Avery and Annalise

Saturday, June 7, 2014

A Day For Mark

Mark loves the mountains.

They are his place.

Any time he can get out and get to the mountains he is super happy.

He and his friend Jeff decided to take a day and do some scouting for a good fishing hole in the mountains. They headed toward Mt. Baker and found Bald Lake.
Turns out they were a little early. The lake was still frozen and there was snow everywhere!

But....they had a great time being OUTSIDE in the mountains!

Sunday, June 1, 2014

Another Performance

Avery and Annalise like to perform.

We get the privilege of watching lots of "shows".

The show of the day....

It always seems like they work on it FOREVER.

I mean, like HOURS in a day.

This show was no different.

The introduction....

Yes....those are socks.

And I'm pretty sure the show that took them all day to create, lasted approximately 2 minutes.

Not the 10-12 minutes as advertised.

I wonder how long this will last?!

They so enjoy playing together (most of the time).

And I love watching their shows (most of the time)!

Just another Sunday at the Schneiders! :)

Thursday, May 29, 2014

Breaking Boards and Fighting Boys

Now Avery's on to breaking boards.

This is such a cool picture!

And she's sparring every Thursday.

Sometimes with the Instructor's Aide (he's the only one her size! :) )

Who would've thought?!

Sunday, May 25, 2014

Memorial Day

We decided to stay home for Memorial Day weekend.

We needed a little outing one afternoon so we tried a new park.

The girls thought it was pretty cool.

I loved how they played and played and then paused to let me take a couple of pictures!

Thursday, May 22, 2014

Gramps

After my Mom passed away I made my Dad promise to come spend his birthday the following week with us in Ferndale. He agreed and I was so glad he came.

We went to dinner to celebrate.

Annalise even shared a birthday rainbow sherbet with him!!
He stayed for a few days and it was so great having him here.

I can't even imagine what it must be like for him.

They were partners for 52 years.

High school sweethearts and then married for 48 years.

They loved each other deeply.

They were best friends.

They were a team.

When my Mom was diagnosed with kidney disease 20 years ago, my Dad took on another role...caregiver. And he was an amazing caregiver. So patient, so loving, so fully present.

He would say "yes, Stephie" when she grumped at him.

He would swell with pride when she called him a "saint".

It wasn't always easy, yet there was never a doubt in his mind as to what he had "signed up for".

I worry about him.
I know that he will be just fine.
It's just that now he's on this journey without his partner and that breaks my heart.

Thankfully we can look back and be grateful for what they had.
Many years of a deep, true and pure love.
One that some people are never so lucky to have.

Sunday, May 18, 2014

Happy 6th Birthday Annalise!!!

The day after Hanmadang was Annalise's birthday party!

Her FIRST with friends!!!

She was bursting at the seams with excitement!

She was dressed and ready to go hours before the party started!!

We were off to the Jump Around Fun Zone....

We got everything all set up in the party room.

The kids have time to jump first, then once they have cake, etc. in the party room they aren't allowed back on the jumpy toys. (I like this rule! :) )

They were jumping in no time!!!

And taking some water breaks!

Avery and Jordan were too big to jump...so they played hangman

until the littles were done jumping.

When the jumping time was up, we headed into the party room.

Annalise decided to do cupcakes FIRST!

Then Avery thought it would be a good idea to have a game prepared just in case we had some extra time. Avery organized the girls to play "Pin the sunglasses on the Barbie".

(We forgot a blindfold, but they were creative!)