Don't miss it.

I just uploaded a post called "Who knew?" that appears after "I have a question..."  If you have not yet read it, please read it before you read this post (and close your eyes as you pass this picture).  Then they will be in a more appropriate order for you.

On Monday afternoon, Brenden was outside playing with his "friends" (the three boys down the street who evidently have no parents).  When they were headed home, Newman was following them and Brenden tried to retrieve him with no luck.  I told Brenden we would hop on our bikes and go get him.  I headed in the house for some shoes and realized that Brenden had hopped on his bike with no helmet or pads.  We made it almost all of the way around our loop safely, but down the street from us there is a evil, man-eating puppy who thinks Brenden is particularly tasty.  Well, he attacked Brenden, who flew off of his bike and his implant flew another 5 feet from him.  We figure he had a concussion because his pupils were huge and all he wanted to do was sleep.  He cried in a fetal position for 3 hours whining that the dog was getting him and he was mostly incoherent.  He seems fine now, but I was pretty worried for a while. 

I have a question...

Next to "I need a hug," "I have a question" is Nolan's new favorite phrase.  Lately, our favorite conversation goes like this:

Nolan: I have a question, mom.

Me: Okay, Nolan, what is your question?

Nolan: When I run away, will I get a big spakin' or a little spankin'?

Who knew?

My kid can ride a bike!  For the last several years, Brenden has ridden around on his bike with training wheels and I never tried too hard to teach him how to ride it.  He is kinda nutty and freaks out about little things, so I thought I would give him a while.  I told him we were going to try today after church and he cried and said he would fall down and get hurt.  So, I went through some boxes and found the helmet and elbow and knee pads.  I told him if he fell, these would help him not get very hurt.  In the process of the move or maybe from having gravel roads, one of his training wheels broke off of his bike, so I removed the other one.  I told him, it is okay if he falls, he just needs to get back up and hop back on and practice some more.  He said, "But I'll be okay, cause I have this!" and pointed to his helmet.

We went down to the road and found the most flat spot we could.  I helped him get steadied and started to run along side him.  I realized I wasn't doing anything, so I let go.  Off he went and he rode down to the house and into the driveway.  I was amazed.  The first thing he said was, "Dylan will be so proud!"  (Dylan is his cousin who is 6 months older, but has known how to ride a bike for almost 2 years now.)  Here is a little video for you.  Sorry it is shaky.  Our road is not what you would call "smooth" and I was more concerned about falling in a hole.  I will work on my movie making skills too.  I have not had time to play with my new movie software yet (and by new I mean one year old).

Moose have a hug

About 1,243,561 times a day Nolan tells me, "I need a hug."  This is not something I should be upset about, but it is getting a little excessive.  He can't go to bed without hundreds of hugs and wakes up in the middle of the night because he needs a hug.  I love to hug him and I love his hugs, but sometimes this gets a little out of hand.  When Doug and I came house hunting, we saw a pair of pajamas in the airport that had a moose on them and said, "I moose have a hug."  I have wanted them ever since.  When I was souvenir shopping with Doug's parents, I found them.  There was one pair and they were Nolan's size.  BUT, they were $23.  Anyway, they were cute.  Just had to share.  On this website, they are only $12.99, but no one seems to know that we still get the US Postal Service here and they charge an arm and a leg.  Also, on this website they are purple, but still say they are for boys.  Hmmm... what kind of boys?  The others were brown, but I can't seem to find them on the internet.

Halibut fishing in Homer

August 9, Doug, his dad, and brother Greg left at 4:00 a.m. to go halibut fishing in Homer. Unfortunately for Doug, we were up until 1:00 looking for our missing dog, Newman. That is a whole other story though. The boys had a great day. They each caught 2 halibut and Greg caught 2 salmon and the other guys caught 1.

Morning in Homer

Sunrise on the ocean

Two thumbs up - Way up!

They were incredibly close to several whales.

Greg driving the boat - SCARY. Who let him do that?

Reelin' in the big one.

Silver Salmon

The boys fishing

Doug's halibut

Greg and his halibut. Is that not the scariest looking fish ever? Or really just disgusting?

The other side of the halibut - much less scary.

Grant's halibut

Grant's salmon

Greg weighing in his salmon. He was only 1/2 lb short of winning the daily derby.

