long weekend

Ben took a few days off this past week to spend at home with us. Mostly we just spent family time at home, but on friday, we decided to go to the NW Trek. We haven't been there since this spring, so we thought the girls would like to go. It was a nice, cool day, but not rainy, so that was ideal. tall trees

There are huge banana slugs all over at this time of year. We accidentally squashed this one with the stroller, but didn't tell Kara it was dying as she admired it.

Family picture, though you can't really see Evie.The girls were so excited that the otters and beavers were out swimming around, and not just sleeping in their dens.

The wolverines are always running around and hyper.

Kiersten enjoyed gathering leaves as we walked around.

Evie woke up toward the end of the day, while we were in the discovery center.

I was getting the girls ready this morning, and when I was fixing their breakfast, Kara said she would "babysit" Evie. So I put her in the swing to make it easier for Kara to watch her. (and to protect her). She is a very sweet girl, and always wants to help. Lately she is really into "chore lists". and asks me to write her a list nearly every day. Then she checks off all the chores as she gets them done. occasionally, Kiersten will ask for a chore list too, but she loses interest in actually doing the chores pretty quickly.

Kara's preschool class has a field trip to the mall today to ride elevators and escalators, in honor of it being "E" week. She is pretty excited, and we had to get a picture of her in the field trip uniform. Her teacher had asked me if she needed a bigger shirt, but her shirt from last year is still a little too big on her. I hope they have fun. She's pretty excited that they will be riding the city bus to get to the mall. I would have volunteered to chaperone, but i don't think they need me with my double stroller and 2 extra kids slowing them down.