A blustery day at the Zoo

The boys' preschool class went to the zoo yesterday. We had had 80 some degree weather the day before but a cold front blew through overnight with thunderstorms and it was only 40 some degrees at the zoo time but we went.

The boys were not so patient, they were more in a hurry to get to lunch but they made it through the zoo. They rode a camel and made faces at a tiger who kept coming to the glass to look at them. Matthew held his water bottle up to the glass to show a monkey who ran up and tried to grab it and they loved that!

The zoo has a new lion exhibit opening in June so we bought a family membership so we can go back more often this summer, hopefully during warmer weather!

We didn't stick it out for the group picnic lunch, we had a quick lunch in my car with Grandma and Papa and headed for the warmth of home and a Red Wings playoff game.

Go WINGS!!

A letter for Grandma Cindy

The other night Jonathan came to me and said he had written Grandma Cindy a letter because he missed her. How could I say no to that?? He had something in an envelope and it was all sealed so I didn't know what we were sending but I agreed. He wanted to address it himself so we spent awhile writing out her address and then he did his return address on the back side. It wasn't easy but he got it done and he was so proud.

Grandma Cindy called last night to say how happy she was to get the letter after a long day. She got rewarded by two boys who were eager to stall bedtime and actually spent quite a while filling her in on their day at the zoo and all they have been up to. It's a rare day that one of them, much less both, feel like talking for long on the phone so it was a real treat for Grandma.

We have a feeling that letter will be stored away safely somewhere and that Jonathan will see it again someday. Grandma Cindy is good with treasure keeping like that.

Summary of April

We're quite a bit behind here, sorry about that. Spring has sprung and things get busier and busier around here.

This month the boys have really been working on their bike skills and spending a lot of time cycling around the driveway and the house. They're getting ready for lots of bike rides this summer with Grandma Cindy and Papa Terry.

We've all been enjoying the warmer weather and spending time out in the yard, especially Hayley who is eager to catch any ball thrown for her.

We celebrated my birthday with a nice day for Mom. I had sweet presents from my boys and Jeff and Hayley too.

Grandma Kris and Papa Mark made their long-awaited return from a winter in Arizona. The boys were thrilled to see the coach pull up in our yard and eagerly took off to "help" Grandma and Papa go unpack a bit. The next day they went off for an adventure in Papa's little red car to try their hand at geocaching. No caches were found but the boys had a ball playing on a pile of snow they found in Duncan Woods. Hopefully, that is the last snow they will be able to play with this spring!

Last night they had a final birthday celebration with Papa, Grandma and Great Grandma and they had a cake that looked like a burger! They loved that.

A couple of weeks ago Jeff and I went to kindergarten orientation for the boys. We are still having trouble trying to decide if we should keep the boys together or separate them next year. There are pros and cons for each way and I have just resigned myself that no matter which way we choose it will be wrong in some way. Parenting is hard that way!

The boys are ready to go, they want to start school now and be on their way! The other morning I asked Matthew what he had for breakfast and he said, "French toast sticks mom and I had three of them, you know, the kind that is six minus three or two plus one"!!!

A short story....with a sad ending

Once upon a time two boys had a birthday and this was their cake. Then, the boys and their guests went swimming and bowling and when they came home they found this:


And this is their dog:


And the boys are NOT happy with the dog. The dog has a tummy ache and is not getting much sympathy in this house tonight.

A few misc. pictures to get caught up

The nice thing about having no floors was we could dye eggs in the living room with no worries.

The boys went to their first hockey game a few weeks ago, we saw the Muskegon Fury play.

They are learning how to dive from the side of the pool into the deep end, getting pretty confident at that skill now.

There is also a picture of what happens when you let Jonathan pick out his own outfit. Quite the mix.

Happy Birthday FIVE year olds!!

I cannot believe my little boys are five years old!! They are so ready to be five, ready to go to school and learn new things. They got their registration packets for elementary school the day before their birthday and they have hearing/vision tests coming up.

We had a quiet birthday for them. They were off school so we had a fun day at home and went out for a family dinner. We went and got them haircuts afterwards.

The next day they had a beach party at school so the boys brought cupcakes and ice cream cups for their class and got to help pass them out. The teachers were nice enough to take a few pictures for us.

This weekend they have their birthday party with family and have asked for a bowling party so we'll be off to do that.

The BEST part of the boys' birthday was that our house is officially finished!! I am so happy to be done with paint and dust and mess and back to normal.

