Memorial

This weekend was my grandma Marnie's memorial service in Great Falls. It was super sad. Photos of my family here. If you see a photo you like, right click and save as on your computer or drop me a message and I will ship them off to a Walgreens for you.

I am super grateful to have had my grandma this long. I am also grateful that she got to meet both of my babies. While I feel sad for me losing my granny I feel even sadder for Ron who took such great care of my grandmother and my mom, aunt and uncles who just lost their mom.



I miss her. I think she would really love this photo.


and this one.


I was great to see my family. I wish I saw them all more often.


I am going to try to spend as much time with my grandparents as I can.



The boys are great. Jr. is wild like crazy and he likes to play "exterminator" or "catcher" with his new bug net. He rings the doorbell by yelling "ding dong ding dong" at the door, I ask him to come in and he gets rid of my pests. We have lots of pests - bunnies, earwigs, worms, ants, gophers, squirrels, scorpions, spiders, flies. . . He is really good.



Graham learned to dance last week. I will try to catch him on video. He might be our little rocker. Click on me - I am a video.


Farmer Coleman.


Here is my last email to my grandmother. I don't know if she got it or not. She was pretty sick at the time. It was just before she died. I hope she knew how much she meant to me. To all of us.

For Grandma. Thank you.
Hi Lisa, will you print this out and give it to grandma for me? Or read it to her. Either way.
Thank you for being my grandma. Thank you for all of the amazing times we have spent together. I remember everything. I feel so lucky to have known my grandparents so well and my only regret is that I didn't spend more time with each of you. I am proud that my two sons got to know their great grandmothers. I was so
fortunate to know my great grandmothers.
I have a wonderful lifetime of memories with you. If I can share some of my favorites.
I love seeing you sitting in a sunny window at your piano in the morning in your robe. I love the smell of your house in Everett. I love the way you made me feel so special when I would come to visit you on the summers and I loved your visits to us in Montana.
I always thought that you named your finches Ronald and Nancy because you actually liked Reagan but now I get it. Those finches were totally irritating. I loved Molly and felt so sad when she she passed away.
I was so intensely proud of my grandmother that co-owned a music store and hung out with rock stars. I loved that my grandmother took me to a Rolling Stones concert. I still remember every detail of that night. I loved sleeping with you even up until I was in college.
I love your little house in the woods in Coleville and your and Ron's gardens. I loved visiting you there. I remember when we came through on our way to the gorge and you knew the history of Westby and we teased my friend Justin about his mullet.
I remember you taking me to see the fields of tulips in NW Washington, I think that place is so beautiful my heart still goes there at times. I remember going on tour of the Olympic National Forest with you and my mom after I graduated high school. I can't wait to go back there some day with my family. I will tell them all about
mom falling on the beach logs and getting splinters all up and down her legs and ass and having to pull them out and put diaper ointment on her wounds while you read Jerry Seinfeld's book and laughed. Mom was so mad.
Thank you for letting Ian live with you. Thank you for taking care of him when we all had reached our limit with him.
I like the Mariners because of you. You and Grandpa Ed.
I remember Cream of Wheat. We never ate except when with you. I remember you and Grandpa together and how much you loved him and how much he loved you. I remember Grandpa Ed. How he smelled, his voice and how I thought he was the tallest man I ever knew. I still want to eat at Iver's some days.
I also want to thank Ron for taking care of my Granny. I like to think a out Ron puttering around the yard with Madeline's lesbian hat on. Oh and I remember him riding around with Molly on the back of the four wheeler.
He is so funny.
When I think about you, I always think about you washing dishes singing to yourself and staring out of the window. I never mind washing the dishes and I think it is because of you. Maybe I felt how calm it made you and now I feel that calmness. I will have that forever. Thank you.
One last memory I want to write to you and that is about the time we were in the Linwood mall and you drug toilet paper out of the back of your pants for the whole length of the mall. Mom was so embarrassed and you just laughed. I love that, you laughing.
I love you. I miss you. I think about you every day and I am praying for you which I don't really do very well.
Thank you for being my grandmother. Thank you for making my life better. I am a better person because I had you as my grandmother.
::Autumn::

Happy Mother's Day!

Special thanks to our three amazing moms. We seriously couldn't do it without you. Thank you and I hope you have a happy happy mother's day. XOXOXOXOX

Now down to business. Aunt Liesel, consider yourself warned. Look away from the computer now. This one is going to hurt your eyes a little bit.




She looked, didn't she?


My mom and I LAUGHED at this outfit. We called him little Guido.


