo Shoot

We did it! We finally scheduled a professional photo shoot with my friend, Annie Schilperoort (click on her name to check out her website). I need to mention that my brother is also a wonderful photographer but is currently serving our country by flying Chinook helicopters in Afghanistan (thank you, Kyle).
Annie met with us for the shoot at the George Fox University campus where Mike and I met and fell in love :) It was meaningful to us to have our photos taken in a place that holds so many wonderful memories. Who would have guessed 12 years later we'd be sitting on campus for a photo shoot with our 4 children! The day was beautiful but very cold (especially for early September). Annie was wonderful with the kids and knew just what to say to get them laughing. It was a miracle in itself to get some photos with all 4 kids looking in the same direction, let alone smiling or laughing!

The Dahl girls! Mike loves this one :)

I love their bare feet on the stump in this one.

Noah looks especially cute here.

Handsome 7 year-old! Getting a real smile out of this boy is very hard to do.

Fun candid shot.

We were having a good time!

Sweet sister shot. Elsie was also a tough nut to crack for a real smile, but Annie got a few :)

This nut is not hard to crack. He rotated between laughing and temper tantrums the entire time.

10 years of marriage and we don't look a day older (we don't do we? oh wait, we kinda do...)

We almost didn't try for this part of the photo shoot since the kids were starting to fuss about the cold. I'm sooooo glad we did! I LOVE this picture!

I'll post some of the black and white photos later. Thanks again, Annie! I know we'll treasure these photos for many years to come!

Vacation (Pt. 2)

When Mike returned from South Carolina we packed up the van again and headed to Seattle to visit and stay with Mike's brother, Tim. We didn't take any photos, but we had a great time crashing at Tim's bachelor pad. Next we stopped over at Lacy, WA to visit Mike's Uncle John and Aunt Marion. The kids LOVED all the wonderful sweet treats Marion bought for them :) Mike's cousin Alex, a fireman, took the kids on a tour of his station. We enjoyed every minute of John and Marion's hospitality. Next stop was home for a night, then on the road again to Waldport, OR for a 4 night stay at the beach. The highlight was visiting the tide pools and discovering all the ocean creatures. Weston especially loved this part of the trip.

The weather was not supposed to be good for our trip. The first day at Waldport I prayed and asked the Lord for some sunshine. The next 3 days were absolutely beautiful! We are so thankful for this special blessing.

Big moment! Weston played his first game of Catan with Mike. He was bummed to lose, but Mike said he did great for his first time.

At the tide pools near Yachats!

Notice the sea anemones and starfish.

Noah discovering a mommy and baby starfish.

Mermaid Grace with a starfish. Toward the end of our tide pool experience Grace stepped off a rock onto what looked like sand. She ended up in a tide pool up to her neck and even had seaweed in her hair. That was one of the biggest splashes and screams I've ever heard! The whole event was very dramatic (from Grace's point of view) and very hilarious (from my point of view). It was very difficult to pretend I wasn't laughing. Despite being cold and wet, I think she kinda enjoyed the extra attention. We now call her our little mermaid!

Weston, the tide monkey. This boy burned some major calories exploring the rocks.

Elsie enjoying the beach house trampoline.

Elsie and Noah enjoying the sunshine. Noah escaped after I took his diaper off. He was enjoying the fresh air. :)

Vacation (Pt. 1)

I'm so far behind on blogging it's tempting to give up. We've done so many fun things this summer I want to post photos of. Here goes!

In August Mike had to go back to South Carolina for a week for work. I packed the kids up and headed to Bend to stay with my parents. The highlight of our trip was Weston capturing and "taming" this lizard. I think the lizard must have been very stunned. The kids held him and played with him for over an hour. He even escaped once and Weston recaptured him. Even Grace and Elsie held him (Mommy did not).

Here's the lizard crawling on Noah's back.

The kids hangin' with Macy and the lizard in Bend.

I was pretty impressed with Grace's bravery!

