Her precious

I heard the tell-tale thud on our front porch and knew that Christmas had come early for Sydney. A brand new phone book! I set the package on the table and began unveiling it from its plastic wrapper.

Sydney: A new phone book? Where’d you get that?

Mom, pulling out the mini yellow pages: And look, it comes with a baby phone book. Do you like the baby phone book?

Sydney: No.

Mom: Why not?

Sydney, flipping through the pages of the big one: I don’t know. I don’t want it. ‘Cause I like this one the best.

Mom: O-K.

Sydney, with awe: Ooooh…This is a cool phone book. Turning more pages. Yessss! I love it!

Later, I’m fixing dinner for Tyler who pushes the phone book aside as he plops down in his usual spot at the table.

Sydney: Mom, Tyler moved the phone book!

Mom: It’s OK.

Sydney starts leafing through the pages again while Tyler eats his dinner.

Sydney: Mom! Tyler's looking at the phone book! Then, laying across it protectively, MY phone book!

Tyler: It’s like Lord of the Phone Book. Then in his best Gollum, My precious! And then they have to like throw the phone book into the paper shredder at the end.

I’m going to be so bummed when she’s over this phase.

Sydney lets her fingers do the walking

A couple of months ago I had gotten out the phone book for some reason or other and Sydney took to carrying it around and leafing through its pages. I could not understand what the appeal was, but she was happy so hey, whatever. I put it away a day or two later and she moved on to the next thing, which happened to be Tyler's boy scout handbook. O-kay. Well the other day she walked over to the closed pantry and I thought maybe she was looking for a snack, but she asked for the phone book. I got it down for her and she was just so excited. It was like Christmas morning.

I tried to discover the source of her affection for Dex.

Mom: Why do you like the phone book so much, Syd?

Syd: I love the phone book because it’s a big square.

Mom: Ohhh.

Syd: I love reading the phone book, Mom.

Mom: You’re reading the phone book?

Syd: I want to read the alphabet. Look at all these pages. The pages are all smart.

I noticed she paused in the yellow pages section at an ad for Les Schwab tires. She plopped down on her tummy, propped herself up with her elbows, rested her chin in her hands and gazed at Les for a good 2 minutes before continuing her perusal. She was quite distressed when one of the pages ripped as she flipped it over.

Syd: This page is broken. We need to fix the phone book. We need some sticky tape to fix it.

Sticky tape a la Dora the Explorer.

I think I have a good idea what to wrap up for her birthday next month.

Mini Lee Family Reunion

"Mini Lee" sounds funny, but considering we were missing quite a few people, just plain old "Lee" didn't seem like a fair description.


Over Memorial Day weekend we were lucky enough to have all of my siblings together in the same place for the first time in probably 11 years! My brother Sam usually tries to come out from Maryland to see us around Christmas time, but was not able to swing it this past Christmas, so he planned a spring trip. With him coming, Rebecca decided to come up from Portland to see him. And once we figured out that 4 out of 5 siblings would be together, we knew it just wouldn't be right to have someone missing, so luckily Jennifer found a great deal on a ticket and was able to fly out from St. Louis. Then my dad thankfully decided that he couldn't pass up an opportunity to have all 5 kids together so he came up from California!


We had a great time that involved a lot of eating--all of our family's old favorites like fried chicken, chicken tacos, egg rolls and burgers and potato salad on Memorial Day. Oh, and the cheesecake! I probably put on a good 5 lbs., but it was totally worth it.


Here's the family all sitting down together to stuff our faces:

I'm in the middle of a coughing fit and Nate's taking the picture.

We also played games and just hung out--we're a very low-key kinda bunch. After dinner on Monday we gathered for some family photos.

Here's everyone all together (Rebecca with her two daughters Mary and Laura--her husband Jake stayed home with their boys, Eric and Scott; Kim and Jeff and their kids Kara, Jessie and Aaron; Nate and Me with Tyler, McKenzie, Elise and Sydney; Jennifer--her husband Michael and daughter Linda stayed home this time; Sam and Dad).

And here's all of the Lee siblings with Dad:

I like this one because Dad looks so amused--I wish I could remember what he was laughing at:

And here's a shot of all the grandkids that were there:

Our girls had a great time playing with their cousin Mary. I'm not sure Laura was particularly impressed with us, but we were still glad to have her. We're hoping next time Jennifer can bring Linda and Rebecca can bring her boys.

Sam is always very popular around our house. The kids all love him.

They particularly enjoyed playing on our new Wii fit with him even though he kept getting the high score on everything. But it hasn't taken them long to knock him off the leader board since he left. I wish I had pictures (or better yet video!) of Sam doing the hula hoop and yoga poses on the Wii fit. Good times!

We were really grateful that Dad/Grandpa could steal away a few days from work, too. We know he was really busy, but it meant a lot to have him there. Next time he'll have to bring Grandma.

We were all sad when our weekend was over and it was time for everyone (well, Jennifer got to stay through the week!) to go, especially the kids. They even picked up a few new catch phrases from their cousins and aunts, including "You know me", "special little snowflake", and "Dat not good, Wudy". We hope it's not too long before we get to see everyone again.

Anyone up for organizing a full-size Lee Family Reunion? Not it!

Sumsion kids got talent

The past few weeks have been busy ones for the Sumsion kids, performance-wise anyway.


Elise had her kindergarten program, in which she had solo parts playing a drum and dancing as a robot and an elephant. Not all in the same routine, although, I'd buy a ticket to see that!

McKenzie had her class play, The Bremen Town Musicians, in which she played the dog, one of the starring roles with a singing solo and everything. She also had her second piano recital. Her piece was Taco Rock (her teacher is big on the classics) and rock it she did. She rocked it so hard in fact, that she performed it again for her school's talent show the next week.

Tyler performed The Melted Ice Cream Blues at the same piano recital (his third) and had his second band concert just last night. He's been enjoying learning the clarinet this year, but after last night's concert, I'm not entirely certain the same could be said for the other kids in his beginning band class and their instruments. Wink.

Sydney has yet to make her offical stage debut, but she has been working hard at home practicing the fine art of tantrum throwing. She's really starting to come into her own on this one. Lucky for her (and us) that she's still for the most part her sweet and adorable self. Who could resist this face?

The kids are all counting down the days left of school (four for Elise, five for everyone else) and looking forward to our summer plans, including our now annual 4th of July trek to Utah to visit the rest of the Sumsion clan, a weekend trip in late July to Portland to visit their zoo and science center (we have year passes to our local ones that are good in Portland as well) and my sister and her family, and a weeklong trip in August to Seaside, OR, one of our family's favorite vacation destinations.

Looking forward to seeing all of you that we'll be seeing!

What kind of summer plans do you have?

We're one of those families now

One of those families with a blog. A blog to share anything and everything you may ever want or not want to know about their lives. From the big events and celebrations to the everyday mundane. Here it will be. Whenever we get around to actually sticking something on here, that is.