If he is Guido than this is his big brother Bubba. Bubba will bounce your a$$ right out of here if you aren't lucky.


Who, BY THE WAY, gives a three year old a sword for his birthday? UNCLE BEAN! While it is much nicer than the cardboard setup we had made for him months ago and yes they are still in action. The new one is SOOO COOL though and as expected he gets into a lot of trouble with it. Mostly he wants to cut the sharp bones out of his mom with it. Just the sharp bones momma. ?Its okay momma." He says to me so sweetly. . .


Jr. is in a whole new phase of childhood. We have officially entered the "WHY" phase. Oh lord help me. . . And why can't I just ignore him? Why? Well, I will tell you, most of the WHYs come when I tell him to do something. Jr. put that down please! Why? WHY! Because you are spilling all over the floor! Things like that. I wish it was more like WHY is the sky blue? WHY do fish live under water? Oh no. It is just a phase like the others. Sassy boy phase.


(He told his dad that he was wearing those green pants with his orange shirt earlier in the day - and his dad BELIEVED him. Peas in a pod.)

So my favorite thing he says right now, and I am surpised at how much it comes up is LOM(B)ONSTER. Combo Lobster and Monster. That and he is still super curious about Kevin - you know where you go when you die. Kevin. Oh and Ballcano. He found the raft pump the other day and wanted to make his own Ballcano. I got into trouble from my mom today for repeating "Danging DVD" after he said it - but it was so funny!


Half stand-up commedian. Half drunk midget (yes I ripped off Tina Fey, but she is so funny and so right).

Graham is so busy. He can really get around without crawling and he is in everything. He loves to open and close doors and LOVES cords and electrical outlets. When I pick him up he gives me a huge tight little hug and I still get TONS of slobbery wet sweet kisses. Oh and boy howdy can that little bugger eat. No more baby food for him either, he wants cut up adult food. He sees his brother get a bannana, damn he better be getting one too. He still isn't napping at dayccare and the whole zombie baby thing still gets to me, but he is sleeping well at home for naps and at night. I just don't know what to do.


For mothers day, I am going to go to a movie all by myself with some wine. Cissie is going to babysit. Ed is gone for the weekend rafting. Yup. I am so looking forward to some dark alone time with a big tub of buttered popcorn and smuggled wine. It is not like I don't want to spend mothers day with my munchkins, but I just need a couple of hours, besides, Ed was gone most of last week, plus this weekend, I have had TONS of quality time with the boys. Now I need some quality time for me. Or to quote from Tina's awesome book again - how to carve out some "me" time. Volunteer to unload the dishwasher. Offer to go get diaper ointment and stand in your childs room quietly until your spouse comes to find you and curtly asks you what you are doing. Oh there was more, but those were my favorites.

As you can see. I am a pretty lucky mom.

Chico - sans photos

Last weekend we jetted off to spend a night at Chico. Goodness I love that place. Cissie went with us to help out and see a new part of Montana she has never seen before.

We took a little adventure into Gardiner and there was some fantastic wildlife sighting. We saw a ton of bison outside the park. Some right near the road - Cissie got some good photos. We saw two giant herds of elk. Huge herds more elk than I have ever seen before. We also saw a small herd of mountain goats. They were tremendous. Jr. was mildly interested but was distracted by Curious George. Ahhh George. Blessing and a curse.



We swam and ate and swam and drank (the grown-ups). It was really fun, but not enough sleep. Graham pulled the 5:15 AM wake-up call. I sat with him in the lobby and drank coffee with older folks and another mom with a baby who woke up way too early. Everyone kept asking me if my baby is always this happy. Yes, he is I would reply. Yes he is smily, happy and funny. He makes eye contact with strangers (no they can't hold him) he smiles and claps for them.

I saw us as a family going to Chico when the boys are older and then again maybe someday just the two of us. I have so many wonderful memories of that place, I can't wait to pile on more.



Yeah - I don't know why I can't get my photo taking in gear. Here are a smattering of other photos I took here and there. Check Picassa for a video of Graham almost crawling.

It is TERRIBLE to be three

Sort of. Well, let me explain.

On Friday Jr. got sick sick sick. He ran a super high fever and couldn't get his business in order all day. For those of you who know my kid - he spent the entire day on the couch and fell asleep a couple of times. He did take a hiatus from the couch to watch some George in his cribby. He cried for at least an hour straight and demanded his daddy. It prompted me to cancel the birthday party. Nanny had to come over to assist.

