Vallarta Anniversary Trip

A few weeks ago Mike and I enjoyed the most wonderful vacation to Mexico to celebrate our 10-year wedding anniversary! We had such a relaxing and refreshing time together. Although our anniversary is not until June, it worked out for both sets of grandparents to babysit in April. Weston and Elsie spent the week in Spokane with Mike's parents and Grace and Noah spent the week in Bend with my parents. Mike and I had 7 whole nights all to ourselves (insert Hallelujah Chorus here)!!!
We were able to stay at the Grand Mayan Resort in Nuevo Vallarta (about 20 minutes North of Puerto Vallarta). We agreed it's the nicest place we've ever stayed (thanks to my parents for the use of the timeshare)!
By the end of the trip we were ready to come home to "real" life and missed the kids so much. Although it was a fantastic vacation, it was good to be reminded how blessed we are in our day-to-day, normal life. Although being home is much more difficult and full of work it is also very rewarding and fulfilling!

All week it was about 85 degrees and sunny! I like this photo above because it shows all the beautiful, tropical plants that covered the resort.

This is a photo of our kitchen/dining area. We had a two bedroom suite with a kitchen and a jacuzzi tub. Our balcony wasn't ocean view but had a private little pool and patio chairs.

We went into Puerto Vallarta for half a day. It was nice to visit and see a few things but we were more interested in relaxing and reconnecting in our marriage than we were in sightseeing. In the photo above we are standing on the Malecon in front of Banderas Bay.

Mike was very impressed by this Seahawks poncho and wanted a photo (not impressed enough to buy it though).

This is the cathedral in Puerto Vallarta. Mike took this photo.

The beach at Puerto Vallarta.

These are some of the resort pools from the view on the 4th floor. There were about 6 different pools at the resort as well as a lazy river (pool river at the bottom of the picture). You could jump on an inner-tube and the current would take you around all the other pools. It was fun to ride the tube around, especially when the wave machine was on! There were also 2 wave pools, a water slide and a pool with a water playground for the kids.

Another photo from the 4th floor. This one shows the wave pools, lagoon, ocean, and the Mayan ruin which is actually the tower the water slide comes out of.

Lazy river picture.

This is the kids' pool/playground. There were lots of families with young kids vacationing here. We were glad to be there without kids this time but would love to bring them at some point.

Mike and I visited a little surfing town called Sayulita for another half day. It was about 45 minutes North of Nuevo Vallarta. It was very small and had a laid-back feel. I think they were going to host the Mexican long boarding competition there the next day. The church in Sayulita.

Mike enjoying the sunset at on the beach in front of the resort. The night before I took this photo we enjoyed the most beautiful sunset either of us had ever seen but we didn't have the camera with us. We brought it the next night but, of course, the photos don't do it justice. What a wonderful creator God is! I was reminded of my smallness and God's power as I watched the sunset.

One of our favorite days of vacation was the day we did the Outdoor Adventure Tour through Vallarta Adventures. The excursion started with a speed boat trip across the bay to a small village, we then loaded onto huge all-terrain vehicles and drove up into the Sierra Madre Mountains to the base camp. We were then all harnessed up into repelling/zipline gear and loaded onto mules. We rode the mules up into the mountains for about 30 minutes to the first zipline. Luckily, the mules do the trek 2 or 3 times a day so we couldn't mess anything up or steer them the wrong way. They did gallop a bit and try to pass each other on the path, but nothing too scary. From there we did about 10 ziplines and 2 repels. Let me just say it was SO MUCH FUN!!! We got to repel down the face of a waterfall and land in the pool at the base. We also zipped down into the river and later repelled straight down from a hanging catwalk. Mike and I felt safe the entire time. We were double-clipped onto the ropes and there were about 6 guides with our group. The last zipline ended right at the base camp where were could change our clothes. We were soaked from ziplining right into the water!

Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take our cameras on the tour and decided not to spend the money on the professional photos they take. But take my word for it, Mike and I were pretty awesome zippers!

We are so thankful to the Lord for this special trip and for the 10 years of marriage He's given us so far. Lord-willing we'll be celebrating our 20th anniversary in another 10 years (the years seem to be going by faster and faster). We were pretty stunned to realize that on our 20th anniversary our kids will be 17, 15, 13 and 11. Yikes! Please pray for us over this next 10 years!

Keith Green Easter Song!

Thanks, Kara, for sending us the link to this video!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7OEqavkJGCE&feature=related

Resurrection Sunday Joy!

Happy Easter! Jesus is risen! Here are a few shots of our Easter activities. We had a wonderful Easter service at Gresham Bible Church this morning. Easter is my favorite Sunday of the year. It is so joyful to celebrate Jesus' defeat of death. We have a tradition on Easter Sunday before church to watch the very end of the Passion movie when Jesus walks out of the tomb with the hole in his hand. We all clap and cheer. It sets us in right frame of mind before heading to church to worship.

