Brielle's Modeling Pictures

Back towards the end of the preschool year I was approached by one of the parents in Cammy's class who is a professional photographer.  She owns the company June Bug Photography here in Mill Creek and has a GORGEOUS natural light studio. She has been wanting to get more babies in her studio around the "sitting" age and she thought it would be nice to use Brielle to model some of her ADORABLE vintage outfits so she could have more examples of this age and what she has to offer.  I never like to pass up free pictures, so I agreed. Just look at what precious memories I got from just coming into her studio for like 30-40 mins...

Take Me Out to the Ballgame!

On July 16th we had a little belated Father's Day celebration by going to a Mariner's baseball game with Jason, the girls and my parents. This was Hailey's and Brielle's first Mariner's game and I would say it was a success.  We tried to get up and walk the girls around during the game, but Hailey was very upset that we took her away from watching the baseball game and kept telling us "I just want to watch baseball!" I think we might have a baseball player on our hands...a good arm AND loves to watch the game?!

I feel like no summer is complete without going to a professional baseball game and enjoying some good people watching, baseball playing and good food...all with good company!

Grams and Gramps with the girls ready for the game to begin!

Jason and Cammy watching the game

Taking a little walk around the stadium

Naptime for Brielle

One minute she's watching the game from up high...

Not long after she is napping on Gramps

Cammy was the only one who wanted to visit the Mariner Moose

Baseball with our girls

Our whole group after the game

And just in case you were wondering...the Mariners did WIN!

Proud to be an American!

To celebrate the Fourth of July this year, we did our usual 4th of July parade in downtown Everett with my parents and a few friends and their kids.  It was definitely not your typical 4th of July weather, as it began to sprinkle right as we were parking at the parade shuttle.  All those cute sunny weather dresses and rompers I bought for my girls to wear had to be bundled up and layered under and over (hence the leggings under Brielle's super cute romper). Thankfully the rain stopped before the parade began and we managed to stay warm.

My festive girls

The jean jacket crew

The girls patiently waiting for the parade to start

Our friends who joined us at the parade

Our All American Girl!

Happy 4th of July from the Lumsden 5!!

We had a yummy BBQ dinner and then ended the night with some fun sparklers right before bedtime. The girls were a little hesitant at first with the idea of holding the sparkler, but towards the end they couldn't get enough of it and kept asking for more. Not sure who enjoyed it more...Jason or the girls. No better way to celebrate the 4th than with sparklers when it's just too late to go see any fireworks shows!

Grams and Gramps celebrating with us

Brielle, our American cutie!

There is something truly special about Jason's short shorts!

Cammy with her sparkler

Hailey getting help from mommy

And now with Grams

Gramps doing sparklers with the girls

Celebrating 11 Years!!

It's a bit crazy to me to think that Jason and I have been married for 11 years as of July 3rd!!!  So much has happened in those years...moved from CA to WA in our very first apartment together, Jason started working for Boeing and has been there every since, I started working in different districts subbing and eventually landed a few different teaching positions, we bought a condo and got a cat, then we got 2 dogs, then bought a house, I quit teaching so I could stay home with my kids, and now the rest is yet to be told!

We spent our anniversary this year as a family during the day hanging out in downtown Snohomish for lunch and a river walk and then just Jason and I went out to dinner later that night to a new place to both of us, Terracotta Red. Sometimes simplicity is the best way to celebrate!!

All because two people fell in love...

What our family has become 11 years later

Brielle's 6 Month Pictures

On July 2nd we had Brielle's 6 Month photos taken by our favorite professional photographer, Kristin Harris at Discovery Park in Seattle. We had scheduled these pictures for a month prior to when we had them taken but then had to reschedule due to me still being stuck on crutches. But...we did manage to get them taken BEFORE she turned 7 months. I was a little sad that Brielle wasn't all smiles (it happened to be her naptime, so she was a tough one), but I guess she just has her big sister Hailey's personality and those smiles are definitely hard to come by! Kristin always manages to capture something good and these are a few of our favorites...

Father's Day Brew Fest 2016

Nothing says "Happy Father's Day" better than going to a brew fest and letting dad have a well deserved relaxing day drinking beer! Ha...if only it actually went down that way.

We went to the Washington Brewer's Festival at Marymoor Park on June 19th.  This was a chance for Jason to try lots of different beers brewed in this state.  Now, remember when I said earlier..."if only it actually went down that way"?  Yeah, back to that...

