Introducing...

Our sweet baby boy,

Samuel Bradley Hansen
 
Born at 5:03 Saturday morning

a surprising 8lbs 15 oz, 20.5 inches long.

Chubby cheeks, bright eyes, a head full of dark hair, and an obsession with his thumb...

Welcomed by one very proud papa, one very happy mama, and two very excited big sisters.

We love him so much.

Rock Climbing

Spring has sprung here in Spokane (we think). At least it has stopped snowing and it's a little warmer outside. Coupled with daylight savings time (which gives us a good extra hour of light every day) and we are pretty happy. I feel like we've been stuck inside in the dark for months!

Last Saturday was sunny and gorgeous. Lainy said she wanted to go rock climbing. It took very little convincing to get her Dad on board, and Leah and I were happy to go too.

And so we spent a perfect afternoon sitting in the sunshine and rock climbing. Lainy has become quite the climber. (She might be better than me.)

Starting out

Sweet move

At the top!

Even Leah gave it a go for the first time! She did great, besides a minor meltdown when she realized how high she was. She said she liked swinging (aka repelling) the most.

I half jokingly asked Brad if I should do a climb, you know, to encourage baby boy to come early. He said he didn't want to be accountable if my water broke and we ended up rushing to the hospital. I figured it was probably sound advice. So I watched. And ate most our snacks.

But I am getting anxious to meet our little guy! I've been walking and eating lots of fresh pineapple and drinking raspberry leaf tea (disgusting). So far they've been ineffective. My due date is Thursday. We'll see if he makes it by then.

Seattle

Well, friends, we went to Seattle last weekend.

It was a very spur-of-the-moment trip with virtually no planning. Brad got off early on Friday so we jumped in the car and left.

Four hours later we pulled into our hotel in Bellevue where we ate good food and went swimming.

Saturday morning we headed into Seattle. The girls were so cute driving into the city: "There's the baseball field!" "Oh look, that's the bridge to the beach!" "Look, the Space Needle!"

We spent the morning hanging out on the pier and at Pikes Place Market.

We visited the gum wall...

And snapped a pic with our old friend Rachel the pig.

Then we went to sit on Alki Beach. The weather was mild and the sun was out. It felt so good!

We even saw a seal pup sleeping on the beach. We couldn't get close to him, but here's a picture I found of the seal on the Alki Beach blog:

Cute, hu? Apparently his name is Spencer and he does this a lot.

We splurged and ate brunch at Salty's where we devoured all kinds of fresh sea food, prime rib, belgian waffles, crepes, fruit dipped in chocolate fountains, and at least 4 desserts each. Mmmm.

Before heading home we surprised some friends at our old apartment complex, then walked around the University Village and looked at all the things in stores we still can't afford. I guess not much has changed :)

We miss you Seattle! It was fun to go "home" for a day.