Happy Easter

It's not feeling much like Easter around here, we are under a Winter Storm Warning and have about 5 inches of snow on the ground and it's still snowing heavily.

Jeff had to go to Flint this week for work and I have a sinus infection so the boys went along with him and had an adventure with Grandma Cindy and Papa Terry for a couple days. They went to the Flint Children's Museum and are still talking about the fun they had.

Today, we decided their beloved blankets aka the "kikis" needed a bath. It was long overdue but the boys don't like them washed because then they don't smell good. They actually LIKE the dog fur on them too. Anyway, Jonathan burst into tears when he discovered the blankets were in the washing machine. He was upset because "it wouldn't smell like Grandma Cindy's house anymore....and that's a good smell mom!"

Thanks for the fun Grandma and Papa!

The rest of the flooring arrived Wednesday and will be installed on Monday!! Once that is in and the trim is done we will be DONE with house renovations for now. We can't wait to put things back where they belong and be done with the mess.

It will be a quiet Easter here, I am working so the boys and Jeff will be on their own. We're aiming to keep it a quiet celebration as we are gearing up for the big FIVE party this week! I cannot believe my babies are already five. I swore I was not going to tell them when they turned five so they wouldn't but the darn kids learned when their birthday is on their own!

The boys are going to help me make cupcakes for their classmates. They are having a beach party the day they go back to school which will be when they celebrate their birthday so that worked out nicely. I found cute pinwheels to put on the top of the cupcakes.

The big family party is later to come next week and we are happy to see the weather is supposed to warm up a bit by then too.

Happy Easter everyone!!

A few pics from the last post

Busy week

The boys helped our awesome friends putting the new flooring in. They are hiding where the fridge goes and supervising. Hayley is seriously depressed now because the new flooring is very slippery for her, poor thing.

They are loving their new Y classes and played floor hockey this week. They are also learning how to dive into the deep end of the pool and swim to the side to get back out. Pretty amazing to see how well they take to it. Their mom never learned how to dive, never could keep my head down!

The boys also went to our friend Claudia's first birthday party today and had a great time. They had monster sized pieces of cake!! Happy birthday cutie girl!

Blogger won't let me upload pictures right now so I will try again later.

Please keep one of our Sgt's sons in your prayers, he had a terrible car accident last night and is badly hurt. We're sending good prayers and wishes.

Matthew

Here is Matthew feeling well:


Here is Matthew today, with a fever and sore throat:


It's very sad, poor little guy. He hasn't moved off the couch or spoken many words today. How long until the rest of us get it?? Ugh.

March comes in with a MESS!

Well, it may be March but winter shows no sign of letting us go. We have had 115 inches of snow this winter, 52 in the month of February alone! Thankfully, we have had some good thaws or we would be in a real mess.

The house project is moving along, slowly. The painting is 90% done now and should be done tomorrow. The dining room green proved to be a challenge. The first paint we picked (which was supposed to be a pale sage green) looked like mint chip ice cream green so we went a shade darker and achieved sour apple green and not the look we were going for at all! I went to Menards for the 10th time for the week Thursday night determined not to leave until I found the right green and not believing much in myself and my choices. I found a green. It's not exactly what we were looking for but it's pretty and it will work. Jeff and I painted it ourselves, I didn't have the heart to ask our friend Sue who has been doing the painting to do a third color! We are now re-evaluating the art and things we had hanging on the walls and what we want to go back up and what we don't. It's nice to have all fresh walls where there are no holes from ourselves or the previous owners to worry about.

Flooring is another subject. The bath/laundry room floor we chose is a vinyl tile and it has been installed although no trim yet. At least we have laundry facilities back and the toilet is out of my pantry closet where it was temporarily stored, it was NOT a good look. The wood flooring for the rest of the first floor has been delayed and is scheduled to arrive in NY on a boat on St. Patricks day and then ship to Michigan. Please keep your fingers crossed we can get this installed before the boys' birthday party on the 29th! We are living on particle board floors and it is messy and ugly and tough to keep the boys in slippers or shoes so we don't get splinters.

