Our little guy . . .

Tyson Julius Hamon

born Friday, March 13, 2009

10 pounds 12 oz - 20 inchesWe named him Tyson because we liked the name Ty, and while looking up different variations on this, we found that Tyson means "son of Dennis", if you can believe it. We got a little chuckle out of that. Julius is in honor of our friend and worker, Julie.

Dad and he look quite alike - note the furrowed brow on Tyson - Dad has an identical wrinkle, although he has nothing to frown about in this picture, so you don't see it...
The girls meet their brother...
Taylor holds Tyson for the first time...
Emilie....

Kimberly....

Daddy took good care of him...Tyson meets Isabella, Paul & Amy's oldest daughter...

Best entertainment around...

We had this little insert for the car seat to keep him snug, but he was so big he didn't fit. I had a good laugh at this...the car seat itself is snug.

Coming in the house for the first time...

Several someones to watch over him...

Happy Birthday Kimberly & Emilie!!!

Kimberly & Emilie blow out their candles. 9 for Kimi & 7 for Emi.

Happy Birthday, girls!

growling girls

As Dennis walked by the girls room, he heard them growling at each other and started loudly singing "love is the kingdom's banner...." and then made up some other words as to how they should treat each other. Then it was back to the garage for him to help another stubborn child with her science homework. Fun night for him....not. But I am sitting here enjoying two things. One, my husband is good at making up funny songs and sayings to snap kids out of the funks they can get in, and two, he is a good dad for caring enough to pay attention to fighting kids and help a tired, uncooperative kid with her homework.
A fun night for me as I sit here listening to him make up funny things to say to the kids. I'm laughing as silently as I can.

a post at last.....

I haven't posted in a while, so here are a few things we've done in the past several months . . . .

We spent New Year's with some of our favorite people in Wenatchee. Dennis bought these cool lanterns for the kids to light and send into the sky. Really it was quite a flame, so the parents ended up lighting all of them, with minimal help from the kids. They were pretty fragile, but fun and magical for them.

Another picture from our time in Wenatchee - Taylor's practicing up - lucky for me, she is good with babies and likes them. I think I will assign them each two days a week when they get to be the "helper", otherwise I am going to have to listen to quite a bit of bickering over who gets to choose the outfit, who gets to sit next to the baby in the car, etc. At least until the novelty wears off.....

They all entered a touch Kumite tournament - this is where they fight, but not with fist - to score a point, you have to touch your opponent with your hand or foot. At their level, the first person to score three points wins the match. Taylor and Emilie both won 3rd place in their age group, and Kimberly, who is actually pretty talented at Kumite (fighting), went up against a red belt (3 levels above her) and a very good fighter, so lost her match, 2 to 3, but she did a good job and tried her best!

Tuckered out on the way home from New Year's - although I think the one smiling is faking sleep. Really, fine with me, as long as it's quiet!!!!

Taking our sweet nieces and daughters to the Science Center in January.

Some other things of note from the last couple of months:

Our brother-in-law, Paul, died in November. His girls are pictured above at the Science Center. It's been very difficult to see them go through the loss of their dad, and hard for all of us as we loved Paul very much. He was a caring father, and a good brother and friend to Dennis & I. His last words to me the day he died were "I REALLY love you!!!" accompanied by a big hug, which was very characteristic of him. We miss him very much.

The girls and I spent 4 of the last 5 weeks at my parent's house while Dennis painted like a mad-man at our house, getting the baby's room done, some bathroom remodeling done, and lots of trim painted. It was an interesting experience not living at home, to say the least, but I am fortunate to have such gracious parents who obviously love me and the kids. My dad made breakfast for all of us most mornings, and lots of great dinners for us. I was pretty spoiled for 4 weeks. Some things I learned during this experience:

1. Living two blocks from my kid's school is a God-send. Driving 15 minutes to school feels like a huge waste of time, not to mention 15 minutes back the other way to karate, then back 15 minutes to pick up child #1, then back 15 minutes to drive her home, then 30 minutes to drive child #3 to swim lessons, etc, etc, etc, all without the help of Dennis. I spent half my day in the car. I didn't realize how "green" my car activites were until I stayed with my parents. Not to mention the ridiculous amount spent on gas, and how many times per week I had to fill up.

2. I really like my husband and have Dennis-withdrawal when he's not around. This might seem obvious but sometimes you don't understand how much you like something or someone until they aren't available to you.

3. My parents are even nicer people than I thought, and I thought they were pretty nice to start with.

4. Having my house finished feels really nice - and I do feel more inspired to keep it clean. I'm hoping this is a result of the "house-finishing" and not just a nesting instinct that will pass when the baby is born. :)

A great February to everyone!!!!

3/4 done

In one week, I'll be 30 weeks along, and 3/4 of the way through my pregnancy! Only 2+ months to go!!!

Snow!!!

Two + feet of snow at the cabin means snow for Christmas, which was what we were hoping for!!! Yaaaay!

the Nap Shack

I've never seen the water this high before. There were several boathouses on the road in that were partially submerged. Same with several docks. That has to do some damage.

This area where the trees are is usually nowhere near the water. We keeps buckets down here with life jackets, etc, in them during summer. Last weekend when we were up, everything started to float away and Dennis had to go out in the canoe and haul everything back. I think he got everything, including the logs to our firepit, which you can see is now underwater.

Taylor doing some crafty thing to occupy herself.

We've been spending Friday nights at the cabin lately - it's been fun getting it stocked for living. We've bought most everything second hand, which has made it super cheap, and fun for me, as I like treasure hunting at thrift stores.

The outside still needs quite a bit of work, but we've done the structural stuff before the pretty stuff, so it will be next summer before we paint or update the outside.

This picture was taken in the kitchen. To the right are the windows and the lake. This door in the living room is the closest door to the outdoor bathroom.

Our dining "room".

Kimberly reading as she monitors nacho-making in the kitchen. The room beyond will be the kids' bunkroom. Someday we hope to have a real kitchen, but for now we make do quite nicely with our "new" used stove and our single countertop/cabinet.

You can see some of the structural work that's been done in this picture. The beams that support the cabin have all been replaced and the cabin levelled, although that has made some places in the inside look a little off-kilter. Luckily, this was done before the sheetrock, so we just sheetrocked over the quirkiness and you can't notice it unless you are sitting on the couch gazing at the walls for long periods of time. It gives it character. The guys also dug a trench and laid a pipe last weekend to channel some of the water that gives our cabin the ability to be called "a river runs through it". There is a little stream somewhere up the hill that makes a mud hole of our driveway come winter, spring, fall and anytime it rains in summer. It did help the drainage issue - laying gravel in the driveway is our next step. We also plan to build a deck around the cabin sides and back so we don't have to walk on water. It would make our shady area much more livable. We can also watch after the kids playing in the treehouse and woods behind our cabin better from a deck. Things to look forward to!