Tools that work

"Daddy, breakfast?" "Daddy, jam?" "Daddy, toast?" Being the caring father that I am, I naturally fixed Scottie some healthy whole-wheat toast, lightly buttered, with a spoonfool of jam, cut it in half, then went back to my pressing email needs.

Apparently, Scottie is used to having Mommie serve his toast with a napkin to keep his hands clean....because I looked up a few moments later, I caught him doing this.

Evidentally, Scottie had seen that Daddie was too busy, or too foolish, to get him a napkin. No bother, he thinks, I'll just reach up into the drawer and get myself a spoon.

What's left when breakfast is over? Everything but the jam.

Media Fast

Our bishop has challenged our congregation to have a media fast for the month of February.  So, no movies, tv, nothing.  Does blogging count as entertainment media or journeling?  Hmmm...  I don't mind doing the media fast but am not looking forward to enforcing it at all times with my 2 year old.  Scottie hardly ever watches tv or movies, but occasionally he really really really wants to watch the movie Cars to get his Lightning McQueen fix.  Is that so bad?  :)  

I left my heart in San Jose.

This past week we went to San Jose, California for one of Hyrum's conference. He presented a paper that he and his professor had worked on. At the last minute we bought a ticket for me and I got to go too. Thanks to my sister Shannon, it was just the two of us. Scottie had an awesome time playing with his cousins Eli and Cade, and we had a relaxing little vacation. Here we are at the Japanese friendship garden.

One of the coolest things we did was go to the Tech museum.
Here I am walking the line with drunk goggles. These are supposed to estimate what it feels like when you have a blood alcohol level of like 1.1 or something.
I would be a terrible drunk. I could not walk straight to save my life.

They had the coolest robots and computers. We programmed our own Mr. Potato Head, had a computer take a picture of us then draw the outline with a robot, and this cool robot would spell out anything you asked it to in blocks.

The tech museum also had a special exhibit spotlighting Leonardo DaVinci and all of his invention/engineering projects. They had tons of models showing his inventions. This one was a spring that basically told time. Springs were basically the only storage form of kinetic energy back then, they were like today's batteries.

His flying machine. The wings were supposed to flap. I doubt this one ever really worked but cool idea Leonardo.

We went to the Winchester Mystery House. This was a crazy house built by the widow of the man who made Winchester guns. She was haunted by the fact that they killed so many people and felt that she could only appease the spirits by constantly building. So this house has all sorts of odd architectural things inside. Legend has it she used to hold seances and sleep in a different bedroom everynight to avoid the ghosts.

Ooh, the Winchester Mystery house all in gingerbread.

Overall we had a great time. I loved getting some sunshine, I don't get enough vitamin D in Washington in the winter. I even went swimming in the hotel's outdoor pool though it was only maybe 70 degrees. It felt great to me.

Seattle Winter, some fun to be had.

Sometimes I feel like Seattle winters are the worst. You don't get much sun, and this year it has been extra cold and had lots o' snow. Lots of snow for us is 2 weeks straight (that never happens) over Christmas and some random snow days where we get snow for 2 days and then in another couple of days it melts. But still. Anyway, we have actually had a lot of fun this winter. Here are some of the things we have been doing.

The day after Christmas we braved the snow and went to the zoo with the Farmers!
It was a lot of fun and we never checked out the inside exhibits so well.

Scottie and Hyrum feeding the birds.

Jimmy and Eli feeding the birds.

Cade hatching out of a dinosaur egg.

Scottie and Cade enjoying the zoomasium.
Notice how wet Scottie's pants are. He didn't care that it was snowing out, he still wanted to splash in any puddles and to fall down in snowdrifts. He had a blast.

New Years eve with the Travis Magelsen family and some ward friends.
We had some live accordion entertainment from Hyrum.

Scottie enjoying the sparkling cider. We rang in the New Year with the kids at 9:30pm.
They even set the clocks forward...devious Melissa.

Karissa gave Hyrum and I a day of babysitting for Christmas.
We decided to use it with a day of snow-shoeing. We had a blast!

My sister Shannon and I took our kids to the Children's Museum.
Here is Scottie and Cade being firemen.

Scottie driving the tractor.


Downstairs in the museum they had a "workshop" where you could build stuff.
We had a blast building towers and here is our igloo that we built around the kids.
Their favorite part was busting out of it when we would build it around them.

Anyway, we have had a pretty decent winter so far. 2 more months to go.

Magelsen Christmas 2008

Let it Snow!

