What do you say?

He drives me CRAZY!..................but you have to love him

We were on the plane back to anchorage when Ethan called me OUT. What you ask? Well I will let you know. As we were waiting to take off and the first hour in the air Ethan had ants in his pants. He wiggled, moaned whined, cried and told me he had to go potty when I had just taken him right before take-off. I had tried every diversion that I could think of; "look at the water outside" "lets sing a song" nothing worked but finally out of sheer frustration of him driving me absolutely crazy I finally said " if you don't knock it off right now I am going to tack you out of you seat pull your pants down and paddle your little rump!" ( I am good at idle threats I really never would have done it)
to which he replied "no I don't want you to I don't want everyone to see my rump."
"well" I said "then knock it off and just chill for a little bit"
Well about five minutes past while he kept himself entertained with one thing or another and then he did it he looked at me square in the face and plainly said.................."GO AHEAD DO IT AND SEE WHAT HAPPENS"

Elder Watt

I totally forgot to write about one of our stops while we were in Utah for a day. When we went to drop off the rental car that Daylon had brought from Seattle we stopped by Elder Watts house, a missionary that had served here in Alaska. It was so great to see him and meet his family. And the kids absolutely fell in love with his family.

Alaska Animals

After school one day we, with our German intern Chrissy that we absolutely adore, drove down the Seward Hwy to see the animals at the animal refuge. We have been there before but in the snow. we saw most of the animals that are native to Alaska. The moose were close enough to the fence to touch there fur and we also saw bears, musk ox, Sitka dear and lots more. The best part was on our way home we got to see beluga whales in the inlet (the one and only animal that I wanted to see before I left Alaska) and we saw mountain goats on the cliff too. I will say it again I don't like living here .................but there are the benefits.

First Day of First Grade

Braydon is back in school after 3 long months of vacation. He was so upset when school had ended. He loves going to Rilke Schule German School of Arts and Sciences and he does so well. He has gotten 6 Sprachmeisters already, that means he goes half the day only speaking in German (think about that.........going over 3 1/2 hours only speaking a foreign language). We are so proud of how well he did last year and hope he continues doing the same.

Space A, Jelly Bellys, San Fransisco and Plane Tickets

So everyone knows that I love hops (space available military planes) and all of the 9 time that I have flown everything goes good................well this time the plane we were suppose to fly back to Elmendorf on was too full of cargo to have any passengers hence no space available for us. "What do we do now" I decided to ask when the next flight to anywhere in Alaska was..........Sunday there was a flight, Wahoo!!!! However it was Thursday so we stayed at the USO on mats on the floor in case there was a change in flights and we could leave at a moments notice (let me tell you now fun stuff).

Now what do you do when you have your kids in a small terminal for 3 days with nothing to do? We checked out the things that there was to do in Fairfield California. It just so happens that the Jelly Belly Factory is there so we looked at the local bus system and with one bus change we were there. There was Jelly Belly art, Jelly Belly Motorcycles and we even ate a Jelly Belly shaped pizza. We even got some nasty Jelly Bellys that tasted like moldy cheese, pencil shavings, vomit, boogers, rotten eggs and skunk spray. Oh and let me tell you that is actually what they tasted like.

When we got back from the Jelly Belly Factory I went to one of the many computer monitors in the terminal only to find out that our flight was canceled. We did have to get home though so my mom went on the Internet and found us some cheap tickets to Anchorage Sunday evening. So Sunday morning we left for San Fransisco about one and a half hours away, unfortunately I also left my purse sitting on the bench outside of the terminal (but that is another story). When we arrived at SFO we stored our luggage at the USO and Daylon's Aunt Debbie picked us up and took us to Lindamar/Pacifica where she lives right up the street from the beech. Of course what did we do next but went to the beech and played in the COLD ocean. FUN FUN and you know the kids got absolutely soaked.

Finally after our very long vacation we got on the plane back to Anchorage. Ethan has only really ever flown on military planes and he didn't quite realize he actually had to stay in his car seat the entire time so he made the first 2 hours impossible!!!!! We landed safely and Jason was there to pick us up and take us home........and even though Alaska is NOT MY FAVORITE PLACE, I was happy to sleep in my bed and not a mat on the floor. I also still have faith in space A.

Independence Day

The 4th of July, Americas Birthday, Independence Day...........well on this day Ethan decided to have his own Independence Day. Yeah, leave it to Ethan. We were at the Sullivan Arena Parking lot in the back of Daylon's truck. We Had popcorn, soda, candy and 2 sleeping bags, nothing too out of the ordinary in preparation to watch fireworks. Anyway Braydon decided he was cold (remember we do live in Alaska people, and it was midnight) so he got into one of the bags. We continued to watch the firework display when Daylon told me look at Ethan. So I did.........and there he was standing there in his Birthday suit, well he did still have his Thomas the Tank Engine underpants on but if we didn't look in about 2 more seconds he would have had those off too. "I cold I want to get into the sleeping bag too." but I replied "why on earth do you have your clothes off?" and he answered "because I sleep nakey like you." (which I can assure you I Do Not, I have no idea where he got that from) So he got into the sleeping bag and continued to watch the fireworks pretty much O'Natural. And I let him..........getting him dressed right before we left. Needless to say being Ethan's mom I have learned to choose my battles!