Pool Party

At the end of the year for Pee Wee baseball, there's always a pool party at the "water park" in town. It's not a huge water park, but there are 2 nice sized slides, and kiddie section with a slide and a "sprinkler section" for little ones. We didn't go last year becasue it's always on a Sunday night. This year we left church a little early and made it to the pool in time to spend a nice amount of time. There was a bazillion kids there (every Pee Wee player and their family was invited), but it wasn't so crowded that we couldn't enjoy it. We started out in the sprinkler section and that's the only place I took pictures. After that, we spent some time in the kid section and then moved onto the slides. The kids LOVED the slides! C went down w/ Daddy once and then was brave enough to go on his own. Once he got to the bottom of the slide, it was shallow enough for him to touch and walk to the side. K went down with Daddy and I a few times each. She giggled the entire way down! It was really fun! The slide could get going kinda fast if you layed back. We had such a good time. K cried and didn't want to leave. She wanted to stay the night there. I think she would have changed her mind after everyone left.

Happy Father's Day!

Wow! this is one late post! But we have had so much going on! And I wanted to blog in order, so I'm just now getting to Father's Day.

We took Daddy out for his dinner Saturday night. We went to Stone Creek out in Plainfield at the out door mall. They have such good food! A little expensive but very yummy! I had mustard chicken with smashed tatoes and asparagus tips with some kind of sauce over all of it. Very good. Daddy had a pasta, sausage, and chicken in a gouda cheese sauce. Yum. I had his (and mine) leftovers a few days later. It was very good. The kids meal came with a brownie Sundae. That was good too.

We let him open his present after we got home from eating (and some shopping). We got him a sport utility net. So he and C can hit golf balls in the back yard---into the net instead of into the pond.

C's last game

C had his last baseball game last Saturday. I think he ended up with a winning record. I know he really improved over the year. At the last game, they always announce each kid for like a "starting line-up"

Nice action picture, Daddy!

This was kind of a spontaneous picture. All our kids had to be out of the dugout for the next game, so they all lined up here to wait for snacks and parents. So of course all the moms got out their cameras.This was their last huddle. Go Yankees!

Of course, K got hold of the camera and had to take some pictures. I actually think she did a good job on this one. At least he has a head (compared to my golf picture).And here is my K girl. What a ham!

Another K funny

This is a very short post, compared to the last few. But it's a K funny that I just had to share.

Sunday morning, K said to Daddy "When I die and go to heaven, I have a question for Jesus." Daddy -a little take back- "Oh? And what is your question?"
K: "I want to ask him about all those fuzzies in the laundry room."

HUH?

Along the same lines of heaven, don't ever let a 6 year old try to have a philosophical discussion with a 2 year old. I can't remember the exact conversation but it was quite interesting.

Stanley

Stanley Lambchop has been flattened by a bulletin board! But now he is able to travel through the mail in an envelope and experience many new adventures!

Stanley was one of the presents that C got at his grad party. The Stanley books are actually a series of books, telling the adventures of this "flat" little boy. What's even cuter is that a Flat Stanley is included in one of the books. You can send your Stanley on adventures by sending him to friends and family. Whomever Stanley is staying with at the time is to take Stanley places (daily activities, landmarks, special places) and take a picture of Stanley and/or the host/hostess. Stanley (host/hostess) is to then write a journal recording what you did on each adventure. Eventually Stanley will return home and then C will have pictures and a journal to show where Stanley has been and what he has done.

The first adventure that Stanley had with us was to take pictures with everyone that attended C's party. The next day we took Stanley to Squealer's (the best BBQ place). Stanley is right now in NY state with Grandma and hopefully will get to visit Hoffman's House (the best hot dog place) as well as other places there. Stanley is also going to get to go to Mexico with M & Green Socks on their honeymoon.

I would really like Stanley to be able to visit other places and to meet new people. Is there anyone out there that would like a very flat house guest for a few days? He doesn't eat much. :) I would just ask that you take his picture and make a small journal entry to go with each picture. If you know anyone else that would like to meet Stanley, please feel free to send him on a journey--just make sure he gets home once in a while.

