Welcome to the Tay and Ray Adventure, a website documenting the misguided, up and down lives of two lawyers.
Since we never seem to change this page as often as we used to, I decided that we might as well skip ahead to Valentines! Hopefully we will have some changes to report soon and then we can change the page again. Hope everything is going well for everyone!
Remember you can always go to the "guestbook" section of this page and leave us a message! We would love to hear from you.
Seasons Greetings,
Raychelle & Taylor Fielding
Braden wasn't sure what to think about the ride at first.
Waiting in line for the Sidewinder.
This was Braden's first "real" ride. It was a little scary for him, but didn't stop him from going on more rides.
After the Sidewinder ride was over, waiting to get off the ride.
On the Sidewinder.
Also waiting to get off of the Sidewinder.
Natalia seemed fairly content to wait while others went on rides.
Sally came over to play with Natalia. Natalia kept sticking her foot out for Sally to tickle it.
Natalia and Sally.
Braden rode the Red Baron to keep him entertained while everyone else was cleaning up Natalia's mess.
Natalia in outfit number 2 of the day.
This was the first of 3 train rides. This was also the first ride of the day for many of the adults in the group.
This is also my proof that my hair started out straight this day!!
Racing the cars.
Poor Braden got stuck behind a little girl that didn't move her car very quickly. This is him trying to push her along.
To get these "mine" cars to go you had to do a little work. Braden was up for the challenge!
Brooke and Braden picked the right ducks and each got a very cute polar bear.
Trying to find sunglasses small enough for Talia was not easy!
Raychelle & Brooke. Tonya & Braden.
Tonya and Braden getting ready to get off of the ferris wheel.
We could see this one from the top of the ferris wheel and it looked like a lot of fun.
After we watched the cowboy shootout, Braden was shooting everyone that went past with his new cork gun.
Bad guys came through the train and told us to put up our hands. This guy is telling Brooke to make her "boyfriend" put up his hands. She told him he was her cousin and he replied with, "you are dating your cousin?!?!?!" She didn't get it, but we thought it was funny.
Talia was safe from the bad guys!
Waiting for bumper cars.
Braden was devastated that we took time out of our busy ride riding schedule to watch some gymnasts.
Braden wanted to spin as fast as possible. Yoshi didn't love that plan.
Last ride of the day for Brooke and Braden.
Braden didn't make it through dinner. He was completely out within 5 minutes of sitting down. I guess that means he had a great day!
This is a (crappy) picture of the outside of the building. (Taken through a bug covered windshield.)
Looking at the picture: Spencer is on the right, Brooke is on the left, Taylor's hands are above them.
Trying to get a better angle of their outlines.
Close up shot of Spencer's face.
You got onto the plexiglass and then once you were flat on your back the operator would raise the nails through the holes in the plastic. Brooke said it was cool, but pokey. She was the only one of us brave enough to try it.
When you moved in front of this wall, it created stars behind you.
The machine allowed you to search for martians on a planets surface. Mom found the martian!
Spencer and Taylor had to try their hand at finding the martians after mom was successful.
On the side where Spencer and Brooke are standing there are a couple of different labrynths to try your hand at. On the side where mom is standing there are bunches of punches where you can "tattoo" "hieroglyphs" onto a piece of paper.
The labrynth that Brooke was working on.
Spencer was successful at his labrynth and lit up the entire display--TWICE!
This exhibit shows how it is possible for anyone to lift 500 lbs with hydrolics. Taylor and the kids were racing to see who could get their weights to the top first.
Mom got to make a pretty rainbow.
Taking a break.
They are learning how much water they use in every day life. I learned that I use A LOT of water. Did you know that a 5 minute shower uses more water than a bath, running the dishwasher or one load of laundry? I had no idea!
In their defense, I made them get into this truck for a picture.
In this exhibit you could get inside and pick one of three historic earthquakes to experience.
They are sitting through the 6.4 1933 Long Beach earthquake.
You could stand, jump or stomp in front of this seismograph and create your own earthquake. We all jumped together to create a really big quake!
Taylor was very proud of the earthquake he created all by himself.
This table showed how quakes affect taller buildings more than shorter ones. You could change the frequency of the quake and see what happened.
We sat outside and enjoyed the beautiful weather while we ate our pizza hut and taco bell.
This was a very fun station. You could create different sizes of clouds depending on how hard you pushed on the ring, what angle you pushed down, what speed you pushed or how many people were pushing on it. Brooke and I spent quite a bit of time at this one.
This is Brooke's hand multiplied infinite times by mirrors.
This one was one of Spencer's favorites. You could touch and manipulate the vortex and create different sized and shaped twisters.
Brooke checking out the tornado maker.
Taylor LOVES the Steelers so he was very excited that they were playing in the Superbowl again. He was even more excited when they won the game. Go Steelers!
This is Brooke with the box that we made for her to take to school for Valentines. She thought it turned out great! I didn't think it turned out too bad either, considering my lack of creativity and Taylor's lack of patience!
Our cats have lived together for almost 4 months now and they are FINALLY getting to the point where they can be near each other without trying to beat each other up. Discovering them sleeping on the same bed together the other day was very encouraging!