Monroe has been hit with more snow than I have seen in a LONG time! All week long we have had dustings of snow. Last night we were hit big. Last night I thought, "you never know how long we keep snow so let's play!"

Here is Scottie and I with our snowman.

Then here is the view out our window this morning. It is 5pm and it is still snowing. We now have more than a foot! Having lived in Boston, we know this is nothing amazing but in the Seattle area, it is Grand! Scottie LOVED it last night with all of the snowball throwing and such, but today it is too deep for him to walk in so he didn't like it so much.

Now if we can just get Karissa here safely. We are headed out now to the airport and are hoping to make it safely. Monroe is not known for their excellent snowplowing, wish us luck!

Congratulations Melyn!

This past weekend Hyrum gave me the weekend off to go to Utah for Melyn's wedding. Melyn is a dear friend that I met in Boston. She was one of my roommates when I got engaged to Hyrum. She met her match, Kyler, through crazy circumstances and now is off to Jerusalem where he works for the state department. We will miss her like crazy. As a side note, Hyrum and Melyn always joked about being twins. They are nearly the same height, (Hyrum always is sure to point out that he has one inch on her 6'3" frame), they have about the same shoe size, and they are both extremely slim and good looking (I would say). So she is like part of the fam.

Melyn and Kyler coming out of the temple. What a good looking couple huh?

One of the best parts of the wedding was seeing old friends. Here is Kriss Jacobsen and Jodaddy. Thanks for letting me bunk with you Jodi.
Here are my old roomies. Lisa, Jodi, Melyn, and I. We were just missing JaNeece.

Thanks for the fun tall girls! Your wee one.

Another great part of the weekend which unfortunately I didn't document with photos was seeing my parents as set apart missionaries in the MTC with their name tags and everything. My two sisters live in Provo, Utah, and we got to hang out with Mom and Dad for part of the weekend. They are spiritual powerhouses. I know they are going to do a great job in Ireland. We had fun swapping missionary stories, and hanging out. Karissa was kind enough to share her loft bedroom with me for one night, and Michelle, Bennett, and Karissa even took me out to The Malt Shoppe, my old favorite. Thanks for the fun guys. I can't wait for Christmas Karissa.

Halloween

Here are a few pictures from our Halloween celebrations this year.

Scottie dressed up in his Chinese costume we bought in Beijing. You can't tell too well from this picture but his hat was a little Chinese skull cap (it was a little big) with a black pigtail hanging down. Too bad he wouldn't keep it on too long.

Hyrum and I attended a costume Halloween party where he was a tree and I was a tree hugger.

He makes a good looking tree huh.

Scottie and Daddy at the ward "trunk or treat." Daddy is wearing Scottie's hat.

Happy Birthday to Us!

October is a month of craziness for my family. As a kid I LOVED October because not only was it my birthday, it was also the birthday of two of my sisters and my Dad, plus Halloween. That means that every couple of days we got to have cake or some sort of goody, and then we got to eat Halloween treats, what could be better. The only down-fall as a kid was that my Irish twin, Shannon, and I always had to share our birthday party, but since we were so close in age and most of our friends were friends with both of us, it really did make sense. So now, to keep up with tradition, I had my first son on October 27th.

This was a big year for me, I turned 30, GASP! I always thought that was so old when I was a kid (my mom had me, the 4th child, when she was 30 years old). Now I think I am pretty young still. After all, I only have one child, and my husband is still in school, that should give me some sort of youthful air right? :)

So for the celebrations this year Hyrum took me out for a night on the town to dinner and a movie, I honestly cannot remember the last time I went to the theater to see a movie, it has been ages, so it was fun. My awesome fam also made me feel special during the day by coming over and celebrating with me. Thanks guys!

Being a two year old, Scottie still doesn't quite grasp the concept of his birthday. He does however grasp the concept of a fun day with ALL the attention he wants. We started the day out with some Curious George on PBS and then a walk in the fall air afterwhich he and I spent at least an hour jumping in piles of leaves. Then to make it even better, his cousins Cade, Eli, and Eric came over and he got to ride his bike outside and then jump in piles of leaves for at least another hour more. He topped it off with a fun family night with Mommy, Daddy, Grandma, and Grandpa. Could life get any better?

Here are some pictures to show the fun:

At our big group family birthday party for 3 aunts, one grandpa, and 2 cousins, we had bobbing for apples, pumpkin painting, and donuts on a string. That was a real popular one.

Scottie and Cade playing in the leaves on his birthday.

At our birthday family home evening.

I hope they call me on a mission