Part 1 was all about sparklers and fireworks that didn’t make me fear for my children’s safety. Part 2 is where we moved on to enjoy some real fireworks courtesy of some of our neighbors.
I didn’t have my tripod so the results of my walk around the neighborhood may, at times, be a little blurry. Let’s call them artsy.
I love the starbursts that appeared in these photographs.
And that’s a wrap for Independence day 2013 – a day that my youngest child declared at one point to be THE BEST FUN EVER!
I grew up in a country where displays of fireworks were a special event and handled only by professionals. They were massive displays that lasted 45 minutes to an hour and were sometimes accompanied by a radio soundtrack – and ONLY on Australia day or New Years Eve. (I also grew up in a place where you couldn’t buy alcohol in grocery stores, but that’s another story).
I’ve lived in the States for 10 years and I still find it shocking that I can walk into a grocery store and spend $29.99 on a packet of fireworks that I am allowed to set off in my backyard. I’m sure others in our neighborhood cross the border into Washington State and spend way more than that. I won’t do that on principle – and also because I’m a big chicken with two little boys who love fireworks in a way that makes me fear for their safety.
Last year we were in Australia on July 4th, so it’s been two years since my boys have witnessed the light show. And what a difference two years makes. Thomas was 5 last time, timid and shy. Now he’s seven and wants to light the fireworks himself (we didn’t let him). Two years ago, Samuel was an oblivious three year old. We may have even sent him to bed before the real fireworks began. This year, he’s five and his excitement freaked me out just a little bit, but he was incredibly entertaining. The friends who joined us for the 4th of July get together have children the same age – a boy and a girl. Looking back through the photos, it’s clear that firework are very much a boy thing, although five year old girls enjoy sparklers.
I’m breaking this post into two parts because I took way too many photos (or maybe just the right amount). The size and intensity of fireworks grew over the evening.
We begin before the fireworks.
I have no idea what’s going on here…
Look how sweet she is… oh, a how I wish for a little girl (until puberty anyway).
Bring on the sparklers.
Our sparklers come with a declaration of “Wingardium Leviosa!” Although I’m sure that happens in every family…
This is Edie. She almost makes me want to get a dog… almost…Perhaps if we could clone her…
After the sparklers we moved into the alley behind our house and started with the louder stuff.
Right now, they have no idea what’s coming.
Samuel was unable to keep still from excitement. See? He’s levitating.
Three, two, one…LOUD!
And then the light show started.
We took a short break for S’mores…
And then kicked it up a (small) notch.
Impressive and exciting, but the most impressive fireworks came courtesy of our neighbors. I’ll share those tomorrow.
On the second (and last) day of our mini vacation to Mt Hood, we decided to hike the Salmon River trail. (You can read about our day one hike up to Mirror Lake here).
This hike came highly recommended as a great option for families with small children and it didn’t disappoint. The trail was mostly flat and free of treacherous drop offs, so the kids were able to run ahead until I felt the need to call them closer out of fear that they might dive into the frigid water. They’d return for about three minutes and then run off again. It gave me time to relax and enjoy the scenery and, of course, take a few photographs.
The walk itself can best be described as looking like a scene out of Jurassic Park with about a thousand different shades of green. A light rain was falling when we first first set out on our hike but the sun started to appear on the way back which changed the scene so much that I joked to Kei about walking it again just to retake the photos. OK, I was only half joking.
Recently, Samuel has been telling me that he sees a faces and objects in trees, clouds and other elements of nature. He told me this one looked like a face. Should I be worried?
But I’ll admit that I can see the monkey hanging from the tree in this one.
And then he made a face of his own in an apple…
We stopped for a quick snack.
After which the boys sang me a song in Japanese (I bribed them with my Luna Bar).
We then took a few minutes to skip some rocks. Kei took this next photo of me. It’s not the most flattering and shows my poor rock-skipping skills, but I suppose it’s proof that was there.
Side note to the people who left their trash in a fire pit (including an old pair of socks): NOT COOL. I can only assume you’re not Oregonian because an Oregonian would never do anything so thoughtless and disgusting. We carried out as much of the trash as we could but I am not your mother. Rant over.
Finally, after a little more exploring, we headed back to the car and then home to Portland.
We only left for two days, but it really felt like an escape and it was just what we needed.
This past weekend was beautiful in so many ways.
The only down side to all of this outdoor activity was the inevitable side effect of spring allergies. Kei looked at me last night and told me I looked all puffy. Nice.
