Happy Birthday!

Happy birthday Andrew!It's from the archives, but this picture always makes me laugh. This one's nice too: Right now he's probably at the Phoenix airport getting ready to head home. Tonight the boys have make-up soccer games, so we'll probably meet up there, and then head home for his favorite: blueberry pie.

Let's go!

The boys and I headed to the zoo yesterday (along with almost every school district in town taking their kids on end-of-the-year field trips, but oh well). As we got ready, I just chuckled that this is so Colorado...here we are walking around in shorts and t-shirts, tripping over snow boots that still hadn't been put away from our 2 feet of snow last week.

When I came downstairs from getting ready, Max said "Mom, I have something to show you." He proudly showed me that he had already laid out 3 wrap-n-mats, 6 pieces of bread, 3 lunch bags, and 3 water bottles on the counter for our picnic! Such a sweet helper's heart. :)

Where have you been all winter?

Winter finally decided to show up. It started raining Thursday, turned to snow overnight, and kept on going and going and going...the snow finally stopped for us late this afternoon (Saturday). We easily got 2 feet. We lost power for about 5 hours, but we had a birthday party to go to (in the neighborhood, thankfully) so that gave us something fun to do while we waited for the power to kick on again. Here are some pics: Now for the meltdown...supposed to be 75 by Wednesday!

Fancy Clothes

Last week the boys got some "fancy clothes" for Easter, and I tell you, Max has been anticipating the wearing of the fancy clothes breathlessly. A couple of nights last week, Andrew didn't get home until bedtime, and when he went upstairs to kiss the boys good-night, Max would say "Dad, the day after the day after the day after tomorrow, I get to wear my fancy clothes!"

It took a little convincing to get Ben to agree to the fancy clothes; Andrew's prediction was that on Sunday, Max would be neatly put together with his clothes all just so, and Ben would look like the drunk guy at a wedding...tie crooked, shirt-tails hanging out...you get the picture. :) Although you can see in the pictures, neither one would tuck in his shirt. We play "old man" too often around here...tuck in shirt, hike pants up to armpits and laugh yourself silly...the only reason you'd actually tuck in your shirt would be to play a silly game, not to dress up!

Anyways, Sunday rolled around, and Max didn't even wear his jammies downstairs to check out his Easter basket. He came downstairs, already fully dressed. Here are some pics from later in the day at my parents' house. (They wouldn't stop making goofy faces.) (The boys, not my parents. ;) ) Hope you all had a great Easter too!

The way to his heart...

Driving to church last night for our simple supper and Lenten study...

Max says, "Mama, we go to church to learn about God, right?"

I answered, "Yeah, it's one place we learn about God."

Ben pipes up "And eat dinner."

Executive Decisions by Maxwell

We were just standing in the kitchen discussing what we should have for dinner. Max piped up, "How about pizza?" We said something along the lines of "Hmmm, pizza, maybe." As Andrew and I continued talking, Max pushed a kitchen stool up to the white board on the side of the fridge where we write meals for the week, grabbed the pen, asked "How do you spell pizza?" and then proceeded to write it into tonight's menu slot. The boy knows how to get things done around here!

Blizzard? Not exactly. But fun nonetheless.

Well, the blizzard they were forecasting didn't exactly show up; we got about 10 inches or so at our house instead of the 16-22 inches that were forecasted. I've never seen so many schools, businesses, travel plans, etc closed or canceled in anticipation of a storm around here, but pretty much everything was shut down around here yesterday. Andrew got stuck in Grand Junction an extra night due to his flight being canceled, but it's been such a mild winter, we really can't gripe about his travel plans being affected this once. We sooooo needed the moisture. And snow yesterday means sledding today...yippee!! We FINALLY got to bust out the tube I bought clear back in December...

Soccer, Week 2

Great morning playing soccer - Ben was not shy about tearing it up with the other 3-year-olds this week! Both boys had a lot of fun!

Day at the zoo!

We had a great day at the zoo today! I'm just enjoying the beautiful weather because I have a feeling I'll be shoveling snow in May to make up for it :).

The boys took Anty the Anteater and Hyena Shier (souvenirs from a previous zoo trip) along for the ride so they could visit their animal friends...too funny.

Soccer Season Begins!

This year, both boys are playing soccer, and the season kicked off this morning! It's hard, but good for Ben to do activities without his brother. They're getting to the point that they are separated for school, sports, etc. Ben was very clingy and pouty at first (despite happily running around with his brother's team last year), but by the end, he was coming out of his shell a little and playing with his own team...hopefully as the season progresses, he'll keep finding his place with the other three year olds. Max's coaches were gone today due to a previously scheduled trip, so Andrew pinch-coached.

The Honeybees: The Blue Thunder:On a different note, last night we watched Horton Hears a Who together...highly recommended!!! Cute, nicely done, entertaining!

The best part of new car seats

the boxes!

Yeah March!

March kicks off tomorrow with my 33rd birthday! Mom and Dad are out of town this weekend, so they stopped in last night to celebrate with a family dinner. The boys put the candles in the frosted brownie cake, so it doesn't exactly spell out "Happy 33 Birthday."These pics were taken with my birthday present from Andrew and the boys...a new camera: Yeah!