Now, about Newman. There are 3 little boys down the street who wander the neighborhood as if they have no parents. As a matter of fact, I have not seen any parents. Evidently, they have been trying to claim Newman as their own. They have been taking him home at night to sleep at their house. We were up until 1:00 looking for him and never found him. At 6:00 a.m. he was on the deck howling. The next night he was gone too. The third night, I walked down to what I thought was their house and knocked on the door. It was 11:00 p.m. 3 little boys answered the door and I heard one of them say, "Uh oh, Newman, you have to go home." I asked them to PLEASE not take my dog in their house. The next night Newman was gone, so I walked down again and they were in the garage with the hose water running (they told me they were trying to flood their garage) and they were teasing Newman with their cat. They said, "Well, we didn't take him in our house!" These boys are 6 and twin 5 year olds wandering around in what essentially is the wild. We have moose and bears here and I have never seen these kids with a parent. I was looking for friends for Brenden, but I am not sure these are the kind of friends I want him to have.

So, after being up all night, Doug threw up all day. They all decided it was a good way to attract fish.

Happy Birthday

Not that this is a normal blog entry, but my sister did not answer her phone today, but I know she checked my blog, so here it goes:

Happy Birthday, Em!  Love you.

Visitors!

August 6, Doug's mom, dad, and brother Greg came for a visit.  Our house was a disaster, so Doug went to pick them up at the airport while I frantically cleaned my house.  Later in the day, I took Brenden to register for kindergarten.  He is so excited and I am pretty excited too.  Full day kindergarten - woo hoo!  He will actually be in a K/1st class.  He is academically way ahead of most preschoolers.  If it weren't for his deafness causing a bit of a social delay, I think we might have had him tested to skip Kindergarten.  He can read just about anything you put in front of him and has such a great desire to know everything.  He is always full of questions.

August 7 we went to Seward for the Kenai Fjord Tour.  It is a 6 hour tour (although you can take a 9 hour tour, 6 was plenty) through, you guessed it, the Kenai Fjords.  A fjord is a water filled inlet carved by ice.  It was a GREAT day full of fun.

Nolan was ready to head out!

Greg and Nolan spotted fish before we even left the harbor - Swedish Fish.

The boys really liked seeing the boats in the harbor.

Safety First!  Greg is very cautious... (rolling eyes)

This is the blue water I mentioned before.  It is so blue from the silt run-off from the glaciers.  What you can't see in the picture is all of the seals on the rocks.

Harbor seals basking in the sun.  We saw LOTS of them swimming, fighting and hanging out.

The gigantic glacier.  We were able to see and hear it calf (when it shifts and breaks).

Glaciers are blue because of their thickness.  The ice absorbs most light and reflects the short wave length blue light.

Ethan, Greg, Grant, Brenden, Trudy, Nolan

They fished out a piece of the glacier from the ocean.  Here is Brenden checking it out.

Brenden and Greg have been the best of friends since Brenden was born.

Ethan was rather bored, so he spent his time crawling across the bow of the boat.  We were the first people on the boat, so we claimed the observation deck.

He wore out Grandma AND Grandpa.

Sea lions.

A school of porpoises came and "played" with the boat.  They swim along side and back and forth under the bow.  It was incredible and probably my favorite part of the trip.

We also saw some whales, but were rather unsuccessful at getting a good picture.  There were lots of birds, but I am not an avid bird watcher, so I didn't care about too much other than the puffins.

Could it get any more beautiful?

As I said, we were the first on the boat and claimed the observation deck.  For the next 20 minutes we were fighting off people trying to claim our seats as their own.  We were fed lunch, but the boys did not eat all of their carrots.  We saved them for later.  One older gentleman had been trying to invade our prime territory and Grant was doing a good job of spreading himself across the seats.  The man came and settled himself across the entire front of the observation deck and spread out all sorts of paperwork.  Then he really started making himself at home.  He ate the boys' carrots and then stole our seats, spreading himself and all of his stuff across our prime location.  Rude!

Our favorite quote of the day was from a lady watching some fishermen remove their catch from their boat.  She asked, "What kind of fish iz zat?"  The men told her it was halibut.  Her reply: "Zis iz ze first time I have seen ze halle-butt."  We repeated it for most of the week.