Kartchner Klan

2011-10-19T18:30:00.000-07:00

This is me so happy. The whale is spouting in the background. It was awesome.

One item down on the Bucket List!

2011-10-19T16:06:00.000-07:00

An item on my bucket list was to go whale watching so Dan planned it as a surprise for me for our 5th wedding anniversary. It was even cooler than I thought it would be! We saw 4 blue whales. Did you know their tongue alone is as big as an elephant? The largest mammal ever - even bigger than dinosaurs. The dolphins under the boat on the way to the whale watching grounds was an added bonus. The boat was going about 35 mph! The dolphins are drafting.

flyer pic

2011-03-30T23:46:00.000-07:00

Christmas in the Yucatan

2011-01-17T08:43:00.001-08:00

Click here to view this photo book larger

2011-01-09T20:44:00.000-08:00

2011-01-09T20:01:00.000-08:00

Brian Time

2011-01-09T19:06:00.000-08:00

Bon Fire

2010-08-07T22:43:00.000-07:00

So in love

2010-04-13T15:06:00.001-07:00

Brianna gearing up for Summer

2010-04-13T14:55:00.000-07:00

She loves to wear her swimming suit and floaties - sometimes the floaties are on her feet, sometimes her arms. (She's usually smiling.)

Allison's true love

2010-04-13T14:48:00.000-07:00

The story of how casual bath toys - a frog and a duck - became more. One day, Allison was playing with the duck and Brianna wanted it. Dan suggested Brianna get the frog. It was at that moment Allison realized she liked the frog better than the duck, better than her pink bear, better than all the animals. She loved Mr. Frog. She let out a guttural, "NO!" and ran, chubby legs pumping her as fast as they could, arms flailing wildly, screaming, "MY FOG"! to claim her frog. They have been nearly inseperable ever since. She changes his diaper frequently (see pic), asks if he's O.K., if he's having fun, worries about him not wearing socks when it's cold, tries to feed him, the usual mom stuff. (Except when she abandons him for hours on end). He is the first thing she asks about in the morning and the last thing she clamours for at night. I think it's his winning perma-smile.

Installing our hardwood floor

2010-04-04T18:33:00.000-07:00

This was spring break, so we decided to put in our hardwood floor since our lives fall apart when our kitchen falls apart.

Monday and Tuesday
Kenny is using the finish nail gun to install the hardwood over the tar paper. He couldn't use the flooring nail gun since it was too close to the island.

Kenny using the floor nail gun on the hardwood. The gun got everything tight and close together and made the floor look great. We only wanted to rent the gun for one day, so we stayed up until 2 am trying to get as far as we could.

Tuesday

After the floor was in, we put wood filler in the cracks and deformities to make the floor uniform. William liked helping with this part and did a great job.

Wednesday and Thursday

We decided to hand sand the floor instead of renting a sander since we had a pretty small floor. Kenny rotated between the electric sander and just a block of wood with sandpaper. Taylor came over and helped us finish it up.

Thursday
After we sanded and washed the floor, we could stain it. William liked to help us with this, too. The color was a little darker than we expected, but we love the color and it works well with our carpet color, too.

While we were painting, we were trying hard not to spill the paint. But William got up to move and kicked over the stain. Kenny and I just moved as quick as we could and got it all spread out. Disaster averted!

Finally we had all the stain on and smoothed out. It looked great!

Friday and Saturday

Kenny applied the first coat of polyurethane Friday afternoon and we stayed the night at Hargrave's house (Andrea's parents). We came over Saturday morning and sanded and washed the floor before applying the second coat of polyurethane. Saturday afternoon we put on the third and last coat. Then we stayed the night at Kartchners (Kenny's parents). Sunday after conference we came home and put our kitchen back together. The floor looks awesome!! We love it.

Our almost finished kitchen. It still needs upper cabinets and a pantry door, but we love it so far.

The Good Old Days

2010-03-22T21:03:00.000-07:00

Christmas Video Excerpt

Swings and Water

2010-03-22T20:50:00.000-07:00

Taylor is spending a good half hour swinging each day and exclaims "This is reaaal fun" after every swing.

Cutting down our HUGE tree

2010-03-09T21:28:00.001-08:00

This is the tree we wanted to cut down in our backyard.

Kenny is up in the tree and Dad (Richard) is down pulling on the life line connected to Kenny's safety harness.

Jordan up in the tree...

...way up in the tree

Kenny scaling the branches to tie them off.

Kenny up in the tree.

The one mishap as the branch hits the shed. There was a rope tied to the end of the branch, and Taylor, Jordan, and Joe would pull the branch as it fell and miss the shed. But pulling as hard as they could didn't move it enough.

