Double Your Pleasure: Fun with the Archibalds

What's more fun than one three-year-old and one one-year-old? Two of each, naturally. We've had some coincidental pregnancies in the past four years: Jane is three months older than Jonas. Miles is five weeks older than Grey. We were very excited to reunite the cousins in June.
Whitney and David and the kids came to visit us in June, keeping us on our six-month schedule of seeing them. Come August, we will have seen every Singley/Archibald/Gadd/Kirkland and Gibson in 2009. Not bad for living over 800 miles from the nearest famiy.
Showing Whitney's family the sites gave us an excuse to be tourists in our own town (tourists with their own transportation and some insight into what to see, that is.) Before David arrived, I took Whitney and the kids to the Ballard Locks and Chittenden Garden.

We arrived in time to see boats go through.


Our attempts at group shots really capture this toddler-preschooler era. Holding still, all at the same time? That would be some kind of holy event.

We also visited the Fremont Troll


And ate gelato under Vladimir Lenin's shadow.

The kids had a blast together, making pizza, looking and sounding a bit alike, talking excitedly about going on the boat (the ferry) and explaining how things work (in English and gibberish).


Sometimes we couldn't tell who was crying or talking--and we're their mothers.

The grownups had fun watching chick flicks, eating insalata capresa, waxing poetic about hazelnut and chocolate, and talking about architecture and fresh basil and EB White. Okay, that might have been more fun for the female grownups. We outnumbered Brad the first couple days, so he couldn't uphold an official ban on BBC productions. All of us enjoyed talking about Bishop and our love of the high Sierra.
David came into town for his conference, but we still had time to take a ferry to Bainbridge Island. Bookshops, bakeries, and little shops. Oh my!


"Miles, wait for me!"

Bad picture of the great Mora Iced Creamery. Everything we tried was delicious. I could write an entire post about gianduja (hazelnut chocolate) or pink grapefruit sorbet. They even serve gluten-free cones.

"Look, Jonas! It's the Space Noodle!"

At the Seattle Aquarium, we touched sea stars and marveled at the octopus


Jane loved making Miles smile. Every time they saw each other was all smiles and giggles.



Super hero cousins

We finished the Aquarium day at Gas Works Park to enjoy the views of the city over Lake Union.
Our final day with David, we ate tasty tacos at Seahurst Park. And if you ever wondered if you should order an all-bean burrito, the answer is no, you shouldn't. At least not if it's a big burrito.
The kids played in the rocks/sand

probably my favorite picture from the week.

and kept escape attempts

and splashing

to a minimum.

David didn't get to see the kids sing in Sacrament Meeting on Father's Day--his plane took off that morning. Watching Jane and Jonas sing "I'm so glad when daddy comes home" was priceless.
Tired from the adventures thus far, the kids watched Peter Pan


and played by the window.


Cousin Robin came over for dinner. I'm sad I didn't take pictures of her while she was here. We love our "Ribbon."
Monday was our last full day together. We distracted ourselves from the sadness of parting with a trip to Lake Wilderness Park.



Jonas: "I'm bigger than you." Jane: "Yeah, but I'm older than you."


A final group shot

In conclusion, having kids close in age rules. The Archibalds were wonderful guests. I loved spending more time getting to know them--we've rarely spent time together since we've always lived so far apart. We can't wait for Christmas.