Party for the Sheepies!

Jamie is into sheep right now so we got to be creative and threw her a sheep party.  She picked out this special mylar balloon because it had a sheep on it...of course!

We played pin the tail on the sheep...

And of course the kids wanted to see mom do it.  I had lots of help to make sure I went the right direction.  Everyone had lots of help on this game.  We also played 'Hide and Sheep', Musical Chairs to "Mary Had a Little Lamb", and the girls fished over a white picket fence after watching a clip from "Jakers".  Also, Caitin read "Russell the Sheep" to the party girls.

Jamie had her two best friends over.  When she finished unwrapping the presents she said, "That's it?!"  She forgot that she chose to open the family gifts on her real birthday.

Brandon did a most excellent job on the cake!  The frosting was coated with marshmallows and chocolate chips.  I actually think that the marshmallows tasted pretty good.

The birthday girl!

Five candles seemed to be a lot for this big girl to blow out in one breath.

Duck Hunt

I've been into something new lately.  I've joined a buddy from work a couple of times duck hunting.  I love the challenge, and so far I've tolerated the cold.  Each time we left town at about 4:00 a.m. and set up for first light at 7:00.  Both times we had ducks landing in our spread before 7:00.  Both times I had to wait and watch them up and run just before shooting time.  No matter, there were always more coming in. 

 

On day two we saw several mallards, and my first shot of the day brought down a hen.  Later on we had two drake mallards coming straight at us low on the water.  My buddy couldn't see them, so he followed my lead as I brought my gun up and clicked off the safety.  When the birds were only about 20 yards away I fired...and missed!  My buddy stood and sighted and I racked another shell.  Both ducks flared and were now pointed skyward.  We fired in the same moment and with two puffs of feathers the birds dropped and splashed! 

 

J-Me is 5

Jamie is 5 now.  Here's a few pics from her birthday:  

 Birthdays in our house always start with two things:  Balloons...

 

...and Donuts!  Jamie could make a good trucker or homeless child.

 

 As a family first, we went out for donuts this time.  So fun!

 

And yes, that is the greatest donut ever created.

 

A few great presents.

 

This present actually came a few days early.

 

 She looks older already.

 

 Happy Birthday Jamie!

Jamie Bikes

First off, grandma Astle was super nice and bought Jamie her own scooter while we were in Ontario helping them move.  That way she and Caitin could entertain themselves outside for extended amounts of time; it worked really well.  From that day and on, she has learned to balance on it really well and it has now helped her to balance on her bike too.  One day she asked to go on a ride with her training-wheel bike.  I refused because I knew she could do better, and this is what we ended up doing:



 Next summer we want to ride the Hiawatha Trail and she'll be able to do it without a tag-along.

Hardwoods

After the cats had thrown-up hairballs and the carpet needed cleaning anyway, Brandon and I decided to pull the carpet right before he left for camping.  I mean like 30 minutes before he left.  It was going to give me something to do while he was gone. Oh it gave me something to do all right!  A whole week's worth.

 

This is how we were living for the week.  Imagine plastic all around the walls too, separating the eating area from the living room.  It felt so cramped!  We were living in a plastic tent, surrounded by dust everywhere.





This is what our floors look like now.  I LOVE them!  So shiny and slick.  We did four rounds of sanding and lots of vaccuming.  We then finished with three coats of oil-based polyurethane.  Luckily it was fast drying because we couldn't stay out of our one bathroom for three days.

This is the hallway into the bedrooms.

And this is our new living room, except for the fact that the couch usually doesn't go there.  It is parallel to the piano to create a walk-way and faces the fireplace and tv.

This was supposed to be my project but the fact that we had to live in a construction zone warranted Brandon's help to get it done fast.  I still did a lot but can't claim it as my own.  I am pleased with the outcome and am excited, yet not, to go find an area rug.  We still need to put down quarter-round and re-paint the baseboards but I can live without those things for a while.

Father of the Year

Last night I came home from work to find Sarah in a whirlwind mode.  She was trying to cook dinner in our over-crowded kitchen due to the fact that all the front room furniture was in there while she was re-finishing the hardwood flooring.  The girls were anxious to have some parent time.  I asked how I could help, and out came the laundry list...including the laundry.

