Backyard Beach

We are still early into the summer and I am quickly learning just how hard it is to entertain a 2 year old. I bow down to all you super moms who stay home with your children each day. I love spending time with Ashe, but it is difficult to keep him occupied. I just can't wear him out like a bunch of 2 year olds can. So this weekend we cleaned out and refilled the sand and water table. Nick pasted down some small plastic toys like fish, and sea animals for the water side and dinosaurs and snakes to hide in the sand part.
I was lucky enough to sit with a book in the warm sun, while he quickly mixed the two sides together. Luckily these hot Florida days evaporated the water and I just scooped the sand back over to the correct side and refilled the water the next day.

Full of Favorites

It's so funny that Ashe has favorite things, for such a little person. (He's no longer a baby but a little kid.) Some of his favorites are... favorite song (If Your Happy and You Know It), favorite beverage (Apple Juice), favorite movie (Toy Story), and his newest thing is that Green is his favorite color. He doesn't care what it is as long as it's green. So today, on the last day of VBS, I stopped with the boys for some Italian Ice at Rita's. He had to have the green one, of course it was green apple and quite tart/sour . I knew he wouldn't like it, I even had him try it while we were there. He insisted that the Ice must be green. We got home and he took one bite and told me he was done. I even tried to get him to drink the melting ice, with a green straw.

Oh my, another toddler phase.

Bat Cave?

A big THANK YOU to Ms. Lynn for passing on this super cool toy box. Ashe loves it, of course we should be putting toys in it and NOT children. Since Ashe is all boy, one of the things he loves is superheroes. He is now pretending that his new toy box is the bat cave.

Move over Batman because...

This appears to be a regular toy box...

... but really there is a super cute (but equally scary) biter living inside.

Ashe can scale tall buildings.

He can trap bad guys with his super evil strength.

(In this picture, poor Nick was trap inside under Ashe's power!

Not to worry, I did save him after the photo opportunity.)

I guess this is what kids do on rainy Florida afternoons.

I hope it's not just my strange kids.

Story Time

Ashe loved looking at the books, while mommy picked out some take home stories.

Today while Nick was at VBS, Ashe and I spent some time at the library enjoying story time. Ashe loved all the interactive stories and the dancing. We ended up picking up some fun bedtime books for daddy and Ashe to read together.

Water, Water Everywhere!

I know that life can be so busy, but...I try so hard to ensure that my boys have those memorable moments in childhood, that always put a smile on our faces. These moments don't cost a lot, but they're the ones we always remember.

Today's summer fun was running through the sprinkler. Of course the yard is now muddy and there was grass, leaves and dirt stuck to everyone and everything I carried into my clean house, but the important part is... they has a blast!

(Of course Nick joined in the fun, but he didn't want me to post any of his pictures because he's too cool to have fun being a kid.)

VBS 2009

This week Nick we will spending each day at our church enjoying Vacation Bible School. There is so many fun things to do at VBS. Today their unsuspecting crew leaders (two volunteering teenage boys) went home soaking wet. Today's motto was that God always keeps his promises, always trust in God, (like the way a team always trust in each other). So the kids in Nick's group teamed up and wet those poor boys, I guess they did work as a "TEAM". On the first day Nick was a little shy and nervous, but now he actually looks forward to all fun. It's nice that Nick gets to see all the cool things that our church has to offer. Unfortunately, after many fun VBS years, this will be his last since next year he will be going into middle school, and after that he'll be able to start volunteering as a crew leader/activity helper.
So someday he will be leading a group just like these crazy preteens, and I hope he will look back with fond memories when he's the one their soaking.

(The decorations were so cool this year, it was a Louisiana swamp theme, I wish I would have gotten pictures of the gym but I didn't want to go picture crazy and embarrass Nick.)

School's Out For Summer!

