The Bartholomews Brave Nature

  Back in January we decided to plan a few camping trips. We had not been camping all together since I was pregnant with Charles, so it was high time to plan a trip. We checked our options and decided to visit the Pinchot National forest. A while back I read a book about Gifford Pinchot and his contributions to the national forests and thought it would be fun to see his legacy. We chose Moss Creek and reserved a prime spot.
 Fast forward to July, Daniel and I got very excited to try out some dutch oven recipes that we had been saving on pintrest. We checked our gear and tricked out the big van for an amazing get-a-way, or so we thought. While I love camping, I was now nearly 8 months pregnant and the thought of sleeping outside was appearing less and less desirable. Call me a wimp, but sleeping in my bed is hard right now. Anyway I decided to go a head and I am glad I did. Of course the kids were excited, they had been asking when we could go for 2 weeks solid! So when we finally headed out we were too early to get to our camp site. Luckily we passed the Columbia Gorge Interpretive Center and turned around to check it out. It was fascinating, but unfortunately didn't have many children's activities.

This is a fishing machine. The wheel rotates and scoops up the fish. It was quite impressive.

   We reached Moss Creek a little early, but the site was empty and had our name on it so we set up camp. It was a beautiful place, we were right off the creek and though if was quite swift, it was shallow so it was fine. There were a few trails to follow and amazing things to explore. I loved it. It was so peaceful and the temperature was perfect. 

 Nothing says camping like smores!

   This was our view from the tent. It was gorgeous! This is heaven to me, unfortunately this sit and enjoy or wander aimlessly discovering the beauty of  nature was not what Daniel expected for the next 2 days. He expected some sore of activity or itinerary. Google to the rescue! We were about an hour and a half from Mount St. Helens so we decided to go there. I had wanted to take the kids at some point anyway, so Friday morning we had breakfast and then headed to what I thought was the visitor center. The last time I was there I was on a girl scout wider op and it was on the east side of the mountain. I remember it being so cool. So we followed the ever infallible GPS and reached.... The base of the peak of the mountain. Not visitor center just a little pull off where you could hike 2 miles to reach the peak. Ha! like that was going to happen! We did find snow though so he kids had fun with that. We packed some in our cooler since our ice was getting low. Bonus! 

  After a little while we drove back and passed Ape Caves, another of my future take the kids to picks, so was turned around and went there. We didn't have our flashlights or lanterns, but they rented out Coleman lanterns so we paid and headed down. It was super cool! Lizzy had a hard time for a bit because she thought the bats and spiders were out to get her, but we never saw any. I went about halfway and then left Daniel to wrangle the kids on his own. 

   This is the entrance, there are stairs down to it and then a little ways in there are some more stairs to help you get down. Its easy going as long as you have a light.

  It was fun and I chatted with some nice folks as they emerged from the cave while waiting for my intrepid band. Then we headed back to camp for some dinner and more exploring. 

Proof I was there!

Charles made a bow and arrow.

  All in all I think it was a sucessful trip. We came, we ate, we explored and we survived! I can't wait to go back!

Lizzy's 9th Birthday

Because I'm essentially a lazy person, I had put off thinking about Lizzy's birthday. We do every other birthday with friends and this was a friend birthday. So barely a week and a half before her birthday I started planning. (I need pressure to complete things, sometimes you just have to make your own pressure, right?) Thinking about my creative daughter I decided to throw an art party! Hooray for Amazon 2 day shipping! I decided to try my hand at Tie-dye. Lizzy's very first party she was invited to when she was a baby was to an 8 year old's tie-dye party. We had a blast. So armed with this vague happy memory, I blissfully ordered a tie-dye kit and white shirts and waited for the packages to arrive.
                                        
This kit was awesome! It has instructions and so many colors! It has rubber bands and frankly pathetic gloves and bags. So really all you had to bring were the shirts and the paper towels! Sold! What I didn't count on was that the dye had to set for 6-8hrs. So I may never see the creations the girls made, alas.
  The day came with much anticipation and for once I was ready for it, almost. I had set up two stations and was going to pull a quick change for a third, but that didn't happen. The only bad thing was that I had planned the party for 3 hrs! Yeah... poor planning... the kids had fun, but there were moments of "well, what do we do now?" Luckily Daniel and I are quick thinkers and have a ton of outdoor games! Score!
  This is the only pic I got of the tie-dyeing because we were helping the girls so much.

So the guests all chose an apron to decorate and then got started on the tie-dye. Afterwards there was a place to paint. At first the girls were painting nice pictures, but it quickly dissolved into the biggest mess they could make! 

Emily had the best time! She loved all the color! Next they all played in the yard for a while and Daniel and I cleaned up the tie-dye and put the food out. We were informed that it was the best outdoor party because we had Ruffles! Go us! Later we cut the cake and had a tug-a-war and sack races. We did a pinata, (which burst by the second person, when does that happen? The guests had fun beating the pinata to a pulp.) and then the rain started so we cleaned up and went inside to watch Despicable Me 2. By the end I was exhausted. I think everyone had a good time though!

In Case You Didn't Know

   Most of you know that Daniel and I are expecting our 5th child in September. For those who didn't know...Surprise! Another Bartholomew Boy,(name to be determined). As I contemplate this experience I had a few thoughts on our family planning. If this is a subject you do not wish to read about, please skip to another post, (no hard feelings) but since this is my blog I thought I would share my experiences. So if you are still with me remember this is my personal story and in no way is meant to underscore or demean anyone else's family planning. You know what is best for you and I respect that. Whew, if you are still reading then you deserve a medal. So here goes....

   Growing up I always wanted four children. In my head one child was practice since you don't have to deal with the joys of sibling rivalry or division of attention. Two children was not enough, three was odd and four was perfect. I have 3 siblings and have felt close to all of them. I had heard stories of large families where the oldest children didn't really know the younger because of the gap and that made me sad. So for me, Four was the golden number, the Goldilocks of family planning, if you will. 

