November 2017

November highlights:

Kids woke up the day after Halloween with gifts from the switch witch in exchange for their undesirable candy.  Elena wrote a letter to the witch, asking if we could give the candy away instead of it being taken away.  So we gave the candy to a homeless shelter. Proud moment.  The kids also had a dentist appt that day and were surprised to have no cavities!  I asked Dr Yi if he passed out candy yesterday.  his response, "Of course I did!  It's my fire insurance!  I gave them handful$."  HA!

On the first Thurs of the month we went to the Museum of Flight.  Every few months the state of Washington has a sign-up for school aged children to be members of this museum until they are 18 for free!  One adult can accompany each kid, so when you tourist friends come visit, you can visit the museum for free as long as you have our kids on a leash. :)

Once upon a time when we attended the Skyway ward, we grew close to the Sablan-Lauaki family.  Well we got to see Tupo speak at church following his mission in Costa Rica!  That same weekend, Carlotta had pre-wedding shower, as she and her beau later got married in Utah. It was so nice to see all of my old "young women".  Brother White traveled in from Coeur d'lane, so it was fun to see Dan chatting with both Brother White and former Bishop Sablan.

We fed a couple sets of missionaries.  We also had Geno and Ben (and kids) and Elma (and kids) over for dinner.  Elma was Geno's old college roomie and Elma's kids go to Concord Elementary.  Oh how the world seems so small sometimes, when other times I am lost in its enormity.

Dan FINALLY replaced the rotting beam in the deck.  Thank you Bucky for helping!  Oh!  Oh!  And I completed our bedroom with this used bedframe (it was gold and we painted it black) and art that Cora painted at the Children's Museum.

We attended some free events in the city:
Free Crafts at Home Depot (first Saturdays of the month)- the kids made cars
Day of the Dead- amazing performances!
Diwali Family Festival- got henna tattoos!  And Cora loved the pretty dresses.

We drove to Portland and spent Thanksgiving with Dan's mom, along with The Foulgers and Becks.  We played in a pool (Michael swallowed a lot of water and upchucked some jello, Elena flipped off the diving board, Cora clung to our necks, and Charlie silently enjoyed the dip), watched "Coco" in the theatre, and ate ate ate.  The kids had a blast playing with the Beck cousins.  One morning I went on a walk and got stuck walking 5 miles!  It was tiring but nice.

Last but not least Michael started kindergarten the Monday after Thanksgiving.  His speech has improved quite a bit (thank you speech therapist!), he is figuring out how to read (thank you: How to teach your kids in 100 easy lessons!) and he just wanted to go.  He wanted to go!  So we let him go.  So far so good.

Our kids are going to need all kinds of therapy with how our decisions are bounced around.

Sometimes I think my life is boring and uneventful, but then I look back and it appears that it is a lot more eventful than I think.