Riding a bike

We've been trying for a while now to get Emmy interested in learning how to ride a bike but it seemed that she was following in the footsteps of her biggest brother and refused to learn.  London is a great rider, but Cannon never would learn.

But when we got to Liz and Don's house, Emmy discovered that Lydia who is almost 2 years younger than her, was riding a bike with no training wheels.  Well, it didn't take long for Emmy to decide she wanted to learn to ride a bike!  Isn't it amazing what a little peer pressure can do (but this time for a good cause)?

We started teaching her on Lydia's first bike with the training wheels raised to their highest position.  Needless to say, Emmy looked a bit overgrown on this clown bike.

But to get a little practice, we walked down to the neighborhood park and she did pretty well.

Tuesday came and Emmy was begging to try the bike again.  We got her out on it again in the afternoon and low and behold, after only a few times of me running alongside, she figured it out and was off and running!

A little crooked, but moving forward!

By Wednesday she had figured out how to start by herself, turn and brake.  Way to go Emmy!

Spring Break - Tuesday

It was a little cloudier today, although we actually found out it wasn't clouds but smoke from agricultural fires in Mexico, but the temps were still warm and we found lots of fun things to do. 

Like...swinging in the hammock reading books to the kids.

And coloring.

And building.

And hanging in the front yard watching the kids bike.

And Don made us Texas-sized stuffed hamburgers.

We also went to their community pool - twice!  We are having such a fun, active time.  These kids are going to drop sooner or later from all the exercise!

Spring break - Monday night

It was a fabulous balmy evening on Monday and we spent the time outside playing with the kids.  The kids took turns on the swing and riding bikes before heading down to the park to play.  I love evenings like this!

My beautiful girl

Sweet Lydia

My handsome man

The light was fabulous for taking photos - love this one of Em

At the park

They had on matching outfits!

Spring break - Monday

Monday was warm and kind of sunny so we headed out to the Padre Island National Seashore.  I didn't even know there was a national seashore, but it's the world's longest undeveloped barrier island.  There's your fact for the day!

Now this is Padre Island, different from South Padre Island of drunken teenage fame, and the beach is secluded and really beautiful.  When we first got there, we were the only ones on the beach and were later joined only by a handful of families.

The kids had an awesome time playing in the water:

 

Playing on the dunes:

Sand angels!

Relaxing in the sun:

And even partaking in an educational talk:

But the highlight of the trip was when some guy came running down the boardwalk with a park officer (with gun drawn) in hot pursuit.  We watched the excitement as the guy ran in and out of the dunes followed by the officer.  Then the Coast Guard helicopter was flying over us until eventually we could see down the beach the guy surrender and get arrested.  From that point on the kids kept referring to him as "the robber".

The officer is on the dunes, the "robber" is on the beach and the "ghetto bird" is circling above!

Here are some more shots from the day.  It was beautiful, although Emmy and I got quite sunburned - and that was with sunblock on!

Liz trying to keep the lunch away from the birds.

Spring Break!

It's Spring Break week and since Cannon is off to Nicaragua, and since I haven't left the state of Washington in 9 months, I felt the need to go somewhere!  After considering all our options, I booked a trip to see our great friends, the Jones, in Corpus Christi, Texas.  We haven't seen Liz, Don and Lydia since September and since Liz is pregnant and expecting a baby in June I thought this would be a great time to see them again.  This thought was confirmed when Liz told me it was 80 degrees there and she would take us to the pool and the beach.  Score!

So Saturday we flew down south to the Republic of Texas!  We flew into San Antonio (it was cheaper to fly there) and stayed overnight in a hotel.  The next morning we met another great Oki friend, Angie Kasuske and her daughter Becca for breakfast.  Angie's oldest son, Isaac, was Cannon's best friend our first year in Okinawa and it was really hard on him when Isaac moved to San Antonio after a year.  It was great to catch up with Angie (who is also pregnant and expecting a baby any day), even if it was a short visit.

I was feeling really skinny here!

After breakfast, we headed to the San Antonio zoo - a really nice zoo.

Riding a Komodo dragon

London compared to a condor's wingspan

Some of my favorite animals:

The flamingos.

The Okapi with his really obscene, blue tongue.

And my favorite - the hippos!  You could see them underwater and I thought it was really funny to see their big butts covered all over with colorful tropical fish.

After visiting the zoo for a few hours (and enjoying the sunshine and heat), we piled in the car and headed back to Corpus Christi.

Bon Voyage, Cannon!

Well, tonight is the night Cannon's been working toward for months now - his departure for Nicaragua! 

In case you haven't been following things too closely, Cannon's Spanish teacher announced back in the fall that she would be leading a trip to Jinotega, Nicaragua over Spring Break and the students were encouraged to join.  The trip is coordinated by a non-profit called Outreach 360 and they do service work with children in underpriviledged areas.  Cannon's group will be teaching students in a learning center in a remote mountain town.  I am sooo excited for him to go and be a part of this. 

To make the most of the experience, we had Cannon raise his own funds for the trip ($1,300) and with the help of some generous grandparents and a lot of cat sitting, house sitting and other odd jobs around the neighborhood, he came up with every cent.

Tonight Stevie dropped him at the airport and the group of 26 will fly down to Houston on the red eye and then make a connection to Managua followed by a 2 hour bus ride through the mountains to Jinotega.  We'll get one short phone call to let us know he arrived and then we're cut off until he arrives in Seattle next Saturday.  It might be a difficult week for his momma!

Emmy wanted to kiss him good-bye but you can see how he feels about that.

 

Hug from his brother.

 

Hug for mom (this was before I was in tears...)