Happy Birthday Little Man Man

Today Was your second birthday and what a day you had. You road on the tandem bike to McDonald's with Grammy and Tom Tom, paddled in the canoe with mommy and Tom Tom. You took a ride in the bug with the top down to the train that you rode to the ice cream stand. You took the pontoon boat to dinner and decorated mommy with your birthday cake. For a little man that loves his vehicles you had the best day ever. I love you my boy, happy birthday

New Adventures

Four weeks from today Kate, Finn, Henry, and I will board a one way flight to Hawaii for 6 months of family adventures. We have turned in our notice with the apartment, listed our car and some furniture on Craigslist, and filled out the change of address cards to send to the post office. Why are we doing this you ask? Well here is the Cliffs notes version. Kate's sister, who along with her husband is a Dr. in the Army, is getting deployed in early June to Afghanistan. Her 6 month old son and husband are staying behind in Hawaii and they asked us if we would come for 6 months to help look after the little man. I talked to my job about taking a leave of absence but they countered with working from home for that period of time and I accepted. We are heading out June 27Th until the beginning of January to live in Hawaii, help look after Jake and Scott, and live the life of carefree beach bums for as much time as we are allowed. We will be coming back to Portland at the end of this adventure hopefully with a healthy tan and beach blond hair.

Fantastic Four Birthday 2.0

Two years down and the fantastic four are doing great. We got a chance to come to Indy for the second annual Fantastic Four BBQ at the Kaufman's house. The burgers were great as usual and the kids are all cute as can be.  They are all in shirts that Kate made for them with their initials on them.

who you looking at?

Unscheduled sleeping time

We have house guests and pregnant ones at that so we did the honorable thing and gave up the bed for the blow up mattress in the boy's room. We put Finn down at his regular time and Henry went down when we did but getting set for bed Finn woke up and wanted to talk about the whole operation. He called the action like a young Vin Scully while Kate and I tried to ignore him, hoping our inattention would lead to going back to sleep. It worked, or would of I think if we were better at following through with our parenting ideas and didn't both tell him to lay down and go to sleep. Henry woke up early early with a hankering for some milk and his impatience with Kate's speed in delivering that Milk woke up Finn. He picked up his narrating of the events "Daddy Sleeping?" Mommy feed Henry?" as if he had been interrupted mid stream and was just getting back on track. We tried to get him to go back to sleep but being in his room proved to entertaining for him so I got up with him and brought him downstairs. I didn't realize how loud my son was until trying to keep him quiet at 6 in the morning. He wanted to hold his uncle Jesse and sit on the counter and do any number of things that sleepy daddy was keeping him from doing. I got Finn some Milk, a bowl of strawberries and sat him at the table trying to sleep a little more on the couch. I would drift in and out of sleep seeing Finn first at the table, then inches from my face with a bull-truck, then looking out the window at the early commuters. He kept crawling up and laying down with me for three seconds and then climbing down to get something and coming back. He asked me to play trucks with him, go outside with him, go into the kitchen with him, do anything with him instead of just lay there but I was so tired. i finally said "Finn I need you to play by your self for a little bit" not thinking that he would ever do it or even understand what I meant. I was wrong, he did understand and as he dropped his head and dejectedly said "OK daddy" in the saddest toddler voice you can imagine my heart dropped. He didn't know it was too early to get up, he just knew that him and daddy had a chance to play and daddy wouldn't play with him. He walked over and grabbed his truck and walked to the foot of the stairs to call for Mommy. Maybe she would come and play with him. I got up and turned the lights on, grabbed my boy and sat him on the kitchen counter. I told him I loved him and he smiled up at me, all was forgiven.

