.:Meet the Ritchies:.

And a very special one indeed!  We have two things to celebrate today, because on top of being Father’s Day it is also my Mother’s 60th Birthday!

My Mom is not only a very special mother, she is also the best Grandma a kid could ever dream of having.  She always has a smile and a hug for her grandkids and they know that they can count on her for anything.  They love her, adore her and can’t get enough of her!  I am so thankful and blessed to have you as my mother, Trudie, I hope you had a very special 60th Birthday and here’s to many more to come!

Claire & Grandma Trudie, when Claire was about three...

Wyatt with his Grandma Trudie, last summer...

Grandma holding her youngest grandson, Hunter, last summer...

Trudie and her kids, yesterday at her party...

Absolutely no family resemblance here, eh? Marta, Trudie, Sherrie & Grandma

Crazy Auntie Sherrie (who really isn’t crazy at all, she’s just nutty like the rest of us so we call her that, affectionately of course.  We also call her husband Uncle Butthead, again, with love.) hosted a barbecue birthday party for Mom yesterday in Arlington.  The sun even made an appearance, it was awesome!  It was great to spend time with everyone, hopefully we can do that again soon.

Veda, Claire, Kade and Kallyn

Aren't they sweet!?!

Happy Birthday Mom!  xoxo

And today is also the day where we honor our Fathers!  We got to have lunch at my Dad’s yesterday before the party, and enjoy his little slice of heaven out in the country.  And then this morning, Veda and I took Mark to breakfast at Slappycakes this morning and then we did some bowling with Grandpa Bill!  It was $2 Sunday at Hollywood Bowl, I highly recommend this because it’s a great price and there weren’t too many people there on Sunday.  Mark came out as the high score, but Bill was only two points behind!  It was a lot of fun!

Look at Grandpa's form! I think he's secretly a pro...

cheesy cheese..

Veda did great, look at her go!

Happy Father’s Day!  xoxo

The girls spent the day with Grandpa Bill today, since they are now officially out of school for the summer.  Grandma Betty works at Hudson’s Bay High School in Vancouver, and they had one of their teachers accepted into the space program several years ago.  She has since gone to space!  She made a special visit today to the school to talk about her adventure and the girls accompanied Grandpa to see it.  Since Grandma knows the Astronaut (is it capitalized? I don’t know but since the woman has gone to the final frontier, I think she deserves it), the girls got to have their picture taken with her.  Dottie Metcalf-Lindenburger was a science teacher at the high school in 2004 when she was selected as an Educator Mission Specialist and moved to Houston.   You can read more about her here.

The girls had a great time and enjoyed the slide show that Dottie presented, with pictures from her time in space.  Should space be capitalized?  Space.  I think so.  Claire sent me a text message afterward that said “we got our picture taken with an actual astronaut”.  I don’t know what she expected, a fake one?

Thanks Grandpa for hanging out with the girls today, I asked if they took good care of you and they said yes.  I hope they were telling the truth, you know Claire is going through the moody tween-age thing right now.  Or maybe she just saves all that attitude for Mark and I.

Claire, Veda, Dottie the Astronaut & Grandma Betty

Veda has always been a lover of dance & song.  I’m sure if Mark was writing this post he would recall that she’s been musical since she was in diapers.  He has the best story of one summer evening, he had put her to bed and was out on the porch with his friends.  When Veda suddenly appears in the doorway, naked as a jay bird, with her little ukelele, and starts singing her very own song.  It went something like this, “Rocka rocka baby sign, when the moon shines on the lily pads”.  She was born with it.

So it probably won’t surprise you that she has taken ballet for as long as she can remember, or more accurately since she was three years old.

This last Saturday was her annual recital held at an auditorium at Mt. Hood Community College in Gresham.  On top of taking ballet this year, she also took some workshops for jazz and tap.  So this year she did more than one dance!  Very exciting!  It’s amazing the difference a year makes, as this is the 3rd recital I have attended since we met.  So I have started to recognize some of the kids, particularly the boys since there are only a half a dozen of them.  They have all gotten so tall!

Veda danced beautifully, it was such a wonderful display of the hard work and dedication that those kids put into it each season.  Here are some pictures from after the program, unfortunately they don’t allow cameras while the dancers are performing so the only shots we get are of them posed with their classes afterward.

All the dancers receiving their flowers and awards...

Veda's class - Ballet one plus

Veda (3rd from the right)

Thanks to Grandma Betty for this picture! That is Veda's gorgeous Mama and adorable little brother Ursa behind her... doesn't Veda look happy!

I am on my lunch break, waiting for my tomato soup to cool off enough that I can dig in… so I thought I would take a few minutes to tell you a funny story that happened to Mark and I this weekend.

Saturday was a beautifully sunny day that started out with a 9:30am soccer game for Mark over at Cleveland High.  It got over shortly after 11am and we dashed off to take care of the long list of things we had on our agenda.  The parents were coming over at 12:45pm to carpool over to Veda’s ballet recital in Gresham, Mark needed to take a quick shower and we hoped to get a bite to eat somewhere in there.

