Thursday, December 29, 2011

Christmas Time

Christmas this year, was nice and chilled out for us... we needed a quiet Christmas! It was also our first Christmas at home together and the first time Kayle has had a Christmas Tree! I wrapped up all her presents and hid them in our bedroom so that she would have a surprise on Christmas Day.

Boy... was she surprised!

When she woke up on Christmas Day, she came into our room and just wanted to snuggle with us... we were the ones who told her she could get up and go downstairs and see if there was anything there.

She ran downstairs and looked under the tree... she was so excited by all the presents there, she didn't even notice her stocking by the fireplace! Needless to say, we had fun opening them all!

Kayle also got lots of amazing gifts from our friends... she got this wonderful jacket from our friends at work! She loved it and put it on straight away! I think she has worn it most days since!

She also got these wonderful new PJ's and put them on straight away! She had fun playing with her new Littlest Pet Shop toys that her friend Elijah gave her!

Christmas Day was wonderful... once we were done opening gifts, we got dressed and headed to church. When we got home, we Skyped with Granny and Grandad and opened MORE presents! (Video to follow!)

I cooked us a yummy English Christmas Dinner that we all enjoyed... the full works, roast potatoes, veggies and apple meringue for dessert!

A few hours after we ate our dinner, Kayle and I came down with a horrible tummy bug... it was so terrible. I was in bed for 2 days and poor little Kayle had such a bad tummy for about a week! But, we are better now and are looking forward to New Years Eve at our friends house!

Friday, December 23, 2011

New Christmas Traditions...

I am trying to start some new Kyser Christmas Traditions this year... so, we headed out with our friends to create some!

First stop... Bellevue Square for Snowflake Lane.
We got there a little late so weren't able to get close enough to the stage to watch the main show, but we did get close enough to watch the drummers and get 'snowed' upon. The make snow and fire it off the top of the building and cover the people below! It was so busy, but it was fun!

Once we got done there, we headed to Issaquah to meet Santa! Kayle was so excited to meet him! We rushed to the little groto and went in and said Hi... we didn't get a photo because they were SO expensive, but the kids had a blast seeing him and talking to him.

Next stop... Crazy Christmas Lights!

I downloaded a list of houses from the internet that are famous for having crazy lights. We got all loaded up in the car and headed out to our first one.
Pretty crazy....

Onto the next one... this house was out of this world. It has INSANE lights all over the house and garden and even had a set of reindeer that lit up as they 'jumped' over the road. The lights were flashing on and off to some cool Christmas music. The kids had a great time.
This was our last house for the night because we had 2 tired little kiddies on our hands! We made our last stop at Starbucks for toilet breaks and then headed home.
We had a really fun night and will certainly do it again!

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Photo Shoot...

We were given a wonderful Christmas present this year by my boss, Toby. She was having a photo shoot done of her kids for Christmas presents and said that Kayle and I could also have our photos taken to give as a Christmas gift to Jason.

It was fun to have it done because I have very few photos of Kayle and I because I am the one who takes the photos!


Thursday, November 24, 2011

Our own place... at last!

We are finally in a place of our own after a long year!

We moved into a great 2 bedroom condo in the same town that we used to live. Our place also has a 'Den' for our visitors! We are so excited to be in our own place.

Kayle and I enjoying our new kitchen... we like making breakfast!

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Washington here we come! Almost home!

Jason, Kayle and I are heading back to Washington. We have all our stuff packed up and are ready to go. We will be driving to Medford, Oregon and staying the night because it's a long 18 hour drive!

Once we get there we will be staying with our friends until we get organised and find somewhere to rent. Our friends have 3 little girls and Kayle is really excited to stay with them so she can play with them everyday.

Thursday, September 29, 2011

Fun Bouncing in the Sun

Kayle loves bouncing on the Trampoline...
she loves it even more when it involves a hose and her swimsuit!

While we were staying at Ken and Sue's house, she spent most of her time out on the Trampoline. We had so much fun bouncing in the water!

Monday, September 26, 2011

Outdoor Movie Night



Jason, Kayle and I decided to go to the local Free Outdoor Movie Night on Saturday. We had seen it a few times and been meaning to go, so we finally got around to it! We had no idea what film would be on, but we knew it would be a cool family film that Kayle could see too.