This is the last trunk to go down. Jordan is at the bottom trying to get the last few inches cut. The top of the tree is tied off to our big truck, so the tree doesn't fall the wrong way. This video doesn't capture the terror we all felt as we watched Jordan sawing away at the tree and hoped it wasn't about to crush him.

Jordan conquers all!!

Thanks to Jordan, Dad, and Taylor for coming and helping cut down this tree.

BOOM SHACKALAKA!

2010-03-06T00:13:00.000-08:00

This is our Chinese New Years party we went to at a friends house. This is the pile of fireworks we lit off that night. Below you can see Katelynn standing in the midst of them, and then you can see me holding one of the 20,000 fire cracker rolls. At one point, In true American fashion, we put two 20,000 firecracker rolls and one 10,000 firecracker roll in a pile and made a trail/fuse to the pile with a 2,000 firecracker roll...and then let'er rip. I can't even describe how loud and sereal it was when the pile went off! It was like being in a state of total bliss. AWESOME!

Boating with Friends

2009-10-12T20:39:00.000-07:00

We were invited by some friends to go boating one night. It was couples only. It was so much fun.

This is us trying out the surf board.

Chloe's FHE Pumpkin

2009-10-12T19:21:00.000-07:00

We were browsing the web for pumpking stencils and of course Chloe saw this one and we had to carve it.

Are they looking more identical?

2009-10-08T21:07:00.000-07:00

Family pic in the Sequoia National Forest

2009-10-08T20:08:00.000-07:00

Pics of back yard and back room

2009-10-08T19:59:00.001-07:00

We have big plans for our back yard including a garden, orchard, root cellar (Dan's from Kansas) and much more grass.

kitchen

2009-10-08T19:58:00.001-07:00

Our new home

2009-10-08T19:50:00.000-07:00

Skiing Web Video

2009-09-13T21:07:00.000-07:00

This is Will trying to save time at the bon fire on Labor Day and G&Gs.

2009-09-07T21:15:00.000-07:00

Stack Rock on Mo mo's

2009-08-18T20:23:00.000-07:00

This is a ride Jordan and I went on to Stack Rock from 8th street. Pretty sweet trails that were nice single track in the trees. My favorite kind of ridding.

NEW YORK BABY!

2009-07-30T03:08:00.000-07:00

There we were walking down the streets of New York and I felt the urge to break into song and dance...

Jordans great photography skills...actually a pretty cool picture.

Pauls great photography skills.

Just one of the pics taken through the binochs.

2009-07-30T02:37:00.000-07:00

Just enjoying some of the sights of New York up close.

I just don't even know how to explain how cool I am in this picture.
AK-47 slung across my back, rambo knife on my hip, Glock on my other hip.

Side note: it has been raining pretty good today here in Shanghai. It has stopped and now the sun has come out and can see farther than I've ever been able to see in Shanghai before (it's actually pretty cool looking out from our office on the top floor of this 28 story building). Anyway, everybody started freaking out about something out the window and I go over to see what they are going crazy about and it is because they can see a rainbow (part of one). They were saying things like, "oh, I remember I saw one once when I was younger." and, "I haven't seen one for 5 years" etc., etc....just an idea of how polluted it is here.

Ethan's run

2009-06-27T19:50:00.000-07:00

which one of these runs is better?

All in a days work

2009-06-27T18:01:00.000-07:00

Camping in the rain

2009-06-10T21:26:00.000-07:00

We went camping last weekend, and tried to dodge the rain as best we could. We spent a lot of time in the tent and went to bed pretty early.Hiding from the rain in our tent.

Playing bubbles at our campsite. The ground was wet, so the bubbles wouldn't pop until the kids stepped on them.

We finally got a fire going in the morning, so we could do some s'mores. After watching me and Kenny stoke the fire by blowing on it, Anne kept trying to blow on it, too.

Kenny and Will making some s'mores for breakfast.

The sun finally came out and we went hiking in our NY t-shirts.
When Jerome saw his shirt, he pointed to the words and tried to figure it out. I told him it said, "I love New York." He still didn't understand the New York part, and looked at the shirt kind of funny. I then told him the shirt was from Uncle Jordan. His face lit up and he said pointing to the words on his shirt, "I love Uncle Jordan." So we are wearing "I love Uncle Jordan" shirts.

Settlers Park in Meridian

2009-06-10T21:11:00.001-07:00

Wendy and I met at Settlers Park to let the kids play. We were hoping it wouldn't rain, and the morning turned out pretty nice.

Anne and Sophie sharing snacks.

Anne finally was brave enough to get her hands wet.

Will and Chloe couldn't resist the water and ran through some of the fountains. Wendy and I were debating if the temperature had gotten up in the 60s yet.