To learn more about Flat Stanley and to see who he has met and where he has been, log on to http://www.flatstanleyproject.com/. Momma, wouldn't this be a fun thing for your class to do? :) You can print a "blank" Flat Stanley off the web site and have the kids color it in. If anyone is interested and gets a Flat Stanley, he is more than welcome to visit us.

I do have to give kudos to my sister: she had mentioned Flat Stanley A LONG TIME AGO and I never did it (to be honest I was just lazy and then forgot). But now Stanley will get to visit her and maybe even meet the new baby before we do!

And now I would like to introduce to you, Flat Stanley. (applause, applause)
This is Mr. and Mrs. D. They bought C the Stanley books and thus introduced us to Stanley.This is Miss S. She was C's AWANA leader last year. Now she works in his SS class. She LOVES C and vice versa. For those of you who don't know, Miss S is a blind lady who lives on her own, holds a job, sings in the choir, listens to AWANA verses. She is an amazing lady. Very sweet too.This is Miss P. She was C's other AWANA leader. This is Miss M.K. She is our piano player at church. And her mom is our organ player. She also works in C's SS class now.C, Stanley and Grandpa.Grandma, C, and Stanley. Grandma was very taken with Stanley. She actually was reading the first book before she left. She didn't get to finish, so she doesn't know what happened. Oh the suspense!This is Green Socks (the groom) and the Father of the Bride.And here is the Mother of the Bride.And here is M, the Bride-to-be (not sure how she ended up last in the sequence)This is the Maid of Honor (cousin of the bride).C, K, and Stanley at Squealers.K and Stanley at Squealers.

Congratulations Grad!

Since C is homeschooled, he doesn't get to have a traditional kindergarten graduation. Although, I have found out that up here, kindergarten graduation is not a big deal. Only some of the local private schools do a graduation. So sad. Instead of figuring out how to do an actual graduation, I just skipped straight to the party. Nice, huh? Thursday night we had about 11 people or so come for a party. I had snacky food (one recipe in a future post) and drinks. (definition of snacky foods: veggies/dip, crackers/dip, fruit/dip, desserts/dip) Everyone got something to eat first and then C opened presents. He made out pretty good. Let's see if I can list everything: $15 cash, $10 Wal-Mart gift card, a wood USA puzzle (that talks and tells you state & capitals), pencils (already sharpened--cute idea), word search book, 2 Cul-de-Sac books (Beverly Lewis), Connect 4, sun catcher kit (another messy project), a really nice Earth and Space book, a travel chess set, 2 more books, and a really nice wood 4-in-one chess/checkers/tic tac toe/something else. The last set of books deserves its own post (another future post). They are called the Flat Stanley series. Such a cute idea! Oh and another cute game he got is called Find It! Check out this web site for more info (it's too hard to explain here) (Since I can't get the link thingy to work, here's the web site http://www.finditgames.com/) Two funny things regarding C opening presents: he could NOT conquer opening cards! I think we need a lesson. He mutilated every envelope. and he kept turning his back on everyone. Turn around!

I think everyone had a good time, even though it was VERY hot! We were able to sit outside (a bonus because we would not have had enough room inside) but it was almost miserable. One thing I forgot, we got C a Jr. golf glove. Within 5 minutes the writing on the glove had flaked off, so I am taking that back. But the glove gave C the idea to get out his clubs and drive some golf balls. Kept him and K busy for awhile. After everyone left, C hit one so hard (good shot) that it went in the pond behind our house! But for some reason, that bothered him A LOT. He cried over that ball. Crazy kid. Later while we were cleaning up, C went running FULL SPEED into the house---except the sliding door was closed. He bounced off that door about four feet and landed on his rear end. He's lucky the door didn't break, he was running that hard. He was pretty upset over that (I don't blame him; he hit hard). So we got quick showers, gave him some Tylenol and put the 2 kids to bed. It was late. He did have a small bump the next day, but there is no sign of it now. Poor kid.

Side note: Grandma got K a little present to open too. She was so excited. We told her that she could open it after C was all done. So after EVERY present "Mommy, is it my turn?" She got some new Dora panties. (BTW: she's doing really good still; I'm hoping.....) Oh and by the way, we had another naked moment w/ K girl. She decided to try her new panties on-out on the patio-w/ guests still there. I rushed her cute naked little butt inside to finish putting them on.

