Backyard fun!

When we were looking for our house, we had some criteria for what we wanted, how many bedrooms, etc... but above those on our "list" were the backyard criteria. We already had a house that we liked, but we wanted a BIG yard with a pool. This is not an easy thing to find. It's not incredibly hard in this area to find a pool- but most of the pools we saw were right outside the backdoor (boo) and left very little yard to play in beyond that.

So when we found this house, we were sold. We've had big plans for the yard, and it is coming together a little this year. We are having lots of fun!

Jon especially loves to be outside. He cries if you go out without him or when he has to come back inside. To bad I can't just let him roam free out there, he would be in heaven!

Chris is funny, he loves to play outside, but he gets tired of it and "too warm"... well it is in the 90's and wayyy humid lately, so I guess it's understandable.

In June, we finally decided on the perfect playset. We'd been shopping around, considering all the options and finally decided on one. Dave was ready to hire someone to put it together, but then he and his dad decided that it would be a fun project. But it took FOREVER. Each step was tedious and they didn't have a whole lot of time in the evenings to work on it, so it came along slowly... after a while Dave said we should look into hiring someone... that next week our new lawn guy was mowing for the second time and had obviously noticed the playset that wasn't getting very far since his last visit. He told me that they also put those together for people, so we went ahead and hired them, and they started that afternoon. The next day, it was done! The boys were so excited, they LOVE it!

Lots of swinging and playing...

We had to call and tell Daddy all about it...

The same week, we also FINALLY got our pool open for the summer... better late than never! There were some problems with the water, and the dang pool store people are USELESS sometimes. They had us do several different things for some stains on the fiberglass, and just screwed the water up. We finally hired someone to come out and fix it, and after a couple of weeks it was ready. We are loving it. Our new routine on most nights is to swim from dinner till bedtime.

When we aren't in the big pool (that would be during the daytime- no way can I take them all swimming alone at these ages) they are loving the little pools. We got an inflatable spraying crazy pool for the boys (which I would not recommend, it is not designed well!) and this little wading pool that Jon could play in for hours! Such fun and it keeps us from roasting in this muggy heat.

Yeah, it's a party in our backyard, who wants to come and play?!?

Our Fourth of July

I'm catching up, slowly :) On the fourth, we went out to Point Mallard in the morning to the "Spirit of America" festival which was rather disappointing. Not that much going on. It was probably better in the evening. But the kids liked the bouncy stuff!

This bouncy castle with a slide was their favorite and the best one for their size. They went down that slide over and over and over.

Jon just wanted to walk all over the place...

In the evening, we headed to Grandma and Grandpa's house for water fun, grilling, and fireworks. Jon loved the little pool. We got him his own the next week for his birthday.

Ethan didn't want anything to do with the water...

Nicole and Chris having fun in the bigger pool. By the time we got over there (after naps) the pools were nasty full of grass, but Chris didn't mind.

They also had a sprinkler set up to spray on the slide and a slip-n-slide at the bottom, so the kids would just fly down and across the slip-n-slide. So funny. Chris loved it, he did it over and over.

Jon found his new favorite toy at Grandma's. He loves push around toys. This little ride-on looked like it converted, so I checked it out and sure enough (he's not into the ride-ons quite yet) it popped up into this funny pusher. Carole thought it was so funny that she's had this toy for years and never knew it popped up like that...

It came in handy later that week when I wanted to go to a hair appointment and leave Jon. Thus far, Jon has not been good about being left with other people. He's only been left with one other person (one time) besides Daddy. We got to Grandma's and he started pushing this thing around the house and didn't even know I was gone for 2+ hours. Yay!

The kids get together and run wild. They have so much fun together. This is when they all came downstairs for the "big parade". Jeanne had the idea for one, since there are enough kids for it!

The little dancer posers ("take my picture!")

And the parade. Dress-up on, wagons loaded, wave to the people!

Then some fireworks even though it wasn't remotely dark yet... once it got dark we headed over to the Dexter's business parking lot for some more big ones. That was fun too. The kids all loved the fireworks. None of mine were scared of any of it. I think the only scaredy was Kenzie (a little?)

Jon just wanted to wander all over. He seems to like the grass okay, but loves the concrete for some reason. He always makes a beeline for it, and this day he scraped up his toe and it was bleeding, and he was so mad at me for not letting him go back onto the sidewalk.

Awww, brother love...

And then the rest of the babies... lots of babies around this family. Everyone has had one in the past year.

The newest, Peter

Jacob

and Ethan

What a fun day with the family! We are definitely grateful the freedoms we enjoy!

¡Feliz Cumpleaños!

With three birthdays within three weeks (Chris', mine, Jon's) we went ahead and just threw one big bash with the family. Of course, in my usual fashion, I was less prepared than I should have been (and tried to do way too much) and it was a bit chaotic on my part.... Unfortunately, this time that meant that I got almost NO pictures of the night. Bummer, because it was kind of a cute party. You'll just have to imagine with me...

We had a FIESTA complete with a taco/burrito bar. Shredded beef and chicken, tortillas, and all the fixin's (wayyyy too much of course, the usual). Along with delicious homemade Spanish rice and cheesy refried beans. I totally have been craving GOOD Mexican food (haven't been impressed by the selection here) and it was so good.

(something like this)

We ate out back under the big tree and the kids gorged themselves on Tortilla chips and queso dip and ran wild on the partially built swingset.

Later we opened presents and broke open the pinata. Chris chose the pinata, can you tell? I found these pull-ribbon ones at Party City- a lot cheaper and no kids are swinging a stick around? Perfect. So each kid gets to pull on a ribbon, and one of them randomly pulls open the hatch to release the loot. Only problem for us was that it released on the second pull. Not so fun for the other kids, but they forgot pretty quickly when they saw the little toys and candy all over the floor!

Then, on to cakes! Christopher chose chocolate with chocolate icing and chocolate ice cream (naturally).

Jon had his own little banana cake with whipped cream. He was intrigued by this thing...

Stuck his fingers in it, checked it out, tasted a little...

and shared some with Daddy...

A better response then we got from Chris when he turned one...

More like the reaction from Ben at his first birthday...

Look at these beautiful boys of mine, I feel so very blessed! It's hard to believe how much they are growing... where did my babies go?

I did make a third cake (see, did WAY too much) for me since it was my party too. It was a peach cake, similar to one my mom makes, but I didn't use her frosting recipe. It was a buttery yellow cake (three layers) with really good buttercream icing with peaches in it. I was in a hurry mixing the icing and totally messed it up. I had a hard time because the frosting wouldn't go on the sides (which is probably why my mom makes it as a sheet cake!) But anyway, later when we cut the cakes, I thought I should see if it tasted good, even though it looked pretty bad. Oh man, it was SO good. It was a hit with the family too. I'll have to experiment with that one and find a way to make it pretty too!

In all, it was total chaos, chatter, laughter, noise, delicious food, and a huge mess. Awesome. We'll have to do this again next year ;) Actually, maybe next year we'll just throw one big bash since our birthdays all fall in a three month span. Thanks everyone for coming and partying with us!

A new beachy look...

I have a lot of catching up to do, but first, a new look for the blog! Summer is in full swing around here, and we are having lots of fun!