The Noah: Seven

Yes, he gets a definite article before his name.  He's unmistakable!

The Noah turned 7 on St. Patrick's Day.  These pictures I took back in February are a pretty good impression of him.

Once upon a time we nicknamed him the Loud Lemon.  It's appropriate.  He's so expressive and wears his emotions on his face all the time.

The Noah is 7 and moving up to the second grade has been good for him.  His report card last week showed him at grade level for second grade and he really enjoys this teacher as well.  It's the same teacher Cory had for second grade.  He still misses his first grade teacher and friends though.  He's so outgoing he had made plenty in just the 4 months he was in that class.

Fun story, I've really had more time to consistently volunteer this year now that the girls are in preschool and last week when I showed up they were talking about Alaska and glaciers.  So I was able to pull up this blog post about our trip last summer and Noah was the star of all the photos while I explained to his classmates about the glacier and how it worked.

Nana and Papa brought him a scooter for his birthday.  He was immediately trying to pop wheelies with it.  And then rode through the mud puddles.  This one loves the outdoors and doing all the things.  He played soccer last fall for the first time and was one of the more aggressive kids on the team.  It helped of course that he was almost a head taller than most of the rest of his team and a lot of kids on the other teams too!

With Cory being three years older he often feels like he doesn't get to do the same things because he is younger.  It's hard to wait when you want to try all the cool things that your older brother gets to do.  So in a few things he gets to do things early (like skiing!), but other things he has to wait.  It's hard being the middle child.  I'm hoping to get a weekend with just he and I in a month when Cory goes to a camp and the girls go with my parents.

Noah's good buddy from school last year and Awana came for his birthday dinner.  Noah couldn't open the box with his present in it... so he tried to use his teeth.  He was successful.

More nerf bullets for his Zombie nerf gun.  Boys!

The saying on his shirt is rather appropriate, "Wild is my middle name" courtesy of our trip to Alaska last summer.  And the birthday boy requested ice cream sundaes for dessert rather than cake.  We are nothing if not unconventional in our family!

Overall Noah is a caring and compassionate boy.  He hates it when anyone is sad or hurt in a movie and cries for them.  He's old enough to understand a little of what's going on in the world and cares about the people we hear about on the news in the car.

I love you Noah!  Never lose your love for people and you'll go far in life!

Wordless Wednesday: Bubbles

Because Grandma brought these giant bubble wands at spring break!

Saddle Rock Adventures

Nana took the sisters for a couple of days so I took Noah on a hike I knew they wouldn't be able to do. We had a blast and my little five year old would have beat me to the top if I let him!

View near the bottom. That's where we're going!

 

We saw all kinds of nature on the way. A spider that wanted to hide under my shoe in the shadow. This snake crossing the trail. Noah touched it. Then a very large black beetle. And finally a large flying ant thing that was walking and carrying a caterpillar pupae that was bigger than it was!

We also learned all about erosion as the trail has a crevasse in it most of the way.
 

We climbed all the way to the top and sat on the right part of the saddle for our snack.

Top of the world! The view is so worth it! 

This is my valley!

On the way down we were in a bit of a hurry so guess who fell? The mom, and banged up her knee.
 

The flowers were still gorgeous, but they're getting to the end of their spring run. Pretty soon everything will be dry and brown again.

One of the highlights, we had to stop and use the crooked potty of course!

It's so different just having one child and this one needs his mom time, poor middle child. But we had an awesome hike!

Then off to Lowe's to have a kitchen cabinet consultation... overwhelming!

Wordless Wednesday: Mama's Boy

Noah picked me flowers out of the yard!

Five on St. Patrick's Day!

It's kind of hard for me to believe you're "only" five, my Noah boy. You take after your big brother so much and do most of the things that he does it seems you should be so much older.  In some ways I guess that probably makes you pretty mature for your age.

You are such a great big brother to your little sisters too.  You've spent so much time with them, you know their ins and outs just as well as I do.  Fortunately or unfortunately you have become my middle child.  I hope it serves you well in life. 

You really are still my happy go lucky little guy.  Not much gets you down unless it's someone being unkind.  You're sensitive to the people around you and I really appreciate that.  You want to be friends and friendly with everyone.  That skill will take you far in life!