Grandparents

Neither set of my kids grandparents live close. So when they come to town, it's a big deal. (One of the reasons I home school). Daddy's parents came in from NY last week. They were here in time to go to C's baseball game Wednesday night. (which he won) They were here for just a few days, but it was so nice to spend time with them.

Wednesday night after C's game, we went to dinner (Bob Evans). Thursday morning we went to breakfast (Panera Bread) and did a little shopping (Meijer). Then it was home again, home again, jiggity jig. We spend the afternoon getting ready for C's Kindergarten graduation party (see next post). Friday morning they brought Dunkin Donuts for breakfast and then we spent most of the day here, just talking and spending time together. Friday night we went to Squealer's for dinner (YUM) and then back home for a little more time together before they went back to the hotel to get ready to leave Saturday morning. It may have been short, but it was such a good time!


C and Grandpa played a few games of Connect Four (one of C's grad presents) Then K got in on the action, and C amused himself.

K and Grandma played with Polly Pocket and her dog. They had fun doing her hair.

Both of the kids liked Grandma's iTouch. She even has bubble popping on hers! (Like the packing bubbles) Too funny!

After they left our house Friday night, we had horrible thunderstorms in the area. They were not affected at their hotel, but we lost power for about an hour. We even set up sleeping areas downstairs for everyone since it was so hot upstairs. Within 5 minutes of everyone getting settled, the electricity came back on. Figures.

Reading Fun!

I've got C signed up in 3 different reading contests this summer. The nice thing is, they kinda over lap. The 1st is through Half Price Books. He has to read for 15 minutes per day for 5 days per week. For every week he completes this, he gets a $3 gift card for Half Price Books. The 2nd is through Barnes & Noble. He has to complete a "journal" of 8 books (name, author, favorite part of the book). Once he completes his journal, he gets a free book (from a list) from B&N. He can do 2 of these journals this summer. The 3rd one is through one of our local libraries. I have to log every book he reads online. For every 10 books he reads he gets prizes and gets entered into a raffle. So far he has read 26 books, gotten 1 free book, and gotten $6 to spend! I'm pretty proud of him! I usually have to remind him to read (he is just 6), but he usually does it without complaint and sometimes it's longer than 15 minutes. I hope he's enjoying it. I'm enjoying seeing him read. You go, C!

While K and I were at the shower the other night, Daddy took C to Half Price books to spend some of his money. He got 2 books: one on the planets and one on dangerous animals. A little more "educational" than I expected but still nice books. (I think they missed the BoxCar children type books-maybe next time). "On the way home" (it isn't really) they got smoothies from Cold Stone. YUM! They saved me a little to try once we all got home. YUMMO! I'm glad they had fun.

It's HOT!

I moved north to get away from the heat and humidity! Or so I thought. This week has been so hot and humid. We usually get about 2 weeks of this kind of weather, but not until later in the summer. But I need to be thankful: my dad said in Pensacola last week it was 98 degrees and just as high humidity. We were 90 with about the same humidity. But the humidity is so different from Pensacola's. Anyways.

The kids wanted to play outside this last week. Since it was so hot, I set up the pool for them. The had a such a good time. They must have filled that pool up 3 or 4 times!

Can you see my water bill increasing the longer you look at the picture? STOP LOOKING!

Friday they played in the pool again. I usually set the umbrella up for shade around the pool. After they had come in, here is what happened to the umbrella. Needless to say, it was very windy.

M's bridal shower

Our friends (M& Green Socks) are getting married--soon! I can't believe it's less than 4 weeks away! She probably can't either. This is the wedding that C is going to be in.

Tuesday night was her church bridal shower. I decided to be brave (or stupid) and take K girl with me. More on that in a minute. First let me tell you what we got her. I picked out a 28 piece set of storage containers. I know I use mine A LOT. I also got her a 19 piece measuring set. I'd like that; those I don't have enough of. Then I let the kids pick out something for her. Here is what they picked.

