Mother's Day 2020

This event was many months ago and I can still feel how invigorating it was to get out of the house for the first time in months, but I won't get ahead of myself.  Usually Spring is full of outings as the air warms up and the flowers bloom, but this spring was very different. I was grateful that he had mostly warm weather and that we have a wonderful yard for my boys to play in everyday so we have been feeling beyond blessed in that way. Anyway, MOther's day was so long ago that I'm not remembering many of the details that weren't photographed (Thank you blog for helping me remember so much of my life that I otherwise would have forgotten) But I'm sure my boys started by making me breakfast. They also had presented me with some gifts including some Dahlia bulbs, door mats, a new toilet seat (the boys thought this was hilarious) some hose nozzles and I think some other things. Later, after we were all dressed for the day, Charlie had created a scavenger hunt for me to go on to find my last gift. I found a package wrapped in large leaves on a tree branch and when I opened it, there was a new fancy watch for me. It was pretty exciting. 

We had a low key day, playing inside and outside, we had beautiful weather and an easy costco lasagna for dinner. We also scoped out spots to plant my Dahlias...Also, funny side story. At this time I knew I was pregnant but didn't know the gender. I had spoken with a couple friends that if we were having a girl, I really like the name Jane Dahlia. Jane has always been our top choice for a girl but I had never mentioned the Dahlia part to Max and he didn't even know I loved Dahlia flowers. (Also, I loved that I could see Dahlia as a form of Dale which is my wonderful Red Grandpa's name who passed away when I was 12) Anyway, I thought it might be a sign that I'm having a girl, my little Jane Dahlia, when Max gave me the Dahlias. Stay tuned to find out if we're having a girl, but I'm likely to have our baby before that news ever gets to our blog. 

Anyway, My favorite mother's day tradition is spending the evening in a beautiful place with my family and getting some sort of photo with my kids. We realized that we have always had amazing weather on Mother's day because we have been able to do this for years. This year, after dinner, we walked to Marshall Park (Green Swing Park, according to my children) It was a fun little hike and the first outing  my boys had done in months. The playground was closed but that didn't stop us from having fun. 

We also wanted to take a photo to send to our families to let them know we were expecting baby #4

We found lots of painted rocks on our way. 

And we found a dreamy spot for mother's day photos...and for hiking barefoot. 

Looks like a couple boys were getting bored from all the photos. 

I think this is the one we actually ended up sending to our families. 

After they participated in my extensive photos, they were left with a lot of play time which meant forging up and down the creek. 

Max was telling Edwin some secrets. 

Here is Edwin's reaction, I found out later that Max told him that he could pee on a tree if he needed to. haha!

And another highlight was trying out the slingshot for the first time. 

Don't worry, they weren't aiming for anything. Just figuring out how to launch it. 

And then we hiked back to our home. It's fun to see little messages (and painted rocks) along the trail to bring unity despite this weird socially distant world we're living in. 

Anyway, I just feel so incredibly grateful for having the role of being a mother. There are challenges Every Single Day but there is also so much sweetness in each day and these boys are loved so much from their parents and they (especially over the last 6 months) have truly bonded and become incredibly close friends. 

Even though we have been keeping our distance, we have still been able to have lots of adventures in nature, which will hopefully be coming up on the blog!

A scavenger hunt leading to a great surprise

Well, I've been off my blog for awhile, partly because we stay busy but mostly because making videos is  hard for me and this post includes a long video. We wanted to share some special news with our kids and we thought it would make them excited to send them on a scavenger hunt (and make them do chores during each step) They knew they were doing a scavenger hunt and decided to pick costumes. Anyway, you can watch the video. They had to do 4 different tasks (chores) to get their clues and each clue came with a little symbol that represented a letter in the word baby (spoiler alert) haha! They had a lot of fun and it was fun to see them working together. Anyway, you can watch the video to see how it went down. And overall, they are pretty excited!

Little baby is a lot bigger than this now!

At the end we had a fun cookie making party with these amazing cookie decorating kits made by my friend Heather. So it was definitely a memorable night for these boys. 

And there you have it, the Baertlein's will be a family of 6!

11 years

 Like pretty much every thing this spring, our anniversary did not go as expected. But that just goes along with life and marriage, things turn out differently than expected and you just love each other through it all. So basically the day was filled with take out food and hiding from our children. Ha!

Max got up in the morning and went to pick up some breakfast from a cafe we kept hearing wonderful things about (Portland is a huge place for foodies and we have lived here our whole lives and have explored so little of the food) Anyway, Charlie was awake and didn't know that Max was picking up breakfast so he made me breakfast with an "egg muffin" and greek yogurt with honey. He knows those are both things I love.

Max came home with some fancy chicken and waffles and we all chowed down so fast that there is no photo evidence. But they were real!

