Beginning of Summer

Wow. It's been a while since I've posted. Time has really gotten away from me. I'm really going to make more of an effort to post several times a week. Where to start.......

Let's start with today. We are one week into summer vacation. So far Kaleb has bought Monsters vs. Aliens for the PlayStation 2. He is really enjoying it. I'm just thrilled to hear something other than Lego _________ (fill in the blank) come from the T.V. We have also signed up for the library program and gone to friends houses.

Today has been very busy but very fun. After the boys made me breakfast in bed today, (Kaleb brought me cereal and milk. Dante made me a peanut butter sandwich.) we got dressed and did our chores. Around 11 we went to the Rowe School Playground. It is quite hot today so it only took about 20 minutes of playing freeze tag before the 3 of us were soaked in sweat and wanting to leave.

It was feeling like an ice cream sort of day so we went to McDonald for lunch and ice cream. Between the lunch and ice cream the kids played on the McDonald's playground. I thought I would be fun to shoot up to Parham while we were out and get some rocks so we got our ice cream to go and headed towards West Paris. I had all the windows wide open because it was so hot and when we were on the stretch going 50 Dante started whining that his ice cream was melting. I kept telling him to lick it but he was getting really up set. Kaleb said he had ice cream every where so I pulled over and turned around.............The site sent me into gales of laughter. Yes, Dante's ice cream was very melty. In fact, he was covered from head to toe and so was his seat and the door next to him. The best way to explain how he looked is this. It looked like someone had taken a squirt bottle of ice cream and got Dante and everything surrounding him at point blank. Still smiling I wiped him up as best I could and promised him he would live.

Unfortunately when we got to Parhams they were closed. And not just we didn't come at the right time. They are closed for good. (At the beginning of July is their big close out sale. Everything must go.) This of course made Kaleb cry because he had apparently waited his whole life to go there and when he finally got the chance they were closed. Oh well. I told him we would come back during their sale at the beginning of July.

On the way home we stopped at the Elk farm. We had never gone before and were all shocked at how big the Elk were. The 3 of us just stood there for a really long time with our hands full of corn to afraid to walk up to the fence. Finally Kaleb gathered his courage and walked up to the fence and threw the corn into the trof. We stayed for a half hour or longer and by the end we were all picking large hands full of grass and letting them eat out of our hands.

Next we stopped at Snow Falls. Together we crossed the bridge. The falls were really churning and Dante was so excited. He was jumping up and down saying he had never seen a waterfall before in his life. Which I suppose is true. It was nice walking through the wooded area, past the picnic tables and big rocks. When we had walked as far as we could the kids put their hand in the water and splashed a little bit. Dante said he was being a water bender. A little ways out in the water were some white caps. Kaleb really wanted to stick his hands in that part of the water so I held onto his hand, he balanced on a rock and reached out........he got his hand in the water sure enough. The rock was a bit slick and he slipped off into the water getting his entire sneaker and quite a bit of his pant leg wet. He was a good sport about it though and laughed it off.

After that we felt the need to come home. I know how uncomfortable wet sneakers can be. So here we are. I'm writing this, Kaleb is playing Monsters vs. Aliens and Dante is building a ship out of Lego's while watching. It's looking like rain out, but if the rain holds off maybe we'll head down to the lake later. Here's hoping.

Happy Easter

Today was a very busy but wonderful day. After Church we went to my best friend's house for lunch and an Easter Egg hunt. Here are pictures of our day.

Shayla pushing Dante on the swing.

Matt pushing Jayda on the swing.


Kaleb in his Easter Suit.


Trying not to laugh.


Kaleb on the tire swing.


Wow is he ever growing up fast.


Still swinging.


Jen and Scott.


Jen and Martha.


Jayda finds an egg stuck to the ceiling.


Our Family picture.


Easter Eggs.


Elder Duval. What else can I say.


It looks like they are killing each other but they are only playing.


Dante's turn on the swing.


Funny faces.


Class clown?


Dante shows no mercy when eating peeps.


Always the center of attention.


Elder Campbell pushes Jayda on the swing.

Bento Box Night

A couple days ago I discovered Bento Boxes. I had never heard of them before but I was reading a women's blog and she kept ranting and raving about them, so I did a Google search. Kaleb and Dante thought that they were so cool that we decided to have "Bento Box Thursday". Now we have a food theme for every day of the week.

Sunday~ Pasta + Garlic Bread
Monday~ Extravagant Dessert Day
Tuesday~ Pick from the Box day. ( We have a list of food names in a hat, which ever one we pick is supper)
Wednesday~ Big Breakfast Day
Thursday~ Bento Boxes
Friday~ Pizza
Saturday~ Picnic Lunch Day

Anyway.....This is Thursday so I tried to make my very 1st Bento Box. I went with a Easter Theme. (You know....cuz it's almost Easter) Here are some pictures.

Kaleb ate everything on his plate. Dante ate everything except the bunny and duck. Anyway..... you really should do a Google search for Bento Boxes. It'll make you laugh at how pathetic this one is. I'll post more Bento Box Meals as I get better at making them.

Honest

This is a hard boiled egg that I squished into a snowman cookie mold than painted with food coloring.

Easter is on the Way

Today the boys and I decorate Easter eggs. Instead of the traditional way to dye eggs we made Chinese Tea Eggs.....minus the tea. We soaked the eggs in food coloring instead. Dante colored his egg yellow, Kaleb's was blue and mine was red. It was a lot of fun.

After taking the pictures we ate the eggs. Kaleb and I did anyway. Dante took one bite.....said he didn't like it, than proceeded to dissect it. Until he discovered the yoke he said "mmmmm, cheese." and ate it. He is so funny.

Just another day

Not much happened the last couple days. Today is my day to volunteer at Responsible Pet Care. I enjoy working there. I can just hang out and do my thing. (Plus the cats are to friendly.)

Gerrett is getting quite big. I won't be able to call him a baby for much longer. When I sit on the floor he likes to climb up my back and sit on my shoulder. It's really cute.

Crystal and I hung out at my studio yesterday for a while. We had fun talking about photography equipment.

I guess that's it............

We're covered in Ink.......

We just got done making thumb print people. It was a lot of fun. Perhaps we'll play swamp monster later. We might as well, our hands are purple. Dante and Kaleb make 2 pages, one for Uncle Mike and one for Aldrin. I just made one for Aldrin. Maybe I’ll make a thumb print city for Mike later. We can't mail them until tomorrow anyway.

Last night the kids and I played Doctor for the better part of an hour. I was the sick patient and the boys were the doctors. I was treated for every ailment I could think of from a cramp in my toe to appendicitis. I got a good reaction from the appendicitis complaint. I claimed to be in immense pain and wanted to go under. I didn't want to remember anything when I woke up. Dante grabbed a Lego and gave me a shot in my knee. Kaleb panicked, grabbed the phone and called for backup claiming he wasn't experienced in this type of operation. After explaining to Dante I wanted more than a local anesthetic he asked me to count backwards from 100 and gave me another shot in the knee. While being "under" I felt Kaleb give me a fake slice from my pelvic bone all the way to my collar bone. Upon waking I screamed in shock at the size of my scar. Over all we had an awful lot of fun.

Both boys were excellent at church today. This surprised me only because they lost an hour of sleep last night due to day light saving. I guess it didn't faze them. I'm so proud.

My dad set up a game on the computer called "Battle Chess". Kaleb played for over an hour. He is really getting into chess.

Here is a picture of Barker. Isn't she cute?

I guess that's all for today. Dante and I are going to go make some brownies before we start reading our new book. (We picked "My side of the mountain".)