We have been married for 15 years!

Today is our anniversary.  Can you believe we have been married for 15 years?  Where did the time go, and when did we get so old?  So here are fifteen things I love about you, Ty:

15.  I love that you have an opinion about how to decorate the house.  And I love that it is always a good one.

14.  I love that your shirts in the closet are color coordinated.  You are so organized.  I really did marry the right guy.

13.  Ooh, I really love that your fingernails are always trimmed.  And you never smell bad.  You really always smell lovely.  

12.  I love what a great cook you are.

11.  I love how clean you are.  I never need to clean up after you.

10.  I love how creative you are.  I love that I can tell you what I need made from some wood and you can make it. (ie,  book shelves, craft table, benches)

9.  I so love that you clean all the toilets in the house on Mother's Day and on my Birthday!

8.  I love that you love my big, loud family so much.  There are so many LeeMasters, and yet you keep taking me home.

7.  I love that you want to come home at night and be with me.

6.  I love how you can always calm me down when I am angry.  You make things seem so small  when I have made them into a mountain.

5.   I love how funny you are with the kids.  You always make them laugh.

4.  I love your sense of adventure.  You are not afraid of change, or of eating snails.  eeew!

3.  I love that you take care of us.  You go to work everyday and work hard.  Thank you.

2.  I love what a great dad you are to the kids.  They can't wait until you come home at night. 

1.  I love that you love me so much.  And I love you.

Last Day of School

Maren graduated from Kindergarten this year.  She will be going all day next year.  She is very excited. ( I am not.  I will miss her.)  Sam is headed to 3rd grade.  They both loved school,  and they survived their first year at a charter school.

Baby Foxes

Sam and Maren
Mama with her babies
Mama fox
Fox prints

My friend called a few weeks ago and said she had baby foxes living on her property.  We drove right over and watched these cute things for two hours.  We skipped homework and had to order pizza that night because we were too busy watching these cute babies.

One with Nature!

1. Maren and I were supposed to meet Sam at the Denver Botanical Garden for his class field trip.  We waited and waited and could not find his class.  Come to find out, there are two DBG's.  Who knew?  Obviously, I did not know.  So we had a great time just the two of us. 
   

Maren loved the tulips.
I was able to buy some caterpillars online.  They grew into chrysalis's and then changed into butterflies.  Here are the kids holding the butterflies that we hatched ourselves at home.
I did not know that you are not supposed to touch the wings of a butterfly.  They have a special coating on their wings that can rub off when touched.  Oops!

Dammit!

So last night I was helping Sam with his homework.  He got frustrated about a spelling word and blurted out "dammit"!  I turned to him while stifling a giggle, and said "Son,  you did not hear that from me.  Who taught you that?"  And he sheepishly said, "well, dad says that when he is mad."  So for the record, I am not the one teaching my kids potty words.  Their dad is.  ( although, I am the one that taught their dad)

Amazing Piano and Cello performance

So my brother sent me this link.  Take a listen.  It really is incredible.  These are two of my very favorite songs right now.  Viva la Vida by Coldplay is Sam's all time favorite.  He jams to it every time he hears it.  

Crazy SNOW!

It has been snowing like craaazy here for the last two days.  We had a church meeting on Friday night; cancelled.  Saturday morning; cancelled.  Saturday afternoon and evening (for Stake Conf); hopefully cancelled.  We can't even get out of the neighborhood.  Crazy spring weather.  We have about 2 1/2 feet in our yard.  The bottom picture of the tree is our pear tree.  The snow is so heavy on it.  One branch already broke before we could get out there to shake the snow off.

btw, Happy Birthday Ali!

Easter Day vs. Kwanza

We had a great Easter day.  The kids had matching outfits even.  I don't know how long they will let me dress them alike, but for now I'm going to have at it.  We asked the kids what the meaning of Easter is.  We had this great conversation about Easter and Jesus and what the meaning of it all is.  So then Sam says, "Well if that is the meaning of Easter, what is the meaning of Kwanza?"  I've been asking myself that question for years, son.

Happy Easter!

Lost Time

I feel like I need to make up for lost time.  We haven't blogged in so long.  Now that I am on a roll I can't seem to stop.  It is great to be a mom of these sweet kids.  I love my job.  Sam is almost eight and Maren is almost six.  I cannot believe how fast the time goes.  I never thought two lovely kids would be all the Lord would send.  But I can't imagine my life without them.  I thank God every day that I have this little family of mine.

the new MAC

Here she is, the new MAC.  Isn't she lovely?  Tyler insisted on this big of a monitor.  I myself, thought it was a bit large.  But what do I know?  This is the loft that used to be the kids art center.  When we redid the toy room, the loft became the "office".

Maren's artwork

Maren's artwork got chosen to be displayed at the Parker Adventist Hospital.  She is thirlled.  Here are some of her favorites, including the one on display at the hospital (Tyler is holding her )

I found my photos!

