March Madness!

Well, March has been a blur. I haven't even watched a basketball game from the NCAA tournament. Here is an update on what everyone is up to.

Me: I went to math day at the UW and took 40 students with me. Really, this was the first school field trip that I actually organized. It was a great time and we got to listen to some cool speakers. The main speaker was a fisheries guy and he explained how math is used to keep track of the fish populations and keep them fished to an optimal level where the catch can be maximized. I also have just gotten my Loan Originators license. I am working with secure financial center and I am really excited about working the numbers to help people get a loan. If you need to refinance or want to buy let me know and I will help you out. I will definantly have your best interest in mind.




AJ is leaving Monday for a 5 month training and world mission trip. He managed to raise/earn all the money needed and he stopped by yesterday to say goodbye. I hope he has a great trip. The kids love him and will mis him stopping by.


Mackenzie: She has lost a bunch of teeth lately and now has one of her adult teeth coming in on top. She's been playing with her friend Juliana next door a bunch and is a big helper around the house with Levi and Gabriel. She likes to help in the kitchen too.


Gabriel: He has been a little sick lately and I'm not sure if it's teething or something else. Actually he was doing quite well today. He has two bottom little teeth and they are very sharp. He's a real charmer and loves his jumper.



Lily: She had 4 kittens a couple of weeks ago and they are all really cute.  She keeps them under the stairs and we try to keep the kids away from them as much as possible. The kids are actually great about it and leave them alone. It's our visitors that really like to get in there and see them.


Levi: He's doing very well with his alergies. He hasn't thrown up at night or had diarhea for at least a month. It's been so great. He's talking a lot more and his favorite thing to do is play hide and seek. Joanna is constantly working on finding things that Levi will like and also some things to put his supplements in that will mask the taste. 
By the way it has snowed for 3 days straight and it'smarch 30th during my spring 
break, and after easter. What's up with that?

Joshua: He plans on playing football in the fall and has been saving up some money to pay for some gear. He plays with Spencer, his friend next door, as much as he can. He's also reading books as much as possible.

Joanna: She has been slaving away in the kitchen making special foods for Levi and the rest of the family. It's rare that dinner is not delicious. In fact, my belly can't remember the last time. I need to force myself to eat smaller portions. She is really excited about a homeschool conference that we will be attending soon. She's also working hard at home schooling the little stinkers. Add in a little nursing at night, a whole lot of cleaning and there isn't much time for anything else. I try to let her sneak out of here when I can. It's nice for her when she can even just go shopping on her own.

California Homeschool Law

If you've followed the news lately California courts have made a blanket statement on a court case saying that parents are not legally allowed to homeschool(in California) unless they have a teaching degree.

Joanna and I strongly believe that parents should have the right to educate their children without a teaching degree. So we both signed the HSLDA petition. 

Even if you haven't personally chosen to homeschool, it's vitally important that parents retain their rights to educate their own children! Personal convictions aside, home education is statistically a great choice for academic reasons.

As parents, we value our right to make decisions regarding raising and educating our children, and for us, that includes not heading off to a school building for 8 hours every day.

You do not even have to have children or live in California to sign the petition. Please consider.

Old Pics

I was looking through our older photos and found some that I'd like to share. Here they are. 



Here we are at Disneyland with Tigger.


This is at North Bend.


Uncle Chris, Josh and Mackenzie.


Me before I was taller than Sara.


Josh kissing a llama.


Mackenzie with great grandma Jeanne.


Josh and I at the Monsters Inc. Disney on ice show.


Mackenzie, Josh and Kameron. I think this was at a birthday party for grandpa Omar.



Mackenzie at the pool.

"Come on dad let's ride!"


Joanna and I at a Young Life dress-up night.


Grandpa and Josh under the pier in California when we went to see Mike.


Joanna wearing my crazy rocker wig.


The Elenbaas and Allinson kids during camping one summer.

Gabriel's First Bite and Levi's a Chicken

Levi has been talking a ton lately and it's been fun. He's putting a bunch of words together and he's starting to copy anything we say more than he was before. He's also back on the binkie. I think it's more to do with getting him off of the foods that have been causing him some issues. We are very thankful and praise God for his good health.

Gabriel is trying out his brother's high chair.

Gabe was all in for his first high chair feeding experience. He was opening wide and grabbing the spoon/my hand to get the food in his mouth as quick as possible. He did a fairly good job keeping it in his mouth as well. He had rice cereal with breast milk. The kids thought that was kind of funny and Josh was alarmed when I told him that we also put the breast milk in our soup. ha ha.

Here he is pulling it in.

Costco Cart Buddies

Levi and Gabriel riding together in a costco cart. Today we went to pick up a ton of stuff at Costco. Joanna had the list and we were out of there in no time(1 hr. or so) Gabe is actually big enough and strong enough to sit in the cart. I thought that I was going to be holding him up a bunch, but I didn't have to at all. It also helped Levi to feel more comfortable in the cart. Now that he wasn't the only one in there he really didn't want to get out - he squirmed a little. We had to rush home because Mackenzie has an appointment to read to Epic at the library at 7. She's really excited because he was sick for their last scheduled time and she finally gets to read to him. Epic is a dog. Mackenzie brought the book, "Go Dog Go," to read to him.

Test

I'm sending this post with picture from my email. It's a setting that I didn't know was available and so I thought that I would give it a try. Maybe I'll like it better. We'll have to see. It's suppose to take the picture and test. Well, here it goes.

Jumping Gabriel

Joanna found a jumper and Gabe loves it. At first I didn't think he would jump in it. I was wrong. Check out the video. Do you see him getting his feet off the ground? This kid is a jumper. I think he might be a basketball star in the making.

Note: I can see the video in my preview of the posting, but right now it doesn't show up on the post. I'll see if I can fix it.

Joanna's Blog

Joanna started a blog and she's likely to be more specific and also write more clearly than me, a math nerd. Anyway, you don't have to check on her site if you check mine because I've included a link to her site on the right. You can also see what her latest blog titles are. If you've already read them, then you don't have to check another page.