Catch up

We have been doing pretty good at getting out every weekend since we have been here so I have lots of pictures that tell the story better than I do. So bear with me on the slide show...

Vasona Creek Park: This was a lot of fun with the boys. They had a bit of everything.

Carousels to ride on...

Trains to ride on and whistles to blow...

Geese to gawk at...

and trails for little boys to run on and expend the maximum amount of energy. It was a great park. I think we are going back with our bikes next time.

I got sick and so we had a weekend in with plenty of brother bonding time. Luke showed Noah the ropes on how to operate Mom's Iphone.

Because I was sick, we left the cooking up to Biscuit.


My brother Aaron decided to take his spring break in sunny California, only it was not so sunny, we had a huge series of rain storms roll in just as he got here. We didn't let it ruin our fun. We had one good day and took it to go to Santa Cruz.

Monarch butterflies are supposed to winter here but we didn't see any.... we didn't look super hard either.

We did catch the seals at the wharf. The boys loved watching them and listening to the barking.

We decided to investigate the Mystery Spot on our way home. It was pretty cool. As you can see the laws of gravity don't apply here.

This is rumored to be due to the alien spaceship buried under the spot. Sounds logical to me.

Aaron is a big NHL fan so we got tickets to see our local San Jose Sharks. They played the St.Louis Blues and stomped them. It was a lot of fun. I had never been to an NHL game and haven't followed it much but after watching the game I could get on the wagon.

Proof that we were there!

We took Aaron to Carmel to see the beautiful coast line. It was cold with driving rain but that kicked up the waves and made it quite interesting. We ventured out of the car to get a picture on the beach and not much longer than that.


This past weekend Ryan's sister Callie was coming to town (Laguna Hills) so we decided to drive down and see her and all Ryan's siblings. It was an unofficial Rasmussen reunion. Luke and Kevin became best buds.


They played together so well, it was heaven. Noah feeling a little left out turned to ketchup for comfort...


Always best straight off the spoon.

We got to see all of Ryan's siblings. Unfortunately Jessie flew in just as we were leaving but we caught her at the airport so we could at least say hi and see Haddie. (No pictures of her but trust me she is cute)


We are excited for Jessie to come see us and spend some more time together. April can't come soon enough!!

Jacob & Deidre come to visit!!

So I am about 3 weeks late posting about their visit but it was definitely noteworthy enough for a post. Jacob and Deidre flew out for a couple of days to visit and to watch the kids for me for a couple of days so I could get caught up on some work. What a good aunt and uncle....

seriously.... they were great. I don't have pictures of what they did with the boys b/c they are on their camera but they took them out.

We didn't make them babysit the whole time they were here. Over the weekend we hit San Francisco. We ventured into China Town and got some silk PJs for the boys. Totally worth it.

On Sunday we took a drive out to Half Moon Bay and up to Pacifica. It was beautiful but a little chilly. We got out only a couple of times because it was a little nippy.

Ryan and Luke are both warm-blooded and didn't seem to mind.


Noah and I on the other hand were a little cold.

Luke had so much fun with Uncle Jacob and Deidre. He has set places for them at the table for weeks and still talks about them. Thanks again for the visit you guys!

It's a ...

GIRL!!

We found out today. We are hoping for a healthy, calm, and obedient little girl... because that is what all little girls are like right???

I wasn't going to post a picture but what's an announcement w/o a picture and like Luke told me today... "It's kinda cool and kinda gross." Don't know what he thought was gross but it was funny.


We are super excited to welcome a new little girl into our family. My family is going through another round of babies again. Noah was one of 5 boys born in a year. Pete had the first of the next wave in December. A little girl. There are 4 of us pregnant and so far two of those are girls... we are hoping for a perfect 5 again to even out the boy-girl ratio.

4 years

I will apologize now for the back posting but let's look on the bright side... at least I am posting right? It is hard to believe that it has been that long. We decided when we made the decision to move away from Rexburg that we would try to go back to our cemetery and visit the quads' grave every year on their birthday (January 31st). Even though it has only been a month since we left, we wanted to start things off right so we planned a weekend in Idaho.