There is value in the medium

Thursday I was looking back at some posts that I wrote here on the blog and remembering those times. It was kinda fun to go back and read through what I was thinking and writing about the events of that time. I could still feel the stress of not having a job when we got pregnant the first time, and then the pain of the loss. I read about looking for a house and starting the work on the floors and I could feel that humid house in the heart of summer with no AC in the house. That was the best workout plan I have ever been on I think. I must have lost 40 pounds scrapping those floors. Too bad it didn't stay lost. I guess the very act of writing a blog says that I value the medium but going back and reading through old post made me realize I really do value this opportunity to write. It makes me want to document more, to try to better get to the heart of things so that some day i can back through this with Finn and Henry. Mark and I got to do that with my dad's letters from Vietnam and my mom's poems in high school. We got a glance into that time in my parents life and we loved it. If your reading this years later Finn and Henry then know that I was thinking of you when I wrote it, I'm kinda always thinking of you two when I do anything lately. I love you boys.

Arizona

It is Friday already and because of our vacation in Arizona this has been a short week for me. After the whirl-wind weekend that just past that is a good thing, as is the slow weekend we have planned. We got the chance to visit family and friends in Arizona and Finn got to ride on an airplane with Papa. That might just be the greatest thing that has happened in his young life. When we hit turbulence or had a rough landing Finn clapped and said " One more time?" Neither Finn nor Henry were any trouble at all on the ride out or the ride back and whether you have good kids or not that is amazing.

We flew in early Thursday and went right to lunch with Mark and Kendra. We hadn't lubed Finn up with sunscreen yet and his sensitive skin was turning pinker and pinker by the minute. It was a nice change from the 40 degree rainy days we have been having here in Oregon. We then headed to my brothers house to watch Finn and Tyson run around while we basked in the warmth and napped. For me going to Arizona is like going back to your old neighborhood. Almost all of my friends moved to Arizona so it is a one stop shopping opportunity to catch up. We are all a little thicker now and have much more responsibilities but we still make fun of each other in ways no one else can and know the back ground stories that make current events so poignant.

Friday night we went to a John Mark McMillian concert and got to have some time with my sister Zonda and her husband James. They are doing great and it was so much fun to have that one on one time with just them. We told stories and laughed over Ice Cream and Cheese Cake while Grandma and Papa took care of the 5 kids. Their kids are better behaved then your kids will ever be. I am not sure what they do but it's working, those kids are wonderful.

Saturday we played some golf in the desert heat and I got to ride around and talk to Kyle a bunch. Then Mark and Bing challenged us on the back 9 to a best ball two-some battle which was comparable to the Atlanta-Boston series with Kyle and Playing Atlanta. We held our own out there and only lost on the last hole. James gave away the Laker's score on the way home so I passed on the game and opted to get some much needed rest instead. It is a tough pace those AZ folks maintain and for the last year or so we have been moving at a much slower stride.

Sunday we went to church then off to the Farm for some lunch. Finn played with whoever came around him and Henry was content to be held by all but mostly Lyric. Lyric is his cousin, James and Zonda's daughter, and she held Henry when ever she could. She was great with him and it was great to see our kids together. We went down to Scottsdale for stay at resort and sat around the patio playing cards and eating snacks while the sun went down. That night Grandma and Papa had the kids while Kate and I got to go out with Mark and Kendra and Melissa and Kyle. We went to this bar that had a crazy old coot tending bar. He looked like a dead-head and had us laughing hysterically by the end of the night. While telling us about the Lavosh pizza I asked if they invented it and he said "Well not the cracker, that been around hundreds of year, but we made up the pizza." Yeah, thanks for clearing that up. Kate got his special Mai Tai that he apparently flashes and we all told honeymoon stories and basked in a night free of kids.

Monday was a nice lazy morning around the pool and some naps to recharge. We toured the model homes in Verrado and played basketball with the boys. I thought I was going to die after about 2 points but made a point to run up and down the court on every change of possession. We watched the Lakers finish off Denver and had some great Cilantro Lime chicken with mango salsa.

long winter alone. It is nice to be back home though, the pace of life for those folks is fast and atIt was a great weekend and the sun and people brightened our times ran us over. maybe it's the desert air that gives them all that energy. They helped re-charge us and we are thankful for that.