A visit from the other Shumates

Devin, Dacia, and all their kids came over for 4th of July weekend. On Friday we went to Silverwood. It was a very hot day so we spent all day at Boulder Beach. At about 5:00 pm, we were all starving so we went to this restaurant inside Silverwood. Here's a picture of all the kids while we were waiting for our seats.

After dinner we went on some rides.

Here's the kids mocking the cactus behind them.

The next day we went up to Manitou Park in the South Hill. The kids ran around and Matt took a bunch of pictures.

Here's a couple of all the Shumate cousins together.

We didn't really do much for the 4th of July except just hang out together and let the cousins play all day. It was a fun weekend!

June happenings

Matt's grandfather, Bob Shumate, died, and we went to Tacoma for the funeral. Here's a few pictures from the cementary.

Here's a picture of his children.

Here's some of his grandsons.

And here's most of the grandchildren and great grandchildren.

Afterwards we went to a river and the girls played for awhile with their aunts and uncles and cousins. It was a nice, hot day.

The next day we went on a ferry with Grandma and Grandpa Shumate. It was the first time that Kelsey and Gwyn had been on one.

We also went to Fort Nisqually at Point Defiance Park and saw what it was like to live in the 1800's.



Also in June, we went to Reagan's piano recital. We were surprised to see so many people there. It's normally just a handful of students and their parents there but this year they combined it with another teacher's students and had it at a different location. This caught Reagan a little off guard but she did great, even though she messed a little more than she would have liked. We were all proud of her.

The girls have been wearing shorts these days, so we get a lot of this happening. This is just one of the many injuries between Reagan, Kelsey, and especially Gwyn. Ouch!

Finally, here's a cute picture of the girls "striking a pose" that Matt took.

May happenings

May started out with a trip to Tacoma. Matt got to hang out with the fellas he grew up with. It's been a loooooooong time since they've all gotten together. They stayed in a condo by the ocean for a couple of days. If you want more details, you'll have to ask Matt. All I get is "what happens in Westport, stays in Westport." Just kidding. I was so glad that Matt got to take a couple of days off and hang out with the guys. He doesn't do that very often.

Here's a cute picture of Kelsey and Aunt Jaqui that was taken that weekend. I love this picture!

On the way to Tacoma, Matt stopped at Vantage, which is the half way mark and it where we cross the Columbia River. Here's a picture he took.

On the way home, we also stopped in Vantage, but this is on the other side of the freeway. It was soooooooo windy. You could barely keep your eyes open!

We made it back just in time for Kelsey's First Grade music program which was the next day. It was called E-I-E-I-uh-oh. Kelsey was a chick with her good friends Chloe, Ashley, and Sarah. Their costumes were pretty much thrown together, whatever we could find that would resemble a chick. It was a cute program and most importantly, Kelsey had fun.

Later in May, the girls got to be part of a children's music video for Jenks. They got to dance around and move around like different animals. We are friends with Corey Jenkins, who writes songs for kids. We have one of their CD's that the girls like a lot. You can watch the video Here. Reagan is wearing a greenish and brown shirt, Kelsey is wearing a pink shirt, and Gwyn is wearing a green shirt as shown in this picture. Watch for them in the video!

Lastly, and very sadly, we said good-bye to our good friends, the Buers. They are our friends that we spent Thanksgiving and Christmas Eve with last year. I will miss my good friend, Wendy and our kids will miss their kids. Here's Kelsey with her other BFF Hannah.

And here's Gwyn with her bud Landon. She loved playing with him.

April happenings

I already posted about Easter, but here are a few other things that happened in April:

First, we were surprised to find out that Kelsey's BFF Hika was visiting from Tonga. She moved to Tonga over 2 years ago. Here's a picture of them together a couple of months before she left when they were 4 years old.

She wasn't supposed to be back until the end of the year but her mom came back to have a baby and Hika got to come visit us a few times. Here is a picture the first night she came over. They played really good together and kept playing even though it got dark outside. Hika is now back in Tonga with her family until the end of the year.

These pictures were taken one nice Sunday afternoon. We went down to the river and took a

walk. After the long winter we had, it was nice to get out and be outside together.

Also, in April, we got a visit from my mom. The girls love their Grandma so much and had a wonderful visit with her.

Lastly, here's a picture of Gwyn playing with one of her buds, Finn. He's a cute kid she calls her friend. I just like saying "Gwyn and Finn."

March - Reagan's school music program

In March, we went to the 2nd Grade music program. The theme was "green." No, it was not about being "environmentally friendly." They sang a lot of cute songs about things that are green. Reagan loves to perform. She gets nervous, but it's excited nervous. Although she is normally a little shy, she is very brave when it comes to getting up in front of a lot of people and gives each performance 100%.

She got to do a dance with scarves with a few other people. She did awesome!

More of Matt's Photography

I'm not going to post pictures from every photoshoot that Matt has, that's what his websites (portfolio website and blog) but I thought I'd post some from this one simply because many of you might know the model.

His model for this shoot was Lani Call and I think these photos look like they came straight out of a fashion magazine. Take a look at these and head over to matt's blog to see the rest of the photos and read about the shoot. You should bookmark his site too. He's got some cool stuff coming up.

Matt's booking dates for the near future for kids, families, seniors, glamour shots (minus the collar grab, unnaturally big hair, and trip to the mall), weddings, etc.

Like he says, he shoots people.

Easter

This was our Easter weekend:

Friday it occurred to me that I hadn't yet put out the Easter decorations so the girls helped me decorate the house. Saturday evening we dyed Easter eggs. We pulled that off without making too much of a mess.

Sunday: Easter morning. At our house, the Easter Bunny hides the Easter baskets and leaves clues for the girls to find them. Kelsey found the first clue that was left by the cereal boxes. Kelsey and Reagan then followed the clues and found their baskets. They got a bunch of Easter goodies including a Hannah Montana puzzles and game book for Kelsey, the latest Magic Tree house book for Reagan, and a toy Mickey Mouse camera for Gwyn. After the girls took their showers and got dressed, they searched the house for eggs. Gwyn had been practicing the day before so she knew exactly what to do.

There's always a couple eggs that have money in them. In this picture, Kelsey and Reagan just spotted these eggs. Woo hoo!

Gwyn just couldn't get enough of the jelly beans that were inside the eggs. We finally had to take them away and this is what happened:

Here's a picture of the girls after the hunt was over. This was obviously before I did their hair. After curling all their hair with my new flat iron, which I am having way to much fun with by the way, we rushed off to church before taking any pictures. What a bummer! I even curled Gwyns hair.

After church we had a delicious ham dinner. This is the first time I have ever made a ham. I don't really care for ham but I didn't want to have just the same old thing for dinner since it was Easter. It turned out really good. Then I made some sugar cookies in the shape of Easter eggs for the girls to decorate. I usually just let the girls decorate cookies once a year for Halloween or Christmas but I thought they would love doing it this year for Easter too. Matt thought I was crazy for letting them decorate the cookies because of all the work and the mess but I kept it simple. I made the dough the day before and just had 3 colors of frosting and some sprinkles. That made the preparation and clean up much easier. Gwyn even decorated a couple of eggs. Afterwards, Reagan and Kelsey could not stop telling me thank you for letting them do this.

So, over all, we had a pretty good Easter.

Recent Photoshoots

Here are some photos from a couple of Matt's recent photoshoots. Click here to see more photos and read a bit about the sessions.