What we did (and did not do) over Spring Break

We did not:
-board an airplane
-drive more than 20 minutes away
-go on vacation
-visit the Tulip Fields (this one I am sad about)

We did:
-do the typical weekly stuff (gym, laundry, walks, housecleaning, playdate with a friend) but not co-op
-visit an indoor sandbox on an overcast morning (brilliant!)
-have a pizza lunch with friends
-visit a coffee/pastry shop we have never been to before & run into two people we know (Etta's co-op teacher & a former co-op mom)
-visit a new-to-us playground in our neighborhood that had clean, unlocked bathrooms (a big score!)
-take a hike at Discovery Park on a gloriously sunny Saturday. Dig in the sand, watch a heron watch us, look at the boats, etc
-follow our Discovery Park adventure with burgers, milkshake and fish & chips at Red Mill Totem House
-swim for free in a local pool on Sunday (they were celebrating "April Pools Day"). Addie rode in a row-boat with a lifeguard and floated on a lifeguard rescue board. Etta did not want to do those activities, but she did want to sit in the firetruck parked outside (Addie however hid against us & played shy during that). Both girls really perked up in the pool once Myron, Lori & cousin Coen joined us. Hurray for splash time! And hurray for pools and pregnant bellies! To top it off, they were doing give-aways: Addie got goggles, Etta got a t-shirt that is like a dress on her & she loves it, Coen got a life-jacket!

Here she is folks

The newest member of our family...

for now I think we will call her Sienna. We have another girl we need to name.

Our Vibe (who I do miss) was white. I was not a fan of having a white car. When we knew we would need to purchase a van I said "any color but white". Oh famous last words! Our rental SUV was white & the van we bought was white. Ugh. Maybe we will be better about washing the Sienna then we were the Vibe?!

Of course there were other vans out there. If color was truly the most important criteria to me we would not have gotten this one. But there are so many factors: year, mileage, number of seats, wear & tear, warranty, features, brand. oh and price!

The van does not fit in our little Seattle driveway without blocking a significant portion of the curb. So she gets parked on the street. This makes me a little nervous because vans are a bit wide & what if someone was not being careful & smashed into her? So I try to always tuck in the driver side mirror (I can't park with the drivers side against the curb because I got ticketed for that on our street a few months back!). And I am very grateful for sliding doors that make door-dings less possible in the parking spaces that (even if not labeled compact) feel a little too compact for a van. Too bad my stomach is not compact. I will need to allow even more space on the driver side as this baby bump on mine continues to grow!

The good news about the van not fitting in our driveway is that now we are in no hurry to buy a new garage door. Our garage door is quite old & swings out. So when the Vibe was parked in the driveway we could not open the garage door to get strollers/bikes/etc out. So I had to plan ahead & park on the street, or move the car when I knew we needed bike access. Now I guess i could have just always parked on the street, but parking in the driveway felt more protected & safer.

So we miss the Vibe but are happily adjusting to the perks of owning a "swagger wagon"!

In case you were wondering...

The ultrasound this morning showed a very active baby girl!

Christ is Risen!

As evidence from the pictures in the previous post, we had a wonderfully sunny Easter spent with family. Here are a few pictures of the girls before church. We had a relaxed morning at home eating breakfast casserole, strawberries, and hot-cross buns that Matt made. We went to the 10:45 service but got there 20 minutes early since seats fill up fast! The girls brought flowers from our camellia bush at home to put in the flower-cross at church. (But we forgot to bring our camera to church to take pictures of it.) The kids also got to decorate the sidewalk with chalk during sunday school. Addie had fun with this, but her body and Easter outfit was quite messy so she had to change into her backup outfit before going to Kent. Etta had about 3 outfit changes that day to pee accidents so my tendency to over-pack means we did not have to resort to undies only. Although Etta would much prefer that most of the time (as evidenced in the first few pictures below).

 Their Easter baskets included a few candies such as Peeps, 

but mostly other small things like stickers, socks, cds, etc

This picture is actually from last week Sunday (Palm Sunday). 

I just wanted to document that they were both in polka-dots :)

A beautiful, glorious spring day!

Today sure is. Yesterday was too. I can't complain about Saturday either. I know that more rain will come but I sure am enjoying the sun! It is about 65 right now, and yesterday hit 70! We were in Kent for Easter at Matt's parents house. I had on sunglasses, short sleeves, a skirt, bare legs, I took off my shoes so my toes could enjoy the sun and I actually considered whether I should have sunblock on so I did not get pink (it does not take much sun to add pigment to this winter-white skin of mine!)

Hooray for the sun! And hooray for May who took some great pictures of our gathering - here are some:

 The kids needed some direction in finding all the eggs, but they will get lots of practice over the years :)

Matt gave wheelbarrow rides to the kids

 Addie wanted to play fire-fighter with the hose, and she got some helpers on her crew.

 The sweater did not stay on for long, it was actually warm enough to simply wear a cute spring dress!

Goodbye Vibe!

Within the next couple of days we will be signing over the title on our much-loved but very smashed up white Vibe. It was a really good, reliable car for us and we had hoped to keep it for years to come (even though it would have become our "back-up" car since a van will get used on a daily basis with 3 kids). But the cost of repairs on the damage are more than the Vibe is worth (so according to the insurance companies it was a "total loss"). So this morning I cleaned out all our personal belongings from it (gosh! a lot of stuff has piled up. and it was not exactly clean inside!) and handed the keys over to the dealer. They will be releasing it to the insurance company that we accepted the "settlement offer" from. I was able to get settlement offers from both our & the other drivers insurance companies and choose the best offer. So we will be getting a healthy check from insurance (plus the other drivers insurance is covering our rental car costs). And a mini-van will be joining our family very, very soon.

This is not the scenario we would have chosen. But (in spite of all the time-consuming phone calls to multiple insurance companies) it worked out really well. We were not hurt in the crash. We were surrounded by good Samaritans after the crash. The other driver did not dispute the fact that it was his fault. We are getting more money for the car through insurance (post-crash) then we would have been able to sell or trade it for (pre-crash). The rental is being paid for. We did not have to pay any sort of deductible. And we have our eye on a gently used van being sold here in Seattle. More details to come on that within the next few days.