(And have you figured out which is Max's favorite shirt? If it's clean, he's wearing it.)

Shout out

We have to give a shout out to Sheplers. We bought Max a pair of boots there over a year ago and they got a big ol' hole in the back of them for no good reason - it really wasn't due to normal wear and tear or snagging them or anything. Anyways, Andrew stopped in the other day to see if there was anyway they could fix them or something (thinking at best we might get a discount on a new pair)...they said bring the boots in and they'd take a look. Andrew stopped back in today with Max. They took a look at the boots and told him to go pick out a new pair no charge! Wow! I was so surprised and impressed!

Child.

It's so hard to discipline when you're trying not to laugh. In case you can't tell, that's the Sit-n-spin on top of the trampoline.

So Sad...

I am so sad that tomorrow will be the final edition of the Rocky Mountain News. I feel for everyone losing their jobs at the paper and I will definitely miss my Rocky every morning. This paragraph in particular stood out:

In the past decade, the Rocky has won four Pulitzer Prizes, more than all but a handful of American papers. Its sports section was named one of the 10 best in the nation this week. Its business section was cited by the Society of American Business Editors and Writers as one of the best in the country last year. And its photo staff is regularly listed among the best in the nation when the top 10 photo newspapers are judged.

Wow.

On Being a Mama

I love this.

Book bags!

Whitney's sewing craftiness inspired me to bust out my sewing machine too! Mom came over since there's no school today, and we spent the day making book bags for the boys for their library books. We first headed over to the fabric store for a pattern and to let the boys pick out fabrics (I exercised some veto power) and then headed home where Mom helped me do the rest. The bags are reversible with 6 pockets.

Max chose frogs with stripes. Pockets on the inside:Pockets on the outside:
Ben chose vintage airplanes and stripes.
Pockets on the outside:Pockets on the inside:

Here's the pattern we used:

Happy Valentine's Day!

Last night we ate heart-shaped pizza and then snuggled up on the couch together to watch Wall-E. Tonight the boys are spending the night at Grandma and Grandpa's and Andrew and I have yet to make plans. Happy Valentine's everyone!

Someone's 10 today...

Ten years ago: Today: Andrew and I had ourselves laughing pretty hard at her near-death experiences over the last 10 years...

• Chewing a hole in the wall (yes, through the sheetrock) right in the middle of the staircase when we put our first house on the market to sell.
• Eating the very first loaf of bread Andrew had ever made with a new bread-maker as the bread cooled on the counter.
• Eating just the tops off a dozen muffins as they cooled on the counter. We may be slow, but we began to watch carbs closer.
• Eating DeCon a few days before getting spayed. She passed the clot test before surgery but after surgery didn't clot, so she ended up needing a blood transfusion. Whoever heard of a blood transfusion on a dog???
• Eating a whole bowl of Hershey's Kisses around Christmas. I thought chocolate was bad for dogs, but she had no problem, just pooped red, green and silver tinfoil for the next few days.
  

But we love you, ol' girl, for your sweetness and patience, especially with the boys, and your good-natured descent down the totem pole when we started bringing little people into your pack. Heck, you could just be getting ready to make your run at Westminster - ha!

Sweet Tooth!

Here's Benjamin checking out the treats I made last night for our MOMS Club Valentine's Party today. He quietly retrieved the stool from the bathroom so he could be very up close and personal with the cookies. And here he is decorating his cookie this morning at the party. It's hard to tell from the picture, but the frosting and sprinkles were seriously about an inch thick. Just the way he likes it!

Ha! Another post!

Andrew had his long week away this week for his annual sales conference in Dallas. He flew out Sunday morning and gets home (yeah!) this afternoon.

Both the kids have been fighting colds. Ben coughed like a barking seal on Tuesday, so we kind of laid low that day. Then Max started cough-barking Thursday. Oh, those coughs make my throat hurt just to hear them - they're awful! Coughs always seem to bother Max more. Poor punkin coughed so hard he threw up in the middle of the night last night. He's still barking a little bit today, but is doing better. He had a low fever this morning, but I think it's gone now. So yesterday and today, we are also laying low. Three days this week kind of just hanging around the house taking care of sick kiddos, although cold are pretty easy and nothing to complain about (better than puke or pooh issues), just those couple of days they feel like dukie you feel so bad for them.

On the plus side, I've had plenty of opportunity to post on the blog (which is why I'm blogging yet again :) ), update the blog background (that little owl is adorable, but it bugs me that the words stick out into the blog stuff), read my book club book, and even write most of my essay that's due Tuesday. So we made the best of it, I guess. Looking forward to having Andrew home.

You are so not coming in the house

Awww nuts!

OK, what's not precious is the argument over pistachios that resulted in the bag being grabbed off the counter, um, UPSIDE DOWN. What is precious though is the way they immediately started working together good-naturedly to clean up, even channeling Wonder Pets with "What's gonna work? Teamwork." Ben even thought of the broom and dustpan on his own.