Day 9 and 10

Hello We've been eagerly awaiting Wednesday because we get to see our Mommy again. Yesterday we went to Liberty Park to play while Aunt Linda took a mile hike. In the afternoon Lindsay took us over to the wading pool for a few hours. It was great fun. Last night Parker fell asleep by 7:45. Aunt Linda started teaching me(Tricia ) how to sew by hand. I did a straight stitch and sewed a seam and I sewed on 2 buttons. It was exciting. I've already practiced on the machine. We're going to try sewing a doll blanket next week. Today our friends Roderick and Vincent came over to play with us. We are getting ready to go with Aunt Heather tonight to San Diego. When we wake up in the morning we will see Mommy at the zoo. Hoorah! More later! Love Tricia and Parker

Day 8 A relaxing Sunday

Hello Everybody We went to Sunday School and church this morning. We had a lot of fun. Then we went out to eat at Dalton's restaurant where Ryan's girlfriend Lindsey is a waitress. Parker calls Lindsey the love of his life and brought here flowers today! Our Sunday School teachers were eating there and came over to say hi to us. Then after lunch Lindsey brought us a huge hot fudge sundae to eat. It was delicious!!!! This afternoon we played with Roger, Bekah, and Hailey... some of the neighborhood children. We are really missing Mommy and Daddy but have been very brave and haven't cried yet. Aunt Linda laid in bed with us and told us silly stories of when she was six and went places with her Grandma. I told Aunt Linda that even though she is old she is a lot of fun! Today she started teaching Tricia how to sew on her sewing machine. They are going to make a doll blanket. Good night! Love, Tricia and Parker

Day 7 A Fun Birthday Party!

Hello Everybody This morning we just relaxed at home. Aunt Linda took Lindsay to all day play practice. (Lindsay doesn't have a car and Aunt Linda wanted to keep her car for the day.) Lindsay will be in a play at LBCC this summer. The play is Candida by George Bernard Shaw. We might get to see Lindsay in the play. When Aunt Linda went walking this morning she found a yard sale and a lady was selling a Little Tykes Log cabin for $5.00. The husband even delivered it for that price so we have a new(or old) play house in the back yard and a picnic table, too. The price was right! This afternoon we went to a birthday party. Aunt Linda teaches school with a lady named Claudia. Her little daughter Jennifer was 5 today. We really had fun. There was a squirt gun fight, a Hello Kitty pinata that her Grandma made for her and a wonderful play ground nearby that we got to run and jump on. We are tired right now but it was a great day. Last night we talked to our Daddy. We sure do miss him. This morning we talked to Grandma Shirley and thanked her for Parker's birthday gifts. Grandma Margaret wasn't home. We can hardly wait to see Mommy next Wednesday. It seems like she's been gone forever. Aunt Linda showed us a magazine with pictures from the San Diego Zoo. It will be fun to go there. Bye Everyone. Write soon! Love Tricia and Parker

Day 6 at the Wading Pool

Hello Everybody Today we went to the 99Cent store and Parker found a real bargain. He found Gameboy games for just (you guessed it) 99 cents! It's a game called NSYNC and it's fun to play. We also watched my Aunt Linda's old view master which was a gift from our Grandma Patti to Linda when she was just 5 years old. It was exciting watching the view master stories. We saw Little Black Sambo, The Ugly Duckling, and TheThree Little Pigs. They also have little books with them that tell the story. Aunt Linda also let us play with Andy and Scott's old walkie talkies(that's why we went to the 99 cent store to get batteries which we almost forgot). This afternoon we went to Del Valle Park and played in the wading pool which our Mommy played in when she was young. We met some friends and collected leaves which Aunt Linda let us carry home in her socks. We also watched Shari Lewis sing some of the old songs that Lindsay knows(By the way Uncle Jordan the song is called My name is Flo and I work in a button factory...not Joe!). We're having a blast! Lakewood is fun! Bye for now...we've got to run and go eat at SoupPlantation. More later! Love Tricia and Parker

How long have we been here?

