What are little boys made of?

What are little boys made of?
Frogs and snails
And puppy-dogs' tails,
That's what little boys are made of.

You better add rattle snakes to that as well, and here is the proof.

On Easter my family had gathered together at my brother's home in Kennewick Wa. I was thinking it would be a nice relaxing visit with family catching up and reminiscing about fun things we had done as kids. (one of our favorite things to do) That was abruptly cut short when our boys came back from their walk with a dead rattle snake in tow.

We were quickly informed of the exciting events that had just taken place.

While on their walk, the boys were stopped short by a sound that they had thought was a hissing sound. Upon further investigation they realized it was not a hissing sound, but a rattling sound that was coming from this snake that was only a 3-4 feet away from them.

Cameron & Dawson (apparently the only ones with any brains) immediately took off and put some distance between themselves and the snake. Colby and Evan however took aim at the rattler and opened fire. And in a hail of bb's that rattler drew its last breath.

Needless to say, as this story unfolded I was hyperventilating at the thought of my little boys facing such dangers. Their dad on the other hand thought it was the coolest thing ever.

And I wonder why I have to color my hair every 6-8 weeks.

Spring Break 2010

This spring break we decided to take a couple of days and head down to my parents beach house on the Oregon Coast in Rockaway. We stopped off in Salem for the night on the way down to spend some time with my Grandma and Grandpa. We were welcomed with Grandma's turkey and homemade noodles. Our favorite.

My uncle Joel is the Fire Marshall in Keizer OR so the next morning we headed down to the fire station for the grand tour. It's always cool to see other fire stations and how they operate.

Without further delay we were off to the coast. We spent the week just hanging out and spending time together. For the most part it rained the entire time with the exception of the morning we were getting ready to leave (figures). That's just the way it goes this time of year at the coast.

Ribbon River Run

On Saturday March 20th Ryan and Colby competed in the first Ribbon River Run in the Tri-Cities. The Ribbon River Run is a new fundraiser for the Tri-Cities Cancer Foundation. The event was a 5k race that took place at Howard Amen Park.

It was Ryan's first race since the Hood to Coast relay we participated in last August. Colby however had run the weekend before in the Shamrock run.

I am pleased to announce that they both won first place. Ryan placed first overall and Colby placed first for the youth. It was a very good day for team Savage.

A Basement Update.

We have been at this basement remodel for a while now, and I have good news to report. It has been a very productive weekend. We rented an industrial grinder with a diamond grit head and sanded the cement floor down nice and smooth. It was a very messy job. I thought drywall dust was bad, but it had nothing on concrete dust.

Ryan is in there somewhere.

After the sanding we started staining the floor with a new product called acetone stain. You mix a powder substance with a gallon of acetone. It smelled just like fingernail polish remover. We applied it with a simple weed sprayer.

We let that dry for a day and then began to apply the sealer. We discussed this whole process with a few different people, but not one of them told us about the intense odor that came along with the sealer. We had to leave the house for about 6 hours. Thankfully Jill and Dustin took us in for the evening.

I must say it was all worth it. We love the finished product.

Ryno brings Keoni home to meet the Savages.

Ryno has been gone to Boise now for about 4 months. He has been dating an "amazing" (that's what Ryno says about her) young lady named Keoni. She is attending the same college, they met in his photography class. He was just dying for us to meet her so he invited her down and she didn't know us well enough to decline.

Ryno & Keoni

They got here and we had a couple of hours to visit before we met up my brother Jake and his family in the Tri-Cities for Pizza and Bowling. We figured if we were going to scare her, we might as well scare her big time.

Jake & Steph

The dudes figuring out the score.

Sooooo Cute.

The pressure of the game is just too much.

We had an awsome weekend with all our boys and Keoni. We hope we didn't scare her too badly

Christmas 2009

I am one of those people that just can't wait for Christmas to get here. I start planning for it and decorating for it way before it's politically correct. I would start even earlier than that if Ryan would let me. He keeps me rained in.

This year was as busy and crazy as usual. The festivities started on the 23rd with the Savage family gift exchange. We decided to change things up a little and we had Italian food. That was kinda cool.

On the 24th we had the Raines family(that's my side) Christmas at my sister Jill's house. My Parents came down from Nampa ID for a couple days. It wasn't near enough time, but it never is. My Unlce Dave, Aunt Sandy, Cousin Crissy, Jenny and her new husband Jared and baby daughter came by for dinner. We had a wonderful Prime Rib that Jill and Dustin made. It was sooooo gooood.



Finally the big day had arrived Christmas Day. The day that the boys get to open all of their gifts. The hard part was that we had to wait for Ryno to get there. Colby and Cameron only had to wait about 15 minutes, but you would have thought it was a couple of hours.

This is a picture of Colby & Cameron showing me their impatient faces.

Colby's surprised face.

Cameron's surprised face.

Ryno's version of the surprised face. They all need a little work.

Basement Construction Has Started

We have lived here at 1918 Benson Ave for almost 2 years now and have wanted to finish the basement since the day we moved in. Well the time has finally arrived. It has been just a couple of weeks now and things are looking good. We (I mean Ryan) has put up some walls to separate off an office area and another storage room. We( I mean him and I) hung sheetrock on both the walls and the ceiling. If you have never hung sheetrock on a ceiling it is an experience, one that we do not recommend doing with your spouse. We ( I mean Ryan ) are now down to taping and texturing. Things are looking good.

The walls are up.

Sheetrock and Tape.

Getting ready for texture.