The twins celebrated their 1st year of life and what a year it has been! It's hard sometimes to think about feelings from a year ago. I made a little slideshow DVD of their first year and Carlos and I both bawled immediately at the sight of them in their incubators with so many tubes and wires and looking so, so tiny but being so, so tough.
I attempted making an owl cake and they didn't even want to smash it!
We had baby races, played a game guessing what all of the tiny things from the NICU were used for, watched their 1st year slideshow, opened presents and had cake. The kids performed a special version of "Happy Birthday" which ended in a pyramid. A video of them performing is at the end.
This fall was so incredible weather wise. We took advantage of the 70 to 80 degree weather and went on lots of beautiful hikes. These are from Chip Ross Park.
If you could blow this picture up, you would see that the look on their faces is pure bliss :)
Carlos pushed the stroller all the way to the top.....
where we enjoyed this dynamite view. This was a hill I used to do hill repeats up with my running club when I was 8 years old, so the kids and I did a few. Nothing gets you in shape faster than good old hill repeats.
Rivers and I in our matching dresses. She wanted to wear them to church together and do our hair the same and everything and I know those requests won't last so we did it.
She is such a great kid!
Halloween 2010....we had a cavewoman, a shark...
...and two little chicks!
Loved these costumes!
At our halloween, hot chocolate party...the big banana is Cody...Osama is Tyler...I was Alias (Sydney Bristol in a spy outfit) but most people thought I was the designer lady from the Incredibles.
On another warm fall day I took the twins and Dwight to explore some new trails a couple miles away and we found the coolest oak forests. The leaves were falling, so the trails were full of those "poppers". Dwight informed me that his bike is now a mountain bike and he was going to go over lots of bumps, so he brought his balance bike and had fun on his first mountain bike ride. You almost can't tell that he's on a bike in this picture.
Shirtless and playing in the leaf piles.
It was like a huge, plush carpet of leaves.
I love how the twins both had leaves stuck to their heads the whole time.
Another hike, this time to the top of Bald Hill. You can see my mom's house in this picture way down below.
I love how ferns grow out of the trees. We had fun mushroom hunting on this hike. We saw probably 20 different varieties.
Mealtimes are crazy. I usually sit down on the floor with a bowl of something and let my little birds climb all over me. When I put the spoon in one mouth, the other one grunts or cries until I put a bite in their mouth and then the other one fusses. It just goes back and forth like that the whole time. I need to get it on video.
OK, this year we finally had our girls weekend. Whitney planned it and it was so much fun. We drove to Waldport on the coast and first stopped at this little diner called 'Salty Dawg'. It was right by where we were going to go crabbing, so we went in to eat before putting our nets out and we felt like we'd stepped onto a movie set... All the guys looked like they'd just stepped off a fishing boat that had been out to sea for months. One guy started talking to us to give us tips on crabbing and the conversation got so weird that Amber finally bolted out the door and we all quickly followed. Here's Diana and I enjoying our huge chowder boats.
We tried crabbing her in the Alsea Bay but didn't have much luck, so we headed to the cute little town of Yachats and then to our yurt.
Along the way we stopped at his gem of a lookout. We started feeling like we were in a horror movie with all the fog and trees and scary fishermen.
Good thing our yurt was so cozy. We cooked up some delicious tin foil dinners and banana boats in the fire pit outside. Yep boys, we got the fire roaring even with the rain.
The next morning Whitney and I went on the coolest run ever through crazy beautiful trails out to the beach and then up to a lighthouse that was over 100 years old.
Have I mentioned how much I love being back in Oregon?!
Posing in front of the yurt on our way out. Diana made it through the night without giving birth in the yurt. She had contractions and her babies typically come fast, so she was making us all a little nervous. Good thing we had a surgery tech. with us that could have caught the baby without passing out. It added to the excitement of the trip.
We drove to Newport and tried our luck at crabbing again... Whitney's saying "oh please, please let there be a crab in there".
Success. We took home 5 or 6 crab and boiled and ate them that night.
I missed this little face though. This is her new cheesy smile.
Ahhhh!
All Rivers wanted for Christmas was a zip line. Since we won't be here on Christmas, she got her present early and Carlos and I spent all day on Thanksgiving putting the 70 ft. line up. It goes through the trees and over a ditch.
Our little pilgrims at Thanksgiving dinner.