More Pictures, Ok, a lot of pictures.

2009-06-10T20:48:00.001-07:00

Princess of the castle.

Mattie's first sunburn, and a picture from our girls excursion, we are the Back Seat.

.

Mattie's hair cut.

Sam doing what comes natural. Fog at the beach. We love this beach, it's the most California like beach we have found up here.

Shopping with Sam and Hazel.

Anniversary Flowers. I'm married to the most thoughtful man.

Our first fruits from the garden. Ok, fruit, it was just the spinach.

Everyday Happenings

2009-05-29T21:38:00.000-07:00

My favorte picture of Hazel. She climbed up there herself to get the animal crackers. She thinks she's so clever.

FHE treat.

Family Home Evening, don't they look excited.

2009-05-15T07:47:00.000-07:00

WE GOT HIM! And we're bringin him home.
Pictures of New York City

"Downtown, where all the lights are bright."

Saying Goodbye

2009-05-11T20:05:00.000-07:00

We love you Dad and miss you already! Hope you are warm and got some food and sleep.

Tulip Festival

2009-04-30T15:13:00.000-07:00

This weeks FHE was a visit to the Skagit Valley Tulip Festval. We had a great time and all decided we live in a beautiful area.

2009-04-17T16:36:00.001-07:00

So I have been meaning to blog for about a month now about Mom, Dad and Claire's visit with Mark and Marianne, and spring break. They were all fun, and I had some pretty witty remarks and great comments and they all got deleted, so this is what you get. Enjoy!

Anacortes, & Meece

2009-04-09T18:57:00.000-07:00

Partners in Crime

2009-04-07T13:02:00.000-07:00

It had been quiet too long so I knew the girls were doing something naughty. This is what I found. Brianna was choking on the mouthfulls of flour she was trying to eat; her face is covered. This picture captures Allison's proud and triumphant look of her mischeviousness.

First Tooth Brushing

2009-04-07T12:59:00.001-07:00

2009-04-04T13:52:00.000-07:00

Chloe and Sophie when we went dirt bike riding in Emmett.Hockey Game in February. Chloe loved all the music they played and even made it on the big screen during the dance off.

I think that Chloe is actually a lizard with this tongue.

Claire and Seattle

2009-03-30T17:22:00.000-07:00

Sorry, mom asked me to give the family an update on some of my past activities. So here you go...

Guess who?? Mom and i went to this sweet aquarium in Seattle. it was so big and pretty fascinating

Me playing the harp for the talent portion of Jr. Miss.

My sweet date and I. We had dinner, a dance and games all at our house.

My Sweet Heart girls group cooking
My fitness for Jr. Miss.

One of the weddings i played over the summer.

Kazakistans who stayed with us during the Special Olympics

My date Josh and Sadies group.

Christmas

2009-03-16T21:53:00.000-07:00

I just noticed Taylors Request to post pictures from Christmas. I don't have much either becuase most of ours were videos, but here are two.

Mt. Spokane

2009-03-16T21:44:00.001-07:00

Mt. Spokane is closed on Monday's, so I got a couple runs in. Thought this might be a good reminder of a good day we had up there a few years ago. 1800 vertical straight down.

Legacy Girls

2009-03-12T10:31:00.000-07:00

Marianne, Keriann, Wendy, Kelli, Mom, and I all met up for the Andersen Legacy Conference in Provo March 5-6. It was wonderful to get together. We stayed in Uncle Ken's basement. There was room enough for us all! We all brought our youngest daughters (we missed Cami and Katelyn) and the cousins got to play (and share germs).

Sophia, Allison, Chloe, Hazel, Brianna and Anne in the back.

Hazel

Chloe being crazy!

Sophie

2009-02-28T00:58:00.000-08:00

This is my nifty black/cut eye. From a Chinese elbow while playing basketball.

Recent Lantern Festival pictures.

2009-02-18T18:49:00.000-08:00

If you would like to see pictures of our cruise, visit our blog at http://twcskartchner.blogspot.com. Sorry I don't want to post in both places.

The race

2009-02-05T14:08:00.000-08:00

Brianna walking

2009-02-05T12:56:00.000-08:00

Brianna has been a few weeks behind Allison in walking, but she's getting the hang of it now. They both are really enjoying their new found freedom.

Another Bathtub Story

2009-01-26T14:36:00.001-08:00

I have always prided myself that I do not bathe my kids everyday. Well, besides stinky kids and teaching questionable hygiene habits I have discovered another disadvantage to my pride.

Sam, Hazel and I were at someone's house for a women's luncheon. Another woman was there who brought her three year old daughter. Sam and Amy played together the whole time, running around and making themselves at home. When it came time to leave, I searched the whole house looking for Sam. I finally found him in the bathtub, with Amy--taking a bath. Both stripped down, turned on the water, plugged the tub and took a bath.