So, while I would love to sit here and write a beautiful long essay about the weekend and all the fun we had, I’m afraid I am finding it difficult to pull my head out of this fog long enough to string more than a couple of sentences together.
Oh, and I took about 3 photos over the entire weekend. I was too busy up to my elbows in fertilizer to risk pulling out the camera. So, instead, I’ll share a couple more photos from my downtown adventure with the boys last week.
Photographs taken in the Pearl Room at Powell’s City of Books.
Our Spring Break is off to a rocky start. What started out as a nice, sunny morning, quickly became a scary situation when Kei was taken by ambulance to the hospital after suffering an allergic reaction to some medication. He’s OK now, but I was very worried. The up side? The kids were with him and experienced their first (and hopefully last) ride in an ambulance. Thomas said it was cool, even if they didn’t turn on the siren.
Side note: It hurts a little that, in an effort to save money I arranged a series of childcare swaps with friends rather than sign the kids up for day camps. It was a fantastic plan (and still is) but, sadly, it looks like that money will be spent on medical bills instead. Don’t get me wrong, the ambulance ride was absolutely necessary in this instance. I just wish it didn’t drain our bank account.
Let’s change the subject, shall we?
I was looking through my photos from the past few weeks and realized that apart from the red couch pics, I hadn’t shared the rest of our photos from our recent visit to OMSI. While I used to take Thomas to the science museum a lot when he was a toddler – they have a baby playroom – I realized I hadn’t taken them to check out the museum since they have been old enough to really enjoy and understand it. A school holiday seemed like the perfect opportunity.
After my kids asked me what this is…
…we made a stop in the ball room where the they had to build tubes and then use forced air to move balls through the tubes. Samuel showed me around.
And, honestly, I think they were a little delusional with this sign.
We then wandered around learning about balance and earthquakes and all things physics. I may have even learned a thing or two.
This was so much fun – paper, a pen and a pendulum. think we made about six of these drawings.
Sadly the boys wouldn’t let me take any pictures of these with their static electricity hair, but this was the next best thing.
We built perfectly balanced arches…
Played with some puppets…
and looked for fossils.
We even sorted some recycling, although Thomas looks a little perplexed by this potato.
It was a great day – so much so that we stayed for about five hours and were forced to eat in the OMSI cafeteria. I have to say, though, that the food was actually very good. I’ve eaten in a lot of museum cafeterias and was incredibly impressed by the quality and the reasonable prices. I’m tempted to go back even without a museum ticket.
I’ve determined that 7 and almost 5 are great ages for OMSI. At this age, the boys have just enough curiosity that they’re not easily jaded by things like electricity and, well, puppets. I think we’ll go back agan soon although I think a trip to the Planetarium might be on the cards. I think the boys would really enjoy it and, to be honest, I might too.
For me, Valentine’s Day isn’t about love and flowers and chocolates (although I unexpectedly received some chocolates this year). o, for a mother of two school-age children who happens to live in America, Valentine’s Day is about making a last-minute stop at the store to buy packs of Valentines that are really just cleverly disguised advertisements for superhero merchandise. It’s about making your children write their name and, for Thomas someone else’s name, on 25-27 valentines over three evenings because that is just too many to do in one night after school. It’s about the crazy mess that is distributing said valentines to individual envelopes at 8am when you’ve already missed the first school bell. I also carpool so add one more child to the mix and that’s at least 75 valentine cards to be distributed before 8:30am.
Somewhere, St. Valentine is sitting up in the clouds and laughing at the chaos he created. It’s enough for me to come up with a Bah Humbug! alternative for this very special, most romantic, day of the year.
Still, this year did bring a couple of unexpectedly sweet Valentine moments thanks to a couple of boys who now have the ability to write and who have way more sentimentality than their mother.
Like this little surprise message from Samuel. Who says you can’t say it on a post-it note?
And he was kind enough to give me really long legs.
Thomas wrote a very special Valentine for his crush. Translation: To Sabrina. From Thomas. 2013.
It came complete with a photograph of himself, of course. I love that he calls out the day and date of their last playtime.
And then finished off with a heart.
Both boys have been working on letter writing at school so I also want to share a couple of special notes that we’ve received over the last few days.
From “your friend” Samuel. I’m particularly impressed by the hiragana.
And this one from “your son” Thomas.
Receiving letters from my boys may be my new favorite thing, but I don’t need them with a side of candy hearts.
