Scrapbook Pages

After staying home Tuesday with the boys, I went to bed and Mark woke me up at 10:50 pm saying Matthew had just gotten sick (ugh!) At least this time he kept it contained on the bed so a quick change of the bed and we were all back to sleep. So, for tracking purposes, that was once on 3/15, once at a baseball game (weather related), and once on 7/24.

I went to work Wednesday, but Mark was still pretty tired. By the time I got home last night, Matthew was pretty wiped out and did not look well (although he ate a normal breakfast and lunch). After dinner, he lost it in the other direction (sorry, how else do you say this?)


Matthew was tired, but in an effort to keep them busy until bedtime, the boys and I picked out their favorite memory/photo from summer so far and they created their first scrapbook pages. They chose the paper colors and cut the zig-zag edge with special scissors. They also did their own journaling with some spelling help from mom. I thought they turned out terrific and daddy was really surprised by their creations. Andrew had a whole story to go with his dinosaur stickers..."the black footprint is really the pink dinosaur who stepped under the palm tree to avoid running into the big green dinosaur who is the father of the baby dinosaur in the egg who is going to be yellow with green spots like his mom when he grows up."

Unplanned Day Off

Oh jees, you're sick and need me to stay home from work to spend an entire day with the boys? Sign me up!

Mark has not been feeling well since we ate dinner at Carraba's on Sunday night. He had shrimp and scallops which tasted fine, but by Monday noon, he couldn't keep his breakfast down. So by the time I got home from work yesterday he was not well at all. He has pretty much been in bed the entire time.

The boys and I convinced our neighbor Stacey and her kids to go to Burger King with us for dinner last night (the boys request, not mine). They have been really good today and took their own list of items to the grocery store and helped unload the cart at the check out.

We've had lunch, done laundry, played outside, watched a little TV, and now they have convinced me we need to have Pistachio Pudding Salad for dessert tonight. This was one of my favorite recipes of my mom's when I was a kid and they really enjoyed it when I made it a couple of months back. Hoping to get some scrapbook time in while they are resting and then we are going to try to get dad to eat dinner tonight.

Mom's New Look

I have been threatening my hair for 2 months now and yesterday was the last straw! I had 5 inches cut off the back and it cut 15 minutes off my getting ready time today. I am so much happier, should have done it months ago.

To avoid the chlorine turning my hair green today, I stayed out of the pool, but we all went for a couple of hours this afternoon and had a great time. It's only in the mid-80's here today with no humidity so it was actually chilly getting out of the pool.

Matthew has figured out how to do handstands and somersaults in the pool. He was really proud of himself today as he can do 3 somersaults in a row without coming up for air. After swim, they had some goldfish for a snack and I caught a couple of photos worth sharing...

Nothing else exciting going on this weekend, the weather was terrific both days. We had another estimate done to replace/cap the wood around our garage doors and windows on the front of the house. I helped our neighbor with some digital scrapbook stuff and she and her 8 year old daughter stayed for lunch yesterday. Cleaned house today and relaxed this afternoon. Hope you all had a nice weekend too!

Earning their keep/1st Internet Purchase

Mark and I have been encouraging Matthew and Andrew to help out around the house this summer. They have been doing a good job keeping their toys picked up and Mark has them helping to clean the house. Matthew is great with the vacuum cleaner and Andrew cleans a mean toilet (yes, he enjoys it with the new 'brush-n-flush'). Most often these jobs gain them $.50 or so and the quarters have been piling up in their piggybanks - - so much so that the quarters were "burning a hole".

The boys have been talking up a couple of the Star Wars Transformers that they really want (General Grievous' Wheel Bike and Emperor Palpatine's Imperial Shuttle). Last Friday, they saw them at the store and Mark noted the price of each. They still had quarters to earn to have enough to purchase the toys, so all last weekend, they were looking for jobs to do. We looked on the internet to see if the price Mark remembered was correct and we wanted to explain the concept of Sales Tax to the boys so they had enough money for the purchase. On the internet, we found each toy for $9.99 which was less than our local KMart. Mark and I agreed that they could order them online and mom & dad would pay for them as long as they paid us back. Standard Shipping was $5.49 for both so we had a 20 minute conversation that Mom & Dad would cover the cost of shipping if they could wait 7-10 days for ground shipping (v. emptying all the money from their banks for an extra $2.25 per toy) - still cheaper overall than the local store.

