Happy 5th Birthday ! Happy Birthday to You!!

Oh, Aiden, you are so special. From your wonderful never-ending sense of humor, to your awesome athletics, you are so special. From your protection you always offer your sister when you put your arm around her and lead her to a new game, you are so special. From your amazing trust and willinginess to try anything new (Last night you tried octopus and ate the whole chewy leg without even a grimace). I love the way you throw a frisbee, cast a fishing pole, kick a ball, ride a bike, climb the playground, you are so special. From your total love of dogs and all animals for that matter, you are so special. You always give us a helping hand, and work so hard at the jobs that need to be accomplished, you are so special.

Happy 5th Birthday Aiden Winston, we love you and are so lucky that you picked us.

Love,

Dad and Mom

More boating pictures...

Sweet Maia. She is the coolest girl I know.

Boat full of kiddos, and my friend Elizabeth.

Wake Surfing...so proud.

About a week ago our friends, the Pillings, invited us to go out their boat. After watching the other guys do some "wake" surfing behind the boat, Randy jumped in and by his third attempt he was wake surfing. Our kids begged to go in the water, and not wanting to take time away from the other adults who wanted to surf, we kept telling them next time, next time. But, by the end of the trip, both Aiden and Maia continued to beg to out in the chilly water. So, graciously, Brad (our friends friend) offered to take the kids out. PIctures of Maia to follow, but here are a few of Aiden. We were so proud.

Oops.

Just for the record...

I passed my driving test. We are official Idahoans. Yes!

Have you checked out the Carol Decker Story yet...please read below.

Found a really good goodwill down the road, yahoo! So good. Thats good. Really good.

Idaho Drivers test

Randy passed. I failed...how embarrsing.

Saturday

7:15am woke up to Maia saying, "I hungy mom, come out famie room"
8am amazing egg, potatoe breaksfast cooked by chef randy.
9am walked over to our neighbor/new friends house for a garage sale; sold a few items, but mostly had a really good time talking. They have one boy turning 5 and one girl turning 4 and one little baby boy. Really nice family.
12pm ate pizza, salad and ice water; side of guac and chips, again made by Randy.
12:45pm Maia goes down for nap, Aiden and Randy to haircuts, Danielle decides to follow Maia's lead and lays down to nap for 2 long hours. Heavenly.
3:30 play outside, ate grapes, killed some spiders
5pm decided to venture into Downtown Boise for dinner
6pm arrive in Hyde park, eat yummy warm pastrimi and spicy chicken sandwhiches, raspberry lemonade, sit on patio, listen to blues music and enjoy the very old, very large trees.
7pm walk two blocks, get old fashioned icecream bars and jelly beans.
8pm drive back to our cute house while kids throw sugar-meltdown fits in the car.
8:30pm kids in bed, ahhhhhh.
9pm write my day down on blog.

All is all, a really nice day.

Carol Decker

I heard of the family below through an amazing blog called Design Mom. Please, I urge you to check out Carol Decker's story. It hits very close to home. Click on "Carol Decker." True story.

Want to feel even more internet hugs and kisses? Help out another family in need — picture going into an emergency c-section, developing an infection which requires having both legs and one arm amputated. Then. Losing your sight. That's what's happening to Carol Decker right this minute.

5 fun facts about Idaho

1. no helmet law
2. hobo spiders are big and scary
3. amazing breezes and cool mornings
4. I love Fred Meyers. Yes, this is a fact.
5. Tons of kids and tons of old people. Tons.

Brown Widow

Yesterday, as me and Randy were organizing outdoor patio items for our move, I happened to flip over a wood table and underneath I spied three very round spider egg sacs...very different egg sac then I have ever seen before; very round, white with protrusions all over. Tucked back in the corner I saw the Mama spider, huddled and hiding. Deciding to spare all this hard work I left the eggs and spider alone, deciding that I would leave the table in San Clemente. Today, as Randy was picking up our patio chairs he came across the same spiders (2 adults) and 6 more egg sacs and decided to call me down to take a viewing of the adults. Sure enough, they had identical bodies to a common Black Widow, but were speckled tan, white and brown with orange hour-glass shapes on their abdomnen. I thought, surely, they are just langushing and their color fading. Our curiousty got to both of us and we decided to turn to our dear friend, laptop. With just a few minutes of research we discovered that these spiders are a species of the Widow family (over 30 species) and they are very rare to the Los Angeles area. Orignally from Africa, moved to the tropics, scientist speculate that the brown widow arrived through imports and settled in the area. Only 3000 have been found in California!! The Brown widow is less aggressive then the very aggressive Black widow ( I and Maia can attest to this), but the venom is twice as strong!! Yikes, to think my fingers were mere inches away from the adult. Randy disposed of 1 adult, and 7 of the egg sacs. But feeling pity for them we saved two adults and 2 eggsacs. Creepy!!