"OK, but which one would you like me to do?" I reeled.
"Just take the girls skateboarding.  They want to do that." Sarah responded.
"Perfect.  No problem." I gladly accepted this responsibility.  Not only would I get to help Sarah, I would get to unwind and relax in the process.

The girls were chatty on the way out to the front yard.  We had to go around the house cause the front door is blocked off with our construction project.  Caitin got to go first.  She was happy to show me the way she sets things up on the board.  She lined it up in the middle of the sidewalk, and then pushed off, holding the front of the board in both hands and kneeling in the middle.  She leaned right and then left as she steered between the grass strip and the lawn.

I said something to Jamie, and then looked up to see Caitin sitting on the sidewalk next to the board holding her mouth and screaming.  Her screams were muffled as she cupped her hands over face.  The board had stopped instantly on a water hose that was strung across the walk, and she had kissed the concrete.

I ran down to get Caitin.  She would not move, could not speak, and rigidly held her hands against her mouth.  I picked her up, and asked Jamie to ride the board back to the house.  I continued to comfort Caitin.  I couldn't see any blood, so I held her and let Jamie take her turn on the board.  I pointed down the walk and warned Jamie to stop before she got to that hose.  She acknowleged the danger and pushed off just as her sister did. 

I tried to encourage Caitin to move her hand so I could see the damage.  She would not budge.  Then I heard a scream.  I looked up and saw Jamie...sitting on the sidewalk next to the board holding her mouth and screaming.  She had seen the danger, but locked up and didn't know what to do.  She also kissed the sidewalk, but managed to get an instant nose-bleed that managed to go everywhere!  Ugh.

Our neighbor was out in the yard and got to Jamie first.  I was not far behind, and seeing the blood, I set Caitin down and asked her to walk to the house.  I walked with Jamie who was freaking out about the blood now, and we went around back.  Caitin had gone to the front door, so I called to her to come around back.  Our neighbor ran up to help guide her back.  Caitin was still screaming.

Sarah had been inside momentarily enjoying the peace.  Then she heard screaming at the front door and ran to see what was going on.  She saw Caitin being escorted by our neighbor, and thought to herself, "WHERE IS BRANDON!?"  She headed to the back door where she found me with poor little Jamie.

We were able to eventually calm the girls down, but there was some lasting damage.  Each of them had swollen lips.  Jamie's nose bleed ended quickly.  When Caitin finally dared to remove her hand, we found her other front tooth, which had previously been slightly loose, was now gone.  I went searching, but did not find it.  I understand the tooth fairy is kind to those who lose teeth in traumatic events.

Seriously, though.  I had ONE task...

I really did hope to catch it on camera, but it wasn't to be.  Caitin really wanted to lose her tooth at school, but that didn't happen either.  To our good fortune, she found herself chewing on something extra crunchy in her cereal.  Next thing we knew, she spit the tooth out on the table.

!!!`'\,..7..,/'`!!!

Someone in our house turned 7 last week!  She wanted a Sea Turtle cake, so this is what she got:

One game we played was a sponge relay.  We had awesome weather, so it was fun to be playing in the water.  We also did a water balloon toss, pin the tail on the sea turtle, and red rover.

 

She's not competitive.  At all.

 

After all that fun we sacrificed the sea turtle and had a feast.

Front Tooth

We still haven't gotten this thing out yet...

September Boarding!

So we've loved the extension of Summer we've had this September!  Hard to believe that it is almost October and we were out wakeboarding. 

We've been out boarding a lot this summer, and Sarah has lately been a little frustrated with her progress.  Tonight she had a great night, so I mashed up a little comparison video.  I took footage from early in the summer and compared with footage from tonight. 

I'm so proud of the progress she's made!  It's awesome to see how stable she is now, and how she's ready to take it bigger!

Jumpin Jamie the Tuber!

Labor Day Camping

How great is it to get away for 4 days without even taking vacation!? We went camping with the Allens near Ione, Washington on the Pend Oreille River. Here's a few pics of our adventure:

Sunday was a chill day.  After going to church in a SMALL BRANCH, the kids made collages out of stuff they found around camp.  What a great activity.  Caitin's ended up with a beer bottle cap and a fuzzy dinosaur.

We also went on a hike Sunday afternoon around Sullivan Lake and spent some time throwing rocks into the lake.  Caitin's got a powerful arm, as I witnessed first hand when she clocked me in the back of the head.  Throws just like her mother.  Luckily I was wearing a hat, or there would have been blood.