We got our chairs and blankets and headed down to the car park where they show the film. We got all comfy and warm and waited for the film to start.


It was a great film called 'Soul Surfer'. Its about a young teenage girl who got sponsored as a Pro- Surfer and one day she was out surfing and got her arm bitten off by a shark. It was GREAT film and I would 100% recommend it.

We all had a really fun evening out! I'm glad we went!

Friday, September 16, 2011

Yummy Yummy in my Tummy

When we were in Southern California visiting Jason's sister Jesi, Kayle's cousin Jonah showed her how to eat Sambazon Smoothie's from the packet. So, as soon as we got back to Ken and Sue's Kayle wanted a Smoothie Bar!

Thursday, September 15, 2011

Yosemite Family Photos...

We took a trip to Yosemite yesterday to have some fun. We got up early and hit the road. It took us a few hours to get there because we took a wrong turn, but the wrong turn took us through a really nice town, so it was worth the drive!

I took over driving for a while because the winding roads were making me feel a bit car sick!

When we got there the weather was amazing and we got to take some great family photos. We
haven't had a nice family photo in such a long time.


I also got to take some great new photos of Kayle.
We had a really good day out and were all exhausted by the time we got home!

Monday, September 5, 2011

Apple Picking Fun

Kayle, Mimi and I went Apple picking the other day... one of Sue's friends has a relative who's apple trees needed picking and so we went and picked away! We got so many apples. Kayle had so much fun running around the trees and picking!

Needless to say... someone was very tired after our fun day out!


We got all the apples home and it was time to do something with them all. We decided to slice most of them and freeze them, but we also made some delicious apple sauce!

Sunday, September 4, 2011

Fun in the Sun

Kayle had a great time playing in the sunshine with her Papa... they put stabilisers on her little bike so that she could ride it. Ken let Kayle help with everything!


Kayle is getting to have lots of fun at Mimi and Papa's house...
Cutting the grass...


Jumping on the trampoline...


Thursday, September 1, 2011

Southern California... Here we come!

On Thursday 25th August, Jason, Kayle and I headed down to Southern California to spend some time with Aunty Jesi, Uncle Ryan and cousins Jonah & Maverick.

We got up early to miss the traffic and so that Kayle would sleep. We missed the traffic but Kayle didn't sleep... till the last hour or so!

When we arrived, Jonah and Kayle had so much fun playing in the garden and with Jonah's toys!


While we were in Southern California, we had a BBQ so that we could see all our old friends. It was so good to see them all. (I only got one photo though! Boo!) We had a really nice time with The Blomquist's, The Jones', The Miyazato's, The Delagneau's and The Haacks.


Kayle had so much fun getting to meet and play with all the other kids.

We got up early one morning and went on a family trip to Disneyland. We had a really fun day going on rides, meeting princesses and eating good food!

Our time in Newport was really fun and it was great to spend some time with the family seeing as we haven't seen them in 2 years!!

Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Adjusting to the sun in Northern California

We are at Ken & Sue's and it is HOT, HOT, HOT!
We are not really 'Sun- Bunnies' and so we are still adjusting to the weather!
At least we are getting to wear some of our summer clothes!

We are also getting to eat some of our favorite foods that we miss!
Yum... 'In N Out'!

Monday, August 22, 2011

Heading back to the US

Saturday 20th August, we got up, packed all our bags into a taxi and Aunty Gilly's little car and headed to the airport to get our flight home to the US.

We had 7 HUGE bags, all overweight and we still had things that needed a bag to go in! Our hand baggage was overweight too!

Check-in was fun, to say the least! We had all our bags on 3 baggage trollies as well as Kayle in her push chair and her car seat hanging on the back! We changed check-in agents twice and so I had to explain everything 3 times. We were very lucky that our last agent got so overwhelmed by the baggage that she totally forgot to check the weight of our hand baggage and so we got away with having 3 times as much stuff in each bag!

Once we dropped all our bags off at the right places and paid our baggage fees, we headed through security. Got to LOVE Heathrow... they have a designated 'Family Lane' with dinosaur foot prints on the floor, pictures on the walls and a rainbow on the security metal detector! Kayle had fun following the foot prints and it certainly took the stress out of security!

