SunRiver Vacation

Again this summer, we collected the family together and headed down to SunRiver for vacation.

Clearly both kids LOVED the scenic drive:

We stopped in Portland for a Kruger-family wedding, but I don't have any photos, so you'll have to check-in with Denise for those.  But it was a great little backyard wedding and the cousins had a blast, we had to tear them apart at the end of the day with promises of a week of vacation.  That night we drove down to Albany & spent the night at Jeff & Katie's, we had such a great morning with them we ended up staying into the afternoon and got to SunRiver several hours after everyone else.  As we were leaving Parker told me "Mama, I wish Brody lived in our neighborhood."  I agree kiddo.

The whole week was a whirl-wind of cousins, swimming, and fighting over bedtime.  It was quite a struggle to get our two down for bed every night, even after we kicked Dad out of his room so we could have a closet to put Cecily down in (in my defense I did offer to let him keep his room and just have Cecily sleep in his closet, he politely declined).  The Need children, who were sleeping three-to-a-bed in a glorified hallway still slept better than ours, that's just pathetic.

But, sleeping issues aside, it was a great trip, so great, that I pretty much took no pictures.  We spent several hours every day at the pool, then rode our bikes into town for ice cream, returning for dinner that someone else cooked, not too shabby for a vacation. 

4th of July

Traditionally, we've gone to the cabin for the 4th of July, but since that's not an option any more, we went to our friend's house for a BBQ.  They live on the most amazing cul-de-sac so the kids could run around & ride bikes the whole time.  The rain even managed to hold off until we were just about to head home.

On the 5th we were invited to our friend's lake house for a BBQ.  The weather was too iffy to swim in the lake, but the kids did get to swim in the hot tub.

It was a huge hit.  Parker is now constantly asking when we can go back to "hobby's auntie's house"  (Hobby is their preferred pronunciation/nickname for Xavier) 

Playing outside

Has this not been the most amazing summer?  The kids have been playing outside all the time.  We've completely worn out the swimming pool.

Cecily has been living off Popsicles pretty much morning, noon, & night.  They're mostly beets & veggies with a little fruit thrown in, so I don't really have a problem with it...except for the mess.

Parker had "science camp" this week, they made explosions & all manner of goops.  They also had a slip & slide that the kids could play with.  Parker took his swimsuit every day, but he never actually tried the slip & slide.  I even build a slip & slide of our own to try & get him used to it.  He loved the home slide, but refused to try the one at school.

Cell phone retrospective, Volume 2

April 4th - First Day of Swim Lessons

April 7th - It's finally sunny enough for the water table the kids got for Christmas! 

May 15th - Cecily finds Mama's lipstick

Parker's School Auction

May 30th - Zoo trip in Jammies & hat

June 6th - Edmonds Beach...I think

June 11th - Cleaning the car

The car had reached a level of filth & clutter that I think it was just about to be shut down by the Health Department.  Parker helped me out, and then that weekend we went camping.  So now Parker is convinced that we have to clean the car as part of preparing to go camping.

June 19th - Studying.  Parker got up while I was working on my Bible Study, so he decided he needed his own workbook too.

June 19th - Last Day of Preschool!

We went out for ice cream after the last day of Preschool

June 25th - Strawberry Picking 

June 30th - Parker's new "outfit"

Parker loves outfits that go together, so he was pretty excited when we found this tracksuit at Costco.

July 1st - Bedtime stories

You can't tell from the photo, but it's 9:15am and both kids are fully dressed.  The were playing "bedtime".  They climbed into my bed, covered up, and then Parker told Cecily bedtime stories.  The main gist of it was: "Once upon a time, there was a little princess, her name was Cecily, she had a Mama and a Daddy, and their names were Julie & Keith and she had a brother named Parker.  They lived in a castle.  The End."

The stolen bike saga...

Tuesday morning, Keith went to the gym and then left his car at the Park & Ride.  He came home Tuesday evening and discovered that his car had been broken into.  He didn't notice anything missing until he got home & discovered that his garage door opener was missing.  In the process of re-programming the garage door, we discovered that his bike was missing.

Keith's not a big "stuff" person, I think this is the one and only item in the entire world that Keith loves, so of course, that's the only thing they stole...     

The rest of the week was spent on phone calls with the police and the insurance company.  On Wednesday night, we told Parker that a Police Officer was going to come over to our house.  Unfortunately, the police officer was delayed enough that Parker fell asleep in his chair waiting for him to show up.  We woke Parker up so he could see the Cop car, and the officer even turned the lights on for Parker.  P was pretty asleep/tired at the time, but I think he enjoyed it.

At this point we weren't expecting to ever see the bike again, but I kept checking Craigslist just-in-case.  Saturday morning, I found this ad:

No question, it was Keith's bike, so Keith started calling the police again, but by the end of the day on Saturday, it looked like nothing was going to happen.  I'm sure the police have bigger fish to fry, but this missing bike has been kind of all-consuming in this household this week.  So, Sunday morning, Keith decided to just buy the bike back.  They'd lowered the price from $460 to $405 (in one day), so we were afraid they'd find an actual buyer before the cops did anything.  It's offensive in principle to pay for something you owned outright a few days ago (and still do own, legally), but it would have cost us a lot more to buy it all new.

Fortunately, we have a friend who's a police officer (not in Seattle, but still willing to help).  So, Keith arranged to meet with the thief and Josh agreed to tag along.  They arranged to meet with the Seattle PD down the street before meeting with the "seller".  Everything takes longer than planned, so they spent a good half-hour hanging out just off Aurora, but eventually the SPD showed up and Keith texted the seller that he'd be at their meet-up spot shortly (it was originally a fast-food restaurant, but then the seller moved it to a near-by hotel ...creepy).

As soon as they showed up at the hotel, the seller came out with the bike and Josh was on the phone with the SPD, and within minutes the parking lot was filled with cops, and soon enough, Keith was on his way home with his beloved bike, none the worse for wear.  I think it's unlikely that anyone will be arrested for this, but we're very relieved to have the bike back safe & sound...and the summer has been saved.

A few things we've learned from this experience:

*Don't keep your registration in your glove box.  According to the law, you have to have it in your car, but there's nothing saying you can't hide it somewhere not so obvious.  And we'll be much more careful going forward that we don't leave anything with our address in the car.  We previously programmed our GPS to think that we live at Central Market, but it never occurred to us that they might look through all the random papers in the car for our address.

*Have a locked door between your garage & the house.  I'm sure that locked door saved us from a MUCH bigger theft & headache.

*Don't leave your garage door opener in the car at the Park & Ride.  I'm not sure I'll keep this one up, but it's probably a good idea for Keith.

*Check on Craigslist, you never know, they might be dumb enough to post it a few days after the robbery.

*Have a friend who's a Cop.  There's no way we would have gotten the SPD to take this seriously if Josh hadn't been with Keith.

Cecily, what do you want for lunch?

My cuddle-bugs