Christmas gift bags for the homeless

We walked under the Burnside bridge on Christmas Eve to hand out 10 gift bags holding wool gloves, fresh fruit, a giant chocolate bar, and $3.  One smiling woman told Koh "I LOVE a $2 bill - thank you thank you!"

 

Little librarians

UNPOSED: here we are at Hillsdale public library trying to find some books, reserving for pickup "how soon will we get them, dad?"
 

Why is it so loud?

Sound of paper crinkling
Abe: Why is that so loud?

The school cafeteria
Abe: Why is it so loud?

Music playing softly
Abe: I can hear that!

Abe got his hearing aids this week and has been repeating these words a lot as he gets used to hearing things he was missing out on all these years.

Snow days off school!

Winter wonderland + 2 DAYS OFF!

Abe's First Gymnastic Meet

Abe: Sunday I competed in my first gymnastics meet. It was super fun and I think I did pretty good, getting 6th overall.  Click THIS for all my pics and videos. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Hanging out

Sometimes we like to just hang out with dad.  Circuit bouldering gym today.

Thanksgiving 2016

It's becoming a turkey day tradition for us to go to Mt Hood, walk around Trillium Lake then enjoy dinner and play time at the Mazama Lodge.  We didn't have a frozen lake or even much snow this year but we still had fun.  We found some geocaches, a beaver dam, a ski lift, a deer skeleton and built some snowmen.  And ate a lot, too.

Geocaching - how fun

Today we took dad's phone (and we took dad too) and we went on our first geocaching adventure.

Wow that was really fun and we found five caches all walking from our home!  One in Willamette Park and 4 more in Riverview Cemetery.

We now have ideas on where to hide our own geocaches.

Koh back to soccer, indoors now

Koh - My shoulder is back to full strength so I played today with the Dragons, and scored 3 times, including with my left foot once!

Love Letter from Dad #14

Abe & Koh - Last night we watched on TV the historic presidential election of 2016.  I am so impressed with your interest in this civic matter, it seems more interested than I've ever been.  We sat together for 5 hours watching red and blue colors appear on the USA state map.  You hoped, like me, that Donald Trump wouldn't be elected.  We watched in disbelief as more red states came on and that number kept rising toward 270.  Finally you fell asleep on my lap and my arms before you knew the result.  Koh, you slept on the sofa all night. Today you woke to learn who would be our next president.  Koh, your reaction was to smack your forehead, no words.  Abe, yours was to say "Bad!"  I just love you guys.

Halloween 2016

Koh: We were really scary for Halloween this year. Abe's a ninja and I'm a zombie. Brains, brains, brains....

Cairn building at our beach

We love rocks... throwing 'em, collecting 'em, climbing up 'em, and building stuff with 'em too.  This weekend we built almost 20 cairns on our favorite backyard rocky beach.

Climbing School field session #2 - Rapelling

Abe - Here we went again back to Horsethief Butte SP and this time we dangled on our rope learning to "self-belay" on rappel.  Koh didn't come this weekend 'cause of his broken bone from last weekend.   Here's our class photo journal

Oregon Dunes and Accidental Big Air

Koh: I was going a bit fast and got some accidental BIG AIR on my first quad trip, so our annual September beach trip ended in the hospital.   Oops.  Here's our trip photo journal.

Climbing School - our first field session

They don't waste any time at Mazama's so here we are climbing and belaying each other at Horsethief Butte State Park, WA.  It was big fun and we camped with the other families, too.  Here's our class photo album.  

Let's go climb trees with our prussiks, dad

Finally, A Broken Bone

It is hard to believe that it took nine years before one of the boys broke a bone considering all their adventures and escapades. Abe has a small fracture on his foot from doing a back flip and landing on a rock.

See the Abe Can Levitate post for how it happened. 

Koh's Munra Point training hike

We were sad today Abe couldn't go but we were happy Forest and his dad went on this 3.5 hour hard hike and we made the summit and were the only kids there today!

Allowance earned today!

Abe can levitate

10th Anniversary Deschuttes River State Park campout

We haven't missed a year since we were born, and we want to keep coming' next year, too, Dad!  Click to check out our anniversary music video, too! 

Camping at Olallie Lake

We spent the weekend camping at Olallie Lake. We love this place. 

Goofy shot with Mom

Another goofy shot at sunset

Abe spent a lot of time fishing. He caught one!

Campfire smores with our friends

Abe reading

Koh being goofy, still

We caught crawdads

Camping on our Willamette River island

We play in Willamette Park like it's our yard and walk or swim to the island all the time.  Last night we decided to camp there on a warm summer night, wow that was fun.  Swam and made many sand structures, cooked s'mores and had our favorite hot pizza, slept under the stars and meteor shower. Fireside chat:

Koh: Dad, do you want more pizza?
Dad: You can have it, I'll eat any that's left.
Koh: Dad, why are you so generous?
Dad: (pause)
Koh: Maybe that's just what Dad's do.
Dad: Yep, I think that's the right answer, Koh.

Koh: look what dadda fixed me today...

A twin-yolk over easy egg breakfast, yummy!