Kayle got given a bag of goodies before we got on the flight. (Thank goodness, it kept her occupied while we were waiting to board!)

The flight home was good. I had a seat in Business Class (Oh Yeah!!) and Jason and Kayle had seats in Economy. We kept the separate seats, so that we would get some 'down-time' and were able to watch a film. Jason took the first leg because we had to be in our seats for Take-Off, and I went back to sit with Kayle once we had eaten and watched my film. Kayle slept for the first 2 hours of the flight and actually did really well with sitting still and watching the Interactive books and cartoons.

Once we landed, we found Jason's Mum, Sue, we loaded up the car and went to Cheesecake Factory for some yummy dinner. Our sweet girl was so tired, she fell asleep on my lap while we were waiting for our table and then slept through most of dinner. Jason and I enjoyed having endless refills on our coke!

We will be going to Jason's parents house for a few weeks while Jason works, then we will be heading back North to Seattle!

Friday, August 12, 2011

A break from reality with Auntie Kathy

Sunday evening, Kayle and I got the train to Dorset to see Auntie Kathy before we head back to the US. Despite Kayle's face... she was really excited to be on the train and going to see Auntie Kathy.

Monday morning we got up and dressed and headed out to this really cool farm/ play area for kids. Everything there was hand-made, down-to-earth and just really good fun for Kayle.

Kayle loves jumping on the trampoline... she especially loved this huge one!

After the jumping, we got tangled up in this rope maze! Genius! There were ropes attached to poles, you had to clip yourself to one end of a rope and make your way to the other end by climbing over and under the other ropes that crossed it! It was so fun... for all of us!

Next up, was the 'train/ tractor ride'. It was a golf cart that pulled these fantastic barrels that were attached to wheels! Kayle loved it!

Genius!

Of course, we couldn't miss out on putting our heads in the holes to make ourselves scarecrows!

We walked a bit further into the play area and found a slide built out of hay bales! Well, not the actual slide, but it was attached to the hay bales and you had to climb up them to get to the top of the slide. It also had these random tubes in the hay bales! Kayle loved it!

Next, we thought we would try the Maise Maze! We thought we would be fine, but oh boy... we were wrong! Kayle picked a flag to hang on to, just in case we got lost!

After walking around searching for clues, we found ourselves back at the same place we have been a few minutes before... Kayle started getting worried!

In the maze, there was a section where you had to go over this bridge... it allowed you to see how big the maze was and where abouts you were in it all!

Needless to say, the maze was huge and we were right in the middle of it!

We finally found our way out of the maze after cheating a bit and cutting through some 'secret passages'!! Once we were out, we all ran to the toilet and to get lunch. While taking a potty break, Kayle found some cows!

We can't go somewhere that has a sand pit and not let Kayle play in it... for 45 minutes!!

Last stop... tractor ride!
We showed Kayle how to drive it and she drove it around all by herself!

We all went home and were exhausted after our fun day! Kayle was asleep in the car within 2 minutes and that allowed me the opportunity to catch 40 winks once we got home!
Ahhhh... afternoon nap!!

Tuesday we got up, got dressed and headed off for a nice walk. We walked through the river, literally! Kayle loved being able to stomp through lots of mud and water! We found a great little bridge and played pooh sticks! Kayle loved seeing her stick come out the other side of the bridge!

Just up from the bridge was an area for adults to work out... or for Kayle to play!
The whole time we were at Kathy's house, she would not put down the fly swat! She was looking for flies to hit! Needless to say, she took it out with her on our walk! Good job she did too, because when we got to the 'play area' she found tons of flies!

We all took some time to climb over and play on the 'work out' equipment.



Kayle loves blowing the seeds off of dandelions... they were everywhere, so she was really happy!

We also found a caterpillar... Kayle wanted to hold it, but chickened out at the last minute!
We made our way back to the house for some lunch. Once we were done eating, we took one last walk around the garden and Kayle got to blow some more bubbles.
We had a really great few days away from reality! It was just what we needed!
Thank you for having us Auntie Kathy... it was lovely!!