Bucket List 2014 revisited

Let's revisit Bucket list 2014 to see how we did on our adventures.

-Grow own food (Christy)

Our garden was a success for our first year. The girls loved to snack on strawberries and basil leaves while playing outside during the spring and early summer. I loved eating tomatoes and cucumber warm and straight off the vine! We still have brussel sprouts currently that have braved the sub zero temps. Can't wait to start another garden in a couple for months. 

-Go strawberry picking (Christy)

Well, the girls went strawberry picking all the time in our backyard, so this item merged into the latter one. 

-Go to 2nd grade (Brady)

Brady has done this in exemplary fashion! She is rock star in second grade. Homework time is now stress free and she is earning lots of high marks on her papers. 

-Go to kindergarten (Reese)

Reese has blown kindergarten out of the water! She loves school and looks forward to the specials and centers everyday. 

-Go to the Children's Museum (Brady)

-Start running (Elli)

Elli kicked hypotonia in the butt and has fully caught up developmentally to her peers!

-Go to DC (Karl)

We made a couple visits to DC last year. Once to visit the memorials and visit good friends that moved to Maryland. Then another time to see the SF Giants in the playoffs. We see lots more DC visits in the coming years once we move to Maryland ourselves. 

Going to see the Giants play was the highlight of the year for Karl. 

-Go overseas (Christy)

Karl and Christy celebrated our 10th wedding anniversary in the grandest of styles.

-Go to the Great Wolf Lodge (Brady and Reese)

This might has been the highlight of the year for the girls!

-Go see Pop Pop's fish (Reese)

Reese (and the other girls) spent their spring break with Pop Pop while her parents explored Europe. Reese had such a great time, she demanded she sleep at Pop Pop's house, while the rest of the family stayed in a very nice beach house!

-Have a Kid free weekend on our Tenth wedding anniversary (Christy)

We spent the weekend of our anniversary in the trees! This might have been my favorite highlight of the year. The team work to manage the course was rewarding and the adventure of it all was exhilarating. 

-Attend an air show (Karl)

Although, Karl looked forward to bringing all his girls to the airshow, rain and traffic caused this to be a somewhat disappointing experience. I don't think Brady was sold on the idea. 

-Bike/run/play at Mt. Trashmore (Christy)

This time around last is least! This was the only item we didn't complete. Mount Trashmore was visited, just not as an entire family and we did bike rides, just not at Mount Trashmore, so all is good in the Orthner World!

Copenhagen Day Three: "To travel is to live"

Today is a Monday. Mondays in Denmark means lots of (government run) tourist hot spots are closed. So we hit up a lot of random spots, and still had a blast. 

Blu Planet, an aquarium, is one of the newest tourist additions to Copenhagen. Built about three years ago, it is a architectural sight to behold. Honestly though, seeing the building from the outside was the best part. 

 Even though the constant flowing of locals and tourists into the place told us otherwise, this place was small and short coming of our expectations. The most interesting thing inside was the school of fish that are in a cylindrical tank. They swam in a small circle over and over and over; there were the rogue few that rebelled. I gave them a virtual high-five, well high-fin.

 I do chuckle EVERY time I see the under side of a ray.

 The Aquarium experience that filled up 45 minutes of the expected three hours, left us walking around and just enjoying the sights. We stopped for lunch and this was our view. I love it! I think just looking at all the buildings has been my favorite part so far.

 We spent our afternoon at the Hans Christian Andersen Museum. Learning about H. C. (as the locals refer to him) is one of the things I looked forward to the most. This quote made me smile.

 The museum featured many of his fairy tales in three minute summaries with animated scenes.

"The Little Mermaid"

 "The Little Match Girl"

 "Thumbelina"

 Again, these buildings...amazing! This is City Hall. Don't ask what that goofy man is doing in the front!

 Another dose of H. C.

I sat on his knee and asked him to tell me another story, and he rudely turned his head. The nerve!

