"New" Swing

Braden got his very own swing put up for him under our deck. Saturday, the 15th I had asked his Grandpa D. if he would help put it up for him after Ben's soccer game. This is the swing that his Grandma and Grandpa D. bought for Ben when he was little. We have been meaning to pick up a swingset for Ben but still haven't managed to get it, so I thought we could just hang the swing under the deck for Braden like we did for Ben at our old house. Needless to say, Braden loves his swing. He doesn't say "swing" yet, but he points and does the question sound like he does for most things he wants. :)

"Sweet Baby Girl" Abigail Has Arrived!

Congratulations to Travis and Paula! On Friday, September 14th, one of my very closest friends, Paula, had a precious little bundle of love--Abigail. She is a little extra special because she has been highly anticipated for a very long time now. Her and Ethan (S.) rank way up there on the "blessings" scale. I was chomping at the bit to go and see her, so Andy and I went over to see her (along with the proud parents too of course) the night she was born. She is so beautiful!!! And since Paula isn't the germaphobe that I am, I even got to hold her. :) It almost made me want to have another one of my own.......I said ALMOST. :) While we were there, Paula's Mom and Dad got there and Abby decided to sit up and take notice of her Grandparents! She opened up those eyes so big and just studied them so intently. It was adorable! She is a little doll!

Over this past weekend, (on Saturday, the 22nd) I went over to Paula's to spend some time with her and Abigail and we went shopping together. I got to hold Abby again. She is just like a little peanut. She is so tiny! My boys were NEVER that tiny! She is so snuggable and so sweet. She was so good to sleep nearly the whole time we shopped too--except for her little feeding marathon from 8:15-9:00. That was pretty funny.

What a gift she is!

School Lunches Aren't What They Used To Be--Thank Goodness!

The buzz around town is that you are allowed to go to your child's school and eat lunch with them anytime you want to. Well, lucky me! On Friday, Sept. 7th, I asked Ben if many parents go and eat lunch with their children at school. When he said that they did, I told him I might go eat lunch with him sometime soon. Well, what do you think his response was? "How about today, Mommy!!! " So, I did. I have been amazed at how much healthier the lunch choices have been for his school than ever were when I was growing up. We had "crispy baked chicken" and it was pretty tasty, I must say. The "lunch accounts" are so nice too so that the kids don't have to worry about carrying money to school and keeping track of it. We got to sit at a table all by ourselves and enjoy lunch together. We had a nice long chat about what he was doing in school that day and he named off every person in his class to show me who he was talking about whenever he mentioned any of their names. It was almost like an adult lunch date. :) It was so neat. During lunch, Ben asked me if I would like to go to recess with him because, "afterall, it is right after lunch, Mommy." (which I was shocked about--fill 'em up and send them out to run, hmmmmm.........does that seem odd to you too?............I'll keep my mouth shut though cause I'm trying to be positive about school these days. :) So anyway, I ended up going out to recess--RIGHT AFTER LUNCH--with him. (I didn't want to embarrass Ben by taking pictures inside the cafeteria, but I did snap a few outside) We swung on the swings together and then I watched him play on the monkey bars a little bit. Braden was with us the whole time and kept things interesting. He shared my lunch with me and made a huge mess then almost got pummeled by the swing when he decided to walk in front of Ben while he was swinging. All in all though, it was a great experience. I had warned him that morning that he couldn't do any crying when it was time for me to leave otherwise I wouldn't go eat with him again for quite a while until I thought he could handle it. So when the time came for me to say goodbye, he smiled big, gave me a hug, waved and said "See ya later Mommy!" I was so proud of him for being such a big boy!

Blowing Kisses

This isn't one of his cuter ones, but Braden began blowing kisses the day we got home from Pomme De Terre Lake. I didn't even know he could do it but when my Mom and Dad dropped the boys and I off at our house on the way home from vacation, he waved adamently and then blew Grandma a kiss saying "Maaahhhh" in the process, just as they were leaving. Andy, Mom and I were all in shock! We looked at each other and said, "Did he just blow a kiss?" Mom and I nearly got teary-eyed. He seems to understand sooooo much more than we give him credit for. It was soooo adorable!

Pomme De Terre Lake Vacation

Ok, yes, I realize it's been almost 3 weeks since this vacation, but I'm just running a little behind these days keeping up with my blog. For some reason, my life just keeps getting busier and busier. I'm not sure how that keeps happening but it's GOT to slow down. I am TIRED! One break I got lately was our trip to the lake over Labor Day weekend:

Is this the life or what!?

Yes, this is what our Labor Day weekend looked like in a nutshell. Doesn't it look relaxing!!! Well, it was. Even with the kids, we had a very enjoyable, relaxing, and much-needed weekend get-a-way. By the way, this was my Mom and Dad in the motel pool.

Aaaaaahhhhhhh!!!

Oh, did I mention it was a family reunion as well? Well, we have quite the crowd there. Mom, her sister Carolyn and sister-in-law Joy chatting in our Motel room. In the background Andy performs "surgery" on Ben's foot. He got a rather large and nasty looking splinter lodged in his foot. It took Andy and I over 45 minutes to get it out. There were many tears shed to say the least. Lesson learned? I sure hope so! Ben's favorite part of our Pomme De Terre trip this year was spending time with his second cousin Josh. He absolutely thinks Josh is "THE MAN" and wanted to spend every second playing with him. Move over Grandma, Josh is in the house. :) You see, Ben has realized that Grandma and Grandpa have 3 other Grandkids to pay attention to now, so he has to find entertainment elsewhere when he can't access Grandma. He does, however, manage to manipulate "bathroom time" with Grandma and always gets books read to him until he falls fast asleep. The other three haven't taken that away.........yet.Here's Grandma reading to Ben. He didn't want me taking his picture, but I caught him at a funny part of the book when he wasn't expecting it. Lilly and Braden playing on the merry-go-round.