We placed the order on Saturday and today the box arrived! (Glad Hasbro Toys is located in Mechanicsville, PA). Mark brought the box in and saved it for after dinner but we agreed it was best to put it out on the porch so we could catch the reaction...here you get to see Andrew in full verbal animation mode with a little sibling rivalry mixed in for good measure. "Good night General Grievous, Good night Emperor Palpatine, glad to have you home!" Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=65NlpC04_7M

Introducing...

Darth Vadar and General Grievous!

Well, ok, it's Matthew and Andrew in their new Star Wars capes. I think the Thomas T-shirts are a nice touch (?). Thanks for the sewing tip mom, they turned out great!

Gymnastics

So Andrew has asked on several occasions if he could take gymnastics classes. Mark called around on Friday and found a place in Annapolis called 1st Class Gymnastics (http://www.1stclassgym.com/). They offer open gym on Friday and Saturday nights (aka babysitting while the parents go out to dinner). The boys were excited about it so we dropped them off at 6:30 pm and picked them up around 9:30 (they stay open until 10:30 pm).

There were 5 coaches (aka high school and college students who love gymnastics) and they had structured time and non-structured time plus a snack. It is a very nice place and there were probably 25 kids there last night. The owner told us some nights in the winter they have 65-80 kids there in the evening (guess we will find something else to do in the winter)! They really had a great time, here are a few photos of the boys...

OH HAPPY (SAD) DAY!!!

Tonight we passed one of the major milestones of childhood...learning to ride a bike! Wednesday night we let them push Shark bike with their feet and no pedals/no training wheels to get their balance. It was the best thing we have ever done (thanks to the article at the local bike store for that tip). Andrew has been asking all day to put the pedals back on the bike. So after dinner, Mark put the pedals on and we took the bike out behind our house.

Here is Matthew's first ride...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9_tTLznsh_c

And Andrew's first ride...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cvkJZCshFnw

Mark and I were stunned at both of them - they took off the first time like they had been doing it for years and they were so very proud of themselves. They took turns riding Shark bike for awhile and then Mark decided to take the training wheels off of Tonka bike and Matt rode it the rest of the night. Here is a video of Matthew on Tonka bike...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_-C3JpoLOI

They were riding together on the path, passing on the right, riding around the big circle, and trying not to run over the neighbor's overly-friendly cat. We did have a few incidents of running into parked bikes, trees jumping out in front of the path, and invisible bushes, but no harm done except one splinter for Matthew. As we were taking the bikes back to the garage, our neighbors came home with their kids and extended family so the boys had to show off their new skills on the sidewalk to a large round of applause.

What a bittersweet evening - new skills for the kids and same old tears for the parents watching them grow up.

Happy Birthday Cheryl!

In honor of Aunt Cheryl's birthday today, the boys decided it was time to try Shark bike without pedals and without training wheels!

Andrew went first and he is really good at keeping his balance (and he only said "I'm scared" once!) Matthew went second and he moves the handle bars around more than Andrew, but after a few tries, he got the hang of it. By the end of the night, they were both keeping their feet up around the down hill portion of the circle in our back yard and they also rode down the front sidewalk without putting their feet down. A couple more days of this and I think we will put the pedals back on Shark bike. Here is a video of each:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NaZ3yhkvXM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zPooTupZFXg

We went out for dinner at a new Mexican restaurant right down the street from our house. We have been waiting for months for it to open...only to find out it is owned by the same family that runs the Mexican restaurant by the airport. The food is good, but just good, not great so we were a little disappointed. We hear there is a new one opening about 15 minutes away, so we will have to check that out as well.

Aunt Cheryl, we hope you have had a great birthday today and we hope to see you soon!

More Slide Appreciation

Our unplanned "Slide Appreciation Week" continues tonight. Tuesday nights are library nights in our house and we split up (one week Matt goes, one week Drew goes). Our library has a cool website where you can see all the materials you've checked out, renew online, and search the county wide library system (they will move the book to your local library for pick up). Maybe this is typical of all libraries now, it's just been awhile for me.

So tonight was Daddy and Drew's night to go. Before they left, I looked for "sliding" books at our local library and we found this gem about a "way too dapper dad who takes his twins to the playground"... Should make for fun story time tonight.

