Cali Trip and Kids B-day/misc...

DOH!

We had a great time in SoCal visiting Molly's parents and sister. Long drive both ways but the kids and dog did quite well for 13-15 hours of driving. No more dog trips though. The weather was typical Oregon weather that we were hoping to escape. I think it rained at least 5 days, with some of those days raining sideways rain. I was glad we paid to have our stinky dog cleaned before our trip only to have her rained on and muddy after our first day/night in cali. Jessy has a shepard as well (a shaggy version) and the dogs are the same age. The played/fought pretty much all day and night. The grandparents took the kids for a day and night and checked into a hotel pretty close to Jessy's so the kids could swim. Molly and I took Jessy to a gig in Studio City one night were she played a few songs with Jim Peterik (lead singer for 80's rock band Survivor). He wrote and performed "Eye of the Tiger" and "Vehicle" (when he was in the band Ides of March). Pretty entertaining show at and infamous Italian restaurant Vitellos, which is where Robert Blake allegedly killed or had his wife killed. Food was okay.


(Jim is guy to Jessy's left....still rockin')

As you can see from the photos, we went to Universal Studios a couple of days. Kind of cold for cali residents but there were plenty of Oregonians with t-shirts like me. The kids loved the Simpson's ride along with Jurassic Park, The Mummy's Revenge roller coaster, and my fav the Studio Tour with King Kong 360 3-D. If Universal could add 2-3 more good rides then it would for sure compete with Disney. We ate out a lot. If I see someone wearing an IN-N-OUT t-shirt I might just punch him in the face! ha

Here's few more pics from Universal:





The next time you see our kids in person ask them about the House of Horrors, which I'm sure will bring back some pleasant memories for them! ha

Okay, the kids b-day party will be this coming Sat. the 9th at Oaks Park. The party will run from 1-4 or so. Of course all are welcome. Not much else going on other than the kids started a spring track program and Caleb is doing Saturday flag ft-ball over in Tigard. We should have a busy spring.....don't know how I'm going to get all the house/yard projects done and still try to catch a fish or two???

Only one year later!

Really, are you serious it's been a year since we did anything on our blog? I guess I blame myface (as Molly used to call it) err..facebook for taking me/us away from this blog thing. So I guess we'll try to keep something on here for the sake of journal writing like we said last time.

Nothing too exciting going on here as we get closer to spring. Other than we are going to Cali for spring break and taking a 80 lb. German Shepard in our new rig. The kids thought it would be fun to bring the dog as Jessy has a German Shepard the same age so they wanted to make sure they could be friends. Jessy has a nice dog kennel so hopefully the two FEMALE dogs will not kill each other or get jealous...haha. We're trying to break up the drive a little by driving to Roseburg and then leaving the next morning for Cali. So I'm looking at 12-14 hours behind the wheel with kids and a dog.

We're looking forward to seeing Molly's family in SoCal. Molly's dad's been sick and let's just say the health care options are not the greatest (Kaiser). Don't really want to go to Disney but I'm sure we'll do at least one day. Molly and I want to go to Santa Monica, Huntington or Newport Beach and just relax and visit, but you all know with kids it's go, go and go some more. Maybe Universal Studios this time around.

My job with the county has picked up quite a bit. I'll be honest, that first month I was wondering how and what I'm suppose to do for work. That has been solved. I mainly cover the Clackamas County sheriff's office and all their risk/safety related issues. We're about $1 million into claims this year already, which is not good. Just completed re-designing a more ergonomic friendly shooting range with better office/work stations at the public training facility. It's nice and I try to shoot there at least monthly. The 4 day a week thing is really nice, although I need to start doing more house projects instead of fishing!

Molly's had to work more hours lately because of people leaving, getting hurt/sick, and mainly she's just the best therapist they have so they get her to work as often as possible. She is going back to SoCal in April for some training on pulmonary testing equipment and will be able to hang out with her family some evenings and a weekend so she's happy about that. We've been able to catch some movies of late (Kings Speech, True Grit) and on DVD Winters Bone and 127 Hours. All good films but we agree that Kings Speech was the best.

Caleb finished up bball last week with his last game and a fun pizza party. He told me after comparing all his sport trophies that this new one was the best and I have to agree. His coach won best sportsmanship coach of the season and the league is paying for his whole team to attend a Blazer game next Tuesday in good seats. I will go with. We decided not to do baseball this spring but instead flag football. It's a 5 on 5 league and only on Saturdays (practice 1 hour before game then play game...simple/done).

Alia and maybe Caleb might be joining a track club here in Milwaukie. Basically a well known track coach is putting on clinics/training sessions 2-3 nights a week to let kids decide what they would like to run and then train accordingly. There are youth track meets in the metro area every Saturday so they can sign up and we pay $10 per event. Alia is a good runner (it must skip a generation). Both the kids are learning the recorder during school music.....oh the sweet sounds they make (ha).

I think I'm done typing for now.

Baptism info

(Here's Sammie on the trampoline)

Caleb and Alia had their bishop interviews today so it looks like a go this Saturday! The baptism will start at 2:00 PM so if you plan on coming to our house the last vehicle will probably leave about 1:30. The address to the stake center = 8331 SE Cason Rd. in Gladstone. If you're coming from the South/205 take exit 11 (Gladstone/DMV)......or just google it before you leave!