Hi Everybody Today was a kick back and relax day...we think that we needed it more than our old Auntie and Uncle! We watched some Nick TV and a video. We played our GameBoys and played out in the yard. Tricia got to go to Sav On and she found a Dymo label maker for only $2.49 on clearance. It's something she's always wanted her whole life but Mom wouldn't buy it for her so old soft (in the soft touch duo) bought it for her. We've had so much fun with it. We made labels for our bikes and put our turtles' names on their containers. We can hardly wait to go home and label everything...Dad, Uncle Karl, Mom, Aunt Sara! What fun! Well, it's almost time for bed. Parker fell asleep at 7:45 and now I'm watching a movie with Uncle Wilson called The Angel and the Bad Man. It's fun to sit with him since I miss cuddling with Daddy. Parker accidentally fell when I was playing with him and hurt his back a little. He cried for Mom for about one minute and then asked for a drink of water. He asked if Aunt Linda knew why he needed water but she didn't. He said that water helps him stop crying and sure enough it did. Uncle Wilson talked to me about how we can't always say that everything is an accident. We're still reading each night. We like In His Hands and the BFG. We wonder what the BFG stands for...Big Frightening Giant? Big Fat Giant? Big Fierce Giant?...Aunt Linda says we'll find out tomorrow night. Bye! Love Tricia and Parker

Day 4 and Lovin' it!!!!

Hi Everybody! Chinatown was a lot of fun. When we first arrived there we saw a store with live chickens. They were all going balk, balk, and it seemed like the movie Chicken Run! Well, Mrs. Perez was the one to drive us there(Mrs. Perez is Vincent and Roderick's Mom) and she really knew her way around . We went to five stores and stalls that normally sell turtles and guess what??? No turtles! Finally we found one lady who was illegally selling them and of course, it was not turtle season, so the price had tripled. Mrs. Perez wanted to go back to Cypress to buy turtles but Aunt Linda said, "No!" After all we came this far to buy turtles, right? We needed turtles from Chinatown! Our turtles are so cute. Their names are Shelder and Sheldon. When we got home Mrs. Perez told us to put bottled water in the container for the turtles. Aunt Linda got some out of the fridge and asked if the water would be too cold. Mrs. Perez said that it wouldn't be and so Aunt Linda poured it into the container. Suddenly the turtle started gulping and coming up for air. We turned away and in a minute Aunt Linda saw that Shelder was floating on his back. Oh no! Animal CPR to the rescue. Mrs. Perez grabbed him just in time and put her hands around him to warm him up. He finally started to breathe! Aunt Linda sighed a huge sigh of relief..she would not have to rush back to Chinatown in rush hour traffic. By the way in Chinatown we also got pop snaps for the 4th of July(6 boxes for $!.00) and we got little fans. Afterwards we went to Burger King so that everyone could get Star War toys in honor of Uncle Karl. Tricia played chess with Ryan and...lost but wasn't discouraged! We started reading the BFG with Aunt Linda. We are illustrating the chapters as Aunt Linda reads them to us. The BFG sounds scary right now. The cool part is that we are illustrating the pages with cool smelling markers. Bath time, bedtime, and the days are flying....what a schedule! We asked to go to bed!!!!!! We love you! Parker and Tricia

Day 3 without the Folks!

Hey the days are passing so quickly. Today we went to the Post Office and mailed letters to Mommy so she won't get too homesick without us. We went back to the teacher supply store and got 20 more teeth and toothbrushes. Pretty cool. We love playing with them and they remind us to brush our teeth. Our new friends Vincent and Roderick came over and they had never played Operation so we played two games with them. Vincent was in Aunt Linda's class this past year. He speaks three languages and is very kind to us. Tonight we went and ate supper at Del Taco with Aunt Linda and Uncle Wilson. We got spaceship tops there in our kids' meals. They are fun to spin. We also went to Wal Mart. Uncle Wilson loves going there every Tuesday night. They bought us each a treat. Parker told Daddy on the phone that they were very generous to us. Tricia got a Fur Real Friend Panda cub and named it Bamboo. Parker got Sonic hot wheels. Aunt Linda got a new Elmo toy that she likes to have on hand for Abby(her grand daughter). Well it's off to bed. Tomorrow we are going to Chinatown to get our turtles. We can hardly wait.