If you can't get it at home, where else can you go?

Christmas

2009-01-23T12:35:00.000-08:00

Can everyone post their pictures from Christmas. We once again did not take any pictures. Thanks Taylor and Wendy

Soft Silky Hair

2009-01-15T15:16:00.001-08:00

A conversation I had last night as I was getting Emma (the last) out of the tub. Having just washed it with conditioner (which isn't an everyday norm) she was rubbing it on her face and neck.

Emma: "Oh, this feels so good, it's so soft. Mom, you gotta try this."
Mom: Emma, I wash my hair with conditioner everyday.
Emma: Conditioner and pee?
Mom: Pee, who peed in the tub?
Emma: Me and Mattie.
Mom: You both peed in the tub?
Emma: Yes
Mom: Do you always pee in the tub?
Emma: Well, sometimes we plan it.
Mom: So you pee together in the tub? Thats disgusting.
Emma: No it's not.
Mom: Yes Emma, it is. Why do you think we pee in toilets and wash our hands afterwards?
Emma: Because it's dirty?
Mom: Yes, now will you pee in the tub?
Emma: uh, no.

I guess the worst part about it, is I didn't make them all get back in and take another bath. Now whos the disguting one?

Snow Day!

2008-12-17T16:14:00.000-08:00

This is one of those days you dream about. School closed. Dad stayed home from work. Four inches new snow!

We started the day off with Mickey Mouse Pancacks. Mattie made this one herself.

Then we went sledding with the neighbors. Even Hazel went.

(Emma and Mattie are the two kids there, and if you look closely you will see me w/Hazel, the rest of those are neighbors whom you don't know, but they'd give you some figgy pudding if you asked ;-)

The video is of Sam who decided to start going down all by

himself after about the fourth attempt. Really, it's quite brave of him.

Christmas Tree Hunting 2008

2008-12-08T14:11:00.001-08:00

We headed out for our annual Christmas Tree hunt this weekend. There wasn't much snow, so we could drive pretty far in and found some great trees fast.

Taylor measuring his tree.

William and Kenny hauling our tree out.

Carrying all the trees up the hill.

Jerome and Chloe holding hands helping each other to the truck.

Anne and Grandpa waiting in the truck.

Jerome, William, Anne, and Chloe finishing up their hot chocolate.

Funny Video

2008-12-08T08:11:00.000-08:00

This was posted on Laura's blog and is a friend of hers. Tom and i laughed pretty hard so thought you guys might like it as well. And I think someone in our family could come up with some pretty good stories like this as well. ;-)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UkzbLUWXK9Y&eurl=http://socialexplosion.blogspot.com/&feature=player_embedded

Sequoia National Park

2008-11-18T15:11:00.000-08:00

A memorable Veteran's Day vacation. A sequoia - General Sherman tree - is the largest tree (not tallest) in the world. We are standing in front of the Fallen Monarch. The inside was once used stable for the cavalry, a bar, and even a settlement site at one time. There's a reverential/fantastical feeling around these quiet giants. In the picture on the right, you can see how they dwarf pine trees, at least in width. I would recommend visiting the sequoias, at least once in a life time, to everyone. This park happens to not be too far away from Yosemite, if you wanted to hit both of them at the family reunion time. Details on when that's going to be will be coming shortly.

Apple Smashing

2008-11-11T10:44:00.000-08:00

Thank you Mark and Marianne for inviting us. It was worth the drive, we loved it and loved seeing you. So here are our pictures from it.

I tried to upload a video of Mark turning the grinder, it was amazing to me, but I couldn't. Sorry! Holland was pretty good himself. :)

Our Halloween Pics

2008-11-11T10:36:00.000-08:00

The result of last minute digs out of the costume box, Ahh the memories!

2008-11-05T14:26:00.000-08:00

Allison on the right, Brianna on the left (shirtless) playing peek-a-boo.

2008-11-05T14:09:00.000-08:00

Pooh and Piglet. We were having problems getting them to smile despite the candy in their laps.

Apple Smashing

2008-11-02T22:16:00.000-08:00

Halloween 2008

Uncle Carls Hay Ride

Cider Press

Halloween 2008

2008-11-02T14:28:00.000-08:00

Jerome (Train engineer); Chloe (Giraffe); Will (BatMan); Sophie (Bunny); Anne (Oreo Cookie)Bat man needs a ride-so he asks Jerome, the train engineer for one. He would also like a cookie and milk to go with that...and his mom for emotional support.

