As I said previously, I was able to shoot some pictures during our walk this morning in the Whilamut Natural Area of Alton Baker Park. Did you know that “Whilamut” is a
Kalapuyan word that means, “where the river ripples and runs fast”? Neither did I! Anyway, because there are some good shots of the kids, I’ve uploaded them into a private gallery. (Please feel free to register!)

We went for a walk this morning in the open grassy area on the east end of Alton Baker Park (aka the Whilamut Natural Area). Evan rode his bike, Jen pushed Erin in the stroller, and I got to take a few pictures:

Evan was cool, calm, and cooperative at his first visit to the dentist this morning. He had his teeth cleaned, polished, treated with fluoride foam, and examined. In addition, they were able to get three out of four desired X-rays, which is one more than I can handle in a single sitting and about three more than they get from most 3-year olds! Jen reports that Evan was an excellent listener and very accommodating. After his appointment, Evan told Jen, “That was hard work. I had to keep my mouth open almost the whole time!”

We headed out to Mt. Pisgah early this morning for a “breakfast picnic” and then to “hike” around for a while. Erin, who turns 8 months old tomorrow, rode around in the backpack for the first time. She absolutely loved it, cooing and giggling almost the entire time.

Evan walked on his own the whole time. And while he did complain a little about being tired — I mean, c’mon, you’d hardly expect anything different from a 3 year old! — he did a great job and seemed to enjoy it overall. Of course, it helped that I spotted a big old toad just sittin’ on a log in the water garden area. Any time Evan started complaining about being tired, we brought up that toad and let Evan’s imagination do the heavy-lifting of distracting himself from being tired. (As mentioned in this post, Evan loves the Frog and Toad stories.) Here’s a shot of our warty little friend:

I shot a little video and threw together the short movie at the end of this post. Jen even makes her narrative debut!

Just a quick note that we attended the Lane County Fair today and, among many other things during our 5-hour visit, we enjoyed front row seats for the All-Alaskan Pig Race. I’m hoping to post a bit more (perhaps a video — gasp!) of this fun little show later on, but for now these stills of flying racing pigs will have to do.

It had been several years since our last jaunt north to Junction City for the annual Scandinavian Festival, but today we made our return to this popular festival. We arrived just as the festival opened at 10am and promptly got in line at the Faith Lutheran Church booth where they serve the single most popular treat at the event: Aebleskivers! Even then, the line easily had 30 people in it already, but we were soon rewarded for the wait.

It’s a good thing they have aebleskivers because the craft booths and art displays left a lot to be desired. Also, the last time we attended, there was a marvelous life-sized sculpture of a cow… made from butter! I was disappointed that Evan didn’t get to see a similar oddity, even if the irony of a cow sculpted from butter was lost on him.

In case you didn’t get to enjoy any aebleskivers, I assembled a quick video showing how they’re prepared along with a few scenes of the festival.

Last weekend, Evan got his first bike. He was riding a tricycle previously, but his legs just got too long for it. Plus, the thing was falling apart. So, we headed over to The Bike Barn and bought him a HARO Z-12 (with training wheels, of course). Evan took to it immediately and has only returned to his tricycle one time since getting his new bike.

After our first ride around the neighborhood last weekend, I made a really cute video, but it’s not one I’m comfortable posting publicly. So this weekend I “remixed” the video to include fewer close-ups and to omit the great mid-ride “interview” with Evan. It’s not quite as good as the original, but I think you’ll still enjoy it:

Last weekend we made an impromptu and inaugural trip to Wildlife Safari in Winston, OR (just south of Roseburg). We’d heard from a couple other parents that it was worth visiting. I’m happy to report that we had a pretty good time. Evan really enjoyed it, and even Erin seemed to respond by trying to look out the windows every time I said, “Oh look at that!” (She’s still at the stage where she’s more likely to look at you when you say that!) Oh, and the trip provided a great opportunity to try out our new digital camcorder:

(You can also view the video directly on YouTube.)

As is tradition on this blog, here’s an image of the first (non-cherry) tomato harvested from this year’s garden. (We harvested the first cherry tomatoes a couple weeks ago.) There’s one more tomato just a few sunny days away from being picked, but then it looks like we’ll be waiting for a little while longer for more ripe tomatoes. We’ve started harvesting zucchini as well as our second round of lettuce, too.

Evan loves UPS and FedEx trucks, and he can spot them from blocks away when we are driving. We’ve had friendly encounters with both UPS and FedEx drivers in the past, but I have to say, the FedEx drivers have been exceptionally generous. One driver we met last winter offered to help us order a toy FedEx van from her employee gift catalog. She made a special trip to our house to drop off a copy of the catalog from which she could then order the van on our behalf. And then today, the driver we see regularly in our neighborhood left this adorable little FedEx delivery dog (the FedEx Home Delivery mascot) for Evan. He wasn’t even delivering a real package to our house! And like all those drivers, he was in a big hurry and didn’t stay to chat. All he said was that he doesn’t normally do this, but he just really enjoys it when he sees Evan watching and/or waving to him. Now, how great is that?