Day 2 in California

Hi Everybody We were up real early this morning. We're sleeping in our cousin Lindsay's room and her love birds love to chirp and wake us up early. It's a good thing that Uncle Wilson and Aunt Linda are so energetic for their age. Uncle Willy gets up at 5AM and Aunt Linda slowly follows him out of bed. Uncle Wilson sometimes sees me sitting on the foot of the bed when he leaves at 6:15. This morning we ran lots of errands. We started out at Fantastic Sam's where Aunt Linda got my hair(Parker)cut. We asked for a surfer cut so it's shaved close underneath but is still longer on top. Pretty cool. Every morning Tricia gets a great hair do from Lindsay who loves to french braid hair. After the hair cut we stopped by Aunt Linda's classroom to bring home a few more things to play with. We went to the library to sign up for a reading program but it wasn't opened yet. Then we stopped by our new friends' house and saw turtles, clown fish, shrimp, a salt water tank, and all of their birds. Their names are Vincent and Roderick(our friends names not the birds!). Then Mrs. Perez said that we could go to Chinatown this week to get pet turtles so we are very excited. We also went to a neat teachers store and got to buy giant paper clips to hold all of our papers and we got some erasers that look like teeth and toothbrushes. Hey, Aunt Linda's not as soft as I thought she was. First thing this morning she's got a huge chore chart posted on her refrigerator. Wow! We've got 10 chores to try to do every day. We're earning stickers and at the end of the week we will get an allowance to have money to spend when we go to some special places. We're also doing school work every day but it's fun. Well , we've had our baths and now it's off to bed already. We've been reading some neat Kids' books called What Would Jesus Do? and In His Hands. We can hardly wait to hear the next chapter. Hey don't forget to ask yourself, "What would Jesus do?" We love you all. I miss Mommy. I asked Tricia if she missed Mommy and she said, "Not really!" I sure do miss her! Love, Parker PS Did I tell you that Uncle Wilson builty us a really neat swing set and we get to go out in the yard a lot to swing and glide and play in the club house. I wish you could come play with me.

Day 1 without Mom!

Hi Everybody This is Tricia and Parker writing from California! Wow! It's neat out here and to think that we are free from Mom and Dad's rule. Yippee! We're staying with our great Aunt Linda and Uncle Wilson and in case you don't knwo they've got the words "soft touch" tattoed on their foreheads. What fun lies ahead! Today we went to church with them. It was really cool. In Sunday School their was a family from Germany. They work in a school with missionary children. They gave us bookmarks and candy from Germany so that we could remember to pray for them. In Kids Church we made some gifts for Daddy. In the afternoon we went to a Father's Day party out at the Hoppes home. We got to swim in a pool. There were lots of c hildren there...Evan, Natalie, Kaden, Ashley, Dawson, Parker, Abby, Vincent and Roderick. Everytime someone yelled Parker both Parkers turned their heads. Well, good night! It's 8:30...can't convince Aunt Linda to let us stay up any later. Shucks! We love you all!

My Wonderful Aunt and Uncle

As you know I am at a Fitness Camp for 5 weeks in LaJolla, Ca. I could not be doing this without my wonderful Aunt and Uncle who are watching the kids while I do this. I am setting this up so my Aunt and Uncle can blog what is going on and everyone who wants to can read what they are doing. Maybe even Tricia and Parker will blog on it.

I know that today they are going to China Town to buy two turtles. It will be fun for them to have a pet while they are here.

I need to run.

Stay tuned for more of Tricia and Parker's Excellent Adventures!!