Grammy came to visit this week to help us out because Grandma Kris's mom passed away. Jane was a very nice lady and we were all very sad to lose her. Jeff really wanted to travel to the funeral in southeast Ohio to be with Kris and his dad so Grammy came to help us out. She took the boys to Crazy Bounce, again, and to their first new swim class. They have been moved up a level. She helped with letting in drywall guy, paint people, flooring, etc. Thanks Grammy!! Hayley is still annoyed she had to go to doggy daycare during the day two days while paint was going on. We chose to not have dog fur texture in the fresh paint. Hayley says next time Grammy is here we send the boys to doggy daycare and let her stay with Grammy! The dog has been doing these great, exaggerated, huge sighs all week letting us know her displeasure with all this mess and upheaval. Poor dog, tough life.

It was a big week for great grandmas, other than the sad news about Grandma Jane. Grandma Niecey turned 91 yesterday and Great grandma K turned 81 this week. The boys wanted to know what kind of theme they had for their parties, LOL.

Matthew is running a fever today out of the blue, nothing but the fever. Please don't let this go downhill, we've had enough sickies. The boys did start their new class at the Y yesterday, it's called Kickball, Gymnastics and Floor Hockey and will alternate between the sports. They loved it. The Y has turned out to be a great deal for all of us and the boys have been taking 2 or 3 classes each session. We are looking into sending them to the Y for afternoons when they start school this fall.

Love and hugs to Grandma Kris, we know she is hurting and will deeply miss her Momma. She was a wonderful lady and we enjoyed getting to spend time with her the last few years when she came to visit.

More pictures from the last post...

We have survived the storm and come out of the fog now....

Jonathan started the worst sickness we have dealt with in this house in a long time. He had the fever and cough first, then Matthew, then Jeff and, finally, me. When we fell, we fell HARD!! It was a loooooooong week around here but we made it. The boys are still on meds for double ear infections but feeling fine.

We got the house cleaned up from the mess and began a new mess today as we started ripping out all of the floors in the kitchen, dining room, living room, hallways, and bath/laundry room. New paint will come next and then, someday soon we hope, the new floors will be installed. Papa Terry and Grandma Cindy are here helping with the work this weekend.

The boys got out for some play in the snow today. We have had snow, more snow, more snow. We are sick of snow!!! For a change we are having freezing rain tomorrow, followed by three days of more snow. Ugh.

The boys did make it back in time for their Valentine's Day party at school. They were determined to not miss that. We did miss Jeff's birthday in the middle of the sickness. Poor guy had to drag two sick kids to pick up his own birthday cake we had ordered (I was still at work) and then we were all too sick to even eat it. What a sad day. We'll make it up to him.

Breaking news!!

THIS JUST IN......


IN THE WORLD ACCORDING TO JONATHAN:

IF YOU GO OUTSIDE AT NIGHT AND THE GROUNDHOG SEES YOUR SHADOW...



ONLY SIX MORE WEEKS UNTIL CHRISTMAS!!


Who knew???

Thank you Mark

I play a game at night with the boys sometimes when they are in bed where I ask questions about what their favorite things are (i.e. foods, movies, books, games) and I learn alot about them this way and they love playing.

We had a particularly scary 911 incident last weekend and while the boys didn't know the whole story they knew our friend Mark was involved. He's a K9 deputy here.

When I asked Matthew who his favorite superhero was I was expecting him to say Batman, he's infatuated with Batman these days.

He didn't hesitate and answered Mark.

I told him that Mark wasn't a superhero and he came right back at me.

"Yes he is, he saves real people everyday!"

We thanked Mark for being such a great hero for little boys to look up to, he said we made his day too.

Happy belated Birthday Aunt Mary Anne!

Jonathan insisted on writing his own happy birthday card to his favorite aunt. I love his picture and please notice how he signed his name perfectly.....BACKWARDS!!

Oh my!

So the other day Jeff was out of town, it was cold and rainy and not much to do so the boys and I packed up and went to a McDonald's playland. There was a cute little blonde three year old girl there with her dad and we had the place to ourselves. The boys were really nice, including her in their games and letting her play with them.

Jonathan followed her at one point and said, "Could I please have your phone number?"!!!!!

And then, a short time later Matthew got his chance.

"We're leaving soon," he said, "do you think I could have a hug and a kiss before we go?".

I think her Dad was happy I packed the boys up and left, the poor man was chuckling but also a bit pale.

Winter is here

Snow, snow and more snow. We have had a snowy week and more snow coming down now. We caught a brief sunset the other night at the beach, the channel is frozen and the lake is freezing out about to the end of the pier now. Very pretty. Sure makes beach days seem far, far away though.