The girls loved tubing...at least these two did:

Caitin loved the idea.

But she's been developing a strong sense of survival.  It really put a damper on things:

 

Oh, and we did use the boat for some wakeboarding too.  The water was a bit cool, and occasional breezes made for a bit of chattering teeth, but August is NOT the end of the season!  Yeah for Labor Day!

What?!!!

Thanks to fact that our friend was on call this weekend and we didn't go boating, we actually had some basement progress.  The wall is up and some insulation was put in.  Next in line is closets, ceiling insulation, electrical and then drywall.

 

By the way, we LOVE boating just as much as we LOVE chocolate covered cinnamon bears and homemade rolls.

Wakeboarding

This summer has played out awesome for wakeboarding!  Although the weather was slow to turn warm, once it finally did it stuck.  We've had the fortune of being able to get out on the water quite a bit already, and I have worked on landing the backroll almost every time.  With more than a few bruises and sore muscles to show for it, I finally landed one today!

This first clip is the highlights from today.  I successfully tried my first board grabs, and felt super comfortable.  And yes, that first fall hurt a bit...but not the worst I've felt.  Lesson learned...don't celebrate too soon.  Later I landed another one off-camera, with the same wheelie-type (manual) landing. 



We've been fairly diligent about taking the camera out, and I have all but about 4 or 5 of my attempts recorded, so I put them all together chronologically for this progression clip.  The first attempt was last July, and my cameraman was the same for that clip as for the final landing today.  If you're counting, that's 19 attempts on film, and I remember each one...


By the way, progress on the basement was minimal today.

I Thought We Were Finished.

Man, I thought we were finished.  Okay, so I knew the time would come, but it feels so good to complete a project.  Now it's like we are starting over.  At least the room is pretty small, compared to what we just did.

And...they're up!  Here are all (well most) of the doors, finally painted and hung.   The others are up too, just on the opposite side of the room.  It feels so good to see them up.

And...it's down.  Brandon demolished and cleaned up the basement bedroom on 4th of July.  No, we didn't work all day.  He did it in the morning and we swam/bbq-ed the rest of day, ending with fireworks at night.  It is readly to be framed and drywalled before his parents come on the 16th.  Do you think we will get it done?  Hope so or they will be sleeping in the middle of the open family room downstairs.

Gymnists in training

We have finished yet another year of gymnastics.  Fortunately, we get a break during the summer because our schedule is busy with other things.  Here is Jamie before we left for her program.  Caitin's and hers were on different days so we got to go twice.

 This is Caitin's class doing their dance.  Jamie's class didn't put a dance together.

 Here is Caitin on one of her stunts...handstands.

 Caitin with her teacher Miss Rachel.

Jamie with her teacher Miss Kaitlyn.

This is Jamie hopping up into some kind of position.  I have no clue what it is though.  Caitin tells me that this is a jump-squat.

The girls love gymnastics but I think a break this summer is good.  Jamie has mentioned wanting to try soccer.  Caitin has been interested in tennis.  However, after a few lessons I found her not practicing but swinging on the gates like she was on the uneven bars.  I told her maybe she'd better stick to gymnastics.  She says to me, "Mom, I think you're right.  I'd better stick with gymnastics."

Graduations

We had a couple of graduation programs last week in the Blankenagel house.  Jamie had her pre-school program and Caitin graduated from Kindergarten.  Both of these girls have done extremely well in school; highest compliments from both teachers.  We are two proud parents!

This is Jamie's buddy, Maygen.  She gave Jamie the "Most Adorable Smile" award because Jamie would always tilt her head and give Maygen the best smiles.

This is Jamie's other buddy, Rubi.  She gave Jamie the "Little Miss Sunshine" award because Jamie always brightened Rubi's day when she saw her.  My house now sparkles everywhere (note the abudance of glitter used).

Here is Jamie's class, the high school buddies, and teacher, Mrs. Guthrie

Here is Caitin with her Kindergarten diploma.  She has really excelled in her drawing and labeling of pictures.  Mrs. Hester uses her school work often for an example to the rest of the class. 

This is her class at the Graduation program.  They sang us some fun songs and did a dance called "Jump Jim Joe."  This dance taught them to be partners with different people and how to find a new partner quickly.