A mysterious bunny family came into our duplex yard on Saturday night and hid a bunch of eggs for the kids. We did a little detective work and found out it was the Mathews Bunny Family leaving some treats for the duplex families :)

Even Mike got into the action. A little bird told me he was deprived as a child and didn't get to do much egg-dying :)

The kids LOVED the process of egg-dying! They were only sad when we ran out of eggs.

The finished product!

My mom and I bought the girls their Easter outfits. We thought they were pretty cute with their matching flower barrettes :)

This was taken right before Noah threw the egg and broke it!

This is the same outfit Weston wore for his first Easter when he was not quite a year old. We have a similar shot with him reaching into the basket.

First Haircuts

Tonight we did some firsts for Elsie and Noah. I took the girls to Great Clips where Elsie got her first real (not mommy cutting) haircut. She was very nonchalant about it until the hairdresser asked her to look down at which point she burst into tears and was offered a sucker. The sucker made the world right again, and the rest of the cut was a success. Grace also got a haircut and loved the attention. She's been to Great Clips before, so no big deal to her.
When we got home I set to work on giving Noah his first haircut ever. As soon as I fired up the clippers Noah started crying and backing away so I sat Weston down to show him how it's done. My plan was that Weston would smile real big and show Noah how enjoyable haircuts are. Instead, I accidentally gave Weston a little poke with the clippers at which point he started screaming like I had cut an ear off or something. Not pretty. It was all over at that point. I had to have Mike come in and help hold Noah down for his first haircut. Amazingly enough the kids all look decent and there was no blood at all! I do have to admit Moses was not so lucky when I gave him doggy haircuts. I can safely say I will never be a professional hairstylist or a dog-groomer.

I can't believe how much older Noah looks without all his baby hair! He looks like a little man!

Goofy Noah!

I took these pics yesterday of Noah in Elsie's tiger slippers. He was really hamming it up for the camera :) He is definitely our comedian and gets plenty of egging-on by the others!

Blogger Flunky

About time for my monthly post. I would love it if I were not a blogger flunky. Don't get your hopes up.

We took a quick trip to LaCamas Park this past weekend. The weather was so beautiful and the hike was perfect. We took a short hike around the lake. The path is smooth enough for a stroller for Noah (although there were some steep parts, Mike got a workout). It was even warm enough for me to be comfortable in short sleeves in March!

Here is Noah with Macy, my parents' new golden lab. She is one of the sweetest dogs I've ever met. Extremely calm and good with the kids. Noah would start calling for "May-ee" as soon as he woke up in the morning. At first I thought he was calling for me and my heart was so touched by his excitement for Mommy. But no....he loves the dog more.

Kyle came home from Afghanistan for 2 weeks in February. Unfortunately, he had to take his military leave only 1/4 of the way through his deployment. The kids enjoyed their time with Uncle Kyle and Aunt Haley. It was a good visit. Keep up the good work, Kyle!

Noah enjoys waffles and whipped cream. Mike gave it to him, not me!

Weston lost his first tooth finally! The tooth fairy was extremely generous and gave him $10 for his first tooth. The tooth fairy will not be that generous with the other teeth :) Weston did awesome and endured 4 tries at pulling it out with the floss hooked to the doorknob. The tooth needed to come out as the adult tooth was already completely in behind the baby tooth and was growing in crooked. I tried to get a picture of the toothless spot but I gave up after several unsuccessful attempts.

Very genuine smile :)

Double Birthday!

Here are some photos of the girls' double birthday a couple weeks ago. Both sets of grandparents came down for the big party as well as Eric, Christi and Tim (uncles and aunt). Elsie wanted a Cookie Monster cake and Grace wanted an ice cream cake (see post below for video on ice cream cones). My mom made the Cookie Monster cake above (way to go Mom!) and I made the ice cream cone cakes (with help from family). If there is one thing I learned from the ice cream cone thing it's that I did NOT get my mom's talent for decorating with frosting. As I was attempting to decorate the cake cones I was having very strong negative feelings toward the lady in the video. They have got to have some special effects going on in that video because it was NOT as easy as it looked! The cupcake would fall apart as you tried to spread the frosting on. I think more cake and frosting ended up in my tummy than on the cone :) We did find out, however, that both Christi and Eric are quite talented at ice cream cone cake decorating (I'm sure this talent will come in handy quite often in their lives)!

Quote of the Day!

Grace:  "Mommy, if you raced a rock, you would be at the finish line and the rock would still be at the start!"
Mommy (laughing):  "Where did you come up with that one?"
Grace:  "In my brain."

Sibling Time

Here are a few photos of homeschool and sibling time :)  I started a new basic homeschool schedule recently which seems to be working well.  I can post more it later, but thought I'd post a few new pics now.