My ornery little snuggler! Braden hanging out with "Aunt MoMo."

Braden and Isaiah playing together in our room.

It's bubble time!

"Uncle" Dan with Benjamin.

Dan has always swooped in and loved and loved on the kids. He was always crazy about Ben when he was little, now Braden is filling Ben's "too big to be cuddled" shoes. This is usually the only time of the year we get to see Dan and Glenda so it is really nice to get to visit with them! They usually bring a boat down and take us out on rides and to go tubing. I used to love tubing but i think I'm getting too old (or too cautious) now. Maybe when the kids are excited about doing it I will get back into it again. Ben didn't even want to go out on the jet ski this year. I'm not sure why. Maybe b/c Daddy couldn't go b/c of his back. He didn't have any interest in riding on the boat or the jet ski, so I didn't even go down to the lake this year to ride on either. Truthfully I was enjoying just hanging out at the pool with the boys and the rest of the family.

Sam apparently has the touch with Braden. She put him on her lap and began to swing and Braden just layed there like it was nap time. Really, it was just after breakfast though. It was pretty cute! Braden and "Pa-Pa" go swimming. Sooooooooooooooo cute!!! Our little hoochie mama "Princess Lillian" sun bathing in her "spa." :) I just love this picture! The weather was perfect for us to swim! We spent a LOT of time in the pool over the weekend! When we weren't swimming, we were,........................well, what else--EATING. Isn't that what you do on vacation?

The "four muskateers" enjoy some breakfast together.

My Mom always puts together a craft for all the kids to participate in each year. This year we decorated t-shirts. It was a HUGE hit!!! Benjamin had a GREAT time decorating his. We had stencils and stamps and letter tracers. It was a hoot! I made one for Braden too and traced his hand on it to show the size of it.

Here are the finished products. It was waaaaaaaaaaaaay past Braden's bedtime and he had had

E N O U G H ! ! !

Our annual tradition of group shots: Grandkids My brother's family Us, including a very unwilling participant unfortunately.

My Mom and Dad.

Our view of the lake from our room is so pretty!

Our annual tradition of feeding the fish at the damn. It was challenging but we still didn't lose a kid in the water this year. I thought this would be the year, but no. Maybe next year. Ha!

Jer, Lilly and Isaiah at lunch on the way home. There is so much work behind the scenes that it takes to make this trip happen and it would not happen if it weren't for my Mom. For her, I am eternally grateful! These are trips that we will never forget and ones that we look forward to all year long! Grandma and Grandpa with the boys. Ben suckered Grandpa into making "the face" with him. What a sport! :)

~A weekend of memories!~

Fall Soccer

Ben saw the signs posted in our neighborhood advertising the fact that the fall session of soccer was quickly approaching. He immediately became excited and informed us that he REALLY wanted to play again. Andy looked at me with this very furrowed look and said, "I suppose that means I have to coach again." He still does not like soccer even with Ben playing and him coaching, but it's what Ben loves to do right now, so he is being very tolerant. He absolutely does not have the time to be coaching again especially since Ben moved up into U7 which means more players, bigger field, defender, goalie, etc. Ugggg! But after giving Ben the options of the other sports he could play right now, he chose soccer, so off to the soccer fields we go again. I personally love soccer and watching him play is a ton of fun for me, so I was secretly very glad he chose soccer. I am NOT looking forward to him playing football because I worry too much about him getting hurt, but their are risks with every sport, I know. The boys are outnumbered by the girls this session. They are an interesting bunch--all very different, but we're working with them. There is a set of twin girls on our team who are quite feisty but a ton of fun. Here one is being silly with Andy. Just last week, Amanda (one of the twins) fell at school and put a gigantic knot on her head. I asked her if she did it so that she would quit being called Ashley (her sister's name which she hates being called.) She looked at me really funny like, 'you have no idea what I've been through this week' (two trips to the emergency room) Having fun at half-time. Grandmas and Grandpa come to visit and watch Ben play. They are also helping to keep Braden under wraps while I help Andy by being his Assistant Coach this session.

World's of Fun with a Friend--August 11th

Andy's best friend Pat invited Andy and Ben to go out to World's of Fun with him and his daughter MacKinley on Aug. 11th. They met up for breakfast, then went for a long, HOT day of fun!

Just arrived!

The first thing they decided to ride was the Spinning Dragons. What???? you say? FIRST THING!??? Yep, that's what I said too, but hey, I wasn't there to try to talk them out of it. :) I wasn't invited. I'm still bitter about that by the way--just kidding--only a joke!

The look on MacKinley's face says it all in a nutshell here--"Um, Daddy, what exactly is this ride and what does it do? Um, I think I'll sit this one out......what?......I don't want to do this first!!!"

Nevertheless, they did survive and went about their day after much screaming and crying I hear. :) Next, onto something a little more their speed--the bumper cars....

...and the carousel... ...and the train... ...then onto "Camp Snoopy" to do a ton of rides there. They also went on the Viking Voyager and brought home a keychain photo to prove it. They all enjoyed getting wet on this near 100 degree day! When Ben got home, he peeled off his socks and shoes and I just had to take a picture of his poor wrinkled up feet. They had been wet for so long in his shoes! When he took them off he said, "AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!"