Sherwood Robin Hood Festival

A few weekends ago my mom and I loaded the kids into the van and drove across Portland to the Sherwood Robin Hood Festival. We enjoyed an awesome parade (over an hour long with tons of candy thrown) and then attended the festival. This was all right up Weston's alley! The highlights were the kids' craft booth, free face-painting by a local church, a ventriloquist show (Grace laughed and laughed), and the Knights of Seattle who performed the Robin Hood play and also acted out sword fighting (Weston LOVED this!). We all had a great time and Noah even did well without a nap until we left at 4 pm!

Noah loved the parade. He clapped, cheered, and screamed in delight (especially for the horses and tractors)!

What a cute knight and maidens. I kind lady held Elsie up to the face hole while my mom held Weston up. Enjoy the photo...it took some effort!

YUCK!!!

Mike and I took all the kids to the park yesterday to enjoy the 1 day of sun we've had all month. Noah was just a bit ahead of me on the grass. Suddenly, he started fussing and trying to spit something out. I ran over and tried to figure out what he'd put in his mouth. I could see something yellowish in there. Of course, my mind was racing thinking of all the poisonous plants and seeds he could have eaten. Then I smelled it. There was dog poo on his hand and his shoe and IN HIS MOUTH (because, of course, if you step in something everybody knows you must lick it to see what it is)! In all my 7 years of being a mom, I have never had something so disgusting happen. I'm sure one day I'll think this is funny, but for now I'm still pretty concerned about all the horrible diseases and other things my 20 month-old could have picked up from this dog. I'm sure Noah will survive, but I'll bet you he'll never put THAT in his mouth again!

Little Laundry Man

My Laundry Sidekick!

Recently, I've been thinking of how to engage Noah in chores he's able to do at his age and size. I worry a bit about my 4th child coasting along and letting his siblings do all the work. I realized I'm going to have to be a bit more creative to find ways for Noah to help out and learn to work.
Unfortunately, our washing machine broke a few weeks ago which led to the purchase of a front-loading washing machine. Fortunately, this works out perfectly for Noah to both load and unload the washing machine and dryer as his chore. I let him push the buttons, empty the lint trap, and add the dryer sheet. He feels very special and loved it when I praised his "helping" in front of him to the family.

unloading the washing machine

He had to give his blanket a kiss before I strongly encouraged him to put it in the dryer :)

Photo Catch-Up!

I thought I'd do a quick catch-up of our photos since the Mexico trip. A little update on the past month :)

Our good friends, Scott and Amber, had their first baby about 10 days ago. Little Riley is beautiful and has already brought such joy to her parents and all who know them! Mike and I are privileged to call her our god-daughter and support Scott and Amber in raising her to know Jesus.

Mom and baby looking cute at the hospital!

Our kiddos started their first swimming lessons for the month of May. Their class is for 1/2 hour twice a week at Mt. Hood Community College. They are loving it!

Laelie is signed up for the same class, so Julie and I take turns doing the carpool and babysitting Noah and Tirien at home. It's working out well so far!

At the end of April we took a little trip to the zoo with our good friends, Elsa, Owen, Bennett and their mom, Jamie. We had a great time. Noah and Bennett were in their strollers, so they didn't make the photo.

We also took a trip to the Children's Museum as a family in April. The kids had a great time. It was very crowded and the germ-phobe in me wasn't too thrilled :)

I'll do a blog soon for Weston's 7th birthday. I have a 7 year-old!!! Where has the time gone?

New Beauticians

I went to 2 new beauticians last night. They were a little silly, but very sweet. I loved my new hairdo and makeup job and they even gave me a little scalp massage as a bonus. Their names were Rosalyn Rosie Rose and Hannah Mommy. They did my hair and makeup while wearing their pajamas. Their makeup was invisible but they applied it very carefully and gently. They giggled a lot. They used a spatula for a curling iron and got the round brush tangled in my hair more than once. They did my hair with about 30 barrettes and very carefully discussed which ones to choose and where to perfectly place them in my hair.
One of the beauticians is married to a prince but does hair and makeup on the side because "he doesn't give me any pennies or dimes to spend on clothes". The other beautician has a girl baby in her tummy and her husband has a boy baby in his tummy. This was all very interesting!
When it came time for me to leave they didn't even charge me! Rosalyn informed me they don't charge customers who come back to them all the time.
Overall, my beauty salon experience was wonderful and I will highly recommend these ladies! Best of all, their salon is right upstairs!