The night after Thanksgiving is the annual Corvallis Christmas Parade and tree lighting. Love this pic of Carlos and his twin Dre at the parade.
Tukey Bowl 2010
The twins celebrated their 1st year of life and what a year it has been! It's hard sometimes to think about feelings from a year ago. I made a little slideshow DVD of their first year and Carlos and I both bawled immediately at the sight of them in their incubators with so many tubes and wires and looking so, so tiny but being so, so tough.
I attempted making an owl cake and they didn't even want to smash it! 
This fall was so incredible weather wise. We took advantage of the 70 to 80 degree weather and went on lots of beautiful hikes. These are from Chip Ross Park.
If you could blow this picture up, you would see that the look on their faces is pure bliss :)
Carlos pushed the stroller all the way to the top.....
where we enjoyed this dynamite view. This was a hill I used to do hill repeats up with my running club when I was 8 years old, so the kids and I did a few. Nothing gets you in shape faster than good old hill repeats.
Rivers and I in our matching dresses. She wanted to wear them to church together and do our hair the same and everything and I know those requests won't last so we did it.
She is such a great kid!
Halloween 2010....we had a cavewoman, a shark...
...and two little chicks!
Loved these costumes!
At our halloween, hot chocolate party...the big banana is Cody...Osama is Tyler...I was Alias (Sydney Bristol in a spy outfit) but most people thought I was the designer lady from the Incredibles.
On another warm fall day I took the twins and Dwight to explore some new trails a couple miles away and we found the coolest oak forests. The leaves were falling, so the trails were full of those "poppers". Dwight informed me that his bike is now a mountain bike and he was going to go over lots of bumps, so he brought his balance bike and had fun on his first mountain bike ride. You almost can't tell that he's on a bike in this picture.
Shirtless and playing in the leaf piles.
It was like a huge, plush carpet of leaves.
Another hike, this time to the top of Bald Hill. You can see my mom's house in this picture way down below.
I love how ferns grow out of the trees. We had fun mushroom hunting on this hike. We saw probably 20 different varieties. 
Mealtimes are crazy. I usually sit down on the floor with a bowl of something and let my little birds climb all over me. When I put the spoon in one mouth, the other one grunts or cries until I put a bite in their mouth and then the other one fusses. It just goes back and forth like that the whole time. I need to get it on video.
OK, this year we finally had our girls weekend. Whitney planned it and it was so much fun. We drove to Waldport on the coast and first stopped at this little diner called 'Salty Dawg'. It was right by where we were going to go crabbing, so we went in to eat before putting our nets out and we felt like we'd stepped onto a movie set... All the guys looked like they'd just stepped off a fishing boat that had been out to sea for months. One guy started talking to us to give us tips on crabbing and the conversation got so weird that Amber finally bolted out the door and we all quickly followed. Here's Diana and I enjoying our huge chowder boats.
We tried crabbing her in the Alsea Bay but didn't have much luck, so we headed to the cute little town of Yachats and then to our yurt.
Along the way we stopped at his gem of a lookout. We started feeling like we were in a horror movie with all the fog and trees and scary fishermen.
Good thing our yurt was so cozy. We cooked up some delicious tin foil dinners and banana boats in the fire pit outside. Yep boys, we got the fire roaring even with the rain.
The next morning Whitney and I went on the coolest run ever through crazy beautiful trails out to the beach and then up to a lighthouse that was over 100 years old.
Have I mentioned how much I love being back in Oregon?!
Posing in front of the yurt on our way out. Diana made it through the night without giving birth in the yurt. She had contractions and her babies typically come fast, so she was making us all a little nervous. Good thing we had a surgery tech. with us that could have caught the baby without passing out. It added to the excitement of the trip.
We drove to Newport and tried our luck at crabbing again... Whitney's saying "oh please, please let there be a crab in there".
Success. We took home 5 or 6 crab and boiled and ate them that night.
I missed this little face though. This is her new cheesy smile.
Ahhhh!
All Rivers wanted for Christmas was a zip line. Since we won't be here on Christmas, she got her present early and Carlos and I spent all day on Thanksgiving putting the 70 ft. line up. It goes through the trees and over a ditch.
Our little pilgrims at Thanksgiving dinner.
The night after Thanksgiving is the annual Corvallis Christmas Parade and tree lighting. Love this pic of Carlos and his twin Dre at the parade.
Tukey Bowl 2010