C picked out the spatula (pretty practical) and K picked out the plate. I think she was hoping I'd just let her keep it. But then she kept saying it was for M's girl. Maybe M will think of my kids whenever she uses them. Too cute.

Now about the shower. She had many people come and got lots of nice stuff. One lady in our church always makes something for showers: baby or bridal. She made a beautiful blanket for her. M also got some Colts stuff (she's a huge Colts fan), some home stuff, and some gift cards. One of her good friends got her a nice duffel bag-type suitcase full of clothes for the honeymoon (shirts, tops, skirts, etc) What a cute idea!

K actually did pretty good during the shower. She "helped" me with the games, ate some food (cheese, tomatoes, chips, and cake), and then played with another little girl. They did end up getting kinda bored, but all in all weren't too bad. I still like going by myself. Oh well!

Weekend guests

This past weekend we had 2 guests stay with us, Friday afternoon until Sunday afternoon. Here is the first one. What a good doggie! The second guest was one of Mugsy's "owners(?). The youngest of our friends (J&T). We will call her "Chunk-A-Monk." I swear she weighs more than my 2 combined! She looks rolly polly but is so much heavier than she looks even! But she is such a cutie! She was such a good girl, really only fussed when put down to sleep (nap and bed). She's about 13 months younger than K girl. K was somewhat jealous of her in regards to daddy. Kinda funny.

Friday night after dinner, we let the kids ride bikes out front for a little while. Saturday morning, C had a game (he lost). After the game, one of the coaches treated all the kids to ice cream at DQ. Too cute! He even got one for K! Then home for naps, grass mowing, hair cuts, showers, baths. For dinner we went out to eat. It's so different to ask for a table for 5. I'm thankful for my little family. That evening while some played Wii, the girls painted toe nails and fingernails. Monk wanted nothing to do with it. Sunday morning was a little busier getting another girl ready. She went right into nursery for Sunday School and did fine all the way through church. When I went in to get her, she had messed all the way through her pretty dress! Poor thing. Poor nursery workers. Then it was home, lunch, and naps. Daddy and Mommy came and got her about 4.

It was a fun weekend; something different. My kids didn't want her to leave. Even though she was a very good girl, I had a different opinion. I like my 2 kids. 2hands=2kids

We were going to take pictures of the kids in their Sunday best after we got home from church. The diaper issue changed that. So all we have are pictures from Friday night.

VBS: Jungle Safari

This year's theme for VBS was Jungle Safari. Some years our leader does good in making everything "match" with the theme. I think she could have done somewhat better, but who am I to judge? I"m not in charge (thank goodness!) She did rent some really nice costumes for the Bible story time and for the "backdrop" for pictures. Otherwise, there wasn't much.

Daddy is always in charge of taking the kids pictures, printing them, picking them up, and passing them out before the night ends. It usually works well. This way each kid gets their pix--just in case they can't be there the next night. Thursday night's pictures have yet to be delivered. It POURED right at the beginning of VBS and there was no back-up plan for what to do with the kids (the entire VBS night is usually outside). So Daddy wasted a lot of time at the beginning, so therefore the pictures weren't printed in time. Hopefully we will be able to find all the kids on Sunday (our VBS runs Sunday afternoon through Thursday evening-sooo nice to have Friday night off)

K and I missed Tuesday night (due to her ear surgery) and Thursday night (due to a VERY bad little girl--she needed early bed). K would have had her picture taken Thursday night, so I don't have one of her with the VERY LARGE animals. So here is C's picture.