National Slide Appreciation Week

Nah, just kidding, but it seems we have a theme going this week. Check out the new toy at the pool... This photo is after Andrew (in green) started the evening with his "It's too scary!" routine and wouldn't even put his face in the water. Dad, watch out for that foooooooot! After two runs on the slide, Andrew went back to swimming with his mask and decided he might try the slide again later in the season. :-) Sorry for the fuzzy photos, it was getting dark and the subjects were moving too fast!

New Addition

In case you are interested, I have added a section to the blog of other blogs that I find interesting. Today I have added the blog site of "Desert Candy" and if you look back to Wednesday, July 4th, there is a recipe for sticky buns that I think I am going to have to try. If nothing else, she does a great job photographing food and it makes me hungry!

*I am not responsible for the content you get into from searching other blogs. Mine is family friendly, others are not.

Slip Slidin' Away!

Hey, who sent this extra hot weather anyway????!!!! So after the boys helped clean the house this morning, we broke out the Batman Slip-n-Slide from Uncle Corwyn. Or should we call it the Messin-Up-Your-Yard-Slide? (Now I know why mom used to love these things when I was a kid). I started to say it's just good, clean, fun...but then after about 10 runs on the slide, the dirt turns to mud and it becomes a Mud Slide! Uh, dad...the slide is for little kids you know! (He was under great duress to do this since mom had to take the first run down the slide in her t-shirt and sweats to get Andrew out of "I'm Scared" mode!) Overall, the slide had the desired effect - two napping bears! Thank you Uncle "Trouble"!!!

Matthew's New Bike

Update: Blogger Help suggests that many folks are having issues with the title bar and it is related to IE. One kind gentleman, named "Wasted" suggested that you move your cursor slightly above the title block and it would work. Maybe you have to be "Wasted" to figure it out - sure enough he was right.

For whatever reason, my blog is not functioning correctly. When creating a new post, it won't allow me to put a title on the entry. So for now you will have to live without.

"Bikes"

We have been talking for awhile about the need to get Andrew a new bike and get him off the circus bike (which he dearly loves) that is way too small for him. Instead of getting him a new bike, we got a new, slightly larger bike for Matt (Spark Plug) and Andrew is now the official owner of Tonka bike. And believe it or not, Andrew was thrilled for Matthew to get a new bike - no fuss! Here's a photo of Matt on his new bike and some other shots from late yesterday afternoon.
Classic Andrew face! Matthew's natural smile.Andrew gives the big Thumbs UP for Tonka bike!

Color Printer

Well, we came back from vacation and I tried to print a few photos to take to the Scrapbook Convention (another blog soon) and my trusty Epson printer was not printing the colors correctly. I gave up and a week later I went back to it (after the power had gone out in the house) and the darn thing is dead. The power light will come on, the ink carrier moves about 1/2 inch, then it shuts down. I have tried everything to no avail, so off to the internet I go. I decided several years ago to buy the Epson $99 printers as they last about two years and then the print head goes out (so to be exact, this is my third printer since we have lived in Maryland so it's a little less than 2 years each).

If any of you haven't tried pricegrabber.com, I highly recommend it for electronics shopping. You get comparison pricing, side by side comparison of specs, user and expert reviews. Love it! The Epson store had free gound shipping, so I guess I will wait a few days.

The Gathering Place

Our house/driveway/yard/section of the street has become the informal gathering place on the 4th of July for all folks on the block who don't make the hike to DC or Baltimore. Last night we went out around 8:20 pm after the thunderstorm passed. First it was the neighbors down the street, then the neighbors next door, then across the street, then around the corner (Matt's reading specialist for 1st grade) and before we knew it, there were 25 kids and adults at our house. Next time I guess I should have some food and drinks available!

With everyone bringing their own fireworks along (including one large illegal aerial from Pennsylvania that rained sparks on our house), the finale kicked off at 10:35 pm! The boys got to bed at 11 pm, and Mark and I crashed at 11:30. This is the latest we have ever let the boys stay up. Luckily, they took a nap yesterday afternoon and again today, so they made a nice recovery. The boys are very comfortable with the sparklers this year and had a good time playing with the other kids. The neighbors brought out a large citronella candle so the kids could light their own sparklers.