We were driving up Stark street, past where Claire used to attend after school care at the YMCA, below Mt. Tabor where the street winds around the top of the hill.  It’s a narrow road, and the houses off to the north have a spectacular view of the northwest part of the city, and Mt. St. Helens.  I just happened to glance to my left and I saw a very peculiar sight.  A ladder was leaned up against some very tall and thick bushes, with a little old man at the top of it facing outward.  The ladder was leaning towards the road, like it could fall over at any point and the man looked very confused.  I interrupted Mark from speaking and said “Woah, did you see that? That didn’t look right!”   Mark hadn’t noticed so I quickly explained what I saw.  “Do you want me to turn around?”, he asked.  We both sighed and looked at the clock, and I hesitantly said “Well, no, I’m sure it’s fine”, knowing we were on a time crunch.  But then we got stopped at the light just a few blocks away and I changed my mind.  The last thing I wanted was to read in the paper the next day that an elderly man had fallen and was seriously injured, or worse.  Mark made a u-turn and as we came up to the house where the man was, we knew he was in trouble as soon as we could see him.  Needless to say, he was very happy to see us!  While Mark braced the side of the ladder that was slowly falling to the ground, I climbed up to help him remove his shoe from the foot that was caught in one of the ladder rungs.  I am not sure how he did it, but I’m pretty sure he would not have been able to get down on his own safely.  I’m glad that we were there to help.

He explained to us that he was 83 years old, and this was his Kiwifruit bush that he was pruning away from the power lines.  As he came down the ladder, one rung at a time, he would pause to tell us a little more about the reproductive process of the Kiwi.  It turns out, they are very hard to pollinate because you need one male for every couple female plants and males are particularly hard to come by.  Or was it the other way around?  We were only half listening because we were still thinking about the schedule we needed to keep.  He was very sweet, his name was Ron (which I thought was very cool since my father’s name is Ron).  He asked us our names and told us that in September we should stop by and he’d gladly give us boxes of Kiwifruit.

We left in a hurry but felt very good about what just happened.  High fives were in order.  It’s not every day that you can say you saved an old man from a Kiwi tree.  Here’s hoping he hires a gardener in the future!

xoxo

I just overheard a co-worker talking about a you tube video of a 6th grade boy performing a Lady Gaga song.  He was saying how amazing it was, and being the geek that I am when it comes to kids singing at talent shows, I googled it.  Amazing, doesn’t even come close to describing the talent that this young man has.  It’s like nothing I’ve ever heard before.  Greyson Chance.  Remember that name, because he will be famous.  Check out the video here.

We attended the talent show at Claire’s school the other evening.  I couldn’t stay for very long because I wanted to go to Yoga, but my Mom stayed with Claire so she could see her friends perform.  It was apparently a really great show!  Claire took some video on her cell phone, I’ll have to see if I can download them for you on here.

Also, I’d love to share my experience with Yoga with you, as I have been attending now for a week and a half and I LOVE IT!!  I will post about it soon.

xoxo

I spent the day as a field trip chaperone for Claire’s 6th grade class at Parkrose Middle School.  This probably sounds like an easy task to you, since 6th graders are pretty independent, they are somewhat smart with their decisions, for the most part they pay attention.  And you’d be right.  I was very pleased with my group, they listened to me, and they had surprisingly great manners.  Unfortunately the day started with two parents cancelling who were supposed to chaperone, so instead of only having 5 kids to look after, I ended up with 7.  We were dropped off downtown at Pioneer Courthouse Square with instructions for a scavenger hunt.  The kids were to answer some Portland Trivia questions as we walked around on our own.  I assigned one boy to make sure that there were 8 of us at all times, another boy was in charge of the map, Claire took on the task of writing all the answers down and I just tried to keep up!  I made sure to take my camera with me so I could get some pictures and then give them copies, here are a few of my favorites:

Pioneer Courthouse Square

Pioneer Courthouse Square

North Park Blocks

This one's for their teachers!

Jameison Square

Tom McCall Waterfront Park fountain (with snow cones, yum!)

Tom McCall Waterfront Park

Playing in the fountain.

I had so much fun, and like I said, the kids were great.  The school had packed the other kids sack lunches, but when we got to Jameison Square to eat, and Claire and I needed to purchase our lunch (hey, I didn’t feel like packing two lunches this morning, I’m lazy), the closest place was Hot Lips pizza.  Have you ever tried to eat pizza in front of someone having a sack lunch made from a school cafeteria?  Let’s just say, it doesn’t seem fair.  So I offered to buy everyone a slice of pizza and they were super happy.  But that meant we had food that was not going to be eaten.

Not to worry.

In true kind 6th grader fashion, one of the girls offered her sack lunch to a man sitting on a bench at the waterfront fountain.  “I gave my lunch to that hobo!”
she told me proudly.  “That was very nice, but you could also call him a “nice gentleman”, I said.  Then a few minutes later I heard her telling one of her classmates, “I gave my lunch to that nice gentleman over there.”  Pretty cute.  Then about 10 minutes later she gave another sack lunch to a man sitting at a different bench.  It was really cool.  I felt incredibly proud of the kids for thinking outward like that.  And those nice gentleman looked like they were really enjoying the hoagie sandwich, chips, graham crackers and juice!