 What is a trip without a little aerospace. I know we are all shocked that Karl wanted to visit the Tycho Brahes Planetarium. Again, like the aquarium, the facade was the most intriguing part. At least we both appreciate a pretty building.

 I did wish our space loving Reese was with us since they had a scale representation of all the planets. See itty bitty Earth behind Jupiter? That was about it for displays.

 There is so much ingenious public art here. Here there were about five pieces for the kids (young and old) to climb on. Also, notice the cobblestones. This is what 95% of the sidewalks are like. So you are constantly walking on uneven surfaces. It has been interesting with the two pair of shoes I choose to pack.

 Another interesting thing about the city is there are as many bikers and car drivers. Every street corner looks like this. There are also bikes with cabins on the front so parents can tote multiple kids around or pile in groceries.

 Another date night... we were just playing around, our faces don't accurately display the great fun we are having!

Orthnerism: Let's speak about spokes

I realized I never made this announcement official on her. In February, Reese became a legit bike rider. With her I wised up to the whole bike riding process, which does NOT include training wheels at any given time.

Two months later and Reese is a master of her bike. She has control like she has been riding a bike for years. Sorry, I don't have an updated video or even pictures but I have this little verbal gem.

After a weekend afternoon out on the alley, I asked the girls to come in for dinner. As they were cleaning up their bike gear:

Me: "Reese, you really are pretty amazing on that bike of yours now."

Reese: "That's the way it is suppose to be, mom."


Alright Reese, from now on, I will not expect anything short of amazing from you.






But I have a feeling you will never let me down.

By the way, this is one of her latest masterpieces. Titled "A girl dressed up as a princess stuffing brownies in her mouth"

In a blink of an eye

These kids just keep growing up. In a blink of an eye. I feel like I have something new I could report to you all nightly on this blog. But all that growing up keeps me busy.

You remember when I said, in this family we celebrate milestones regardless of timing? Also, there are some milestones that feel like a right of passage into parenthood. You know potty training, first day of school, tooth fairy visits, etc. We have a new thing to check off our list.

Brady rode her bike tonight WITHOUT training wheels.

This is a big deal for US.

A while back someone told me about balance bikes. When a kid learns to ride a bike, they need to learn how to pedal and balance. Most kids get a training wheel bikes (like Brady) and learn to pedal first, then balance. But if you get the kid a balance bike first, they learn to balance first and pedaling is a easy after thought. So we started Reese off on a balance bike and she is probably going to be riding a bike (w/o training wheels within the next month). Brady's bike had training wheels and Reese's balance bike was too small.


A neighbor friend suggested we take the training wheels AND pedals off Brady's bike, let her mess around with that, then just put the pedals back on. Well she only needed one week of that setup, and here she is. I know the bike is too little but we used that one for confidence. We plan to phase her up soon.

So, if you have a little one, I highly suggest you start with a balance bike and skip training wheels all together!

Easy Breezy Friday Afternoon

Last Friday, I brought the girls to the park on base so that Reese could try out her new (new to her that is) bike. They can ride on the sidewalks (no where close to a road) at different speeds without my having a heart attack. Reese's bike is something I have JUST recently heard about...pedalless bikes. Apparently this is the way for them to truly understanding balance in biking and therefore never have the need for training wheels. You are suppose to start them on the pedalless bike around two. They just push themselves along with their feet, slowly gaining speed, all the while learning their center of balance on a two wheeled bike. Then when they are ready you move them over to a pedalled bike (without training wheels). The moms I have talked to that did this at 2 had a kid riding a bike without training wheels by 3! AMAZING in my opinion. The first day on the bike was frustrating for Reese, but it will also be the hardest day for her, since it will get easier and easier with each use. 

 Since we were on base, Karl left work (an hour early) and meet us out there. Luckily, we had our softball gear leftover in the back of the van and the girls and Karl played a pick up game of softball. I so throughly enjoyed sitting in the dugout, feeling the breeze from the bay, and watching my family bond and have a great time together. As I sat there, I thought to myself, this is what life is all about...this is pure happiness.

LIFE IS GOOD!