Picky, picky

My kids are picky eaters (some of you are saying "Duh!") For lunch we usually eat one of 3 things: hot dogs, pop corn chicken (for C; K won't touch it) or mac & chz (for K; C only eats it if he has to). C will eat left overs if they are pasta or tacos. Otherwise we are stuck in a rut. So Wednesday I tried something new. I made grilled cheese and cut the sandwiches into shapes with my cookie cutters. There were moons, stars, hearts, and another shape (an X maybe?). Plus they had a "sample" of all our chips (BBQ, Pringles, Cheetos, CheezIt, nachos) and a sample of every fruit that we had in the house. C gobbled everything down. The "trick" worked for him. K loved the samples of the chips and fruit. The sandwich--she saw right through it. She ate it, but it was still a long drawn out process. SERIOUSLY?!?!? K is on this kick right now where she likes NADA, even the things that she usually loves (mac & chz, sausage, cheese). She drives me nuts! And she is just like her Papa--if she doesn't eat, she gets very grumpy! (love you Papa!) Everyone says she'll eat when she gets hungry or when she goes through a growing spurt. Oh I did forget: she loves her tomatoes! Just like her Auntie. She will eat them until the juice runs down her arms. I'm actually trying to grow tomato plants for her (when will the tomatoes be here?) We went to a Mexican restaurant the other day. C got a taco and I asked for his tomatoes to be on the side, for K. They brought a HUGE scoop of them for her and didn't charge us any extra. So very nice. She loved it! Can a person live on tomatoes?

By the way, for those of you who care: this was a very hard post for me. I struggle EVERY TIME with spelling the following words: sandwich, tomatoes, restaurant. And these words were in this post multiple times. Thank goodness for spell check!

Surgery and hard work

K had ear surgery Tuesday. She had her left ear tube taken OUT and both holes patched. We had to be at the surgery center at 7 am. I'm still not sure why they have you be there so early. Guess what we did? WAIT! Try doing that with a tired and hungry 2 year old with nothing to do. She actually did well, considering. And some of the time she got to watch cartoons so that helped. The surgery was very quick (we were home by 9:30) and everything went well. She was a little groggy and just wanted Daddy. She did well the rest of the day but just to be safe, she and I didn't go to VBS. Wednesday morning she seemed extra whiny, so I gave her some Tylenol and that mellowed her out. We go for a check up in 4 weeks and if all has healed, she can go swimming and dunk her head (hopefully we will have swim lessons too)

On to the hard work: our neighbor came over and helped (maybe Daddy helped him) fix the outlets in my kitchen. It took about 4 hours. What a mess! What a hassle! But they work! YEAH!

Our garage sale

Well we had our garage sale this past week. Sometimes I wonder why I go to all the trouble. We spent Tuesday and Wednesday out in the garage setting all the stuff up. The sale was Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. Thursday we had to leave for about 2 hours for C's golf clinic. Saturday we had to close up early for C's game. I'm not sure if all that hurt me or not. All together we made about $140. The kids made $14! They sold candy and some of their old toys. We had our old HUGE tv cabinet that I wanted to sell. It is still sitting in our garage. UGH! Saturday after the sale, I pitched a lot of stuff. Stuff that hasn't sold in the past 3 garage sales or so. I figured that was a hint. I'm hoping to put our broken tv to the curb tomorrow. I tried to give it away for free, but no one wanted it. If we could just sell the cabinet, we could have our garage back. I've put it on Craig's List but haven't had any response. Anyone want a tv cabinet? :)

For those who are wondering, C won both of his games last week. As he said "I actually smoked the Rays."

We also started VBS yesterday (Sunday) so that will make for a very busy week. If I have any interesting stories, I'll be sure to share. K also gets her tubes out of her ears and the holes fixed tomorrow. (I'm not planning on VBS Tuesday night)

That is our week in review and pre-view. Hopefully I can keep up a little better in the future.

C's golf clinic

Daddy found a near-by golf course that every year has a junior golf clinic. After some checking, we signed C up for the clinic. It's 2 days (Tuesday and Thursday) from 9 am -10:30 and it only cost $25! I thought that was an awesome price! So we spent Tuesday and Thursday morning at the golf course.

Tuesday was HOT! K and I sat and watched. She actually did pretty good. She ended up taking pictures for me. So I thought I'd share. Thursday was cold! We actually had to have sweatshirts on. K got bored and into trouble on Thursday, but what's new?

On the golf front, C really enjoyed it and seemed to learn some stuff. I would recommend it and hopefully will do it again next year. (To back up to Saturday, Daddy took C to drive golf balls Saturday morning--just so C would have some sort of expectation for the clinic.) C did good on Thursday but did get a little bored near the end. But I still think it was worth the money.

On the picture front, I took the 1st picture and K girl took the rest. Some are good and some are bad. Oh well, she had fun!

This is not C's golf bag. K just like how it looked and so took a picture.