When it was all over I came home, promptly laid down on the couch, and napped.  I was one exhausted mama.

xoxo

Saturday promised to be a day full of sunshine, something that hasn’t happened here for, well, 21 days straight actually.  We have been pounded by rain lately, and when the weather station said that it was going to be NOT RAINING we decided to take full of advantage.  So we made plans to meet my Mom and sister downtown at the waterfront, and do a tour of the Navy ships that come to town each year for the Rose Festival.  Armed with a coffee and an elephant ear, thanks to Saturday Market, we got in line to put our names on the list.  After about 45 minutes we were at the front and handed the nice young man our photo ID’s.  Then we took our place in another line to wait for the actual tour.  I think we ended up waiting in that line for a little over an hour.  When it was finally our turn, and we were amongst a group of 20 eager tourists, a female Navy officer informed us that it would be “worth the wait”.  And she wasn’t kidding!  I loved how the sailors would stop and salute as they boarded each ship.  We saw huge guns and where they keep their missiles that can travel up to 80 miles.  They took us up where the ship is steered, and I was amazed at how SMALL the steering wheel was!  I think it was the same size as our Mario Kart wheel for the Wii.  They showed us the bell that is very old and told us how you can have your baby baptised in it.  They will take it off, fill it with water, have the Priest bless it and then dunk your baby.  Then, they engrave the child’s name and the date on the inside.  I turned around to suggest this to the woman behind me who had a baby in her arms. but I doubted there was a Priest nearby so instead I just smiled.

We had a great time, and the weather was amazing!  If you get down to the Rose Festival next year, I suggest you tour the ships.  It was definitely worth the wait.

Then that evening, since the weather was still awesome, we decided to brave the crowd and go see the Starlight Parade.  It had been a long day so we didn’t make it through the whole thing, but we were there until almost 10pm.  I think I most enjoyed the participants of the Starlight Run that happens before the parade, along the parade route, where people are encouraged to dress in costume.  We saw a banana, a sasquatch, Mario & Luigi, hula dancers, Ronald McDonald and the Burger King, women in prom dresses & pearls and a lot of tutu’s and peacock feathers.  I think next year we might have to join in the fun!  Maybe.

Here are some pictures from our day!

Veda wore her Uncle Jay's sailor cap, it's the real thing.

Auntie Andi, Claire, Grandma Trudie, Me, Veda

We waited...

...and waited...

..and finally it was our turn!

...that is a BIG gun!

They nicknamed this gun the "R2D2".. oooobviously..

...on the ship...

The coast guard were patrolling the river...keeping everyone safe..

We had to take a pause in our tour to allow this high ranking Officer to cross from our ship to another...

Here is the bell I was talking about..

See the name inside? Pretty sweet...

...

That little tiny wheel steers that great big ship..amazing!

..look at the beautiful blue sky! it was so nice..

...

...

Adorable!!

And then on to the parade…

We were about six rows back, but it was close enough...

The girls decided to style Mark's hair while we were waiting...

...

family self portrait!

And one more, taken with my new Iphone app Hipstamatic! Yes, I'm obsessed..

xoxo

Instead of writing a 15 page long novel about outdoor school I am going to create a list of my top ten favorite things about outdoor school!! Also, to create a visual I am going to include a handful of pictures. By the way we went to Camp Howard Outdoor School Site located in southeast Corbett.

#1o: getting the chance to actually be there, even if it was only for one night. (at least we got to go!)

#9: changing into nice, warm, fuzzy, pajamas after being soaked all day. (that we were!)

#8: having heated cabins! (We made sure to take advantage of that!)

#7: going on the field study hikes! (five hikes in two days, talk about a workout!)

#6: singing the worlds most annoying bus rides songs ALL THE WAY THERE! (yes, we sang for an hour straight!)

#5: before coming home on Friday we had Field Day, we played a lot of fun games! ( including everybody is it!)

#4: I’m sure those of you who have been to O.D.S. remember getting your wooden tag, or wood cookie. (there’s a picture of mine below!)

#3: luckily my cabin group was my friends, Kyleigh, Jordan, Courtney, Sela, Emily, and my leaders Pad-Foot and Ivy. (great leader names!)

#2: oh my gosh!! The meals were amazing… meat loaf, tacos, fruit salad, ham burgers, pudding, cheese cake… i mean really! (it was all DELICIOUS!)

last but not least…

#1: counselors names!! the counselors at camp had some of the most creative, and funny names! here are some of them!

argyle, caterpillar, S’ghetti, hiccup, cup, spoon, batman, bulls-eye, chupacabra, otter, beagle, reindeer food, Gobi, elk, Disney, Casper, and twinkles, and that’s only half of them!! (I guess I can’t forget my leaders. again there is also Pad-Foot and ivy

thanks for reading about my adventures in outdoor school! hope you enjoyed! here are some pictures for you to look at!

My cabin group!

Padfoot and Ivy, my counselors!

My wood cookie!

Singing on the bus!

Hiking in Plant Study

Me at 7am!

~CLAIREBEAR!!