Friendly game of volley before fireworks

Cute girls

The house...

More cute girls

and more

The waiting is the hardest part

Cute couple

Buds...

Bri is off in Utah and we really miss her. Aiden askes several time a day where she is and then says , "I miss her." He only has me to talk to so it's going to be a long two weeks for both of us. Gretchen and gang went to the airport with us to see her off and it was really hard to watch her plane leave. YUCK! We went to the parking structure and then to the 6th floor and watched it taxi and go. She sounds like she is having a blast so far...Here are a few of the Utah pics. I didn't do a very good job of recording, but great memories...I do have a special request. I am trying to fill all of the frames I got for Christmas before I have Bunco here on the 19th. Nothing like a little incentive to get things done. If you would like to choose the picture of you that I display in the house, you need to send one to me, otherwise, I pick...I can print them here is you would just upload for me. Also Bri will be happy to know that the pool is up-it's a beast. We have a hose filling it since yesterday and it is only 2 feet deep after 26 hours. I'll get a pic of it once I can get the camera back from Aiden...He likes to look at pictures. Also for his birthday I am making him an ABC book. It will have pictures of him and things he likes or says. Like for W it will say, "What about me?" with a sad face picture since he says that when he's been left out. If you have any cute pictures of him or think of anything funny he said or did that I'm not thinking about since I get to see him all the time...let me know. I'll start it tonight at scrapbook camp with my mom. I will just need those soon so he gets something other than legos for his birthday. My other kids really liked their books, so I always look forward to doing this for their 4th birthdays. Thanks!

Rilan Thain Anderson

Sorry for the long delay on pictures but you can't believe how much work a newborn can be let alone getting over a surgery and making sure Rilan gets over Jaundice while trying to learn to breastfeed...well maybe some of you know that well and even more but I sure didn't realize... Luckily Mom's here to help me this week and I already feel better and better every day. Rilan is such a cutie and a joy and we already love him so much. He's worth all the hours of natural labor, then having to have a c section after the dr already tried doing the vacuum forceps and episiotomy to try and get the poor little one out. Quit the experience but well worth every moment. I wanted to experience labor and I got my wish and more :). Rilan does little else but sleep poop and eat and then all that again again and again but he's already trying to lift his head and when we put him on the ground in the park he practically rolled himself over tried to lift his head and was moving his feet a lot.........I think he will be an early crawler...he's already to take off running well inbetween his many naps :). Ok well I will hopefully be able to post more later but here's some anyhow. Hope all is going well with everyone. Love to all. Jill and Thain

More pictures from the vacation

I selected no layout on these pictures but I still can't move and arrange them so bleck I don't know how to layout this blog so forgive it's sloppyness, I just don't get how to do these and probably never will!. Thain got a lot of good pictures theres a ton more that would be fun to blog but I just picked an array of random ones to post and sent on a dvd of all the vacation pics we have Mom to you to use any or whatever ones for your scrapbook. I hope that works ok. Let me know if there's a problem or if anyone else wants pics. Looks like everyone had some good times. I wish I could've done more but I had a good time visiting too or just bieng around family was nice. These are all mostly pics Thain took though. Thanks again Mom and Dad for providing the great vacation!

A little bit of context

Mom requested some pictures of the new apartment... three or four weeks ago. Sorry for the delay Mom! She requested some context to place our new lives in as without it we are just floating out there... or some such thing (you can clarify that point Mom :) )In any case here are some pictures of our new apartment. The place is much closer to everything we care about in Portland. We are closer to Alisa's work, we are closer to many jogging trails, we are closer to PSU (which I haven't fully managed to disconnect myself from), we are closer to restaurants, closer to shops, closer to downtown, closer to a frisbee golf course (OK, we haven't ever cared about this, but we might now have to learn now that we practically live on the edge of one), and on and on.

A view of the living room to the right and the kitchen/dining room to the left:


Unpacking is fun! A picture of SOME of the boxes we had to unpack and the living room starting to take shape:


Another view of the living room and the wooden paneling (reminds me of the pet clinic!):


A view of the deck with Zoey checking out every corner. Hard to tell from this picture, but it is a good sized deck with plenty of room for our bikes and BBQ:


A boring picture of the bedroom prior to the art going on the wall:


As far as apartments go, this one has a pretty good view. I actually don't think I could ask for a better placement in the complex for view:


A look left from the deck as opposed to right as seen above. We both have always liked weeping willows and there are a bunch in the complex.



We have a great view of both sunsets and sunrises the way we are situated. Here is a picture of a sunrise of one of the first mornings we were in the place:



Sure there are some downsides of our new place, it is much smaller than our old place for one, but we are really happy about the move. Some more pluses of our new place: it is much quieter than our old one (we are no longer right off the train tracks!), it is much cooler (being on the second floor instead of the third and well shaded by big trees), and we only have one set of stairs (not four!) to walk Zoey up and down.

I also intend to post some pictures from the vacation, but had to start somewhere and it made more sense to post this one first. We had such a great and miss you all!

Thain's Pictures

Above are the images from our lake trip. These are from Thain's cell phone. Hopefully they will post more soon!