Mass-Posting

I am mass-posting right now bc I won't have internet (or cable) at our house by tomorrow! I cancelled both for the next few months due to our travels. I will still be posting but probably not attaching pictures for awhile.

I wanted to post some pics from last week before I leave.

We had a visit from Papap, we finished swim lessons, and we had our first outing to the splash pad.

PAPAP.

Getting a lift:

Sharing a smile:

W feeding Papap cheerios:

J feeding Papap cheerios:

Give me a kiss!

J.wore.out.out.for.the.count. J logged some good sleep hours on Papap's chest as an infant...he must have been having flashbacks:

SWIM.

W swimming through a hula hoop:

J showing some serious resistance before swimming through hula hoop:

And he does just fine:

This picture is hysterical!

On the right you see Coach Mary cheering and J screaming (seriously, click this pic to see J's face right next to her) He was upset for station #1 (the station before Coach Mary) and Coach Mary's station...as soon as Station #2 was over, both he and J were as happy as can be....it is just the anticipation of Coach Mary that stresses them out. Coach Mary is tough as nails and they have to "jump in!", "turn around!", and "get the wall!" at her station. She wants them to be able to react if an emergency happens. And she quickly caught on that it was just when they saw her that they got upset. But they willingly give her kisses and talk about "Coach Mary" all the time at home. And at the end of the class she told me "Just you wait mama, I am going to get J and W to smile at me one of these days."

W anticipating his turn and J not even standing up:

Off you go (W underwater here):

Here he comes:

And he did it! I just don't have a picture! Here is some of J....

"J, GET the wall!!"

Saying good-bye to Coach Jackie:

SPLASH PAD.
We had lots of fun at the splash pad...mainly using his truck to block the fountains and then running from it:

J had fun...but not as much as W. He only wanted to go near the sprays if I came with him...and I wasn't dressed for water that day...so he spent most of our first splash pad outing on the bench next to me...poor guy. Here is J running with his truck:

Back Track...Memorial Day

We had a nice Memorial Day...and we remembered those who allowed us to be able to have it! My friend Bryanne and I ran in a Memorial Day run and they set the course so you begin the run with a flower and drop it at a war memorial during the race. They even had someone playing bag pipes next to the memorial. I was going to run with the boys but since my dad was here and they had projected thunderstorms (the night before) I left them at home with Papap.

A big THANK YOU to all that have served and are serving our country right now!

That means you Geoff! We love you and miss you!

When Dogs Fly.........

There goes Katy and Bear into the great big sky.

They were ready, seriously. As soon as we arrived at the door with Mark and Jan and Loran they KNEW. Katy ran out the front door and went immediately to the back of my van. They have only made this trip once...last August....dogs are MUCH smarter than we give them credit for.

Here they are ready to go!

Help us up!

Bear getting in:

Poor Katy, her back legs didn't respond as usual...she had a little acepromazine in her system because she gets motion sickness every time she gets in the car...let alone a plane!

Try to ignore me in this picture--but it is the only one I have with both of them - Katy is so big she looked like a real passenger.

My favorite picture...Katy looking at me...(she looks like she takes up the whole back seat!) Bear is already laying down, probably sleeping.

Actually, they have already arrived to their destination and Mark said that Katy slept the whole time. Bear stayed awake awhile and just enjoyed the flight.

Naps Re-Established.

Wooo Hooo! I hope I am not cursing myself by putting this in print...but the boys have been napping again. So THANK YOU for all the prayers for sleep! They worked. I started putting them down a lot earlier (before noon) and that seems to be helping. Running the bathroom fan that is next to their room and sometimes the shower helps too. What a HuGe difference in makes in my mothering when I get a little break during the day.

The boys have been SO funny and cute lately. Listening to them talk just makes me laugh. Yesterday J asked for milk and I told him he could have water until dinner. So I gave him a sippy cup of water and he returned to the living room. A minute later W arrived to ask for milk. And I told him the same thing and gave him some water too. He returned a few minutes later and said:

W: "J has milk."

