Welcome Gabriel Luke

My sister Nikki had another beautiful baby boy on Tuesday, June 24th. Welcome Gabriel Luke!!! I think we are calling him Luke but I am not entirely sure yet! I have been very sick this week so there is nothing new to post on the Thorson family (the kids have just been running circles around me on the couch), but I just had to post pictures to show off our new nephew and the happy family.


Gabriel Luke, 7 lb 9 oz

Berdon, Nikki, Luke, Brooke, and Frank Olsen

A month for "firsts"

Along with adjusting to a new baby brother, Anna and Asher have been experiencing some new things. Asher started taking swim lessons last week and Anna had her first dentist appointment.


Here Asher is perfecting his float. He loves swimming and we are dumbfounded at how he has taken to the water. He will even dive down for little toys in the 3 and 4 foot water. I guess it helps when you live in Hawaii and can go swimming all the time.

He is even going off the diving board! He didn't even hesitate the first time he went up there. Now when we take him to the pool, it is all he wants to do.

Anna was so brave at the dentist! I thought I would have to hold her down or bribe her somehow, but she was so great. Asher went before her to show her how it was done (he wasn't so brave, but it was enough to encourage her that she could survive). She was showing off her super clean teeth the rest of the day.

Holy Centipede Batman

So I blogged about these terrible creatures previously but we really haven't had much experience with them (thankfully!). That all changed last night. I was upstairs preparing for a stamping workshop while Joel was downstairs playing Xbox with Jesse kicking on the floor next to him watching the ceiling fan. Then a centipede darted across the living room floor and under the entertainment center. Joel was in shock. He put Jesse in the swing (off the floor!) and fished the thing out with his super long grill tongs. He kept a death grip on it while transfering it outside and cut it in half with a pair of garden sheers. However, half of the supposedly dead centipede scurried away into the night!!! He debated on whether or not to tell me because he could just imagine me standing on the couch screaming during the whole episode (and I would have been along with Asher who is terrified of ANY bug for some reason)...but he did. I had a little trouble sleeping last night at the thought of "Attack of the Centipedes" occuring in my house. But the housing office is getting a nice call from me this morning and someone better be on their PRONTO to spray!

Here are the pics from my last blog that didn't post for some reason. Enjoy!

Upside Down

We are now in a 2 week lag between family visits. I am sure that everyone can understand how your life gets turned upside down when you have visitors...life just isn't "normal". However, even though Caleb and Amanda have gone back to their normal life Down Under, I still feel upside down. I just have no routine to go back to because I have not figured out this crazy life with 3 kids. Jesse is not sleeping through the night yet (he sleeps about a 5 hour stretch but it is still up in the air whether it will be 5 hours or 3 hours any given night) and juggling time with the older kids while keeping the house clean, nursing an infant, and running errands has left me a bit dumbfounded. Grocery shopping...are you kidding?!?! I am so thankful for the nice weather so they can play outside alot of the day...now if only the 2 of them would stop fighting! However, my "to do" list just keeps getting longer. Can someone tell me that it just comes with time please? After trying to finally do a bit of cleaning, I threw some coloring pages in the trash (OK, we have like a hundred!). Asher loves to hang any art project on the fridge and our fridge gets very crowded very quickly. A little later, Asher is throwing something away and finds his coloring pages in the trash..."MOMMY!!! This ISN'T trash!". Woops. His heart was broken. I can never get rid of clutter because Asher is always pulling everything OUT of the trash...the lei he made at preschool, a dead flower, the 50th page of him writing his name, etc.

I have my first "Stampin' Up" party since Jesse's birth this Thursday and I am so excited for an evening out without kids. Sounds silly, doesn't it. Any mom will understand how nice it is to have an evening with adults after a day of child conversation. We are slowly all figuring this life out together. We are so blessed with what we have and that we have each other. Here are some final pictures of our time with Uncle Caleb and Auntie Amanda.



Asher and Anna ready to go snorkeling!

The first real smile caught on camera.

Uncle Caleb and Jesse having man to man before he goes back to Australia.

Who's Who?

We were looking through Asher's and Anna's baby pictures to see who Jesse looked more like. Here are pictures of Jesse and Anna at the same age...pretty neat, huh?! Guess Asher will be the one who doesn't look like the rest but once we saw his blonde hair and blue eyes we figured it would be that way.

More Island Fun

We are having a great time with Caleb and Amanda...the kids are LOVING their Aunt and Uncle. Amanda and I even got to go shopping without any kids over 6 weeks while Uncle Caleb held down the fort. It was WONDERFUL!! And tonight Joel and I are going on a date...WOO HOO!!!


Here we are on our way to the Arizona Memorial at Pearl Harbor. Finally, a picture with all of us in it! This is definitely a must do on the island, but a very sobering experience.

Caleb and Amanda at the top of the Makapu Lighthouse hike. This is our favorite hike for views of the island.

Auntie Amanda and Jesse at the beach. I don't even think Jesse once opened his eyes and realized he wasn't in the car. He just enjoyed the sound of the waves, a gentle breeze, and the shade of the tree.

And I wanted to finish with a recent picture of Jesse so everyone would know what he looks like now. He had a little cold this past week that made sight seeing and sleep at night a little difficult, but we all survived. However Caleb and Amanda now BOTH have a nasty cold thanks to Jesse...no fun for a tropical vacation.

Exploring

We did some exploring of the island this weekend with Caleb and Amanda. We drove around the edge of the island, stopped at some lookouts, saw some amazing sights, and did a little beach break shown below. I had heard a rumor of a beach where all the "Lost" beach scenes are filmed and we just happened to find it...woo hoo!!!


The Lost camp!! There was actually a guard standing post to stop us obsessed fans from exploring any further.

Mr. Eko's church

Caleb just had to go swimming at this beach to say that he swam at the "Lost" beach. Along this beach we saw a ton of giant sea turtles swimming and lounging on the sand...so during this exciting swim, a turtle happened to brush against Caleb. I have never seen someone run out of the water so fast!! Once we returned home, we internet searched the beach and saw some footage of the TV show compared against photos of the beach and it is definitely where they do all there beach filming. The only thing that would have made it more exciting was actually seeing them filming!

A family photo during our hike to a waterfall. Well, a family photo minus me, the photographer.