Nick has officially been on summer vacation for a week already but it is now mommy and Ashe's turn to join in the fun.
UPDATE ON THE BOYS:

Nick has completed fourth grade and will now be a fifth grader, only one more year of elementary school before he heads off to middle school. He of course still has perfect attendance, and has not yet missed a day of Red Bug from Kindergarten on. On top of all that he once again had straight A's. He really is such a great kid!
As for Ashe he will be turning three this October. He has done very well at potty training and has had many dry weekends. I was nervous to have him go all day at school with underwear so I held off with that until I was home with him. I can say that he has been very easy to train and he even goes in there and does it without my assistance.

Guess What, Ashe?

No More School Until August

... WHAT???

I know it makes you sad...



...but you get to spend the next few weeks with Mommy and Nicky.

How does that sound?

There's that cute smile!

Happy Birthday Aunt Lisa!

Happy Birthday!

We love you so much Aunt Lisa... OXOXOX!

Science Fun

This weekend we went to the science center. It was a kick off to summer for the family. We had so much fun there with all the new exhibits. The thing I love most about the science center is that there are things that both boys enjoy doing.

Look at me I'm in the stomach.

While Ashe was busy crawling around the digestive system, Nick was busy performing heart surgery. Of course he probably won't be doing surgery with salad tongs someday.

Ashe enjoyed looking at the dinosaurs and even digging for some dino eggs.


While Ashe was busy digging, Nick was in the lab working on a cool Vitamin C experiment.

At the end of this fun experiment, Nick learned about the effects of Vitamin C on the human body and how it fight illness.

Reflections Contest

You may remember back on Thanksgiving, Nicholas had access to our family camera (this is the reason we don't have any photos of the family) all day to take pictures for the school PTA Reflections Contest. Nicholas took some beautiful pictures throughout the day. He ended up taking one picture in particular that was really... WOW (the theme of this year's contest). He submitted it and only four students from Red Bug were asked to go on to the county level. Tonight Nick won an award for his photo. He was the only Red Bug student in the photography category honored this evening. He wished he would have gone on to states, but I think he should be proud of his hard work. I am so glad that he was recognized for this beautiful display of God's work.

We are very proud of you Nick!

This is Nick at the beginning of the night. We were so excited to see his work on display. It is the beautiful photo of the sunrise with the silhouette of the tree.

Here I am trying to get a close up of the display.

Nick was very excited to see his Reach/Gifted Teacher come tonight since he worked on the contest in her class as well. He just loves her, he'd spend all day with her if he could.


Before we left for the evening Nick went back with his award to look at his work...

just one last time.

Happy Easter!

We had a very nice Easter together. The boys got some fun things to do in their baskets. Nick ended up with a Wii game that has kept him pretty glued to the TV. Ashe got a fun kid's computer keyboard and game. It is just perfect for little ones. Ashe ended up with a bubble whistle and they both have too much candy for their little bellies. After breakfast, Ashe had an Easter egg hunt here at home. He thought it was so much fun finding candy filled eggs in our yard. Of course, Nick is too cool for this type of Easter fun, but he did help his brother with the hard to find eggs.

As always we celebrated Easter with all the traditional things like church, a large family dinner, and lots of fun.

Aside from the commercial meaning of Easter, what we are most excited about is that we are able to instill the true meaning of Easter to our boys.

We had a blessed holiday and hope your family did as well.

Pi=3.14

Since March 14th was 3/14 on the calendar it was official Pi day. So to celebrate Nick insisted that we have a pie. Since mommy is not a chef, we googled and easy cream pie recipe and use the left over whip cream to make our cool math symbol.

Hangin' with Ashe!

What do you want to be when you grow up Ashe? ... Cool like my brother!

For a couple days Nick was wearing is hat backwards, so since Ashe does everything Nick does I got a few pictures of him sporting Nick's hat.

Valentine's Day

We had a wonderful Valentine's Day. Steven and I spent the day together. We had a romantic picnic together. Funny... We have had a basket since we got married and have never used it. I am happy to say that he surprised me with a picnic lunch by a lake. I of course remembered to take a picture of the lake as we were driving away. Steven got me beautiful roses and we watched my new Nicholas Sparks movie while I snuggled with the man I love.