Just so my brother isn't the only one in our family to create a fire hazard... I will mention that we had a little post festivity fire in the street. In the haste to get everything cleaned up at 10:45, the guys put all of the spent cannisters (minus the last 3 or 4 that were still hot) into 3 large garbage bags. Mark had planned a trip to the dump today anyway because Wednesday is our trash pick up day and there wasn't any trash pick up because of the holiday. The three garbage bags were left at our curb and 10 minutes later our doorbell rang. It was our neighbor Mr. Pete from across the street and he was holding a fire extinguisher. Apparently one of the trash bags had caught fire and he came over to put it out. No big deal, glad we didn't have our SUV parked nearby! The worst part is that while we were picking up, we were sharing the story of Corwyn melting his van in the driveway...

Here are a few photos, enjoy!

Andrew in his best light saber fighting pose!

Happy 4th of July!

We are waiting out a thunderstorm between snappers and snakes and the real stuff so I thought I would post a photo or two. Hope you are all having fun on the 4th!

Pamper Dad Weekend

Well, we finally did it! The boys and I have been trying to host a Pamper Dad weekend for months now and with nothing on the agenda for the weekend, we did a pretty good job of taking care of dad. Our weekend started with a trip to the store on Friday night for all of the planned meals. I got up Saturday morning and walked the dog while Mark slept in 'til 8:30. Andrew was excited that daddy was the "last one up!" After breakfast, dad completed his only job of the weekend - putting the bike rack and bikes on the back of our car. Before we left the house, the boys took their first turn at walking rider dog. This was hysterical as you can see all the paraphenalia they had to take with them...clipboard with paper and pencil to write down all their jobs, poop bag (not that they would use it), dog on leash, and a walkie-talkie in case they needed help. Midway through the walk, Andrew reported "liquid coming out" and Mark and I nearly lost it in the kitchen. Play by play! At one point in the afternoon, they walked Rider again and the following Walkie-Talkie exchange took place: "Andrew, where are you now?", "In the front yard", "Ok, well take Rider down to the bushes and let me know if you need help", "Uh, we can't, he won't move!" I run to the front window to see Rider dog sprawled out in the front grass - just testing the boys to see if they knew what to do :-)


Around noon we headed to Quiet Waters Park in Annapolis. Here we are at our picnic lunch.

This is a good time to talk about the blue cooler on the table. This was a gift from Cheryl and Gary when we lived in Hawaii and it has gone everywhere with us. It was fabulous at the beach as we put frozen water bottles in as ice and then by early afternoon we had cold drinking water. What a terrific investment by Cheryl and Gary!

So after lunch, we picked a trail and took off on our bikes. The boys are enjoying riding bikes although we have to invest in a new bike for Matthew so Andrew can get the hand-me-down. Andrew looks like a circus performer on his little bike - I think his legs make 50 revolutions for one of ours. This was the flattest part of the ride and as Andrew was tiring out, we headed for the huge playground at the park.

The boys love to swing and run around, but we were all fascinated by the fallen tree that Matthew found beside the playgound. This tree must have been over 100 feet tall and as it fell through the woods, it scraped the bark off of several other trees. The roots were huge and we couldn't believe it just pulled out of the ground.

After the bike ride we piled in the car and got home around 4 pm. I had planned to make bow-tie pasta for dinner, but Andrew loves the Mezzaluna at Carraba's (moon shaped ravioli filled with chicken, ricotta, and spinach - aka "parsley"). So I cheated on Pamper Dad Weekend and we went out for dinner. Mark relaxed the rest of the night while I ran soccer drills and got the boys to bed.

Sunday I got up and walked the dog and then made Heath Bar Coffee Cake (yum!) http://www.thatsmyhome.com/hannahs/cofcake/heath.htm, ham and veggie cream cheese pinwheels (thumbs down from everyone but mom), blueberry yogurt with granola, and fresh squeezed orange juice. Mark was the last one up again with a new record - 9 am! We were so stuffed from breakfast we didn't really want lunch but we stopped to get a quick bite to eat at the mall food court (new taco place that almost tastes like Taco Villa in Topeka) and then we went to see Ratatouille. Very funny movie!!! The previews went on for 25 minutes, so we didn't leave the theater until 4:25 pm, ugh!

I made Pork Chops Marsala and mushroom stuffing for dinner. After that, I took the boys to the tot lot and listened to some lady complain about how she hasn't registered her daughter for kindergarten and had no idea what to do (finally figured out she really wants her daughter to stay home with her forever and doesn't want her to ride the bus). Maybe she should consider home schooling?!?

All in all, a great weekend. Mark had to skip golf as he strained his neck getting the bikes/rack off the car.