TGIF!!!

wow, what a week it has been... last day of summer (its been quite a rad one!), first day of school(chloe started kindergarten and clay is in 5th grade!!!), my birthday (thanks to everyone for all the b-day wishes & love!), started working again and, yes, i'm still a kick-ass yard-duty!, soccer practice, dance tryouts (chloe & june are peppermints for the nutcracker... woot!), and back-to-school night last night.

so, yeah... i'm kinda wiped out. i swear, i look forward to the weekends now just as much as my kids do! ha ha ha!

my mr. man & chloe bear

chloe & her awesome teacher

28 life is a great balancing act... and i'm finally getting the hang of it : )
namaste

chloe turned 5

it was an action-packed birthday for little chloe valentina... she woke up at 7 and insisted on waking everybody else up so she could open her presents:

her new bike from g-ma and g-pa in alaska
had to take it out for a spin right away

we went and played miniature golf in the dark. it was so cool. everything was glow in the dark and the black lights overhead made everything look awesome!!


pops tried to beat my score in skee-ball. but he couldn't measure up to my mad skills. ha!b-ball championpinata time!!!

here's the birthday girl... showing off the cake that she decorated

wow... 5 years old. and starting kindergarten soon. where does the time go? really.

happy birthday my chloe bear!!!

beach bums

we have the best friends in the whole wide world...

a special birthday party just for chloe. it was the radness. thanks La for the pictures! we love you guys!

happy birthday kurt!!

went to del valle to celebrate kurt's birthday. it was rad to just be able to relax and hang out with some good friends.

kurt, brandi, and little bodhi

bees-a-plenty
mountain drinking some beer
time for a little swim

just chillin by the water
anyone want some PB&J nilla wafers? YES!!!

this pretty much ruined my day

the new harry potter film isn't coming out november 17,2008 anymore... nope. for no apparent reason (other than money, ofcourse) they pushed the release date back to july 2009. um... wtf?!?!

here's the lame story

alaska 2008: part three

one of our favorite places to go while in alaska is a little town called homer. the welcome sign to this beautiful place reads: "welcome to homer: a quaint little drinking town with a fishing problem." ha ha ha. i think that is rad! it IS the halibut capital of the world and definitely one of the most beautiful places i have ever been. there is a cute little beach where you can look out past the water and see snow-capped mountains and a few glaciers. the day that we went was breathtaking... but i really don't think this video does it justice.

here's chloe... just tossing some rocks into the water. okay, more like chucking them and competing with her brother to see if she could throw as far as him. ha ha.

clay found a sea star just laying on the beach. at fist we thought it was dead but then realized it wasn't so clay HAD to save it and made sure that the little creature made it back into the water.

get crafty : )

alaska 2008: part two

clay is the best fisherman... seriously, he can out-fish almost everyone. he definitely out fished me this year, catching some red salmon, some silver salmon, some king salmon, and a huge 50 pound halibut!! i think fishing is in his blood. he makes it look so easy when really... its not.

here he is with a pink salmon.... we don't keep the pink salmon cause they don't taste very good. their meat turns to mush once they hit the freshwater. but they are a lot of fun to catch and release!! it was clay's first time halibut fishing. i cant express how difficult it is to go halibut fishing. we go out on a tiny boat into the ocean. drop our lines down to touch the bottom (which is 200-300 feet down!!) and you bounce your pole up and down until a halibut grabs hold of it. then you have to reel it up and "fight" the fish at the same time. its a workout i tell ya, but clay managed to catch the biggest halibut of all of us. a 48 pounder. they had to spear it just to get it onto the boat! it was awesome!!

clay's grandparents are two of the most amazing people, and we are so blessed to have them in our lives. here they are, teaching their grandson how to pan for gold...

alaska 2008 part 1

okay, i've got quite a few pics and a couple rad videos from our latest trip to alaska.... but this one takes the cake as being the best video ever!! chloe caught her very first fish while we were in alaska this year. um, yeah.... stoked! it was a pink salmon... or as we "native" alaskans call em: a humpy, due to the massive hump on their backs. she reeled it in with the help of her grandpa larry. here is my little fishergirl in action:

and here she is with her fish:

more pics to come soon : )