So as you read in the previous post, we had a blog snafu when our current host decided to ditch their blogging platform and gave us just a few days’ notice. Thankfully my wonderful husband spent many hours ensuring things would be saved and transferred over, and now has us up and running over here! So I’ll try to start getting caught up again. We’ll start with some pictures from our strawberry picking adventure last month. We found a great farm not too far away that has organic strawberries at a great u-pick price, so we spent a morning in the fields. The kids had fun and we had a lot of strawberries to bring home! We’ll definitely go back again next year.

I’m still getting the hang of how to do pictures with this format, so my apologies if they are small or big or pixel-y (if they are any of those things, please let me know so I can tweak how I do it!).

Hello everyone! Welcome back to Just A Minute Moore! The blogging aspect of our domain went away and I had to get everything moved to a new blogging platform. We were able to keep the domain, so that was a good thing. In the moving of everything, I was told/read that I would not be able to save/move the pictures along with the text of the posts. From what I’ve seen, it does look like they’re there, but for how long I do not know. Maybe those will live on on this blog, maybe the pictures will be gone. Have no fear, we have all of those saved! They just might become a little more challenging for you to see. You can always get them from us. If you do still see the images here and want one, make a note of it and let us know. We should be able to get a full-sized version sent off to you. For data reasons, we shrink the images down to post them. If you’re on mobile data, this is a good thing!
If you are seeing the images and they appear squished or stretched… nothing I can do about that! An unfortunate part of the move. Better a little squished than not there at all!

Now, I need to learn this new blogging platform and will teach Keri what I can… then she can be off and running and blogging about those amazing kids again really soon! We know… you’re just here for the Max and Anna pics. They’re on the way! Hopefully soon!

Cute Test Picture:

Getting closer to getting caught up on the blog! Thought I should get Easter posted while it’s still May at least. We had a great Easter this year. We dyed eggs at home and did an egg hunt inside our house when the kids got up. Then after breakfast we headed to my grandma’s for the family gathering and another hunt in her yard. The kids both loved hunting for eggs this year and checking to see what they got. Last year Anna was starting to get the concept but each time she found an egg she wanted to stop and open it and investigate the contents. This year she had the strategy down and collected as many eggs as possible in the allotted time. There are a lot of cousins at my grandma’s house each year so they stagger it by age, letting the little kids go first so they can find their fair share. The teenagers aren’t left out though, there’s one “golden egg” that has a $20 in it and is always hidden in a very tricky spot for one lucky hunter to find.  

We are very fortunate to live not far from the well-known Mount Vernon Tulip Festival. Every year tulip farms in the area host a festival and visitors come from all over to see thousands and thousands of tulips. It really is an amazing sight to see and we try to get up there every year with the kids. The traffic coming and going gets crazy, but we’ve perfected the strategy of leaving home right after breakfast, getting to the fields when they open, and then heading out before lunchtime. There are still lots of people around, but that way we’re not sitting in tulip gridlock. The kids enjoyed wearing their rain boots and tromping around the fields, and put up with my picture taking. They were good about gently touching the tulips with one finger only, and I’m happy to report that no one picked any. As usual I took a ton of pictures, so here is a selection of the best ones!

Here is the last round of Florida pictures! Some JAMM readers will know about the saga of our trip home. The short version is we went to the airport, flights ended up cancelled, we waited for 3 hours in baggage claim for our bags, went back to Dad and Helen’s, spent an extra day there (that was a nice bonus!) and then flew out at the crack of dawn the day after that. As we were getting ready to depart that second time Max remarked, “I hope none of our flights get deleted this time.” It was so cute, we knew right away he meant “delayed” but it actually still made perfect sense! I’m already looking forward to our next visit, thanks again Dad and Helen for taking such great care of us.

The aquarium had this statue of manatees with a sign for donations. Anna ran up and gave it a hug.

Another batch of pictures from our time in Florida! We’ve enjoyed a week of warmth and sun here, but we’re back to cool and rainy this weekend. So it’s the perfect time to look back at pictures of the warmth. 

I’m really enjoying going back through our Florida pictures and choosing some to share here. We are so grateful for Dad and Helen taking such wonderful care of us while we are there. It’s a trip we look forward to all year long. The pictures below are some more from our first day there. Dad and Helen do a beach birthday picnic for Max every year, since we are always there close to his birthday. He loves it and this year was no exception. We enjoyed a delicious picnic lunch, presents, and then some more beach time. That evening we went to one of our favorite food spots there–a local pizza buffet. They have a delicious salad bar and really good pizza, including gluten-free! They cap it off with soft-serve ice cream for dessert, so you can imagine why Max loves it so much that we went there twice this visit.  It’s such a treat to wear our summertime clothes in March, even in the evening out to dinner!

I have so many pictures from our trip to Florida that I’ll be sharing them in installments. Also hoping to get through the Easter pictures and post those before Easter is too far in the rearview mirror. We had a great trip to Florida! The kids are troopers traveling and watched a lot of Daniel Tiger on the iPad. Screen time restrictions go out the window when traveling. The weather was cooler than normal for Florida, but much warmer than Seattle. Thankfully our first day was warm and sunny, so we spent that at the beach. I figured we would just be wading in the ocean like last year so I didn’t wear my swimsuit. That was a mistake, as the kids ended up loving the water and wanting to go way out. I wasn’t going to pass up that opportunity, so I just went in with my clothes on. Max loved jumping in the waves while I held his hand. We also looked for seashells, built sand castles, and did the ever-popular game of digging a hole in the sand for the kids to put their feet in, and then pouring ocean water in. It is such a treat to have beach time in March, since that doesn’t happen in our part of the country. Here’s the first round of pictures!

I know Easter is a couple days away yet, and I promise to come back and share some pictures of egg dyeing and hunting, but for now I wanted to share these pictures of Max and Anna that my friend Amy (of Amy Bright Photography) took. She has some chicks at her house that she brought along, the kids enjoying petting them and we broke out the bunny ears for a few of the pictures. Happy Easter!

I can’t believe our baby boy is five years old. Five years ago last month, after a long intense labor, Maxwell Nicholas was born. We haven’t had his official five year check up yet, so I’ll add those stats once I have them. But I can attest that, just as when he was a baby, he’s tall and slender with a big head. At five years old, Max is wearing size 6 clothing and size 10.5 shoes. He has started reading though still prefers us to read to him, which we are happy to do. He can count to 100 with just a little help and likes to try counting by twos, threes, fours, or even tens. He is a master staller, especially at bedtime. Max still loves his old friend Chester Bear (now known as “Old Chester” because he got a “New Chester” for Christmas) but Puzzle Bear is a close second, and other stuffed animals rotate in as well. We never thought we’d see the day, but “Blue’s Clues” has been thrown by the wayside in favor of “Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood” and the classic “Mr. Rogers” shows. 

Max is a great big brother–certainly prone to difficulties sharing or taking turns like any sibling, but on the whole very sweet to Anna and good at including her when we play. He is doing so much imaginative play these days, it is so fun to watch him. He likes to play preschool and he is “Mr. Max” the teacher and the grownups are the students. He tells us exactly what to do and say. He still loves pizza and cupcakes above all else, but those are occasional treats. He likes “special oatmeal” (actually bananas and eggs) for breakfast and I can always count on him to eat sweet potatoes if I serve them with dinner.