Valentine's Weekend

Hadley and Cambri celebrated Valentine's Day with their class at school, and came away with a nice little haul of candy and trinkets. Harlow and Crewe were not happy when they realized none of it was for them. I did them one better and brought home some ice cream cupcakes from Dairy Queen for everyone's dessert. That helped a little.

Bristol took a later nap than usual, so she was still ready to party at bedtime. She took advantage of it by getting some payback on Harlow and used her as a stool after she fell asleep while watching scriptures.

Bristol goes everywhere, she's quite the mover, and will be walking in no time.

Harlow and Crewe are good buds, and often become a freakin' chaotic twosome. 

Saturday morning, we drove down to the temple so Emily and I could take turns doing initiatories.

Emily dropped me off and took the kids to get donuts. We then switched and I let the kids explore the little forest area out front, but they soon became quite rambunctious. Cambri asked to have her picture taken with every statue.

In spite of their little bursts of chaos, it was a great morning. 

Cambri had asked Emily earlier in the week if she could help her make a cake, and since Emily was craving a cake, she agreed. She let Cambri do quite a bit of it.

It was a 4-layer cake this time, and turned out really good.

February 15th, the day after Valentine's Day, is the day I proposed to Emily at the lighthouse at Discovery Park. So, we thought it was be fun to take all the kids and walk around a bit. So, after church, we ate a quick lunch, and headed down to Seattle. They don't appear to be enforcing parking anymore, so tons of people were parking in no parking zones, but we were able to find an actual spot.

It was a nice sunny day, but still cold and windy, but it was good. Much nicer than the overcast and rainy day nine years ago.

We tried to get a family photo in front of the lighthouse, where I proposed, but as is always the case, not everyone would cooperate. It's fine, that's our reality and what's the use in trying to fake it for the camera. There was a couple getting engagement photos taken, and they straight up camped out in front of the lighthouse where we were, so I had to use photoshop to remove them from our photos. They were pretty annoying and unapologetic.

We were able to get some pretty good ones, but not a single one where everyone is looking or smiling at the camera.

Nor can any of the kids take this seriously. They get that from their mom, so I would expect nothing less.

We did make sure to get one of just us, of course. A lot sure has changed in nine years, but we're still looking good.

I really wish this one didn't turn out slightly out of focus.

It was pretty cold, so we kept Bristol bundled in the stroller.

The kids really enjoyed throwing rocks in the water.

Crewe boy of loving it, and absolutely fought me when it was time to go.

And yes, they tried to get in the water.

There really wasn't access to the beach due to the piled up driftwood, so Emily walked a little bit with Bristol. They got to see a little bunny hopping around.

When the girls heard we were going to Seattle, they were excited to see the Space Needle, and when we told them we weren't going to that part of Seattle, they were pretty bummed. So, we compromised and hit up Kerry Park on our way back home.

Their happiness made it worth it.

We had a small window of opportunity to take a picture because there were tons of people, and a lot of them had no concept of personal space. We succeeded, though.

There is an art installation at the park, and the kids really enjoyed playing on it.

Crewe was more interested in going up and down the stairs. 

"Dad, take my picture!"

Crewe went up and down the stairs a bajillion times.

After a little bit we packed everyone back in the van, fed Bristol a bottle, and headed for home.

It was a good afternoon, and gave Emily and I an opportunity to drive by places and neighborhoods and  reminisce about our time there. It's weird to think that it's been nine years already. She still seems to tolerate me pretty well, so that's nice.