  Now my husband, on the other hand, grew up in a large family and firmly believes that you shouldn't dictate to the Lord how large your family should be. Honestly Daniel could have a thousand kids and be happy, but being the sweet man that he is, he didn't say anything against my 4 rule. In fact it wasn't until much later that I found out his preferences at all. (Sometimes I can be quite stubborn, I'm sure that is a shock to you) We talked about children of course, but we didn't really plan together, he just let me take the lead because I was the one to bear the children. Then I scared him big time. 

   Prior to our marriage I was employed as a nanny to 3 children for a few years, then I babysat my niece during our first year of marriage and though I loved those experiences and those children, I wanted a break before having some of my own. A perfectly reasonable request in my head. I told my new husband that I wanted to wait a year before trying to get pregnant. Again I had no idea how this sounded to Daniel until much later. In his experience, he had known women who had said similar things and ended up never having children. As a man who always wanted to be a father, (and naively thinking that we were getting old. I was 25, he was 24) He felt his dreams of fatherhood were slipping away. He didn't talk to me about it until years later. Communication is so necessary for a healthy relationship. Any way, being the sweet man that he is he just swallowed his fears and went along with my plan. 

   When I changed my mind about getting pregnant he was elated. We still had Lizzy a year after our marriage, but that was a lot sooner then she would have been born if we had followed my plan. Lizzy was and is an amazing child. She challenges me every day. While that first year with her seemed so hard, I knew that I wanted my 3 more kids and I told Daniel that we would try for every 2 years. Again he went along with my plan. It took us a little longer to get pregnant with Charles. They have the biggest gap of 2 and a half years, but they have always gotten along and though having two was a challenge, I began to mellow a bit and had the added pressure of being in Missouri for only 2 years, (again, by my request, I really thought that I would hate MO, but I fell in love with it completely and I do wish we had stayed longer, alas) So I packed in as many adventures as possible. We were going to see and do everything we possible could before leaving the state. We did it too.

   After we had moved back to Washington I was on track for child number 3 and Devon was born a scant 2 years and 2 weeks after Charles. He is my Christmas baby and an amazing addition to our home. Devon, however was a bit more adventurous then my other two. While I can not say that Lizzy or Charles is not adventurous, they both are highly physical and have no fear, Devon took it to another level.  As his many hospital trips can attest. I really felt that after Devon I could handle anything....Cue Child number 4....

  Emily is almost two now and has her own impressive list of daring feats. She recently had her first hospital visit and just had her staples removed yesterday. We affectionately call her, Emily: eater of soles and the destroyer of worlds. It is astonishing the amount of things she can destroy which never occurred to the other 3. At this point I had my four and was contemplating our family planning and so I actually did what I should have done in the first place and consulted my husband. It takes me some time to get things right. I even brought it up to him like this, "So I have been taking over your duties as head to the household and I need to apologize for that. I think we need to talk about our family planning." To which he replied okay. Fully expecting me to tell him to get a vasectomy, but I had been feeling for some time that we weren't done yet.  So I said as much and he was stunned but of course willing to have another child. So we decided to go off birth control and see what happens. 

   This lengthy story is all to bring us to this point. Here I am pregnant with child number 5 and in the first trimester I thought he was the last. I even started a blog post about the end of an era, but then I felt prompted that this might not be my last pregnancy. So here we are almost 5 kids and loving every minute of it. Sometime things don't go like you plan, but life is so much sweeter when you follow the Lord's plan for you.

Snowmagetton

For the first time since 2008 we had a significant snowfall. More like a snow dump. In a single night we gained 12 in. Having not seen such a sight in a few years it was magical!  Here it is coming down:

The kids loved it. Then as it didn't go away it began to lose it's magical sheen. I think they only played in it 3 days. Of course since it hardly ever snows here we didn't have the basic accouterments, shovel, snow gear or sled...

 We survived it! The kids missed six days of school, so they may be in until the fourth of July, but we survived it! We only had one incident, the boys left a pillow next to the wall heater and it charred it. I got to it before the smoke alarm. Lizzy wanted to do our fire escape route, looking back we probably should have, oh well. Adventures!

 The icicles were quite impressive.






















Our Camilla was bowed in half!

Halfway Out Of The Dark

It's the seasons of holidays and family get togethers.   We had a wonderful Christmas celebrating with my sister. And her famous Christmas Cookie Exchange! It was fun and small, but we had a blast. We played a few games and had Italian sodas. Yum! Christmas eve we made cookies and went caroling in the rain. I love Washington! I find less and less people venture out to carol each year, but it is a favorite tradition of mine. We go 2 or 3 times in the month and everyone loves it. I love seeing the people's faces light up when they realize we are caroling! Last year we added a few more houses and one lady about cried she was so happy to get carolers. She hadn't had anyone come by in years. We made sure to keep her on the permanent list.
  But I digress, After caroling we put the kids to bed and finished the last minute wrapping. This is fun too. Christmas was on Sunday so we went to church before opening any presents. It was hard on the kids, but it made for a smooth morning. Sacrament meeting was so nice. It was fun seeing everyone. The kids even got to sing with the primary children since they had practiced the same song.
Charly's dress had dreaded sparkles on it so when she got up to sing, there were sparkles everywhere. Charles got it in his head to get as many of said sparkles on his clothes. He achieved this by sliding along the pew like it was home plate! Unfortunately for him, the sparkles didn't stick to his vest. Yay! It was a fun time celebrating. We swept up the presents after they opened them in the car so we wouldn't lose them,so when we returned home the next day it was like a second Christmas! Bonus! I hope your Christmas was wonderful too!