Me: "No he doesn't. It is water."

W: "I hear it. It's milk."

My friend's baby is named Austin and after spending an afternoon with our friends....we were driving home and it started to thunderstorm. The boys were very worried that our friends wouldn't make it to their car before the storm arrived and they kept saying "Baby Awesome needs to get out of the rain!"

We were on a walk when we passed a large armadillo that had been hit by a car. The boys had never seen one in person before and they were intrigued and kept asking about the "potato" (armadillo) and the "tornado" (armadillo) the rest of the day and the next. They were so worried about him getting wet in the rain. Then on our way to swim lessons I noticed W kept messing with his ear.

Me: "W, is your ear OK? Does it hurt? Does it have water in it?"

W: "No, there is an armadillo in my ear."

And when I picked them up from their Sunday school class after church they didn't even get up and run to the door like they used to. They totally played it cool and continued to play with their trucks and then took their time cleaning up. One of the nursery workers told me that they were very cute and they played together so well. And she said that before they had their snack W told J: "Come on J, we need to wash our hands." He has become a little mother hen. We have been taking tricycle walks around the block and W will yell "J, move over there is a car coming!" (even when there isn't a car coming) It is sweet to see him watching over his brother.

Roll it!

Here are some very cute videos I had to share. Please excuse my singing in this one. I was encouraging J to sing Bibbiti Bobbiti Boo. He gets gun-shy when the video camera comes out. Roll it!

And some background for this video. The boys like to put things on their head and sing "Happy Birthday to you...." (I guess they are pretending it is a birthday hat) Here is W after dinner being crazy and putting the place mat on his head and growling "Hap-pee-Birth-day.." and I thought it was so funny how he walks out of the room in this clip:

And here is J using his cute voice telling me about the gum drops we picked up on our walk. Not candy gum drops. Real gum drops. OK.....so I just looked it up online to see if that is what they are really called. And I was wrong...they are a fruit nicknamed "gumballs". Gum drop Gum ball..close enough =)

And finally, one of the boys being silly. I was looking for a recipe...I couldn't find it anywhere....so they started to telling me what THEY thought happened to the recipe (and when I ask them what we should have for dinner...J said "rice krispies" and then "quesadillas")*it is hard to hear:

ScAtTeRbraiN

Scatterbrain things I have been doing lately (all of which I will blame on sleep deprivation):

-Arrived at zoo...after unloading kids and getting all gear out of van, couldn't find keys. Looked everywhere. Friend finally noticed keys in ignition.

-Drove with my van in 2nd and didn't even notice until friend pointed it out to me.

-Wore a white shirt all day in public without noticing a big stain in the middle of it until the very end of the day.

-Left my mini van side door open for six hours. The side facing a main road. With my purse inside. And no, all of you wondering where I live, you cannot have my address.

There are more I am certain...I just can't recall them right now.

Horse or T Rex?

Wow...I just noticed that this is my 200th post! Shouldn't I win a prize or something? =) Here is a funny story from this weekend.

The stables near our house had an open house on Sunday that included pony AND horse rides, displays, concessions, carriage rides, etc. How fun is THAT?! At least I thought so. I had visions in my head of the boys getting pony rides and being so excited and getting some special pictures. Wellnotsomuch.

I parked the van on the side of the road and we started across the dirt road toward a large area with lots of little buildings. There were no visible horses at the time...and we have driven on the road before because the boys always want to see the "horsies". As soon as we get across the road J starts getting upset and saying "I want to go that way!" He was pointing further down the road that we were parked on. I thought he was just being stubborn and told him we needed to go the way we were going which led to the main arena. He stands his ground and as we are arguing W starts screaming and takes off running as fast as he can towards the van. I am wondering what is going on when J starts crying more and bolts too! I turn around and down another little dirt road comes a horse walking with his owner. They weren't even very close and you would have thought it was a T Rex or something instead of a sweet horse. I couldn't help laugh because there reaction was hysterical and they both had each other all fired up.