Later that night we fondued with the whole family.

I loved spending time with my boys on Valentine's Day!

Odyssey Competition

I really have a ton of pictures from today but many of them have other kids in them, and I can't post them. So here are just a few...

Today was an awesome ending to all our hard work these past few months in Odyssey. We headed up to a Middle school to compete in the annual Odyssey competition. Nick's groups did a skit about superstitions and my team did a skit on Heracles. The practiced for months writing the script, making the scenery, and making their own props and costumes. There were many problems they had to solve and restrictions that went along with the problems. My team did a great job even after a few problems throughout the day, lets just say we were hot gluing some scenery back together at the very last minute. My team placed third in our division, out of ten teams, of course in our group they only ended up taking the first two groups to states and we were the third. The kids ended up walking away with a bronze medal. Nick's groups had a few more problems then we did and unfortunately went over the time allowed for the script. They ended up getting huge point penalties for the time and did not place. The did however end up winning for their cool script title. All in all, we had a lot of fun. Nick loves that I coach Odyssey because it is something we can do together. Of course I run myself ragged and I stress way more than I should but secretly I love the time I can spend with these creative kids.

Let's hope next year we have less problems and the kids can make it to states.

Winterfest

Sorry for the cloudy picture but it was taken on Steve's phone while Nick was in motion.

Tonight after the Odyssey competition Nicholas went with his dad to Winterfest, a carnival, at our church, St. Stephen's. Of course I was exhausted from my weekend already. The night before, Mrs. Lynn and I spent a long and cold time selling tickets and harassing teenagers at Winterfest. This poor boy Dave will never be same because of us. While at Winterfest Nicholas went on a few rides including this huge bungee that flings you up into the air . I was very surprised that he wanted to do something so dangerous, since Nick is not that kind of kid. Steven knew I would never believe it so he had to capture it and the phone was all he had. Lucky me I didn't get to see them fling my first born child through the air and... I ended up with a funnel cake in spite of not going.

Field Trips - Yeah!!!

My Awesome Team

We had so much fun together !

We went to some fun shows.

I really do have the best job! In what job do you get all summer off, work only 180 days and call it a year, and get to spend a whole day at Sea World with your friends and call it work.

Today my team took about a 127 second graders to a theme park. We had a great time, I don't know how the chaperones felt about it. I guess they don't realize that we spend 8 hours a day with these children, five days a week. Some parents get easily rattled by more than one child The morning started out a little cool but as the day went on it really really warmed up. The park wasn't crowded, which made the lines short.

As much I worry before the trip about losing someone or something going terribly wrong, it always ends up being such a great trip, and this year was just as fun.

Thanks Friscia for doing a great job of planning it!

What's the Buzz?

Bumble the Bee

After many long months, today was our last Odyssey meeting. Nick's Odyssey costume is now complete and he did a pretty good job, considering that he had to do it all on his own. This upcoming weekend our team will be going to competition. So I hope that they remember their lines, move the scenery smoothly, try not to kill one another... but most of all I hope they have fun. They have worked so hard and deserve a day to enjoy themselves.

Super Bowl Sunday

Go Steelers!!!

This was a very exciting game. My family and I cheered on the Steelers to what is now their sixth Super Bowl win. No matter how long I live in Florida, Pennslyvania will always be home to me. So it was awesome that the Steelers could come to Tampa, FL and bring home another Vince Lombardi Trophy to the Steeler Nation.

Potty Training

This is one stage of having a toddler that I am not looking forward to... POTTY TRAINING! We got some cute undies, an Elmo video that talks about putting your pee-pee in the potty, don't forget a potty seat. On top of it all we have a 10 year who finds a great deal of humor in the whole process. I know every parent feels this way when potty training but, I think he will still be in diapers in college. Oh my, please make this stage go by quickly with very few surprises.