And I really shouldn't say little.  You might break that 4' barrier this summer to go on the big water slides all by yourself.  And I'm certain you will if allowed!  It's a bit hard to snuggle you ON my lap anymore at 50+ pounds!

I suppose it's highly appropriate that you are my only blondie, being born on St. Patrick's Day.  You even had red hair when you were born although it turned blond within the year.

You are my ninja warrior and so creative.  You wanted me to take this picture of your sword in the dark and it turned out awesome!

Happy Birthday little man, I hope you know that even if you're sometimes stuck in the middle I love you just as much!

Wordless Wednesday: Salmon Festival

My mom usually just takes the boys to the Salmon Festival, but this year due to scheduling conflicts we met here there.

After watching the Reptile Man's show the boys wanted to pet/hold the animals.  Noah has a boa constrictor above and below the alligator is petting Cory's head.

There really wasn't that much that the girls could do, they mostly rode in the stroller, but I thought they might like the costumes.

For the .3 seconds they would keep each one on I managed to get a picture of Joy in this flower costume.  Next year baby girls!

Where's The Zoo?

My mom wanted to take the kids to the zoo so in the midst of all the crazy busy that is this summer we made a one night trip to Seattle to go to the Woodland Park Zoo.

After a few minor mishaps in the morning we finally made it to the zoo about noon, the sun was shining, but it wasn't too hot, a perfect day for seeing all the animals!

First stop, penguins.  They were totally interacting with the people standing by the window, super fun!  You can see the double bumps of the red stroller, that's the girls watching too.

Poison arrow dart frogs in the tropical building

Toucans making this crazy loud noise by rubbing their beaks on the branches.

Lots of different kinds of monkeys and monkey related creatures.

Even a human one!

We somehow managed to hit quite a few of the exhibits right as they were feeding the animals.  I guess the afternoon wasn't such a bad time to go.  This guy went crazy running and swinging around his pen.  His tail is seriously bigger than he is.

To the temperate forest zone with flamingos (I'd sure love to be able to sleep balanced on one leg!) the most adorable red panda and then the Cheetah!

Noah was super excited because he was wearing his cheetah shirt.  The cheetah was resting in the grass and actually had his head up for awhile, but I was holding up a girl to see and when I finally went back to take a picture he'd laid down.  Oh well.

My double turtle boys.  Cory was wearing his Ninja Turtles shirt and wanted to show that he was a turtle too.

The last time we went to the zoo Cory was not quite three, it was raining, and NONE of the animals were out.  This time, we saw them all and I'm actually not sure if I've ever seen a hippo before in real life.  We heard that the keeper was going to put food out, then he did, and then they let the hippo out to eat.  He was huge.

All my kiddos at the zoo!

And then randomly Joy decided she was going to eat the hippo so here she's going "nom nom nom" I guess maybe because we'd just been watching the hippo eat?  Too funny.  These girls have a LOT of personality!

My favorite part of the day was watching the giraffes.  They were trying to separate out two of them to move across to a feeding area, which I didn't realize and perhaps could have gotten better photos, but as we stood here and watched, the mom and baby pair started playing or fighting and running/cantering around in their pen.  It was the coolest thing to watch!  (But also a little sad since they were basically running in circles.  I hope at times they get to go free out in the big pasture area where the hippo and zebras were.)

On to see the elephants who were also lined up at the gate waiting to be fed.  The keepers came out and "planted" bamboo shoots and such in the ground, towards the area where we were standing so the elephant would come closer to where you could see him.

The girls have an "elephant song" that they sing and at the end you call the elephants.  They were having fun doing that here!

Face to face with one of the monkeys in an exhibit!

Wait, who are the monkeys here???

Our last stop was the komodo dragon, who wasn't very interesting being half asleep.  But next door were the meerkats.  They were all piled in a heap when we walked up to the window with one in the corner standing watch.  Suddenly they all started to wake up and crawl all over each other and then were looking up.  Cory looked up as far as he could from his angle and said there was a bird walking around on the top of their enclosure that had gotten their attention.

What you lookin' at?!!!

All in all I think it was the best trip I've ever had to a zoo!  We all survived and now we have some down time at home with friends coming to visit and swimming lessons for the next few weeks!