A Great Season

Jake played city league baseball with a couple of his buddies this year. He liked it well enough, but he decided he liked soccer a little better, because he said that he liked to be able to run whenever he wanted. Here are some of the highlights of a great season.

Jake was a great little hitter. He got at least a base hit at every at bat. He was so proud when he would get to first. What he lacked in strength hitting the ball, he certainly made up for in speed. Sometimes he even lapped a few guys running the bases.

Playing in the field. His favorite position was 2nd base, I think.
And, running the bases.

Here is the team, waiting for thier trophies.

This boy loves his trophies!

All three silly boys with their trophies: Jaden, Jake and Grant. So fun to play with friends.

Of coarse, this was my favorite moment of the season. I love to see my kids sharing and looking out for eachother.

Another sweet moment at the fields...

These two are meant to be together. They are courting already :)

Don't they look like the proud parents of a little baseball star?

Kindergarten Graduation...Again

Here's Jake with his wonderful teachers, Mrs. Gormley and Mrs. Karen. He had a great year, and awesome teachers really do make all the difference.

This is a picture of Jake last year at graduation...notice how short he is compared to his two best buds.

Here he is at the end of this year with his best buds...notice how we have leveled the playing field just a bit, literally and figuratively. I think we made the right decision to hold him back. I think he will love 1st grade. I'm not sure I am ready for him to be gone all day, but I am sure I will manage somehow.

When this one leaves me for kindergarten, I might get a little emotional.

And here are the proud supporters... I am obviously present, just behind the lens :)

Even Jake's cousins came all the way from Alaska to cheer him on.

Birthdays in Seattle

For our birthday gifts to each other, Ben and I decided to spend a weekend in Seattle. This was our second time visiting together, but the first time was only for about 8 hours to research a business idea just after Ben had graduated from college. This time we drove and stayed in a nice hotel right downtown. We parked the car when we arrived and walked everywhere we went all weekend long. We had a blast!

This is the famous Pike's Place Market, just down the street from our hotel. This is the place where all kinds of people congregate to wait for someone to buy a whole fish. Then these guys take a 25 lb fish and throw it over the counter to be cut up and packaged. We thought it was so cool to watch, but Ben wouldn't let me buy $400 worth of fish that he would never eat. Oh well, there were plenty of people who did.

For my birthday dinner, all I wanted was some fresh crab legs. So, we found a great little restaurant, right on the ocean, and I didn't even have to look at the menu. Ben did; however, and couldn't find a thing he would eat (not a fan of sea food or shell fish). Here's a funny story for those of you who know my husband well. We had passed a little burger stand on the way to the restaurant, so Ben left the restaurant, went and got a burger and fries, and came back to eat them with me. Talk about a little compromise!

I was in heaven with my crab legs, and Ben loved his 'bigger than your face' fries! Somehow I ended up choosing the restaurant two nights in a row and guess what I picked the second night. Yep, crab legs again! The second time around, Ben actually helped me crack them. It was fun, but he decided that was a lot of work for a little meal. Yum, how I love sea food!

One of the nights we went to see Candide at the 5th Avenue Theater. The musical was o.k., but the theater was unbelievable. This is the ceiling right above us. I couldn't believe how ornate and colorful it all was. We agreed that we should have gone to see Fiddler on the Roof, but we took a chance on one that neither of us had heard of and oh well, it was funny anyway.

Here is another funny story...we walked all over downtown searching for a place to have some dessert. We finally found a little bar with some mediocre apple pie and chocolate cake. When we got back to our hotel, we found an empty banquet room with a whole table full of desserts. Yummy cheesecake and tons of other things to taste.

Good thing our hotel also had an amazing two-story workout room with a great view of the city. We spent a lot of time in there and in the pool.

Here we are trying to take our own picture in front of the space needle. Little did we know the Folk Art Festival was going on down there at the same time. We saw some great musicians, some very interesting people, and were aproached by tons of supporters to sign a petition to legalize marajuana. How's that for some culture!

I wanted to take a closer look at all of this silverware art. I thought it was the coolest thing there, but as you can see, it was so crowded we couldn't even walk, much less browse. This is as close as I got.

We decided to take the monorail back after a long day and lots of crowds. I took this picture for my Buddy, who loves a good McDonalds cheeseburger whenever he can get one.

So, with our anniversary and our birthdays so close, I'm not sure what we were celebrating except for being together without the kids. Eight years of pure bliss and we are still so in love! Thanks to Grandma and Aunt Sarah for hanging out with our little Angels so we could have a weekend away! We loved it!