California 2009

I hijacked Wendy's blog to give you all this little story, Dave.

I had my two weeks of army duty out in California about an hour north of San Fransisco. It was a great time and here are some pictures of my trip. These first pictures are all from Fisherman's Wharf in San Fransisco. The first is a picture of an old sailing boat museum on the dock with Alcatraz Island being in the background.


This is at the same museum, but it is a replica Viking ship I thought looked neat.
Here is the best shot I could get of Alcatraz. Thought about going to the island, but only had one day in San Fransisco, so decided to do more walking instead.
Here is the Golden Gate bridge.
Here is a shot of San Fransisco from Fisherman's Wharf. We actually parked near the top of city and walked a couple miles down to the wharf. Then we walked back instead of taking mass transit.


There were so many different pictures I could have gotten of people dressed up like this or doing funky things. This one worked really well because I had my camera out at the time and when we were walking past he froze like this.
Here at pier 39 they get a ton of Sea Lions. There are normally a couple hundred and at the right time of year there can be thousands.
This was again at pier 39 on the wharf and I thought the crab looked cool. My roommate was the one on the right holding a phone. When Alaina first saw this picture she was terrified until we convinced her it was not real.
We all went out to dinner twice while we were there. The first time, the Lieutenant that was with us brought us to a pizza place, but I don't have any pictures of that. This is the second one, from when we went to Fuddruckers. You might think it was weird that we went there, but it was right across the street from the hotel we were at and we had strict curfews.
I gave train rides to a ton of people while I was out there, because they did not have a whole lot of work for us to do after the first week. This first coin, which is the next two pictures, I got from a Lt. Colonel in the first couple days I was there.

This second coin I received from the Sergeant Major of the Battalion that we were supporting out there. He actually came up for rides twice and did some real work with us.


I gave rides to a handful of higher ups in the army, but gave a ton to the soldiers who were working out there. Most of them didn't even know the army had trains until they saw us. The funnest ride I gave was to a Chief Warrant Office-5, who was thrilled to be on a train.

I had a really great time out there and hope to post some more pictures in the next couple weeks. I need to go to the army website that has a ton of pictures and then I can show you a little of what I was doing out there.

Dave

The last 2 weeks

So, we spent the last 2 weekends in the Madison area. We got to see almost all of our extended family, which was fantastic, although we are really looking forward to having absolutely no plans this weekend! Two weekends ago, on our way down, we saw a bald eagle in a field right next to Dave's parents' house. It actually stayed long enough for me to get out of the car, get the camera out and take some pictures. Here they are:





How cool is that!?!

On Saturday we went to Grandma Shirley and Grandpa Gary's house where we also got to see Aunt Kathi and Linda as well Eli (their dog) and the other dog they are dog-sitting. Leo loved playing with the dogs and the dogs were great with him.




Grandpa Gary with the kids.

Unfortunately we missed Grandma Jan and Grandpa Don because they were at my cousin Carry's college graduation (Congrats Carry!)

Later on, we went to visit Dave's Grandpa Jack. Here is a picture with Grammy, Grandpa Jack, Dave, and the kids.
While Dave and Grandpa were talking, Alaina asked if I would take pictures of her posing. Here are a couple:


Grandpa giving the kids hugs goodbye:


After we got home from the first trip, I went in to check on Alaina and Leo before Dave and I went to bed. She was looking so comfy spread out, that I took a picture. (And luckily didn't wake her up!!) Bandit does sleep with the kids every night, but goes back and forth as to which kid he sleeps with.

Late last week we found out that Dave's Grandpa is being moved to a nursing home in Ohio where most of the patients are blind and deaf and all of the staff knows sign language. He left for the nursing home this week and seems to be loving it. Because he was leaving, we made another trip down to the Madison area to spend time with him before he left.

Quite a bit of family got together for lunch. Here is a picture of Uncle Rick and Leo.


And here is Dave's cousin Zach taking a picture with Alaina.

The waitress took a picture of all of the family that got together for lunch:
(Back: Bonnie, Rick, Zach, Jackie, Kristen, Dave;
Front: Leo, Wendy, Grandpa, Grandma, and Alaina)

Grandpa and Grandma:

Leo: "What are you doing to me!!"

Grammy put Leo in a dress-up dress. In her defense, he asked to put it on and she was just helping, but the look on his face is priceless!

Also, in new family news, Dave has accepted a transfer to Kansas City, Kansas and we will be moving in August. It is a great opportunity for him and we are all really excited to go on a new adventure! We will be sad though to be moving 8 hours away from family when we have been spoiled by a 2 1/2 hour drive to see everyone.

We hope you all have a fun and safe holiday weekend!

And here are the pictures that I have been meaning to post for weeks!

Leo (who dressed himself) built a train out of blocks:

Alaina went to a garage sale and picked out a pink frilly dress and a Nerf gun.

Alaina did not want to go up to the front of the church to get her award for finishing the Puggle program...


And I was mean enough to take pictures :)

Alaina asked me to take her picture. Leo jumped in front of her at the last minute...

Here is attempt #2:

While Dave was at his 2 weeks of army, the kids and I went outside just before bedtime and right before a storm hit. Alaina all of the sudden looked up at the sky and said she saw God. To this day she will look at the smaller of the clearings in the clouds and tell me that she sees God there. Both kids spent most of the night staring at the sky instead of playing.

Here is Alaina pointing it out for Leo and I.

Some more pictures of them climbing since I had the camera out.


And then it rained, so of course we had t play in the mud...



Lastly, Leo sleeping in the chair after he woke up from his nap and then fell back asleep.


The kids, Dave, and I are all doing well. We are keeping busy and it looks as though things will just keep getting busier as it gets closer and closer to summer. Hope you all have a great weekend!