We're hoping for nice weather, a good service and some good food with such an awesome family! Some of you already know this but we got a dog today (see photo above), which was a late b-day present promise now fulfilled! Alia and Caleb liked the name Sammie. She's an 8 week old German Shepard and is currently whining in the garage. Don't know what I've got myself into here, but the kids are happy.

Look forward to seeing you all.....

Jer

Caleb & Alia's Birthday Party 2010

All of our family is invited to join us at JJ JUMP's in Clackamas on April 10 at 1:00-3:15. We will be having pizza and cake for lunch. You can check out this joint here.

http://www.jjextreme.com/

I went over and checked it out myself and it looks super fun. We will most likely have the JJ extreme area all to ourselves. They have 2 Wii's, Guitar Hero, Extreme zip swing, Jousting arena, Bungee Basketball, Rock wall and more. Best of all adults are allowed to play too as long as we can behave ourselves. Please RSVP (503)867-3331 ASAP. We hope to see you all there.

Our Annual Blog!

I'll be shocked if anyone reads this due to the fact that we hardly keep this updated. We've enjoyed reading all of your blogs. I really like all the cool photos and video from Hawaii Rich and Deb, and of course those photos of our twin nephews in Pasco! Why can't we all live closer? We hope to be able to get together with everyone this spring and summer more often. I stayed home from work today to help take care of Alia (virus/puke stuff), as Molly was scheduled to work, and I can basically do laptop work from home anyway. The kids just finished up a successful basketball and cheerleading campaign and we should have signed them up last year. Alia really enjoyed the whole thing and made some new friends. Caleb did well for his first year and by his last game there was no traveling or double dribbling. He even made 3 shots in a row from the free throw line area with a cast on. I told him maybe he should just keep that thing on for awhile.





Caleb actually got his cast off on Tuesday, but still needs to wear a brace for a few more weeks. Needless to say, he was extremely happy to get that thing off. And just in time because Saturday we head to SoCal via I-5 to visit with Molly's family and for sure to do some swimming/Disney stuff (not fun with a cast). I think you all know about Molly's father. Molly flew down last Mon-Tues. to go with her dad to get a second opinion on his cancer situation. He's going to have to take medication to keep the cancer from spreading, but even with that, both doctors are thinking 3 years. I hope Molly doesn't mind me sharing all this because I know it is very stressful and sad for all of us. We're hoping to get him up here a lot more in the near future and do some fun things together with him. He's such a good man with a good attitude. I thoroughly enjoy being around him and listening to all his cool stories about his life. He's a good Papi!

Caleb and Alia will be baptized April 24th at 2PM here at our stake center, there's also a less active girl in Caleb's class/our ward that is going to be baptized as well. She's been 8 for a while and I think they feel comfortable with us, so why not. Also, we're having a birthday party for Caleb and Alia, April 10th (Sat.) up here at a place called JJ JUMP's or at the Family Fun center. We should be sending out invitations soon.

Update

We haven't posted anything for a long time so here's a little update. Caleb and Alia are doing well in school and are loving second grade. At parent teacher conferences Alia's teacher said that Alia is very helpful and sweet in class and is where she should be at this time of year in reading and math. Caleb's teacher said that he is "bouncey and pouncey" in class and is also right on mark with reading and math. I was happily surprised that he is at the same reading level as Alia because he doesn't like to read at home as much as Alia. Caleb and Alia are on their second week of swimming lessons at our new gym. They are at the same swimming level and in the same class. This also surprised me because until only recently Caleb has been afraid to swim so I thought Alia would be at a higher level because she has been swimming on her own for a while now. They both love to swim and I enjoy taking them to the pool. Last week I signed Caleb up for basketball, and Alia for cheerleading which starts in January. I'm excited to see how they do. Both are new activities for them and we hope they enjoy themselves. The cheerleaders will cheer at the boys b-ball games which should make the games more fun to watch. Alia has been doing well with her braces and her teeth are already much straighter. Next month she will get a stiffer band which I'm sure will be hard for her because she refuses to take medication for pain. She dislikes the taste of liquid and chewable medicine and would rather suffer. I'm going to try to teach her to swallow pills because it's hard for me to watch her tough it out without medicine.

These past two months have been very hard on me. Two months ago after I got back from NY, my mom told me that the chest xray my dad had recently was abnormal. My dad finished his treatment for Prostate cancer in July and since then I've been worried about him because the treatment was hard on him and he hasn't felt much better since ending treatment. His medical provider which is Kaiser, has done many things wrong all along and he was just diagnosed with Kidney cancer which requires surgery and they aren't able to schedule his surgery until January. Needless to say this is not okay and I've been dealing with Kaiser giving them the opportunity to make this right. I am praying that he will be able to get the care he needs outside of Kaiser within the next couple of weeks.

I'll let Jer post his update when he gets a chance. We are all looking forward to Thanksgiving in Irrigon.

First day of 2nd grade!

Today was Caleb and Alia's first day of 2nd grade. They are excited to be back to school. Jer didn't have to be to work early today so he was home for their big day. I had a good time helping them get ready. They both wore their favorite new clothes. I flat ironed Alia's hair for her which made her very happy (she doesn't like her wavy hair, she says it's too fluffy). I dropped them off today and got to see their happy little classmates. Caleb sits next to his friend Dante from church and baseball. Alia sits next to her friend Breahna, they've been classmates since kindergarten. I think it's going to be a good year. Caleb and Alia both like their new teachers and are excited to learn about new things.