Christinas Dads Passing

On Sunday September 16 we found out that Christina's dad died in car accident. It appears that he fell asleep while driving home. Luckily no one else was involved in the accident. The funeral services were on Saturday. The service was very good and uplifting. The church was filled beyond capacity leaving people standing in the back. It has been a hard long week for all of us, but we are grateful for the gospel of Jesus Christ in our lives and the comfort that it brings letting us know that we will see him again. We want to thank everyone who has prayed for us and shown their love and support.

Yoga Babies

So yesterday I finally did it, I started going to a Yoga/Pilates class. I loved it, but needless to say I am a little sore today, so this morning I decided to do some stretches to hopefully help my sore muscles, and Quinn and Ava decided to join in. It was so funny they were even taking the same deep breaths as me.

Here is Quinn, I mean Spiderman in the cobra pose.

Here is Ava in the downward dog pose.Here is Quinn a sleep with his Spiderman, notice Spiderman has to have his own pillow. The other morning Quinn came and got in bed with me, Quinn took one pillow and when I went to lay on my pillow he said,"No mom that's Spiderman's pillow!" Oh, the things that come out of that kids mouth. My mom once told me that age 3 is her favorite because you never know what's going to come out of their mouths. I think I'm starting to agree.

Too TOUGH for Christina

As most of you know Christina loves to cook and some might consider her a chef, but today she met her match in the kitchen. discouraged by a few big hits Christina figured a way to fight back and win the war with the Onion.

Christina's kitchen comes equipped with everything. Even Onion fight goggles.

On another note Christina and I went out last night ALONE!!!! we went to this new restaurant called Spazzos. Its an Italian restaurant owned by the Swartzs brothers, for any of you from the Seattle area they also own Daniels broiler and Chandlers crab house. All excellent restaurants. Spazzos lived up to the other restaurants and was fabulous. When we sat down a table next to us had ordered a cheese appetizer that they pour brandy over and lit on fire. Christina saw the awesome fire and said yum. that looks good and ordered some for us. The funny thing was that she never really saw the plate of food, just the fire. While we were waiting for our appetizer i asked Christina if it was going to come with crackers or anything or just a slab of cheese. "Oh it'll come with something I'm sure" she said. It came and this is what it was. Christina made sure I got a picture of it for our blog.

A big blob of cheese. $10 worth. The cheese was excellent and very flavorful. we just thought it was funny that we got a big blob of cheese with nothing else. Another favorite moment last night was when i asked the server to tell me about the Orechetti, which in the description was pasta with shrimp, and broccoli in a broth. His responds was, "its noodles (pause) and shrimp (pause) in a bowl." to save him I told him he sold me on the dish. He then said," did you know today is only my third day" which my responds was " No, I didn't know that" then he realized that was a stupid question and responded by " of course you wouldn't". You might have had to been there to find this funny, but it was hilarious just how things played out. After dinner Christina and I went and saw the harry potter movie.

Woodland Park Zoo

Quinn had been asking us to go to the zoo for the past week to see the animals, so we took him. Today was an awesome day to be outside. This whole week has been clear skies and sunny. Today was about 85-90 degrees. All the animals were out and very entertaining to watch. They were all active moving around and making sounds.

our little butterfly.

Quinn got to go feed the giraffes.




We got some good shots of the animals today being active.

This is a sloth bear. can you tell?

QUINN'S 3RD BIRTHDAY!

Yesterday we celebrated Quinn's birthday Spiderman style. The party turned out really good with friends and family present. It would have been nice if Matthew, Jack and Quinn's other friends from Provo could have been able to be here to celebrate. Here are some pictures from the party. Christina made the cake and of course we had a pinata. We also played pin the mask on spiderman. Quinn scored a ton of spiderman stuff from posters, costumes, balls, playing cards, baseball bat, stuffed spidy, sunglasses, lunchbox and there might be more that I'm forgetting, but Quinn absolutely loves spiderman. Quinns costume is reversible so we know what mood hes in by which colors he is wearing out.

This is when we know quinn is going to make bad choices.



This is Quinns tough man look. Be afraid! Be very afraid!

Spidy spun his web for Quinns birthday.

Christina made this cake all by herself. Way to go Christina. I think she'll start taking cake orders in the fall.

Ava and Quinn

Sunday was a bitter sweet day. Ava started nursery. Yes she is only 17 months but I talked the nursery leaders into letting her come in early. She is so ready, every Sunday when we drop Quinn off it's hard to get her out of there. Thankfully they have the nursery split for the younger and older kids so Quinn and Ava aren't together until the very end when it's almost time for us to go pick them up. She did a great job for her first time, they only had to bring her to me for the last 20 minutes of church because she was getting tired and wanted her mommy. So I actually got to listen in class which I haven't been able to do in a long time, I only had one month off between Quinn going into nursery and having Ava. I can't believe my baby is getting so big, it makes me so sad, but also happy because she just gets funnier the older she gets, like for example the above picture is the face Ava makes when she sees you point a camera at her, oh the girls hilarious.
And speaking of getting older I can't believe my little Quinny is going to be 3 on Sunday. He is getting so big. This morning I told him that his birthday is on Sunday and that he is going to be turning 3. He is very excited, we haven't told him yet that he is having a Spiderman birthday party, I know once we tell him he won't talk about anything else until his party. We were even able to find a Spiderman pinata because as most of you know it's not a Stevulak party without a pinata, and I am also going to try my hand at a Spiderman cake, we will see how it turns out. Quinn is also one of funniest people that we know, the above picture is of Quinn showing off his big muscles in his cute blue camo underoos. Oh, and Matt told me I forgot to mention Quinn's potty training, it is going very well. He is only wearing a diaper now when he goes to bed at night or if we are going on a long car ride. I got some great pointers from Sarah, we did a pee pee chart that he got to put stickers on every time he went to the bathroom, and he also got a treat which was usually one jelly belly, and then every time he filled up a row on his pee pee chart he got a bigger surprise (like new Spiderman sandals). It helped keep it exciting for him, because it seems to get old real quick especially when he's playing and doesn't want to take the time to go. Yeah Quinny!!

New niece

My newest niece was born this morning at 3:33am. Her name is Xochitl (pronounced Sochill) and she is so cute. We are so excited to add her to our family.