Saturday morning he was still running a fever but seemed to recover slightly so Ed and I took him on his special birthday date, Coney Island to eat a hot dog and play the candy crane and then to the book/toy store to play with the Thomas the Train set and the marble maze. A three year-olds needs are pretty simple you know.

We also hired a friend of ours to construct an AMAZING wood swing set for Jr. (and Graham - shhhh). Jr. was pretty excited.

After his nap he woke up with a fever so high it scared the daylights out of me. All he could do was whimper and shake. We finally got it down and he recovered enough to enjoy his DQ birthday cake - with a shark (or really a killer whale) on it! He requested a cake with a dragon and a crab on it, but was pleased with the shark (killer whale). We have been watching the Disney documentary about the ocean a lot lately and he is pretty much all about the jelly fish and their stingers and the crabs who look like spiders.

I just love how his obsession changes and we all follow him down the worm hole making robots, dragons, dinosaurs, frogs, guns, football, the ocean our obsession. I guess we are learning a lot.

Anyway, I was pretty bummed out that his whole birthday was Ed, myself, Nanny and Baby Graham, but he was so exhausted he didn't seem to mind. Plus we got him some balloons. Nothing quite like balloons.

He was sort of excited about his new little kid house too. The one his dad spent 7 hung over hours toiling away building in the garage. Thanks daddy. The house is SO cool, it has a little grill and all of the kids treat it like it is a take out restaurant. The first dish prepared in Jr.'s new house - jellyfish steaks, grilled. DELISH!

Sunday was a little better, no fever but still on his F game. He did manage to go fishing with Treyson, Dan and his daddy in the morning. He was so exhausted before I put him down for his nap that he told me in the whiniest voice EVER - that he didn't want his face painted. He didn't want to be a clown. I told him that he could have whatever he wanted.

After his nap on Sunday, Faith arrived to have an easter egg hunt and wish him a happy birthday. Plus it was Uncle Bean's birthday on Monday. He did pretty okay with the egg hunt, but was done after about 3 eggs and just wanted to sit on the lawn and eat jelly beans.

Thank you Moogs for the awesome camera - as you can see, it is a big hit. Oh and if you check out the picassa - you can see how much he loves it!

I think that his third birthday was more important to me than it was to him this year. Poor little turkey.

Here is the weird thing about the fever - he has had no other manifestations of an illness associated with the fever and even though it is Tuesday and there hasn't been any temp since Saturday, he is still on his F game. Tonight I took him on a date to Costco and Target which he normally LOVES and both places he just sat in the cart and whined that he wanted his daddy. So sad.

Sweet little Baby Graham, he loved all of the attention from his grandparents, uncle and cousin.

Hi Sweetie Pie Amelia.

Short note to Jr. on your third birthday:

Hi baby - you are easily the most beloved three year old on the planet. You are tough and smart and cute and I can't get enough hugs and mooches. I love reading to you and digging in the garden with you. I have so much fun exploring the hills around our new house with you. Please oh please get over George. Dad and I are so tired of the Man With The Yellow Hat. You were not the easiest baby ever, but as you grow up, I can really see the fruits of our labor paying off when you ask meaningful questions and even better yet give meaningfull answers to our questions. You learn as fast as we can teach you and I get crazy proud of your smarty pants. Plus you make me laugh all of the time. I love our weird little daily traditions and sometime get sad when I think of the ones we don't do anymore. Daddy says love you buddy. Lets go fishing.

Nine Months

Graham is nine months old! He weighs in at 22 lbs 8 oz and is 29.5 inches long. He is slipping down the charts. He is between 75% - 90%. I can't lie to you, I was a little sad he wasn't 90% - 100%. I blame his month of sickness and me being out of town for one night.


Yeah, you read that, I was out of town for the night. Just me. No baby, no pre-schooler, no husband. Two days, one night, just me. I felt semi guilty but I pretty much rolicked in my own muck. I drank cocktails, ate mexican food and slept a glorious 8 hours without baby interruption. I need to do it again soon.


Yes, the boys survived, thanks to Nona and Cissie. Graham even slept better than he has in months. Despite my fears not any one died - not even me (from massive baby, husband, pre-schooler missingness).


All of the photos in this blog are a week old. We took Jr. to see the Museum of the Rockies. He LOVED the frogs and LOVED the dinosaurs, and had a crazy good time in the kids room. . . until the "ballcano". It scared him - well, starteled him, but he kept going back. Future horror flick watcher you know it.






This weekend means I have a three year old now. We made it. More on that later.




Beware eye melting handsomeness.