GO, DOG! GO!

On the last week of June aunt Natasha came up to Oregon to visit and to help us with a very special project. We are preparing to move Owen from his current room to his own room at the front of the house. We wanted to do something fun with that room and went through many different ideas before settling on a theme based on Owen's favorite book...GO, DOG! GO!

Before Natasha arrived we used transparencies and an overhead projector to trace the pictures on the walls. We also took the book down to Lowe's to custom match all the paints we used to the colors in the book. By the time Natasha arrived all that was left was to paint. It took us from Monday evening until Thirsday evening to finish. In all we estimated there were a total of 40 or more man hourse reaquired for the finished product...Most of which were put in by Natasha.

There are a lot of pictures here! They are intended to show anyone who is interested the process that was invloved. Enjoy!

Sara can multi-task!

Owen LOVES his new room, though he hasn't moved in yet because mommy is working on making him some custom GO, DOG! GO! curtains first.

This is one of the finished walls. It is probably our favorite!

You can see...Owen loves it too! Oh yeah, did you see his "race car" bed? We picked it up at a garage sale! We found it very fitting for his room based on a book about a bunch of dogs racing around in cars!

THANK YOU SO MUCH AUNT NATASHA!!! YOU ARE SO TALENTED AND SO SPECIAL TO SPEND A WEEK HELPING TO CREATE SUSH A SPECIAL ROOM FOR OWEN!

How to grow grapes...For uncle Barth!

A few weeks ago daddy and uncle Barth were talking about growing grapes from clippings of mature grape vines. I overheard their conversation and wanted to give uncle Barth a few tips...

First, you need to make sure you have water in your watering can.

If you can't see down inside, you can always try drinking some water from the spout.

Next, water the clippings that have been planted in potting soil.

Be careful to keep the roots moist, but don't oversoak them... Grapes don't need a lot of water.

When you're done, take off your clothes and do a naked "happy dance" in the backyard because you're so happy to be done!

Good luck, uncle Barth! Hope you have as much fun as I did!

Love,

Owen

These are the days of our lives...

In April Sara and Deven got to go on their first ever cruise! We flew to Miami where we boarded a Royal Carribean cruiseliner and headed to the Bahamas.

The weather wasn't the greatest, unfortunately, and we didn't get to get off the boat at our first planned stop, Royal Carribean's private island called Coco Cay. So we continued on to Nassau where we took this picture in front of our boat.

In Nassau we rented our own motor scooter and scooted all over the island on our own adventure. Deven did a little bit of research before we left on the trip and knew where to find our own private beach. We had a fun time!

The best part of the trip and cruise was that Deven's company paid for the whole thing!

David and Cristy Sanders were so nice to watch Owen for us while we went to the Bahamas. Unfortunately, he decided to pull one of their dining room chairs over on Sunday morning before they left for church and it hit him square in the forehead. David had to take him to an urgent care facility and help hold him down while they gave him three stitches.

Then a couple days after we got home Owen fell down in the back yard and busted two of the three stitches. The doctor opted to use Steri-Strips instead of replacing the broken stitches.

He finally got the last stitch out and the Steri-Strips off a few days after that. His cut is looking much better now and the scar shouldn't be too bad once he's older. But what little boy is complete with out a scar somewhere on his face?

As if the whole "stitches" incident wasn't bad enough, a few days later Owen started coughing alot and getting sick. We thought it strange when one day he fell asleep on the couch. He has never done this before and never again since. Sara decided to take him to the doc who told us he had a slight case of pneumonia. He was prescribed antiobiotics and was good as new again within a day or two.

For memorial weekend we went camping with the Sanders at Lost Creek Reservoir. We got to use our $50 garage sale tent. It was great! All 8 of slept in it with room to spare...including Howie! That's a great deal for $50, don't you think?

One of the following weekends we attended a barbeque at another friend's house. It was so much fun. They had a pool, trampoline, playground, and even a zip line!

Owen loved the zip line and hung on all by himself!

At the end of June Owen begain his first swimming lessons. He was so lucky that no one else signed up for the course so he had two instructors all to himself as well as mommy and daddy. He had so much fun!

Owen loves playing in the adjacent kiddie pool after his lessons! Mommy does too!

On July 4th we went to our Central Point town parade. Owen liked everything except the bagpipe players. As they walked by playing their music he looked at daddy with a frantic look and repeated, "Daddy! Daddy! All done! All done!"

Owen especially loved all the candy that was thrown out to the kids during the parade!