5 days, 4 girls, 3 boys, 2 ice cream cones, 1 fun week

That’s our week in a nutshell! Last Monday (April 4th), my Mom, my sister Mel, Jay, Rose, and I flew from Seattle to St. Louis. We visited my older sister Em there for Spring Break! Mel is the only one of us who’s in school to even have a spring break, but it was a fun break from the daily “grind” for all of us. We had a nonstop 4 hour flight both ways, and Jay and Rose were so GOOD! Rose slept the whole way, and Jay sat happily on Mel’s lap. He also learned a new word: a-pane! (airplane)

It was so fun to spend quality sister-mom-time! We ate mucho good food, made yummy desserts, did crafts, and played with the sometimes-crazy kids (ages: Steve-3, Jay-almost 2, Dan-1 1/2, Rose-2 months). We took well over 200 pictures, so I’ll do my best to pick the best ones for you…

We went to Purina Farms and patted the animals and saw a dog show. Poor Mel had a broken arm, but she still was a Super-Aunt and played with her nephews anyways!

I love horses! This calm draft horse reminded me of Biscuit, the dear old horse of my childhood. Jay liked to pet the big head, but Dan wasn’t so sure.

Jay and Steve playing in a corn box in the barn at Purina Farms. Check out that concentration.

While Jay samples the wood fence, Dan looks at the lambs.

Even the kitties were popular

There was a fun dog show involving flying frisbees and crazy canines. And a big pool of water. Check out those TEETH!

At the dog show

Cute cousins

Creepy Easter Bunny. Jay walked up, touched his hand quickly, and then he was done.

Another thing we did a lot of: baby pictures! Em kept putting Rose in this basket to take pictures of her. hee hee hee, it was cute.

My happy little fuzz-top

and not-so-happy

Rose liked being a “hood ornament” on Grama’s knees.

We visited my Grandma and Grandpa Brown—Rose’s Great Grandparents! Rose is their 8th great grandbaby.

Dan loved Rose. I like Em’s face in this picture. Once, I heard Rose start crying, and discovered that Dan was sitting on her! Good thing Rose is durable.

I got Jay to kiss Rose for a picture. Well, he kissed the air next to her. What a boy!

Jay likes snuggling with Grama and a ball. (and a blanket with balls on it)

When we Browns get together, we enjoy lots of good FOOD. We went out to eat lots of times—Chick-fil-a was our favorite choice—and Em made us a tasty salad for lunch one day. And I made that cute little centerpiece. (ok, Jeff helped a little…)

We went out to a yummy frozen custard place, and they gave the kids free little baby ice cream cones! Jay loved it.

Things got really messy, really fast…

…like I said.

This calls for a boy bath!

Rose got her own bath. She was glad.

Backyard fun!

One-armed Aunt Mel patiently played with her “nephs” out there every day.

She played with Rose too. Good looking girls run in the family, don’t you think?

We made MORE bows for Rose. Then we branched out and made headbands for ourselves! Em is a genius. We bought colorful knee socks at Target, cut them up, sewed a small seam, added a cute flower, and VOILA, HEADBAND:

Yes, I’m the tall one.

We tried and tried to get a good, cute sister picture, but I am so not in a photogenic phase right now, so I kept messing them up. So I like the goofy ones better than the “serious” ones.

We’re wearing socks on our heads! At some point, Em and I started mourning over our “motherhood pooches” (stomachs), and cracking jokes about them. I wonder if Mel will ever have kids after spending a week with her… “well-rounded” sisters!

Even though Jay had a good time with his cousins, it was a rough week for him. He didn’t get nearly enough sleep, and he kept INJURING himself! He rode a bike down the hardwood stairs in Em’s house and got a ginormous goose egg on his forehead plus a big ole bruise on his shin. A few hours later, he tripped and fell on the concrete and got a scraped knee and face. By the end of the week, he was battered, bruised, and exhausted!

The cousin picture! We tortured the little boys with numerous photo-shoots. Rose didn’t mind too much—life is easy when you can just sleep through the unpleasant parts, I guess!

The “posterity picture:”  Grama and all 4 of her grandkids!

Girls! Or as Jay would say, dirrrruurrrl!

One kid per lap. Perfecto!

And then the week ended. I let Rose exercise a little at the airport before our long flight home.

Jay loved the airplanes!

and meanwhile, back at the ranch…

…Jeff constructed a “command center” out of all his pieces of technology: the computer, the computer screen, the TV screen, and even the Wii. I think he missed us!

It’s hard having family scattered far and wide because you’re always missing someone! Now I’m home with my dear husband, but I miss my sisters!! It was a fun, refreshing mother-daughter-sister week. Even though I could post about a zillion more pictures of it, I think you get the picture.

A Family Outing!

Jeff has been training for the Yakima River Canyon Marathon for the past few months. It was Saturday April 2nd, and we made it into a little family excursion!

[I liked the sign they had on the road]

Our hotel had a POOL! The marathon started in Ellensburg, WA, wove through the Yakima River Canyon, and ended outside of Yakima,WA. Since Ellensburg is 1.5hrs from home, we stayed in a hotel on Friday night. Jay loved it!

It was so nice to swim! It has been a while. Jay was nervous at first, but it didn't take him long to LOVE the pool.

I like warm indoor hotel pools--no shivering necessary! Rose took this picture for us, since she's too young to swim...

...Just kidding! Rose reclined on a lounge chair by the pool while we swam.

We brought dinner from home and had a picnic in our hotel room! Then we went out for ice cream (Jeff and I started a pre-race ice cream tradition back in college). We discovered a heavenly ice cream place by Central Washington University called Winegars. BEST chocolate ice cream EVER!

Jay was a party animal! He was so excited about the hotel room that he didn't get to sleep until 2 1/2 hours PAST his normal bedtime!

Rose was a dream baby, as usual--she has been only waking up once each night all week, and last night she slept all night!

Tired children in the morning.

THE STARTING LINE. It was windy and chilly!!

The first few steps. We didn't bring the double stroller because there were only two places to watch the race on the whole course, and I thought I could do it from the car. Well, the start turned out to be farther from the parking lot than I thought it would be. It was SO WINDY and cold, but I was dying to see the start. I sat in the car for a full 10 minutes trying to figure out what to do...

Yes. I shoved Rose in the basket under the stroller again. Let me tell you, she's a lot bigger than she was last time I did this-- I will not be doing it again! But we saw the start of the race.

Then we re-loaded our very crowded little Honda Civic (2 car seats = very crowded) and drove down the road to the only other viewpoint--around the 5 mile marker. We had to hurry because Jeff is fast! He was in first place at this point. Then Jay, Rose, and I went back to our hotel for a little bit before driving down to Yakima for the finish.

We met up with Jay's Aunt Steph, and Jeff's parents at the finish. Jay played with Steph--he loves her! We waited and waited and waited, and NO JEFF came! Right when I was getting kind of nervous and worried, a big pickup truck pulled in and Jeff got out of it! What a relief it was to know that my husband wasn't plastered to the side of the road somewhere in the middle of the canyon! Jeff said his body ran out of energy and started those painful marathon-pains at the 17 mile marker, and he slowed down and thought about what to do. By mile 22, he decided that he was DONE with marathons. He didn't want to kill his body more just to finish, because he has already finished a marathon before in his life. So he jumped on a medi-truck and called it a day. He is glad to be over the marathon bug!

There were people on horses!

We had such a fun time being OUT and ABOUT together!