3 out of 4

Today, I had a surprise for the boys. The plan was to go t Johnny's Toys so Jakeb and Kaleb could go into the birthday castle to get their prize. (I've had Kaleb's coupon since last November.) Johnny's Toys is obviously a toy store in this area, and you can sign up for their birthday club. Next we were to meet the Pelkey's at the mall to play at the play area, eat, and check out the fish at Bass Pro Shop. And last, but not least, we were going to go watch Shrek 3 at the cheap theater for $1.50 each. (Can't pass that up!)
The kids were thrilled to go to Johnny's Toys. I mean, come one, who doesn't like toy stores? We saw trains and toys and all sorts of fun stuff. The kids were excited to see Joshua at the play area, ...and enjoyed our picnic lunch in the food court. (How frugal is that?? We brought our own lunch there? And...Betsy made what Blake calls the "best brownies ever," which is all over their faces.) We made it to Bass Pro Shop to check out the fish and the turtles. You should have seen Betsy almost fall in again trying to get one of those turtles. We made a stop in Babies R Us, so that I could feed that baby. (Look at how hungry she looks....okay, actually this was after she ate.) Anyways, so we're in Babies R US and this is what happens......T-R-O-U-B-L-E. This is what happened after I had told the boys to stay next to the stroller more than once This is what happened only 30 minutes before Shrek 3 started. This is what happened to determine that we were not going to Shrek 3. (I was so bummed! I wanted to see Shrek the Third as badly as they did.) Oh well...3 out of 4 planned things isn't too bad. Maybe next week it'll work out!

Bunk Beds Complete

They are finally complete. Yay!!!! Looks great, huh?? He put the ladder up after I took pictures, so there is a way to go up and down easily! The boys readily went to bed. After putting them to bed, I heard some talking in there and found Kaleb climbing up the ladder to sleep with Jakeb! Bless his heart! He so wanted the top bunk. Maybe in a year or two!

Sleeping Kids

Here's some crazy places or should I say some crazy things the younger kids have fallen asleep recently. Here's Jakeb sleeping downstairs on the futon with the cash register. I don't know if you can see it or not, but he fell asleep with his hand swiping the credit card through the machine!
Here's Kaleb trying to sneaking at bedtime. Okay, well, he succeeded. I didn't see this till way after he went to bed. He did have them stacked up all nice and neat, but then he must have shifted and they sent everywhere!

And last, but certainly not least, here's Makenna sleeping on her Boppy on her....stomach. She's a stomach baby, and loves to sleep on it! She actually slept through the night the other day, thanks to her belly sleeping.

(I'm thankful that I have a monitor that actually monitors the baby's breathing, so if she were to stop breathing it has an very loud alarm that goes off. I probably wouldn't let her sleep on her belly in his crib if it weren't for that.)

crocs for Luke

During t-ball season, there were two kids that Luke saw wearing these popular shoes called Crocs. Ever since then Luke has begging me, and I mean begging me for a pair. Of course, I'm not gonna buy the real deal ones ($35 for a pair of Styrofoam shoes??? no way.), so we opted for the fake ones (less than $10). After buying 3 pairs, and returning 2 of them we finally found a pair that fits. He was so excited. But then.....well, he got a blister from them. He wasn't so impressed anymore. He did say that he will continue wearing them. He better!

Luke lost a tooth

Luke lost another tooth. This time it was one of his top teeth. His other top middle tooth is loose too, so pretty soon he'll be missing his two top teeth, not to mention one on the bottom. He'll be a regular snaggletooth before long.

(Thanks Lindsay for pulling it out at church! I sooooo don't do teeth!)

Daddy and his little girl

Can't tell me that this Daddy doesn't love his little girl! ....and he thought he wouldn't like having a girl.

Merry-Go-Round Park

I discovered this park a couple of years ago, but until about a couple of months ago never could figure out how to get to it. It's on a dead-end, no-outlet road, so there's virtually no traffic. It's great, and it has a MERRY-GO-ROUND. I used to love those things as a child. They were so fun. The boys love it too.
This was the first time Dad got to go with us to this park, so well... as you can see, he enjoyed the park as much as they did. It's funny how much more fun the kids have when dad's around. Mom must be no-fun at all! Oh well...

Look at the fun ERIC is having!!! He was loving it, not to mention the kids were loving it too. (See him on the ground next to Kaleb?? He fell off. And notice Blake on the ground??? Eric had it spinning so fast that Blake flew off!!) And then look below at Eric jumping off the swings. He had as much fun as the kids did!

Look, we have REAL PROOF that Makenna was there. Not just the car seat picture!!!

Daddy and his boys.

Just a fun picture of Blake.....