We arrived later than planned, waited in line to park our car, we waited in a long line to just get in, we had 3 kids all wanting to do anything but watch their dad drink beer and one tired, hot and annoyed mom (from waiting so long to do everything and following my kids all over the place) who should still be using crutches but couldn't.  All of that didn't make the best combo for a relaxing day of beer drinking.  Needless to say, Jason got to enjoy about one or two beers and then had to rush to drink the rest of his taster cups.

Jason really is a great dad to his girls and he deserved a day doing something he enjoyed.  But in true parenthood style, things never seems to go quite as we envision them...especially when skipped naps are involved!!! #dadlife

Trying to enjoy a beer with his girls

The onesie says it all!

Summer Round #1 in Chelan

No better way to kick off summer break than to leave straight from Pre-K graduation and head to Lake Chelan.  I guess we can call this her "graduation trip."  We better be careful...we start trips like this now, I can only imagine what they will be like when she is graduating from high school or college!!

We spent probably one of our best summer weeks at our timeshare in Chelan on June 11-17.  There were lots of people all around, lots of kids Cammy's and Hailey's ages, lots of activities to do, great weather and we spent the week with my parents and some extended family...John and Linda Geigle (my dad's cousin and her husband).  The girls were in Heaven with practically an extra set of grandparents there to play with, do their hair and just have fun with.  And of course we didn't mind the help one bit!!!  The only downfall...they closed the mini golf the entire week we were there for maintenance. And if you remember anything from any of my other Chelan blogs, this was a free activity that we did just about every single day with the girls because it was fun and easy. Talk about disappointment (but we got over it with other fun activities).

On our first full day there we spent most of it just hanging out at the beach and swimming.  We had a fun visit from one of Cammy's friends who happened to be in Chelan for a few days as well.  They boated over to our place and played at the beach with us for a little bit.  Then after naps we drove over to their RV park and the town of Chelan and went to dinner at the Lakeside Drive-In.

Jason and the girls building sand castles

Grams taking Brielle for a little dip in the lake

Brielle hanging in the tent with mommy

Cammy and her buddy Daison who came to visit us

My friend Adrea came over on boat to visit us!

Dinner with Daison at the Lakeside Drive-In

 The next day we did more swimming of course and the girls did a rock painting activity, which was supposedly called "Rock Pets", but it was more like "find a rock and paint it however you want."  The girls still enjoyed it and we now get the honor of looking at two beautifully painted rocks in our backyard :)

Testing out the floaty for Brielle

And trying out a different floaty

The older girls painting rocks

Twins!

Family photo at the lake

Monday, John and Linda arrived for a few days. We made the most of their visit by going to a few wineries, the grandparents went golfing while we stayed back and swam with the kids and we had breakfast at Blueberry Hills with them before they left.  The girls talked us into blueberry picking after breakfast, so we decided to do it since we had never picked blueberries before.

Lunch at the pool

Hailey LOVES to be in the water!!

Having fun with daddy

Our little triplets all ready for bed

Bigs and little at Benson Winery

Wine tasting at Benson

Bowling with daddy

Brielle napping during bowling

He got his very FIRST Turkey (3 strikes in a row)!

The girls ready to hit the indoor pool

Brielle cruising around the indoor pool

Hello cutie pie!

Picnic lunch for these girls

Breakfast at Blueberry Hills before the Geigles left

We love Blueberry Hills!

Grams and Brielle picking blueberries

The older girls picking blueberries

Jason and my dad

Hailey was the designated bucket holder

Jason and I were even able to get away during a naptime one day for a little kid-free wine tasting.  We had grand plans to hit up at least 3 wineries, but of course I had to be a light weight and only make it to one.  We came back home for a little snack and then I felt good to go to another 2 after that.  Oh the joys of not drinking much alcohol since having kids!!!  Talk about one cheap date though :)

Stop #1: Lake Chelan Winery

Stop #2: Hard Row to Hoe

Stop #3: Chelan Ridge

Our last was spent back at the beach and in the pool.  It's basically where you can find us at most given times while here!

Cammy was quite terrified of tipping and pretty much everything, but ended up having fun!

Hailey wanted to be just like her big sister and kayak too!

Hanging on the beach with Brielle

Gramps finishing up with the sand castle building

A chilly swim at the end of the day (lots of wind)

All in all it was a really fun week for everyone!!  We look forward to ending our summer just the way it started...with one last trip to Chelan before school starts.