I was able to figure it out! So MAC has these great tutorials to help old people like me figure out the new computer.  I figured out it was not me that was old, but my camera instead.   My memory card could only be read from a card reader, not our dinosaur of a camera that my mom dropped in Chicago.

Technically challenged

Ok, so I sat down to post a few pictures and I am totally challenged!  We just upgraded from a PC to a MAC and I can't find my photos!  I don't know where they go when I plug in my camera.  I know all you young folks are thinking,  "she can't find her photos?  is she that old?"  Yes, I am old. Until next time....

Stacey is taking over the blog!

So this was Tyler's blog, but clearly he needs four more hours to each day.   So I think I am going to take it over and try to update once in a while.  So here goes.....

"Kill Da Wabbit!"

Growing up, one of my favorite Bugs Bunny cartoons was the one where Elmer Fudd and Bugs spoof Wagner's opera Die Walkurie (or The Valkyrie for you non-Deutsch sprachers). Most of you have probably heard the most famous song from the opera, fittingly titled, "The Ride of the Valkyrie". (Francis Ford Coppola's also used it in Apocalypse Now during Colonel Kilgore's (Robert Duvall) helicopter attack; they play the song from their helicopters.) Bugs and Elmer adopt new lyrics for their version in which Elmer sings, "Kill da wabbit. Kill da wabbit...."

Some of you may know that we've had rabbit "issues" in our yard. Well, the other night our friends were over at our house and they had their Jack Russell Terrier with them. To make a long story short, the dog saw the rabbit and did exactly what Jack Russells are bred to do--dispatch rodents.

The whole thing did kind of whip everybody up into a frenzy, so to speak. And we certainly were not doing anything to stop the dog. But the whole time I just kept hearing Elmer sing, "Kill da wabbit...!"

Chicago

I finally convinced Stacey to join me on a business trip. Although, I can't really fault her; I suppose Chicago is much more fun than the bustling metropolises of Bismark or Boise. We went a couple of days early and had some fun in the Windy City. Here are a few of the things we did (or Stacey did while I was working).

• The Field Museum, we saw Sue--the most complete T-Rex ever discovered as well as some cool Pacific Northwest Indian totems.
• The Lego Store on Michigan Avenue--Full-sized Lego Vader/Darth Lego and R2D2
• The Hancock Tower
• Lake Michigan and Navy Pier
• Walking around the Inner Loop to see the Chicago Theater, Berghoff's (German restaurant where JoAnn liked the Wienerschnitzel much better than the Sushi I made her gag down the night before--ah, the LeeMaster adventuresome palate)
• The Chicago Art Institute (Van Gogh, Seurat, Wood, O'Keefe)
• Museum of Science and Industry
• Downtown (Chicago River, Wrigley Building, big chrome bull moose sculpture)
• Oak Brook--Frank Lloyd Wright house and studio and houses
  

Legos!

Sam really wanted to post a picture of his lego collection on the blog. So, here it is. He has a lot of fun with them and it is a great excuse for Dad to shop for and play with legos again. The flagship of the collection (pun completely intended) is the Black Pearl (on the far right). He also has an airport firetruck, a submarine and tiger shark (very cool) as well as a new police helicopter. And, of course, he has them arranged from smallest to largest--I wonder who he gets that from?

Minor Renovations

Another thing that has taken up a lot of time lately is re-doing some rooms--including changing things up to give each kid their own room. After several years of sharing a room, we figured it was time for each to have their own space. And it has worked like a charm for bedtime.

This is what we did.... We took all of the toys out of the old toy room. The old toy room turned into Maren's room. Of course, the old toy room needed some girl-ification. And, since we no longer had the huge closet in the old toy room we needed someplace to put all those toys in the new toy room.

Then we dismantled the old guest room and turned it into the new toy room. Stacey will also use this room for preschool when she teaches that this Fall. We also moved the art nook into the new toy room. (At some point, the old art nook, a.k.a. "loft" will become the 12 square feet of the house that is mine--well, at least until it is taken over by everyone else.)

Naturally, we couldn't just move stuff from the old toy room to the new toy room. This move required some shelves to organize bins (imagine that). So, I constructed a couple of shelves. They seem to have turned out okay and they certainly serve their function. I also got some new tools out of the deal. Not bad. Maybe I'll use the new tools to also make a door to my new 12 square feet of space so it remains mine.

Time for the Quarterly Update

It looks like it is about time for the quarterly update--seeing as the last update was in mid-February. So we are busy, what can I say. Here are a few things that have happened since...well, February.

Sam and Dad went to Moab to go jeeping with Grandpa Lee and Uncle Todd. We saw all kinds of cool things, like, Newspaper Rock (with hieroglyphics), the confluence of the Green and Colorado Rivers, lots of great rock formations--including Uranium Arch, and some great time in the Rubicon.

* * * * *

Sam made a sweet diorama of a habitat for a school project. Naturally, he chose the ocean for his habitat. He was particularly pleased with the cave for the octopus (in the lower left corner).

Maren graduated from pre-school. She is so excited for kindergarten.