They were at the van saying "I want to get in the van!" "I want to go HOME!" Luckily our friends showed up then and took W (who was much more calm and rational) while I could stay back with J and talk to him enough to calm him down. They watched our little friends Bo and Rylee take horse rides but J never got out of the stroller and W was pretty firm about "just watch" when we asked him if he wanted to get on a horse or ride a horse.

Here is a fun picture of Bo on a horse and I didn't even see the horse heading after my camera while I was taking the picture:

And here is Jason and Julee soothing W (still wearing his name tag from church) while their kiddos are in the background riding horses. I am standing by J in the stroller still trying to convince them that the horses are OK:

Julee got W to pet the horse:

They both calmed down enough to be around the horses though. I got to help brush a horse and clean its horse shoe which was so cool. The lady taught me how to run my hand down the back of its leg, squeeze at the certain spot and the horse just popped its foot right up. And she just felt like velvet. If I wasn't in a dress from church I would have taken W's horse ride.

This is the horse (I think Nya was her name) I got to help groom and you can see the boys keeping a close eye on her since she is behind them:

As we were leaving, another owner walked by us with her horse (named Krispy Kreme) and she stopped and asked if the boys wanted to see her horse. J just pulled his stroller canopy all the way down trying to hide. It was quite funny.

JuSt OnE sMiLe

We were picnicking outside today so I took some random pics of the boys. Here are their "smiles" and "cheese" poses.....

J:

Grumpy and Happy?

Trying to smile bigger:

BIGGER!

More silliness:

They are quite animated little fellows.

Today we were sitting out in the driveway and I asked W if he wanted to go to the store. He said: "No, I want to stay home with J, and mommy, and W, and the dump truck, and the tricycle, and mommy's coffee." (everyone and thing that was on the driveway at that moment)

9:20 p.m.

I was counting on the boys having a great night of sleep last night since they finally napped yesterday (after seven straight days of no naps)...and they tend to sleep well after they take naps. I was watching American Idol and folding laundry and I could hear them messing around and laughing in their room. Obviously doing anything but sleeping. A little after 9 p.m. I went down the hall to put laundry in our room and I noticed the boys light was on. Uh oh.

I peeked in and saw W asleep in his bed...

...then peeked over J's bed to see it empty and him on the floor:

Half under the bed and with the rocking chair almost on top of him. So I turned out the light, moved the rocking chair, and took another picture (of course).

He almost has his hands behind his head (like he sleeps in the car)...and as I was leaving I saw the air purifier unplugged and under the light switch. Guess they decided they weren't ready to sleep when I put them in their room. Our little vampires who don't require much (or at times) any sleep.

Counting Sheep.

So W woke up screaming loudly at 5 a.m. and I got him and pulled him into bed with me for about 45 good minutes of sleep until J woke up screaming so I got him and just got up...W continued to sleep for another full hour-the lucky dog.

Swim Like a Shark

The boys are having fun in their swim lessons. They prefer just gliding in the water rather than kicking and swimming but that will come. They are worlds better than me about holding their breath underwater...I still can't do that!

Their Wed class is smaller and quieter...today there were only four boys (and at times just J and W) so I tried to get some pictures.

Coach Andrea brought out the noodles at one point and the boys quickly got into trouble bc they were swinging them around and lifting them high in the air and saying "rocket ship!" She is very patient with them but I noticed the noodles disappeared pretty quickly (such smart coaches)! Here is Coach Andrea...they like her lots and it is funny to hear them say her name...

Noodles...or rocketships?

W's turn to float on his back (and kick) while holding the noodle on his chest...not sure what he is doing here but it makes for a funny picture:

Their favorite part was walking on this "boat-like" contraption at the end...they are supposed to run or walk and jump off...then swim to the edge of the pool. J went first so I missed him the first time bc I was walking down from the balcony....here is J's second jump:

And play-by-play of W's take 2:

Here I am!