Children's museum

The Cincinnati Museum had a free night tonight. It was free entrance to all of their museums. We used to have passes a couple of years ago, and the boys loved it. So, since it was free and all, we all piled into the van, and took advantage of it. It was packed, but it was so worth it. We visited the Children's Museum first where everything was very hands on. So much fun. They had a whole bunch of different areas....ball area, town area, country area, little kid area, the woods (a big kid play area), and even a small water area. We visited all the areas, and the boys had a great time. It was especially fun to watch Kaleb because the last time we had been there, he was a baby. He was in a new world of his own exploring everything.
Well, no visit to the museum would be completely complete with visiting the Cave that is located in the Science museum. So off we went to explore the cave. Talk about fun!!

graduation pictures

I took some graduation pictures of Luke today. I took probably 100 pictures, and I got one that I absolutely LOVE! There are a few other good ones, but the one is the best. It's frameable! (Yes, I know. I should have ironed the sheet...maybe next time!)

I really like the above one too.

Here's my favorite above and below. Love them!!!

Fisher Picnic

Today Eric's work had a picnic, and the families were invited. Not too many families came, but shoot, I take any opportunity to get out of the house and ....free food...we're there! I only took 2 pictures.....the first is some people that Eric works with, and the second is the two new daddies to girls. The guy on the right works with Eric and has two boys. He and his wife just had their little girl two weeks ago.

Guess what I did today...

For those of you who know me....know...I don't iron. In fact, before Eric and I got married, I warned him and made it a prerequisite that I would not have to iron for him. I know most of you are thinking....poor Eric, but at least I warned him. I think it was a little bit of an adjustment for him because he used to iron his clothes by the week, and have it all laid out for the entire week. And then he married someone who doesn't iron...but like I said...at least I warned him.

Seriously, I can iron something, and you usually can't even tell that I ironed it....so what's the point? I'm more of the spray your shirt with water....and hope the wrinkles fall out. (Eric has adapted to this method too.) Well, today, I pulled out the iron that Eric had before we got married...the same iron that has fallen behind the washing machine and cracked...the same iron that has some kind of residue on the iron plate......and I ironed two things. One was for Makenna because this adorable outfit that Niki gave her needed to be ironed before she could wear it again, and you know it really had to be ironed if I said it did...no water could help it. (Thanks a lot, Niki!) And this shirt that I bought the other day at Kohl's desperately needed to be iron. (Had I known this...I probably wouldn't have bought the shirt, but oh well..it does look really cute with the skirt I bought.)

So, yep, I did it. I ironed two things. You must realize the last time I pulled out the old, cracked iron was when the boys did a project for school last year, and it required ironing over wax paper to melt the little beads. (hence, maybe the residue on the iron plate??) And if I even had to think about the last time I ironed clothes....well...I can't even remember that. College??? Okay it's not been that long, but I think you get the point. I ironed today, and I'm very pleased with myself. Maybe I'll try it again sometime soon.....NOT!

a boy and his toys

He loves these little guys. He likes to set them all up and then request for me to take a picture of them...just thought I'd share how cute he is.

Poor Kaleb

This is the balloon that Kaleb saw inside

This is Kaleb playing outside with the balloon. This is the balloon that was thrown in the air by Kaleb. This is the balloon that is not coming back down that was thrown in the air by Kaleb This is the balloon that got stuck in our neighbor's tree that is not coming back down that was thrown in the air by Kaleb This is Kaleb wanting mommy to get the balloon in the tree that was not coming back down that was thrown in the air by Kaleb.
Can you figure out my answer??

Tractor Ride

I was on the phone with Niki when Eric pounded on the window and pointed for me to look outside. This is what I saw!! Should a five year boy be allowed to do this???? I'm not too sure.
I proceeded to go outside with the camera, and Luke decided to try to run me over. See him coming after me.

One Fine Day

We had a fun day today, not to mention a beautiful and cool day to spend outside which is what we did for half of the day. We met up with Betsy and her kids at the park for some fun. We even enjoyed another picnic lunch there. The boys have decided that picnics are very very cool.
Afterwards, I had to give Makenna her lunch, so we all piled into Betsy's van for a quick...dinner and a movie....dinner for Makenna and a movie for all the rest of the kids. (Hence, the reason for the picture of all the kids in the van...sure did make me chuckle.)
When Makenna decided she was done, we all went over to a new area at Sharonwoods that we had never been to...(well, Betsy had, but we hadn't.)....the WATERFALL!!! The boys loved it. Betsy said that usually the water falls over the whole area, but for some reason today, it wasn't which was fine by my boys. That just meant they could climb and play better in the water. Too bad the rocks were covered with lots of algae...making it a little slippery. Luke climbed up the waterfall great without falling....coming down was a little bit of a problem. You should have seen the poor kid sliding down...okay you should have seen me carrying Makenna in a carrier sling thingy trying to figure out how I was going to rescue my 70 pound son when he went floating down the river....okay....so I exaggerate just a little. He was fine, but he did get pretty wet and dirty. I, as a bad mother, just laughed at him after I realized he was okay. Within minutes, he was climbing on something else, so I knew he was fine. I think everyone biffed it at least once on the rocks except for Blake. Since Luke wasn't the only one to get wet, we figured we would go to the colored park and let the kids get wet even more...if they wanted to. Even Makenna got out of the car seat and had some fun.......in her sling carrier!