Our trip was filled with visits with friends and family,

checking on the business, visiting the cemetery and freezing our tails off. Unfortunately we didn't get many pictures of anything but our visit to the cemetery.

We were lucky to be able to get to the grave. One year we couldn't even make it in the truck because of all the snow. This year we could drive right over, we just had to dig out the headstone. The boys had fun for a little bit trying to navigate the deep snow.


After a little bit we were all frozen and so we tried to explain to Luke why we were there and took a couple of pictures.


It is hard to describe my feeling and emotions that surround our babies. Sometimes it seems so surreal that all that happened to us and other times it is all too real. I look forward to the day that I can hold them, love them, and get to know them as I know my boys. Until then we have that one very special day where we were able to hold and love them and feel of their special spirits. They are definitely woven into the fabric of our lives.

San Francisco Part II

We decided to head back to San Francisco for our Saturday trip this weekend. We wanted to hit Fisherman's Wharf & Ghiradelli Square... can't plan too much with the munchkins along! The first thing we hit was the traffic of thousands of Giants fans going to fan appreciation day at AT&T field. Thank you GPS for taking us right by this!


Now we know where to go when baseball season starts. Finally we made it to Fisherman's Wharf and walked around we found a cool submarine and boat.


But there was no sort of railing between the dock and the water... a little to nerve racking for a mother. As I was telling Luke for the 14th time that he was too close to the edge, I realized that I had come full circle and sounded like my mom with all of us kids.

After grabbing a crab salad on sourdough sandwich for lunch, which was pretty good and I don't like sea food, we headed up to Ghirardelli Square for the dessert!


Who doesn't love a sundae? After we had got our fill of ice cream and chocolate we walked down to the water to check things out. Needless to say this was the highlight for the boys.


Noah and I walked out to the water to test how cold it was while Luke decided he hadn't done enough snow angels in Rexburg and tried to make a sand angel...


Noah, as usual, decided that he couldn't be left behind but made a slight miscalculation on how far from the step he was.


Oops! Maybe next time. Hugs from Dad make everything better.



Once again we had gorgeous weather and tons of fun. We might just get used to this place.

Is this for real?

I have never lived in a warm climate like this. I am told that this is unseasonably warm weather for San Jose but it is awesome. I am amazed every day when I look at the calendar and it says February and then I go outside to green grass, sunshine and blossoming trees. The boys and I are taking advantage of the sunny days. Snack time in the back yard = no mess inside to clean up. Win-win for everyone.



We went to Santa Cruz for an afternoon at the beach with some girls in our ward. It was so nice and the boys loved it. The water is way to cold to get in but they are more interested in the sand than the water anyhow.

We attempted sand castles but they liked the destroying better than the building and so I just left them to their own devices. Noah's was trying to explore other parts of the beach instead of the one where we were at.


I wished that some of my Rexburg friends could be with me and appreciate the warmth and beauty of it all, so I was a little homesick as I loaded the boys into the car. I turned around for one last look and saw this:

So to all my cold climate dwelling friends... Isn't this amazing? The beach in January? No snow, ice, coats or runny noses? Come on down!

San Francisco Part I

I mentioned that we were trying to use our weekends to explore what the Bay area has to offer and so after heading south we decided to go north to San Francisco. I had never been to this city and so I was excited to see what all the fuss is about.

We headed straight for one of the most famous landmarks: the Golden Gate Bridge.


We stopped at the end of the bridge and enjoyed the view across the bay.


That is Alcatraz and the far side of the bay. We decided to walk out on to the bridge because driving over is a little anti-climactic.


This was pretty cool. Tons of people and traffic but what can you expect? Luke was really excited to go up to the tall tower. (He is into towers lately) He was even more excited to see the door in the bottom of the tower.


Much to his dismay and my relief, the door was locked. We headed back to our car and drove to Sausalito for lunch. It was a charming little sea side town and lunch was good. So good we were to busy eating for any pictures. We loaded the boys back into the car and as they drifted off to sleep Ryan took me down Lombard street. I had never heard of it but it is very steep and very windy. This is as we are driving down it.


Pretty cool. I can't believe how steep the streets are. I have seen them on movies and stuff but to drive those everyday! CRAZY!