Gay approval

2008-10-31T11:16:00.001-07:00

So, I've just been thinking (a lot) about the upcoming elections so feel free to disregard this outpouring of opinion. I hope it doesn't come across as bigoted.
A major issue here in CA is Proposition 8 which says, "The state of CA will recognize marriage only between a man and a woman". As of right now, gay people have the exact same rights as married people. They can even get a civil union. The only thing they stand to gain from this amendment to the constitution not passing is approbation and ability to adopt easier.

If it doesn't pass, the majority of the people who are not gay or lesbians, will lose freedoms. Churches they belong to will lose their tax exempt status if they don't allow same-sex marriages. This could cause many churches to close, some will lose the freedom of going to their church. They will lose the right to explain to their children - at a time they deem appropriate - what "gay" means (sexual preference) and why they do/don't believe in it. Same-sex marriage will have to be taught as equal as traditional marriage, starting as early as kindergarten. Now religious people have quiet differences from those who are gay or support the gays. If Prop 8 doesn't pass, the law will require all federal organizations to push their lack of morals on everyone else. Having chosen a partner with whom procreation is impossible, I think they should have to accept the consequences. There is no research proving that people are "born gay"; one study showed it's a psychological disease like schizophrenia.
The fact that the gay community is so determined to gain approval from what is mainly the religious community - a community very few gays are members of for the obvious reason Christians see sodomy as a sin - makes me question what they themselves think of their abnormal sexual behavior. If they don't think what they're doing is wrong, why do they want everyone to accept it? If they think it's O.K., why can't they just live with quiet certitude that they're different and that's O.K.? It's fine if they want to live that way; it just bugs me they want everyone to accept, not just tolerate, what they do in their bedroom. It seems to me they gain very little whereas the majority will lose immeasurably. I see this as expanding the pleasure-seeking and rationalization that is rampantly growing out of control. They already have the freedom to be gay whereas we, meaning the majority, will lose many freedoms.
-Kelli

2008-10-26T08:16:00.000-07:00

It's been awhile, and thank you for your guesses and support! As I'm sure you know, I will be serving in the Mexico, Mexico City East Mission for the next 2 yrs. starting Jan. 21! Here's a couple of pictures to show ya first hand. It's nice to know I've been born into such a wonderful family.

2008-10-23T19:39:00.000-07:00

Ethan May be getting his mission call today so we wanted to get in on the lottery:

Cami ($1): Japan
Paul ($1): Asia (I guess Brianna and I are the only smart ones choosing WHOLE continents): but I guess if I had to narrow it down a little I would have to say Thailand.
Katelynn ($1): She says "Ai yi" which means "aunt" in Chinese so I guess she is saying China

-We will be using Paypal to pay for these guesses, or since Mark and Marianne have been so lucky to handle some things for us in the states you can just get it from them :)

Our guess for Ethan's mission call

2008-10-20T22:29:00.000-07:00

Andrea: Dominican Republic
Kenny: Finland
William: Disneyland (California)
Jerome: Montana
Anne: Italy

William's Broken Arm

2008-10-20T06:38:00.001-07:00

We finally had our first broken bone. William was helping Grandpa put up the Halloween decorations. They were moving some haybales with the truck to the front of the driveway. William said Grandpa was taking a short cut and the hay started to fall. William fell off onto his hands and knees. But the hay didn't stop falling and fell on top of William's right arm. Grandma was hoping it wasn't really broken, but the x-ray showed a clean, straight break that should heal quick. As soon as we walked into the hospital, William started crying about not getting shots. He had just gotten his kindergarten shots earlier in October. Every nurse and doctor he saw he asked if they were going to give him a shot. He finally got an IV so they could give him morphine before putting on the splint. It took 4 tries to get the IV in his arm because he wiggled too much. With a broken arm and an IV, he couldn't bend his arms and his nose kept itching, so we had to scratch it for him. But when he was done, he got a couple suckers and a trip to McDonalds.

William in the ER after getting his splint on.

Ready to go home with his sling!

Finally found a shirt to fit for church.

Where is Eman going?

2008-10-13T20:31:00.001-07:00

Dan -($1) Florida, USA
Kelli - ($1) Russia
Allison ($1) Pacific Islands
Brianna($1) Africa

somersaults

2008-10-13T19:10:00.000-07:00

Ethan's Mission Call Lottery

2008-10-13T10:00:00.000-07:00

Hey, Let's do the lottery on here, just so we can all coordinate and sees where Eph is going. Just post it in the comments or do a new post.

