Blog

  • While parts of the country are playing in the snow…

    We are playing in the sprinklers.

    (yes the grass looks horrible, they just scalped the summer grass and put down winter seed. I’m sure they appreciate us playing on it.)

  • Pumpkins and Butterflies

    Last Friday we took a little field trip to the Desert Botanical Gardens. We visited the pumpkin patch and saw the Monarch Butterflies. Gamma, Papa, and Abby joined out. It was a lot of fun!

    You can see a few more pics here.

  • First Disney Trip!

    This last week we spent the week in southern california with papa, gma, jason, michelle, and cousin abby. We had a blast, got to meet micky, ride some rides, and generally had a blast. We went to the beach the next day for some relaxing water time.

     

    We took a few photos. Just a few.

     

  • Big Financial Goal Conquered

    Warning this post discusses our personal finances. We usually do not discuss our personal finances, but we wanted to do a post on this subject for two reasons:

    1. A record for ourselves. Something for us to look back on and remember, we learned a lot in the last two years and would just like a record for ourselves.
    2. Encouragement/inspiration for others trying to work on their financial goals. We’ve read a lot of financial success stories over the years and they have always kept us going. It is a nice reminder to know you can do it!

    We use our blog to primarily keep friends and family updated on the boys, but it is also a record of our life as a family and this step was important to us. If you do not want to read about our personal finances please stop reading now. 🙂

    (more…)

  • Century

    Matt completed his first century, 100 mile bike ride, this past weekend! Seriously impressive if you ask me. I would not want to sit on a bike seat that long. The ride took place in beautiful San Luis Obispo. He rode up and down hills (pretty flat here so that was exciting), through fog, and along the coast line. Gorgeous ride!

    I am so proud of you!

    He was raising money for Fireproof ministries and you can still donate if you would like.

  • Halloween PJs!

    Halloween PJs!

  • Rain!

    We had a very dry, dusty summer. Yesterday’s rain was very welcome.

  • Funny quotes 3

    Ezra says to Noah, while both are riding laps in the house on bikes: “Hey Noah, go fast, go really really fast. It’s easy!”

    Noah while in time out: “Noah, clean up this mess right now!”  (yes, he made a mess, but glad he wasn’t cutting himself any slack.

    “28, 29, 2010, 2011, 2012…” – noah counting past 29.

    “Daddy get iPad, daddy plays letter games”  Yes, thats what daddy does with the ipad.

    “Ezra let taffy out! I sure did!” – ezra

    We’ve been working on first and last names with the boys. They know their names and mommy’s names and we taught them daddy’s name one night. Matt asked them one more time what mommy’s name was. Ezra enthusiastically shouts, “Bingo.”

    Ezra was pretend pouring drinks. He was giving me cup after cup of milk. After a while I went to the bathroom, and I hear a knock at the door, “Stephanie” me: yes, “Want a beer?”

    ‎”That’s great Ezra. That’s cool buddy!” – Noah

    The boys are serving us food and I pointed they didn’t give daddy a cookie, Ezra, “daddy go poop get treat.”

    During a Cowboys game I accidentally shut the tv off adjusting it, Noah in his your in big trouble voice, “Mommy, back on, Noah watching Cowboys.” That’s my boy. 🙂

    ‎”jump Ezra, jump, here hold my hand. Yay you did it!” overheard while they were supposed to be napping.

    “there is a cow in our wall” – Ezra

  • Play-School Pre-School

    We officially started school today. Another local twin mommy and I have decided to do play school once a week (to start, we might add more days later.) We are alternating weeks, which means I now get a morning off ever other week! We are not super focused on the academics right now. We are focused on having fun, learning to share, take turns, and other basic life skills.

  • sparklers

  • Fun happenings

    Noah had a wedgie and came up to me, “mommy fix butt.”

    Ezra’s new thing is to tell me “mommy hold you” and then when I pick him up he tells me where to take him to 🙂 Guess walking can be difficult at his old age.

    Ezra spotted one of Factor 1’s logos at the house and said, “It’s daddy’s name!”

    Me in my serious tone, “Ezra Yakob…” him, “mommy Yakob!”

