Week by week 50

(June 6-12). Sorry about the delay. We had some expensive electronic difficulties here at my house which I would rather block out right now. So now that we are back I'm going to plunge forward in my efforts to recap.

This week we had a lot of fun hanging out with family. We checked out Thanksgiving Point with my mom and sister and nephew. It was fun. We spent all our time at the Children's Garden. We started with swimming or really splashing around in the splash pool.
Unfortunately some of my cutest pictures of the event were casualties in our recent "expensive technical difficulties" and so these will have to do. Still cute!
My sister, Wu, and her son, Ryan.
We moved on to the rest of the Children's Garden. Here is my attempt at getting a picture of the kids in the flowers. At least one of them was smiling in the general direction of the camera. James and Ryan were busy trying to pick apart the flowers.
Distracted.
Two cousins being good in the stroller.
Maze fun!
Wu with the babies.

Classic mom-on-the-phone picture. If only we could convince her to turn it off occasionally.

The babies playing in the sandbox.

I actually got a picture of my mom and me together this week. I don't have many of these. Too bad I hadn't gotten ready for the day yet.My sister Karen (hiding in the back) with my parents and her 4 kids (and James). He was so excited to play with his boy cousins and they were so kind to play with him too.

My dad is the healthy-smoothie king. He was so happy that Johnny liked his smoothies.

Fun at Rocket Park with the big-boy cousins and Grandma.
James and Lexi. They love each other so. James has smoothie all over his face. We were glad that my sister, Pink, and her kids could come up from California.
James and Max after wrestling.
Johnny after the dog who is trying to hide under the table. Poor Mahona has been so patient with kids over the years.
As you all can see we had an uneventful but very fun week of hanging out with family. This is the best part of vacations. Especially when everyone comes to us (well after we come all the way to Utah anyway).

Week by week 49

(May 30-June 5). I didn't manage to take a single picture this week. I think we were just adjusting from our trip to San Antonio. We flew from Dallas to SLC on the 31st and spent the day with two of Brian's sisters. On the way from the airport to Brian's mom's house, James saw something out the window and was asking "what is that?" Of course we didn't know what "that" was. He was just pointing out the window and was very irritated that we didn't answer his question immediately. (Anyone else going through the "that" phase?) After about 10 minutes of frustration from James we finally figured out that he was pointing to the "V" on the mountain for Viewmont High School. Phew. After that he was fascinated every time we drove between the Grandma's houses by that "V" on the mountain.

James enjoyed following his bigger cousins around. Brian's mom flew in on the 1st and then Brian flew home on the 2nd and left us in Utah to spend a couple of weeks there with family. We missed him but we had a lot of fun with family. James has now started distinguishing between Grandma Shelley (Brian's mom) and Grandma Sharon (my mom). It is cute to hear him talk about them both.

Week by week 48

(May 23-29. a.k.a. USA week 1).

We flew into Dallas and got quickly settled into Brian's brother, Geoff's house. James was so excited to see his cousins. This is the first time we have been back to Texas since we moved when James was 9 months old. It was hot!!! We got to see lots of friends and most importantly, family! Allen does a free concert on Monday's in June and so we went over and the kids ran around and played while the music went on.

I took James and Johnny to Celebration Park which has lots of good playground equipment AND a water park. James was mostly interested in the huge playground as he isn't a huge fan of being splashed by water. Johnny mostly stayed by me but it was fun anyway.

Another day I met a bunch of friends at a indoor playground for kids. James and Johnny both loved this (we will be going back when we move home). There was a lot of fun things to do and play with.

James and Alex. Aren't they such cute cousins? Alex and Hayley were super great at entertaining the kids. James especially loved going to their school for lunch with his cousins. He just stared at all the big kids. He was giddy with happiness. James really looked up to his cousin Alex. He thinks he is super cool!

After a few days of "adjustment" we left Dallas and headed down to San Antonio to check out Sea World. We went with our good friends the Hills. Crystal and I hung out A LOT when I was in Dallas and she is one of my favorite people. She was my first friend in Dallas when I moved here (not counting family). They have 2 boys as well that are pretty much 1 year from each of our kids. So we had 4 boys ages 3.5, 2.5, almost 2 and almost 1. It was lots of fun and the boys loved the animals. I would highly recommend checking out Sea World if you get the chance.

Some of the animals that we saw. Seals, sea lions, otters, fish, sharks and, of course, the dolphins. We got to feed the dolphins, seals...

and some birds. Apparently these are pest birds of Australia. They eat farmer's crops. They sure are pretty for pests. James was a bit wary but he still watched them. He just didn't want them on his arm.