This year we got it right – arrived just as the sun was setting and the gates opened, boarded the second train with almost no wait and brought our own (delicious) Hot Chocolate and snacks, and dressed appropriately for the below-freezing temperatures. The skies were clear and the air was icy but the kids did not complain once about the cold. The perfect sendoff to 2012.
Christmas is a wrap (pun intended). I stuck with my tradition of taking almost no photos on the day itself. But don’t fear, we have plenty of advent activities from the past week or so to catch up on and I took one photo of my prime rib masterpiece.
On to the photo dump.
Not family-related but worth noting that we did see a little snowfall the week before Christmas. This is the view from my office where I watched the flakes fall from the fourth floor before they melted as soon as they hit the ground. It’s important to note that my kids were at an outdoor wilderness-type camp during the “snowstorm”.
I took a couple of days off before Christmas weekend. The boys and I used this time to catch up on some advent calendar activities like roasting marshmallows over an open fire flame. When Samuel saw this photo he asked if I took one when he burned his hand. And, no, I did not. (note: he burned it on the skewer as he tried to get the marshmallow off. Not as bad as it sounds but we may go a different route with marshmallow roasting next year).
Then it was gingerbread cookie time! A festive mixture of snowmen, Christmas trees and ninjas. I found some good old fashioned Golden Syrup which made them taste delicious, even if they were as hard as a rock. I had to mix everything by hand because I don’t own a mixer and apparently that makes a difference. Still, fun was had by all and my biceps got a good workout.
On Friday I braved the indoor playground where the kids played for three whole hours and I read a book (!).
Saturday was kid’s choice so we went bowling at our local, low budget bowling alley.
I didn’t notice the stains on the ceiling until I downloaded the photos. Still, I’ll sacrifice fancy for $1 games.
And, when you bowl with a four year old, you definitely get your money’s worth. It took many minutes for his ball to reach the pins.
Sunday saw us gather with friends for the annual Christmas sing-a-long where my children refused to sing.
Through it all, Hapi the Elf hung around the house and kept an eye on things. I may have used him as a threat once or twice (Hapi will tell Santa!) and I may have even threatened to cancel christmas. What can I say? Being a shut-in parent in rainy Portland can sometimes make you resort to the unthinkable.
Christmas Eve brought a break from the rain and, with it, a chance to get out of the house. We decided on a stroll through a nature park.
That evening, we got things ready for Santa and the reindeer.
Some reindeer food which we left in the backyard.
And, of course, gingerbread cookies and a nice cold beer for Santa.
The boys woke up at 5:30 (!) on Christmas morning. Our rule was no getting up before 6am so they (im)patiently paced the floor of their bedrooms until the clock ticked over. And then the fun began. Every single present was opened before the first sign of daylight.
And then we spent the rest of the day playing, reading and napping (for Kei and Samuel) before I cooked the most magnificent prime rib you have ever seen (or tasted) in your life. Think I’m joking?
Yup.
After we put the kids to bed, I lay down on the couch to watch some TV and… fell asleep by 9:30pm, feeling incredibly happy and blessed. The perfect end to a pretty perfect day.
Today, I am officially back at work. Sure, it’s an anticlimax after the events of the past few weeks, but I do have a girl’s trip to see Les Miserables and an evening of Karaoke to look forward to before the New Year so it’s not all bad. I also have about 8 new photo books to read thanks to some very generous family members. That should keep me busy between the two work emails that I expect to receive all day.
Let the post-Christmas fun continue…
The weather outside was frightful, but that didn’t deter the Ishidas from embarking on a Christmas Light viewing on Peacock Lane last week. And when I say frighful, I mean torrential downpours and winds that threatened to suck the lights away like a scene out of The Wizard of Oz.
The upside? Very few people to navigate, a quick visit and we crossed one more activity off the advent calendar. In fact, it was pretty perfect.
Photos limited to what I could manage while balancing an umbrella on my shoulder.
Carolling Pirates
Tonight we begin the countdown to Santa. I have two kids who are way more excited to go to bed than usual but first we need to mix the reindeer food and set out the home-made gingerbread cookies and the not-homemade beer. The beer is there to make sure Santa knows he’s in a part-Aussie house. Besides, I think I’d be looking forward to a nice cold beer after many, many glasses of Milk.
Our version of a Christmas card because…I am far too lazy and disorganized to send out printed cards… *cough* it’s better for the environment.
Nicole Ishida Photography 