Birch Bay Kite Festival

 Today was the Birch Bay Kite Festival and of course we HAD to go! There were kites everywhere--some pretty cool ones, too! So it was the perfect time to get out the two new kites the Easter Bunny brought last Spring!

 Dutch has an R2D2 kite and is new to this whole experience. He wanted to hold the kite handle all by himself AND chase after his kite's sparkly blue streamers. This was a confusing situation for a three year old.

 

 

 Clem, on the other hand, knew exactly how to do this. She had a new Ninja Turtle Kite that soared the whole time.
(We started out in a fenced grassy area so that Dutch could run to his heart's content--see earlier post.)

 Then we crossed the street to see the other kites. There were all kinds! It was pretty incredible.

 My kids (and Cathy) had had enough kites so we checked out the beach while the big guys sat this part out.

 Minnows! Crabs! Sea Grass!

 

And Dutchy's favorite: mud.

Holy Berries!

 Last weekend, I had a crazy hankering for fresh strawberry short cake. We found out that our favorite (and top secret) u-pick berry spot was also nearly done with their strawberry season, so off we went, with Jim and Cathy in tow, too!

 There were beautiful berries as far as the eye could see and it didn't take long to fill up FOUR of our buckets!

 If you know Dutchy, then you know how much-y he can be. As soon as his feet touch the ground, this kid takes off. Cam and I devised a Dutchy containment plan: Cam would be at one end of a row and I would pick at another. Dutch could be between us and do his thing. For a while this worked and boy, did we feel clever. And then we were out-clevered when Dutch found a break in the row and he took off, running away so fast that he lost one of his sandals along his escape route.

 A search party quickly spread out through the fields and the lost sandal was found.
(Side story--whenever we drive through farm land-which around he is pretty much everyday-I gawk at the neat rows of beautiful crops. The symmetry gets to me and feels me with joy. When I expressed this to Cameron, he said "You love it because the lines of crops are like nature's excel spreadsheets." What I'm saying is: this man GETS me.)

We went home that night with MORE than enough berries for shortcake. We ended up with 10 pounds of berries! I made shortcake, gave a big bunch to Cathy and Jim to take home, made a big batch of jam AND we STILL have berries in the freezer.

Balance

 Every weekend, we strive to find Balance--the balance between what we *have* to do and what we *want* to do. Also, the balance between what each of the littles love--finding time to balance the quality time between each of them has proven tricky with their age difference.

 But I think we nailed it this weekend. On Saturday, we hit up the Whatcom Co. Safety Fair, knowing there would be a helicopter there (which just screams Dutchy!) to explore, but also lots of other equipment to learn and explore (hellooooo! Clementine!).

 We missed the landing of the helicopter but our kids didn't mind. They both checked out the cockpit for a while before we went off to explore a bit more.

 Out of all the other things to explore, Clem said that the "smoking house on fire" where you had to "escape" from the second floor down a ladder was her all time favorite.

 We explored most of the other exhibits, too, where folks tried in earnest to teach my rugrats about safety. Dutch wanted to hear none of it. In reality, he was biding his time to get back to the "hello-copter." And Clem wanted to "escape" down the ladder a few more times.

 Later, we hit up the Scottish Highland Games to check out the men in kilts. (And inexplicably, camels.)

 While Clem got her face painted,

 Dutchy was checking out North American Predator's display (also, inexplicable--isn't this the SCOTTISH Highland Games???)

Somehow we nailed it this weekend. My house is (mostly) clean, all the laundry has been washed. Groceries got. Babies happy. Perfect Balance.

Sundays in the Park

Woodworking

 My favorite girl has found her calling! In Woodwork! My new/awesome teammate (pictured behind Clem in the second picture) runs an after school club for kiddos interested in wood working. Clem LOVES it, of course. She gets to sand...

 Drill....

 And saw (oops! Too big a saw for this project!)

...and saw to her heart's content! Perfect extracurricular for our little tinkerer.

Mother's Day 2015

 Mother's Day 2015 was practically perfect in every way. The sun was shining. I got to sleep in (all the way till 7:15!). The Hubs made me my favorite breakfast. The kids were (mostly) on best behavior. And I got a FitBit!

Halfway through the day, Clem and Cam had an urgent errand to run (spoiler alert: they brought me flowers!) so Dutchy and I grabbed coffee and then kicked back in our yard to blow some bubbles.

But for some reason, even with a backyard FULL (literally) of outside toys, Dutch was most interested in the mechanics of the patio umbrella.

 Later that afternoon, we took a family walk at Tennant Lake. If you have been  here before, you know that we really took a risk taking this rowdy 2  year old with us. The board walk is un-railing-ed almost the whole way. We told Dutch that he had to hold on to SOMEONE'S hand during the walk. He begrudgingly chose Clementine (although you can see him trying to pull away in lots of these pictures. Our girl is relentless!)

 In the distance, we could hear bullfrogs, woodpeckers, crickets and trains. Dutch called back what he could hear.

Our crew made it just over a mile when, like most of our outings, Cam ended up having to carry a crying child back to the car.
Still! I had a wonderful day with three of the humans I love most in the world!