Picasso..........

Taylor loves to draw! She is constantly caring her sketch book around or taking it in the car. These are two pictures that she showed me the other day. I have loved to watch her talent develop

She is also in an art class at school that she is just LOVING! I guess when you get into the higher grades they let you start thinking for yourself and come up with your own ideas. Taylor has always enjoyed her own ideas more than others :0) so, she has taken this class and run with it.

Labor Day

So how many people can say that they went to the lake on Labor day and were the only ones there???? There are so many lakes around here that you can actually do that. We took the backpack for Chase and packed some lunches and headed for Church Lake. It is on the way to Mt. Baker, but you turn off before you get there and head up a dirt road until that ends then you hike the rest of the way in. The lake was so clear and cold (straight glacier run off)

There is another lake lake between these trees and down the hill. As we were standing on the top of the ridge looking down a rainbow appeared between the trees. I don't think I have ever looked down on a rainbow before. Pretty amazing.

Yes, Ryan failed to tell us about the marsh lands we had to maneuver to get to the lake. We even made it through (barely) without any of the kids falling in. Taylor is usually drawn like a magnet to these situations. It was a great day - I wish we could do this more often.

1st Day of Middle School

How bad is this - I am just posting the first day of school pictures almost a month late.

As you can see Taylor is into the "Save the Planet" mode. She would have made a great hippy. She wants Grandpa to save his old VW Van for her first car.

Let's hope this is just a phase.......................

She loves school and is doing great. She started playing Volleyball on Saturdays (clinic's), but can't play for the school until 7th grade, she can't wait!

Chase and the Frog

Our house happens to have a field behind it that has a water retention pond. I guess because of this pond we get hundreds of these little green frogs in our yard every summer. Chase loves to watch them hop around and let's everyone else hold them, but runs away if the frog even looks his way. So today was a new day - he wanted to hold the frog!

He held it for a minute then let it go in the garden.

SHE DID IT!

This might not seem to monumental for most of you but we are going on about 4+ years of trying to get her ears pierced. She had them pierced when she was about 6 then took them out and ever since she has been to afraid to get them redone. We have even been sitting in the chair, dots on her ears, guns loaded and she has chickened out. I told her if she could talk someone else into taking her then she could get them done. She talked my Mom into taking her just before school started and she actually went through with it. YEAH!! She is doing really good with them and should be able to change them out in a few weeks.

Camp Firwood 2008

Two lucky little girls - Taylor and her cousin Julia attended a summer camp on Lake Whatcom (in Bellingham). Here they are getting ready to go find their cabin!

Because they have so many water sports during the week the first thing they have to do when they get to camp is pass a swim test. It was freezing, but they were troopers and both of them passed with flying colors.

Here is their cabin. There were 8 or 10 girls in each of these little cabins and one leader per cabin - brave leader I think -

Not looking to bad for just coming home from a week at camp -

we miss you Julia!!

Happy 11th Birthday

Time flies.....Taylor is 11 and every year seems to go by a little bit faster. She had a great birthday with her cousins - we were lucky to have my sisters family in town for her party. This has not been my year for cakes. As you can see her cake has a nice crack down the center -that just got bigger and bigger. I left the cake on top of the counter adn then turned the dishwasher on - yep - the cake got hot and everything started to slide!!!! Taylor is such a good sport and loved it anyway.

Her very own cell phone. I thought we were going to stay strong, WRONG! I can't complain much because it has already come in handy to get ahold of her.

Happy Birthday Taylor