Audrey Turns Two!

We had a party for Audrey's second birthday at the house. Grandma Sharon, Grandpa Dirk, Aunt Fran, Big Sister, Aunt Gabe and Taj, and Grandma Campbell came to eat cupcakes (thank you Cupcake Royale!) and enjoy the perfect day. Audrey tore into her presents and enjoyed the attention. Big Brother got some good bonding time with Grandma.

Audrey with bubble machine.




Cole and Grandma enjoying some one on one over a workbook.


Aunt Gabe and Taj, Big Sister, and Grandma Campbell.


Big Sister and Aunt Fran.


Our dear friend and neighbor, Mrs. Campbell, with Alex and Audrey. Margaret celebrated her 90th birthday this year! She adores both Cole and Audrey.


Family picture. Minus me (the photographer) and Cole (the boy who either makes a funny face or refuses to be in a picture at all, to my ultimate sorrow!)


Family shot taken by Cole.


April 23, 2009. Birthday breakfast - pancakes and BACON.


Birthday girl.


Audrey loves bacon.


We went to "sibling class" after breakfast, Audrey wore her "Birthday Girl" shirt. Both Cole and Audrey love sibling class and I get a lot out of the parent education.


Cole and best friend, Kiefer, hamming it up at snack time. These two are quite mischievous together..


A girl with a plan! On sunny days the kids go outside to play. On this day they worked at digging a large hole in the gravel pit.


Audrey sliding with friend Claire. Claire likes to pretend that Audrey is her real life baby doll even though she is only 6 months older.




Teacher Anne Marie singing Happy Birthday To You.


Audrey and classmates coming in for a hug from Teacher Anne Marie after the goodbye song.


Here is a video of Teacher Francie from the "mommy and me" class Audrey and I take singing the goodbye song.

Birthday dinner at La Fiamma with Grammy and Grampy.


Alex, Cole, Grampy, Grammy, and Audrey.


Cole goofing. He was disappointed when his pizza came and it had sauce on it. He just wanted dough with cheese. I raised a picky eater and I swore I wouldn't.


Birthday pizza.


Open kitchen at the restaurant makes for easy kid friendly atmosphere and always something interesting to look at. They also give the kids a little ball of dough to play with while you wait for your dinner.


The sad but moderately tasty chocolate cake with pink frosting I made.


Note to self: although the happy birthday candles are cute in the package they burn too quickly leaving puddles of wax all over the cake.

We walked up to visit with Big Sister after dinner. She was working at Peppies (as Cole informed me he likes to call Pepper Sisters ... )


Happy Birthday Sweet Girl.

Sibs

Audrey, spring 2009. Cole, winter 2006.

Mat sat.

Cole is reading short books - along the lines of Dick and Jane. He is very proud and says to Audrey that "he is growing up and can read stuff." We've started the BOB Books from Scholastic. The first book goes like this:

Mat.
Mat sat.
Sam.
Sam sat.
Mat sat. Sam sat.
Mat sat on Sam.
Sam sat on Mat.
Mat sat. Sam sat.
The End

He read this book to Audrey tonight. He continues his mad craze for LEGO. I'm happy to see him building his own stuff out of the various bricks he's collected. Attack bomb ships and the like.

My mom and I took the kids to an Easter egg hunt at the Sudden Valley Community Center on Saturday. Thank goodness we did because it rained very hard on Sunday - way too hard for any sort of egg hunting. We did have a nice ham dinner at my mom's house though and Cole played with his fire station LEGO set the Easter Bunny brought.

Dyeing eggs.

Cole only likes the whites.

Audrey doesn't care much for eggs in general.

Pin the ears on the bunny at the SV Community Center.


Fun with Grammy. I always associate Easter with my Grandma. She made me a dress every year and we had an egg hunt at the ranch. My mom continues the tradition of giving See's Mayfair eggs ... or rather the Easter Bunny always brings Mayfair eggs.

Sweet Audrey.

At least Audrey still likes to get her picture taken.


What did you get?

Audrey gave her chocolate to the Easter Bunny.

No, Mine!

Sweet Audrey will be 2 years old in a short couple weeks and is showing signs of being quite a firecracker. Her two heroes are Brother and DaDa. Anything Cole does (good or bad, but most notably bad) is copied almost immediately. She clearly idolizes her brother. She is also starting to talk more clearly.

No, mine, shoes, juice, mama, dada, flower, up. I know that she's saying more but we're not listening well enough.

We've had a super bug run through Bellingham taking out the young and old. Both Cole and Audrey have been sick and many of Cole's classmates as well as his teacher. This week they've only had 6 out of 15 kids attending Cole's preschool. I'm crossing my fingers that I'll come out unscathed but it seems unlikely.

I worked in Cole's classroom this week and snapped some pictures.

Teacher Heidi demonstrating the watercolor egg project.

Cole and friend Maren working on watercolor egg. These two get along really well. Cole played over at Maren's house and we had Maren over to our house last week. She has an older brother so she knows how to play "army" and she can hold her own.

Making hand-print chicks.

Chicks with tissue paper cherry tree.

No cherry tree blossoms for us this year. Sigh. We miss our lovely cherry tree in our lovely backyard at the Seattle house. Seattle backyard April 2008.

Story time. I Am an Ankylosaurus.

Cole's classroom.

Cole's new thing. LEGO.





Carrot sword dueling.

Good times at Pacific Science Center. Always Cole's choice for a Seattle outing.

Crazy NW Weather

We got some snow last week. The perfect kind of snow - enough to make a snowman but doesn't keep you from getting out of the house and goes away the next day.

Cole and Audrey played outside at their "sibling class".

Another one of Audrey just because I like this picture too.



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Lauren, Cole and Alyssa (our neighbor) building a snow castle.


Family Day at the beach. It was sunny when we left the house but when we got to Deception Pass it was frigid and blowing with intermittent icy rain. The kids braved the weather for about 3 minutes then we retreated to the warm car for snacks.




Windswept ears.

Tired Audrey