Taylor-($1) England
Wendy-($1)Mexico
Chloe-($1)Argentina
Sophie-($1)The Philippines

Emma & Mattie-($2) France
Sam- ($1) Vancouver Canada
Tom- ($1) Ontario Canada
Keriann- ($1) Everett Washington

Mark - ($1) Australia
Marianne - ($1) Atlanta GA
Holland - ($1) Brazil
Cate - ($1) Russia
Caleb - ($1) South Africa
Taylor - ($1) Viva Costa Rica

Anyone can participate.

Coming Home From School

2008-10-09T15:47:00.000-07:00

As I learned this weekend, I find great joy when others are hurt because they find themselves in precarious situations. Like when Taylor fell down the spiral stairs with a cast on b/c he couldn't catch himself and when Robin tried to do a front flip and ended up landing on her face spread eagle b/c she backed out at the last minute. I laugh every time I think of those things.

So this afternoon I was taking a shower (finally) and I thought about Mattie coming home from school and I was laughing my head off (the girls have to walk about a half mile from the bus stop). So I had to take some pictures to share with you. For some of you this may be reminiscent of Ethan coming home from school.

Coming up the steps:

I love her face in this one.

AHHH Sweet Relief......

Tell me if you laughed as well.

End of Capitalism?

2008-09-28T21:37:00.000-07:00

Family,

In case you haven't heard, there are lots of people in the U.S and abroad who count the recent economic problems as strong evidence that capitalism does not work. They claim it has created a greedy few who have now taken advantage of the small people. They claim a lack of regulation is entirely to blame. The failure of this capitalist strategy led to a systemic collapse, and now the government is "bailing out" those criminal, greedy people on top, and not doing anything to help the poor people on the bottom.

Related sentiments are very common in the media. For example, after President Bush's address to the nation about the economic bail-out, the local news people here interviewed many people at risk of losing their homes. Their universal response to the speech, emphasized by the interviewers, was that the bail-out protected the rich, but allowed the working class to lose their homes all the same. They all thought the billions should go to pay the mortgages on which they are about to default.

This message of the victimization of the poor was also articulated by both Obama and McCain in the recent debate. McCain said "And Main Street is paying a penalty for the excesses and greed in Washington, D.C., and on Wall Street."

Regarding these thoughts, let's look at a couple of interesting articles from the end of the Clinton era. Please skim this:

http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9C0DE7DB153EF933A0575AC0A96F958260&sec=&spon=&pagewanted=2#

and this:

http://articles.latimes.com/1999/may/31/news/mn-42807

I especially like this paragraph, in case you missed it:

"In 1992, Congress mandated that Fannie and Freddie increase their purchases of mortgages for low-income and medium-income borrowers. Operating under that requirement, Fannie Mae, in particular, has been aggressive and creative in stimulating minority gains. It has aimed extensive advertising campaigns at minorities that explain how to buy a home and opened three dozen local offices to encourage lenders to serve these markets. Most importantly, Fannie Mae has agreed to buy more loans with very low down payments–or with mortgage payments that represent an unusually high percentage of a buyer’s income. That’s made banks willing to lend to lower-income families they once might have rejected."

Now tell me, the mortgage crisis that initiated this entire economic downturn, was it the result of unregulated capitalism, or did government intrusion in the free market disrupt the balance of normal risk taking behavior?

Now, I know I am going to sound cruel, but think about this. In America, we have enjoyed, for the past 12 years, the ability to live in incredible houses. Granite counter tops were only in mansions a decade ago. Now, they are almost standard. American have felt entitled to live in whatever the neighbors live in. The mortgage people said we qualified for these homes, so we must be able to afford them, right? Isn't this where the greed lies?

McCain said the average American, or main street, is paying the price for the greed of Wall Street and Washington D.C. I think Wall Street and Washington D.C. are paying the price for the greed of the average American.

Please share your thought. The purpose of this post is discussion and debate.

2008-09-16T21:16:00.000-07:00

We were wondering where everyone was spending the holiday's this year. We are planning on being in Soda Springs for Thanksgiving. That is our only plans so far.

Go Broncos

2008-09-15T13:58:00.000-07:00

We took Sophie to her first BSU game!

2008-09-15T01:17:00.000-07:00

this is the bus my company rented to take us, there were about 20 of us. We rented the bus and driver for 500 RMB (or $70) for the day. Pretty good travel arrangements. Notice the guy in front of us, his load is probably 3 or 4 times the size that he is, I'm not really sure how we got around him. The road the whole way there was pretty much a one lane road made into two full speed lanes.

2008-09-15T00:59:00.000-07:00

Some of rice fields and a rice field worker.
One of the rice field workers dwelling.
Some more fields on the way
Somebodys house, that is old and made of wood (in background) rebuilt with mud and rocks and fell apart (on the left) and now building a new house of brick and cement. Notice they live in there while they build it too.

