A creek hike

On Sunday, the Casper family went to McDowell Creek near Lebanon for a short hike. It was a HOT day, and we wanted a cool hike near water. It was magnificent. Beautiful waterfalls dot McDowell Creek. We found a great place for a picnic and then hiked upstream in the water. It was slow going: climbing over boulders, wading into the cool water up to our knees and trying not to slip on the algae-covered rocks. But it was all worth it -- at the end was a gorgeous waterfall into a deep swimming hole. Michael and I jumped in and Eli pushed big logs into the pool. We also found a crawdad. A perfect end-of-summer activity!

A walker!

Ewan took three steps on Sept. 10th: We were at a park, he was barefoot on the grass and he just held Daddy's hands and then let go and walked.

He hasn't walked since! But he has been standing up on his own more and he has been able to squat and then stand back up without holding onto anything. We are about to have another walker on our hands...

Eli's first day of preschool

Eli was very nervous about going to preschool, but we made it a bit easier by serving blackberry-blueberry pie for breakfast (breakfast of champions, of course!) and getting him dressed in his favorite dinosaur outfit.

He didn't want to let me leave when I dropped him off, and he cried. But at the end of preschool Teacher Chris told me that the tears only lasted for 30 seconds.

Colorado vacation

We spent 9 days in Colorado visiting grandma and grandpa and playing with cousins Daniel and Alejandra from Minnesota, cousin Sienna from Fort Collins and lots of other fun relatives! Eli and Ewan loved the nearby cold rivers, a train ride through the canyon and rock hopping in Grandpoppin's yard. We can't wait to come back!

Blueberries, bare bottoms, balls... ah, summer

A very busy summer so far. This week we picked almost 25 pounds of blueberries, swam naked in our pool in the backyard, hit some spray parks with friends, and Ewan practiced his over-the-head ball throwing. Very fun indeed.

Methow Valley vacation

A lovely vacation with friends in the Methow Valley, Washington in early July. The kids thoroughly enjoyed it all -- digging for dinosaur bones, playing in the hot tub, swinging at Ewan's birthday pinata, hiking in the woods and playing with new friends. Can't wait to meet up with these friends again!

Making money

Eli likes to talk about working and making money. His job, if you ask him, is to make money out of leaves, trees and sticks.

He often can't take part in some other activity because of his work.

Earlier this month, I told him I was making a chore chart for him so he could do jobs around the house. He said, "Yeah, but I have an important job to do to make money out of trees, leaves and sticks and that is a lot of work, so I can't clean the house."

How do you argue with that?

He also uses that excuse even if the alternative is a fun activity. Today I told him that we might go to a friend's house and play in their sand box.

Eli: "OK, but when will I do my work?"

Mama: "Well, you can do it before we go or after you get back."

Eli: "Yeah but I have to work about 15 hours today and that's a lot of work. Maybe another day I can play, but today I have to get my work done."

Too bad his "work" doesn't include picking up his clothes or toys!

Ewan is 1!

My dear sweet Ewan,

You are one years old. Mama can't believe an entire year has gone by already.

You have the most infectious laugh, and I love to blow raspberries on your belly or tickle your knees to hear it.

You love to wrestle with Mama and Daddy. You squeal and climb all over us, especially our heads. You'd love to wrestle Eli also but we worry about you getting hurt.

You are a swift crawler and you've mastered going up stairs. You are just starting to go down the stairs safely, i.e. NOT face first! Even though your knees are SO sore that you crawl with knees off the ground in this awkward way, you aren't trying very hard to walk. You will walk if Mama is holding both of your hands, but you don't much like it. If you are distracted by toys in both hands, you will stand unassisted for a few seconds -- once you realize what is going on, you quickly sit down.

You've got two teeth on the bottom and four teeth on the top. Your top teeth are still pushing through and you've got big spaces between them. Your smile is as cute as ever -- a big wide grin that even makes most strangers remark "what a happy baby!"

In some ways, you are even more strong-willed than Eli. You get very frustrated when Mama feeds you; you want to do it yourself! You get very frustrated when you are taken out of a room that is unsafe, namely the bathroom. You get very frustrated when you can't go outside and play in the mud with Eli (you tend to eat the mud!) You scream and cry very hard, and Mama believes it is a sneak peak into what your tantrums will be like...

You are super happy to be playing with Daddy, but you still feel most comfortable with Mama. If you are in a room playing with Daddy and Mama comes in, you will cry until Mama picks you up. If Mama leaves without you, you cry very hard!

You don't like to be in your highchair eating very much, but you LOVE to drink from a cup. We still hold it for you as you tend to spill all over yourself but you don't even mind us doing that. If you are very hungry, you will still wave your arms while eating.

You are talking a lot more now, babbling away and looking at people intently when you talk. You are especially conversational in the morning, unfortunately Mama is usually very tired. You sleep much better than you did at 8 months, but you sometimes wake up hungry in the middle of the night. You are still an early riser, sometimes waking at 5:30 a.m. -- but if Mama is lucky she can get you to go back to sleep until 8 a.m.

You are quite independent, wandering off to play with toys by yourself in the playroom if Mama is doing something boring like making dinner. You like to play with anything Eli is playing with at the moment so playing with your brother alone doesn't work too well.

But Mama and Daddy can tell how much you love Eli and how much Eli loves you. One time when you were crawling on Eli to wrestle him, Eli said: "Baby can pull my hair or poke my eyes. It's OK Mama. I just love him!"

Summer solstice

We don't dare say it out loud, but I thought it would be OK to blog about: Summer is here! After too much rain -- and too many false starts to our beautiful, dry Oregon summers -- I think the summer solstice brought the summer along.

The boys celebrated at their friends' house -- with pools, sprinklers and popsicles. Ahhh, summer!