    Matt put Ezra in his room for a time out and when he went to get him out he was naked. Apparently this is his new protest strategy.

    The other day I put them down for nap and heard Noah saying, “diaper back on.” Went in and both of them had nothing but t-shirts on.

    Out of context Ezra, “Ezra hold ho.”

    Noah handed me the teeniest, tiniest amount of play-doh and requested I make an elephant.

    I took the boys safety rails off their beds because they don’t need them and Ezra walked in and said, “mommy broke bed.”

    Noah was sitting on the little potty and Ezra was on the big potty and I hear, “ready, set, go.”

    Noah wanted me out of his hair so he told me to “go cook.”

    The boys were just getting on the couch and I overheard, “okay let’s cuddle.”

  • Library for Sebeta – Update

    Back in December I posted about working with Ethiopia Reads to build a library in Sebeta. I am happy to announce it is all set up!

    For those of you interested the next scheduled libraries are slated for Harar, Dire Dawa, and Somali. You can donate here and if you are interested in giving to a specific library type “TLMP City Name Library” in the “In Honor of” box.

  • Beach trip 2011

    We had a blast at the beach last week. We hope to make this a yearly trip. I love the beach and I’m so glad the boys did too! (or giant sandbox as they call it) We rented a small cottage with a very nice view. It was so nice having our own space (so we didn’t feel so bad about being loud) and being able to cook our own food (so much cheaper than restaurants).

    We went to the beach every morning, napped (okay poor Matt worked!), and then went back to the beach. There was a train crossing a block up the road from the cottage and the boys had to go see the “thomas crossing” every day. The weather was divine, never above 72°, it was a little gloomy in the mornings, but the sun would come out in the afternoons. We loved being able to walk wherever we wanted without feeling like we were going to melt. The last night there we took a super long walk, walked out on the longest wooden pier in the US, then walked around downtown Oceanside. For all that walking the boys were rewarded with pizza and ice cream.

    The first evening there we went straight down to the beach near our cottage. The tide was coming in and the coast line was rocky right there. The boys went out in the water with us right away, but Noah lost his balance in a wave and was done with the water. We were all playing in the sand up high by the rocks and told Noah the water couldn’t come get him. The waves were coming nowhere near us, so we all relaxed and had some fun sand play. Imagine our surprise (and poor Noah’s terror) when a large wave came up and knocked us all over and started taking our stuff out to sea. Poor Noah wanted nothing to do with the ocean after that and I thought our trip was ruined. The next day though we found a little play beach with no rocks and eventually he warmed up to the water and ended up loving it. 🙂

    On the way to Oceanside you drive through the sand dunes. I pointed them out to the boys and Ezra demanded we go play. He just couldn’t understand why we wouldn’t stop to play in this sand. I explained it would be more fun at the beach. The boy loved the giant sandbox near the water and requested to go to it constantly. “Go play big sandbox”

    You can see more photos here, and also click on the first photo in this post to scroll through and read descriptions.

    Some video of the fun:

    Untitled from matt adams on Vimeo.

  • Canvas Prints

    Stephanie and I really enjoy seeing some of our favorite pics on canvas. Seems like a classier way to showcase large prints, without breaking the bank. We have a few canvases in the house of our favorite wild subjects. Usually black and white, but we have been wanting a few color ones too.

    So perfect timing, Easy Canvas Prints asked us to demo their work at an 8×10″ size. We found a good photo and sent it off.  We used a family photo from the botanical gardens last fall that our friend Tara at third book photography (now in portland) took for us.  We chose color on a 3/4″ frame, with a black edge wrap.

    Turned out great.

     

    We love the print, and the photo, colors and texture were great. I will note that when using a group shot, the canvas texture may show on close inspection to create odd skin details. Mainly because the canvas texture is so heavy, that on a 1″ face will show a lot of texture for small facial features. This is pretty much the same on every canvas we have seen, So more of a general photo to canvas note. Step back 4 feet and its fine.

     

    * Disclaimer. We did receive a free print from Easy Canvas Prints with the intention of a review. We Did not let this skew our opinion of the product, and we would indeed buy from them again.

     

    Check out these awesome canvases!
    Easy Canvas Prints