2008-09-15T00:51:00.000-07:00

3 people on a motorcycle is a regular occurance, but this is quite the skill set. You can easily see how 3 would fit on there comfortably, right? But add just one more and it gets a little crowded.

Hazel smiling!

2008-08-29T12:05:00.001-07:00

Bugaboos

2008-08-23T20:31:00.000-07:00

In Route to Pigeon Spire

Marianne and Pigeon Spire

Mark on Second Summit with Howser in Background

Marianne, Nick, Rick, and Heather

Our new house that I LOVE!!!

2008-08-13T12:40:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics of it. I love it b/c it is so light and airy and I think we'll need that up here when the gloomy days seem endless. The backyard is fabulous, and it is a short drive for Tom. Anyway, come visit us, we'd love to see you all.

Hazel and Sophie's Blessing

2008-08-08T16:08:00.000-07:00

We made Hazel really mad by taking this picture.

The Hainan Beach

2008-07-24T08:33:00.000-07:00

My cute ladies.

Evening stroll on the sand

"Long walks on the beach"

Trip to the Hawaii of China (Hainan)

2008-07-24T07:34:00.000-07:00

We were so warmly greeted at the Hainan airport by our driver holding this sign.

We decided to trek away from the resorts and get a better close at the "real" Hainan. we ran into this canal running down the middle of the street. They had "engineered" a few bridges every so often so they could cross it without treading through the nasty garbage saturated muddy water. You can see how everybody has been tossing their garbage in.

This kid just got done squatting on the side of the street and taking a dump. Thats it right to
the right of him.

Katelynn and Cami on our resorts private beach.

Creative Construction in our Backyard

2008-07-20T16:10:00.000-07:00

I looked out our back windows one afternoon and saw this: but all three guys were on the latter.

Mom and Dad's pics from the reunion

2008-07-18T14:59:00.001-07:00

Tom and Claire

Dad

Group silly picture.

Then the rest of us eating, which we did a lot of, and it was always realy good.

Reunion

2008-07-14T13:35:00.000-07:00

These are the only pictures I took. Lame I know!!

Soda Springs Reunion

2008-07-13T20:09:00.000-07:00

Reunion

2008-07-08T09:15:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone that came to the reunion. We had a great time. Thanks for all your help with food and activities. We were wondering if everyone could post their pictures from the reunion. We did not take many. Thanks Wendy

2008-06-30T07:16:00.000-07:00

Katelynn stuffing her 1-year old face so she can go back to playing in her sandbox

We bought this tub and filled it with sand so Katelynn actually has a place to sit and play. She loved it. Notice all the attention she is getting. Below Katelynn is cuddling up with the bunny a friend gave her. The Chinese love stuffed animals and that is what every one of them gave her. She always grabs the stuffed animals at the market, so she is happy to have her own now. On the left is the van we cruise around in. A nice little ride although it doesn't go too fast and it sounds as if it will explode at any minute. The last picture is of a "water cow". We have yet to figure out it's purpose in life other than sloshing around in knee deep water. We will have to do some more research.

2008-06-25T23:20:00.000-07:00

The great flood. That is a road under that bridge
that you are looking at. That water is probably
15' deep.

This is Cami's new swing...and apparently Katelynn's new jungle gym.

This is Katelynn fitting into this tiny bowl that
she pulled out of the cubboard.

This here is a place we went to in Shanghai for the
20th year anniversary of the Shanghai Branch.
This bouncy place was so much fun, you could jump
just as high if not higher than a trampoline on the top of the mounds. In my
opinion it was better than a trampoline because once you
were jumping as high as you wanted, you could launch
off the top into the air in any direction and land just fine. Supermans,
or Grannies off the top were great fun, just to launch out
and roll into a flip. Other cool stuff at the park like that big
tree house, and giant outdoor little kid water park. FUN!

16th Grandchild

2008-06-22T08:18:00.000-07:00

Here is our new addition. Sophia Kartchner, aka Sophie until about the age of 16. On Thursday, June 19th Wendy was kind enough to labor at home by herself (Chloe was great help) until I finnished up work. Wendy's sister Allie came over at about 5:30, then we were off to the hostital by 7pm. This was one time I felt justified in speeding, even though I took time for a shower at home. We checked in and labored for a bit longer thinking about an epidural, then the Dr.

came in broker her water and things went fast after that and no time for an epidural. Wendy did amazing. Sophia was born at 10:36 pm. She said afterwords that natural birth is over rated and next time, pending our sanity, an epidural is the way to go. Chloe Loves to kiss her bunch and adore her.

Baby is born!

2008-06-15T23:28:00.000-07:00

Friday the 13th marked 41 weeks of pregnancy for Keriann, and the stubborn, hesitant fetus inside her was finally coaxed out into the open.