It seems as though Brooke has finally gotten over her fear of Santa Claus. She was one of the older kids at the party this year so she was asked to be Santa's helper. Apparently that's what it took to make her not quite so afraid.
Spencer, the typical teenager, wasn't all that excited to see Santa this year.
Taylor got some great presents from his family, including these salt and pepper shakers.
Not much to say about this one!
Andrea trying to figure out what word those letter blocks spelled out. From the outside of the package we could only see an 'e' an 'r' and a 'w' and none of us could figure out "winter."
Brooke got a Lambchop puppet and dvd for Christmas. She was one of the few people at the party who did NOT know who Lambchop was.
Spencer had to help set up for the concert so we were pretty early. This was Taylor and Brooke waiting for things to get going. You can tell that the auditorium was still fairly empty at this point.
This was after the concert. Spencer was starving but I told him we weren't going to go eat until he smiled properly--we gave it a few tries.
Spencer did NOT want to wear a shirt and tie to this concert. He says that he does not dress up and that he was uncomfortable the entire night.
This was the best smile we were able to get that night.
This is Taylor all geared up to go. We had to get our life jackets on and practice paddling on the grass before they'd let us actually get in a canoe in the water.
I just shot pictures whenever I had a chance to stop paddling or rowing or whatever the technical term is.
I was so surprised how unafraid the ducks were of us. We could have easily canoed right over them but they never seemed to even notice us.
There were quite a few of them floating around the river in little groups like this.
Yeah, here's some more.
I shot this picture behind my back because I was in the front of the canoe. Taylor was in charge of steering, I was just supposed to paddle when told.
We came around a bend in the river really close to the one shore and almost ran right into a mom moose and her two babies.
These are the two babies out in the river for a drink.
Same two baby moose checking out a tree in the water.
The whole trip was really pretty. It was late September and most of the leaves up here didn't start changing until October, but it was still gorgeous scenery.
This was us showing off how good we were at the whole canoe thing. We didn't fall in the water once! Woo hoo for us.
This is tambourine Mike. Apparently he was at the park every single day of Pig Out in the Park and danced and played his tambourine along with the bands that played. The event lasted 6 days and there were nearly 100 bands that played on three different stages. I think this stage was Mike's favorite but he would go to others when there were no bands playing at this one.
I was sitting on the ground, he was standing up. He looked so intimidating all the way up there.
Who knew that sitting around the park with thousands of people eating food and listening to bands all day could be so tiring? It sure was though!
These were ducks that we saw on the walk back to the car after Pig Out in the Park on Centenial Trail. We were walking behind this little kid who had to talk to every duck he walked past. It was cute, "hi duckies, hi duckies, quack quack duckies!"
This was the sunset over the Spokane River on the walk home from Pig Out in the Park.
A view of the steeples of St. Al's on Gonzaga's campus. Picture was taken from Centenial Trail.
The Fieldings eating some peanuts and enjoying the baseball game.
Avista Stadium sign.
I just think that Brooke looks really pretty in this picture so I had to add it.
A picture of the field during the game.
Brooke had a blast riding the carousel in Riverfront Park. I think she rode it four times.
Spencer didn't enjoy the carousel ride nearly as much as his sister. Once he realized that he couldn't reach the little plastic rings that you are supposed to grab as you go around, it wasn't nearly as fun. He only rode once.
Brooke and Spencer feeding the trash goat in Riverfront park. It sucks garbage out of your hands and kids love it.
Taylor and his kids inside a train at the Mining Heritage Exhibition in Wallace, ID.
This was taken on our boat tour of lake Coeur d' Alene.
This is our whole group on formal night.
You can't go on a cruise and not play shuffleboard! Teresa, George, dad, grandpa and I had a ton of fun trying to figure out the rules. Teresa, dad and I won!! Woo hoo!
We got to see a bunch of totem poles in Ketchikan. This guys is supposed to be one of the best carvers in Alaska. I got in trouble for sneaking into his workshop and taking this picture.
We were told that if totem poles are treated with some substance they are very prone to weeds growing out of the top of them and I guess if enough stuff grows in them it completely splits the pole down the middle.
I was excited to get to see this eagle. It is right by a nest where a mom, dad and baby eagles live.
At least I think this is an iceberg! This was one of MANY that were in the water in Tracy Arm. They are blue because so much snow packs on the top of these every year that it squishes the oxygen out of them and the ice gets more and more dense. (No, that isn't in technical terms, but it gets the point across.)
It really was a gorgeous trip through Tracy Arm. Freezing, but beautiful.
This massive glacier is in Juneau. It was pretty cool to see. I really didn't expect it to be so dirty though. Shows what I know.
This picture was taken at the fish hatchery in Juneau. You can't tell in this picture, but there are thousands of salmon in the water swimming back to the hatchery where they were born.
This sign is on the Alaska/Canada border just outside of Skagway. It is handcarved so they put it up every summer and take it back down every winter.
This is one of many flowers that we got to see at Butchart Gardens in Victoria. It was really pretty. I would love to be able to go back and explore Victoria a little bit more some day.
Our family in front of the (apparently) famous Red Dog Saloon. It still has separate entrances for men and women. Inside the walls are covered with thousands of business cards.