On day 1 we also saw most of the shows with the kids. They really enjoyed them except that James did not enjoy getting soaked by Shamu. He really got it bad and immediately burst into tears. On day 2 we spent the entire day at the Sea World water park. James got to go on his first roller coaster (he loved it and laughed the whole time) and his first water slide (he also loved that as you can see). It didn't even phase him when he went under the water at the bottom of the slide.

Johnny was exhausted from the day before (as well as the time adjustment) so he slept for about 4 hours. When he woke up he played in the wave pool and mainly tried to drown himself by crawling into deeper and deeper water. Good thing I was there to make sure he didn't go under.

That evening, after day 2 at Sea World, we drove downtown to the Riverwalk and took a boat tour around the canals. It was fun and we had planned on having dinner but after the whole day Johnny was totally exhausted and threw a fit so we ended up going back to the hotel for dinner. The Riverwalk is beautiful!

A picture of just me and Brian on the Riverwalk.

It was a super fun trip and we were so happy to be able to go with our friends. We also stopped by the outlet in San Marcos for a bit of shopping on our way down there. (I highly recommend them if you are in the area). And I got to see some other friends this week for dinner and lunch and at church. It was a good trip and it made me miss my Texas friends (but not the heat).

Week by week 47

(May 16-22). This was a fun week. Johnny decided that he no longer wants help doing anything. He wants to do it all himself. Including eating. And he really does try use a spoon but then ends up giving up in favor of actually getting the food into his mouth.Close up. Not sure why but this picture makes me laugh.
Irritated because I wanted him to say "up" before I would pick him up. I know I shouldn't compare but James was talking a few real words by this age and Johnny just isn't (besides dada and mama). I know he can make the sounds because he is constantly babbling so I was just being stubborn. I gave in a picked him up anyway.
See. Then we took some pictures together. This look of Johnny's says, "Mom, are you sure you are qualified to take care of me?" I think he wonders that sometimes.
Just trying to figure me out.
This week we played a lot with friends since it was our last week before out Utah vacation. James wanted to wear my necklace but since he lost one of my necklaces last week while we were in Germany I made him his own necklace with ribbon and noodles. You can't tell but he is being happily chased by his good friend Elias in this picture.
We were killing time while waiting for a friend to join us to go to the farm.
Playing "futbal" with Elias.
Watching my kids makes me remember being a kid. All the playing and having fun. Oh, the good old days.
Our friend arrived and we headed out to "La Gavotte" which is a real farm about a 15 min. walk from my house. They let the animals just roam around and the kids wander among them. Johnny looking at the bunnies.
James with the little goats. This was before he was "bumped" by a goat so he was happy.
Still happy and watching the goats. Notice the huge pile of mud and poop and who-knows-what-else?
This place has so many animals. Notice the alpacas just chilling with the horses. And then James got bumped into the mixture of mud and crud behind him. He cried, I laughed and cleaned him up a bit but you can see on his pants that he was covered. I washed those pants 3 times on super hot because--Yuck!! At least he was happy again (in front of the bunny cages).
Johnny in the pony field having a taste of hay.
More billy goats.
Our friends Tabitha (the mom) and Debora (the child) said Day Bore Ahh. This is one of my first true Swiss friends (well she is French and Swiss). She is such a super person and very kind to me and has shown me lots of things here in Geneva.
Pig. Yep! They just wander around snorting and rolling in the mud and hay. They are not too little either but they seem used to all the people and the kids mauling them. And there are a whole lot of different birds. Exotic chickens and turkeys and roosters.
James looking at some of the birds.
Pheasants too.
A pony. They do pony rides here for not too much money but my kids will have to wait till they are older or until Brian comes with us.
La Gavotte as we were leaving.
As we were leaving we had to walk along side a big sludge pond that was making a lot of noise. Look closely. Do you see the frogs? There were hundreds and the kids really enjoyed looking for them.
My friends that came with us. Caroline and Tabitha. Caroline is from Paris! So, I have officially made it when I can go on an outing with only French speaking friends. I'm pretty proud of my progress in French despite not being able to take any French classes. I'm not saying that I'm perfect but I can definitely have a real conversation and understand most things (except at church when they are reading from the bible because that is crazy ancient French).
The day before we left for Utah we went to another park with animals but this one didn't have them just wandering around. This little lamb tried to eat John-Luke's coat.
After playing at the park for a while we decided to have lunch at the restaurant of the tennis club across the street from my house. It was so much fun. Good friends. Mimi (from Ethiopa), Caroline (from Paris) and Harmony (from Cali) and all our kids. It was outside and the kids just ran around the garden and played and then came to munch and all us ladies got to talk for a bit. I totally need to do this again soon before the weather turns too ugly.
It was a nice farewell lunch before heading to Utah since that trip ended up turning from a month-long trip into more than 7 weeks by the time we made it home. Details to come.