We arrived at the hospital shortly after 8:00, and the atomic wall clock read 13:44:45 at the moment of birth. The interim was filled with laboring, about 5 games of speed with a borrowed deck of cards, and 2 pushes at the end.

Hazel weighed 8lbs 2 oz and as 20 inches long at birth. She and Keriann are both doing great. OK, OK, you just want pictures...

The first moments of life... The delivering doctor was Dr. Ling. I do think he can catch flies with chopsticks, but he didn't threaten to squish anything like a grape.

The other kids love her, and love to hold and help us out with her as much as they can.

She has a bit of bilirubin in her, and is hanging out in the blue lights as a precaution. Doesn't she have a lot of hair?

She is a very snugly baby. She loves to be touched and held. That is all great fun during the day, but not so much at night.

We like her, and will be looking forward to showing her off to all of you.

Love,

Tom and Keriann and family

North West Living

2008-06-08T22:57:00.000-07:00

By request, we will post a few pictures of our local goings-on. We will also hope to soon post some pictures of our new addition. At this moment, Keriann is 9 months and 2 days pregnant, so we should have a new family member quite soon. (About 3.5 cm, 70%, and -1 for those medically oriented).

Any name suggestions would be welcome. We are trying to find a name that would work well in a Limerick. Last night we kind of ruled out a few names...

"There was a young lady named Abby,
Whose thighs were quite notably flabby..."

"There once was a girl named Pearl,
Who kind of resembled a squirrel..."

We similarly ruled out Ellie, Matt, Tipper, and Frankie. (You may mentally compose those lines of verse yourselves). Keriann did point out to me that if I had tried to rule out previous names based on silly limericks, we might not have a Mattie or a Sam. I guess that's true.

Now, onto what is happening. After 1.5 months homeless, we finally found a nice little home to rent. The children were happy to have a place to call home. While our new stomping grounds are not as warm as we have been used to, Everything around us is very pretty.

These and the picture at the top were taken at Rosario Beach. It's about 10 minutes from home, and on my way to work every day. No white sandy shores where we can lay and accumulate actinic damage quite like Florida, but there are great tide pools, and fun places we could explore if we had kayaks (Father's day hint?)

Other local highlights include a huge forest trail system, several small lakes, and Deception Pass. The trails begin right across the street. When we went the the other day we found a newt, a cool tree frog, and all the banana slugs one could ever desire. We have not yet done the hike at the pass, nor been out on the lakes, but we will soon.

The kid's are very cute, of course. Sam recently celebrated his third birthday, and has started, just in the last couple of days, going pee pee on the potty. I am trying to upload a little movie of his birthday celebration. Stand by for that.

We were recently fortunate enough to have Grandma Barlow visit us for a week. We enjoyed her visit very much and we think she enjoyed herself, too, although her quarters were rather spartan. Before she left, we hung out in Seattle a bit. We went to Pike's Place Market, checked out the old beach house where she lived a long time ago, and went up the Space Needle.

That's about it for our update. We will try to post again soon once our yet nameless child is born. If possible I will try to get close up video of the child's grand entrance onto the world stage, just in case any of you still doubt that child birth is a beautiful thing. Oh, wait. Maybe posting that would violate Blogger's user agreement. Maybe an audio recording will suffice. We will look forward to soon being updated on each of the rest of you.

Love,
Tom, Keriann, and family

Pauls hair and Treehouse

2008-06-07T22:51:00.000-07:00

2008-06-03T19:12:00.000-07:00

Kenny found a friend in the garden yesterday. I am hoping it might eat all the squirrels.

Our Recent information

2008-05-19T14:18:00.001-07:00

Just wanted to update you all on our new address and phone number.

4122 Clyde Way
Anacortes, WA 98221
360-588-4529

We are kind of in a dead cell phone reception area, but sometimes we get through. I wish it was b/c we were out in the boondocks, but we are just in a neighborhood that has a gulley we live in. It's still a beautiful place and we are very close to the ocean.

Thanks Mark or Taylor for updating the heading pic. We'll post pictures soon.

By the way, Emma came home and asked for a cell phone! What? She just turned six!

2008-05-15T20:32:00.000-07:00

Taylor's Elders Quorum had a pinewood derby. Taylor entered the modified division and took 2nd place. He strapped a broken crank shaft from his motorcycle to the block of wood, and named it Iron Man as it weighted nearly 10 pounds. It was really funny watching him catch it at the end before it plowed over a kid.

2008-05-15T20:13:00.000-07:00

For FHE we went and rode dirt bikes and 4 wheelers. All of our friends have girls, here is the line up. Chloe is the one on the far right.

2008-05-07T18:10:00.000-07:00