We had a slow morning/afternoon, then Max needed to work a bit. I was just grateful he gets to work from home these days! Later we realized we should have some sort of photo documentation of what we look like on this 11 year anniversary.
We didn't get to spend a weekend at the beach (Already had my mom lined up for babysitting) so we took some photos with our bamboo. Thanks Miles for your photography skills. Haha! We have yet to learn to take a respectable picture.

Edwin's face is my favorite, hopefully it distracts from the groping happening in this photo. 

Charlie had to be convinced to join in on these photos. ha. Hopefully it was just a one time thing. 

Anyway, for dinner we had take out again. This time yummy Thai food! Again, no photo evidence but delicious. I think we just made our kids mac & cheese so we didn't have to share Thai food that they would complain about.

Then we put them in bed and decided to make some candles. We've recently wanted to try making a couple different kinds of candles so we decided it was as good a time as ever to go at it. we made some little tea light candles and a tree candle. Fun experience and we'll do some more with the boys. We also have some supplies to make beeswax candles so we're excited about that.

If only I knew how to rotate a photo on blogger, but I don't.

Once we knew the children were officially asleep, we enjoyed a pampering evening.

Even though the anniversary was far from anything we expected, it still ended up being perfect. We do have a lot of fun together with pretty much anything we do, especially when we slow down from life and take the time to focus on each other. Life is not always easy and we've been thrown some surprises but it has been so much more fulfilling and joyful than I could have imagined. I am constantly impressed with Max's patience and diligence when it comes to me and his boys. He is always kind to me and doesn't raise his voice. (we both raise our voices at the kids from time to time, let's be real) Also, being pregnant (spoiler alert) always makes me feel like I should be doing more to contribute to the household but feel too exhausted and queasy and I have to let my body rest. I often start to feel guilty that I can't keep up with the housework or that sometimes we eat fast food and sometimes the kids fend for themselves for lunch. Max never ever implies that I should be doing more and always encourages me to rest, all the while he works his tail off all hours of the day, trying to balance all his responsibilities. Point is, I got it good and even though we are both imperfect people, we do always try to be better for ourselves and each other and we have both grown individually and together over these 11 years. I'm so grateful to be with such a loving husband for all of eternity!

And here are some throwbacks to that special May 2nd 2009. Thanks Anna for the photos...and that you are probably the only one reading this, True Friend!

You'll crack your head open, or possibly your nose!

May 1st started out with a bang. It was such a silly thing to happen, yet it did. Shortly after breakfast the 2 older boys were fighting upstairs, I was standing at the bottom of the stairs, listening, about to mutter (perhaps yell) something to them to remind them to behave. But then I realized Max was up there so I listened to Max handle it, probably with a lot more finesse than I would have. Anyway, in the meantime of me being enthralled with the conversation upstairs, Edwin wandered down the stairs and was standing two stairs away from me and decided to fling his little body at me with full trust that I would catch him. Well, once I realized what he was doing, it was too late and his body bounced right off of me and onto the floor. I feel like my grasps may have slowed his fall, but it all happened so fast that it's hard to say. His head hit a corner of the wall and started bleeding. There was quite a bit of blood so Max decided he needed to take him into the hospital. 

Weirdly enough, Max was about to leave with Edwin when he checked his phone and realized a doctor, (one of his coworkers) was going to be stopping by our house within 1 minute to pick up some of our eggs she buys from us. Max decided to hold off and have her check it out first. The cut wasn't super deep but it was long and pretty bloody. She checked it out then let us know it would probably be best to take him in and they would likely glue it. So that's what they did. 

Also, Max wasn't sure how to travel to the hospital with Edwin without his head rubbing the carseat, I suggested the workout band holding a gauze or paper towel and Edwin was so excited that I found a blue one (his favorite color) It worked out perfectly and the nurses and doctors commented on it being a great idea as well....just in case anyone finds themselves in the same situation.

He was such a champ! They did end up cleaning and super gluing it closed.

He was completely normal when he got home and he kept reassuring me that it didn't hurt anymore. We had some chats about making sure mommy or daddy know when he is going to jump into their arms.

He liked it when I took pictures of his head so he could see how it was doing.

Anyway, we had some exciting plans for the evening of May 1st since it was the night before our anniversary and also the anniversary of when Max broke his nose (the night before our wedding) We planned on having a campfire, roasting hot dogs and s'mores and having Max relay the story of how his nose became broken. The boys know this story well but always enjoy hearing it.

Also, I"m realizing that there was a lot of dress-up happening this day!
And I'm realizing May 1st may be an unlucky day for our family as far as face and head injuries go.

Moving on...

the neighbor gave them a big box to play in while we prepped the fire, then we may have burned that box shortly after...

Listening to the tales of Daddy's broken nose.

 And here is the video of the re-telling for anyone that doesn't know the story. This just may be a new May 1st tradition. Also, I'm hoping we make it a tradition to avoid all injuries and hospital visits.

Also, I just went through the last several years in my google photos to see if we've had any other injuries on May 1st and it looks like it doesn't happen too often, so that's good I guess!