Sacramento Trip

Last weekend we went to Sacramento. We saw our friends, Jan and Dan, who are expecting in November (yea!). They took us to a Pumpkin Patch where Hope went our her first hayride and climbed a haystack with her daddy. This pumpkin patch also fired pumpkins out of a cannon, which was a highlight. We also went through the corn maze, where Andrew and Dan tried to ditch the pregnant wife and the wife carrying the baby. Fortunately, Dan is more sympathetic to his wife and they turned back and helped us not get too lost. After the pumpkin patch, we went to a pizza place and sang karaoke, at least the girls did.




On Sunday, we went to church with Angela's friend, Shala, and her family to see Shala's baby, Jazzlyn blessed. It was a special occassion and we were glad we could be there.

International Night - Primary Activity

Last Friday, we went to a Primary Activity Day with an international theme. Everyone was encouraged to dress up and the children got to learn a little more about some different cultures. Here's a few pics with us dressed up.
This last picture is Hope eating a Ukranian cookie (while sitting in the sling); lately, she's been liking holding things in her mouth without hands.

Fall

I know, I skipped a whole month and didn't put any posts up. I'm sure everyone's been wondering, what have we been up to? Well, you can put your minds at ease, because it's not a whole lot. Hope and Angela have been taking some community classes - Kids in Tune and DanceKids, basically some play around classes where she gets to interact with other little ones and sing songs. We've also been hanging out with our playgroup, we play at each other's houses or go out to lunch. Hope loves other kids, so she really enjoys having interaction with people younger than her mommy, daddy, and grandma that she sees every day. We met up with Hope's cousin Victor for lunch last week and here she is showing some love.
A few weeks ago, Hope and Angela went and had portraits taken. Here's one of our favorite shots.
Earlier this week, Angela and Hope took the first of probably a handful of trips to the Pumpkin Patch near their house. It'll be fun to take Daddy back.

Twain Harte

A Ringlein summer tradition from Dori's childhood, now up to Hope's childhood, is visiting the town of Twain Harte, named after authors Mark Twain and Bret Harte. It's in the Sierra Nevada mountains a couple hours west of Yosemite near Sonora. We participated in favorite activities like miniature golfing, visiting the Twain Harte Lake, eating ice cream, playing games and enjoying each others company. It was a fun family trip and we were able to spend time with Dori, Jessica, Jim, Sara, Joe, Maria, Adam, and even Katie came and stayed a night. We also paid a visit to Mercer Caverns - a neat limestone cave that charged a pinch of golddust for its first tours.

Maria makes sure to count Andrew's swings - he was on a lucky streak this night.

Hope is happy hanging out on the beach.

Our little family - we had fun celebrating Jim and Angela's birthdays while we were in Twain Harte.

Here we are on our train ride out of Jamestown. This train has been used in many older movies and old western television shows.

East Coast Visit

Our East Coast Trip started in Washington D.C. We got the opportunity to have a short visit with Mark and Sandy on our first night in. They have a nice condo in Maryland that backs up to a wooded area - you could see plenty of fireflies buzzing around - a sight we don't get in Northern California. The next night we paid an evening visit to the National Mall where we saw the Capitol at night, and Washington Monument from a distance. Andrew ended up getting sick, so I saw some sights with Maria and Adam on Saturday, including the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, Lincoln Memorial, and Library of Congress . At the beautiful wedding of Valerie and Martin, it was fun to catch up with the Ringlein aunts and uncles that we don't see very often. Next we went to South Central Pennsylvania and stayed a couple of nights while Andrew recouped more from being sick. We visited with Jim and Sue and their kids Alex, Grace, and Veronica. Jim predicted that Hope would officially crawl on their enchanted carpet (three children had already learned to crawl in that very spot)...and some might venture to say she did just that. It was fun to learn a little more about the Amish on a buggy ride through the farmland. The last couple days of our trip we spent in North Carolina with the Bosleys. We mostly just relaxed, visited, and played games. It was a low-key way to end the trip. Hope really enjoyed the kids she saw on the trip, especially the entertaining antics of Will Bosley - she would giggle and giggle as he jumped up and down for her.Here are Maria and Adam in front of a reflecting pool with the Washington Monument in the background.

Andrew, Bob and Marcia Mayer, Joe and Janice Clements, Mark Ringlein, Angela and Hope, and Maria, the day after the wedding (during a brief window of Andrew feeling okay)

Hope and I tried out the swings for the first time (her first time, not mine)

Hope, Angela, Andrew, Grace, and Veronica in front of our Amish Buggy.

We made a brief stop to see the Washington D.C. temple on our way to North Carolina.

Hope enjoyed "crawling" around and playing with Ivy Bosley.

You can see more pictures from our trip at http://ringleins.shutterfly.com

A Midsummer Night's Dream

For Andrew's birthday, we had A Midsummer Night's Dream party. There was mixing as guests tried to guess the Fairytale name on their back. We played Imaginiff with Andrew, where guests decided what fit Andrew best (i.e. if Andrew were a dog would he be a 1)Dachsund 2)Golden Retriever 3)St. Bernard 4)Rottweiler) and if Andrew got it wrong, then he had to put a marshmallow in his mouth and keep it there. He was a good sport, holding a total of six marshmallows in his mouth at the end. Our finale of the evening was scenes from Shakespeare where guests could pick a scene from a Shakespeare play to improv and ham it up. Probably the most amusing scene was Andrew as Julius Caesar being murdered by a light-saber-holding Brutus.

Mr. Mom and more...

So I had a dentist appointment and asked Andrew to babysit. The picture below is what I came home to - Andrew's idea of babysitting.
We've also been getting swimming time in at the swim club. Hope has really been enjoying the water!
Hope just started eating solid food last week. So far it's rice cereal, but we'll be trying new things soon. I think the wide-eyed look is more from the camera flash than the experience of eating.
Happy Memorial Day - we joined some friends for a barbecue. Here's a sunny family picture.