Where were we?? Part IV

where did we go next???

june 29th:
CEDAR POINT! you know, america's roller coast!
no? not familiar? well, if you like amusement parks this is the place for you! and who likes amusement parks?? ...we were HOPING bean did!

bean's aunt gave her a ticket for her birthday. here they are heading into the park.

weee! flying with the red baron!!

here comes the train!!! :)

posing with the snoopy in front of planet snoopy!

the little train is fun!!

look ma! no hands!! :)
(she held her hands up and almost EVERY ride. including the ferris wheel. ha ha!)

sprout, however, believes in holding on TIGHT!
(one hand on the pole and one clutching grandma!)

what an awesome day this was. bean LOVES rides and rode just about everything that she was tall enough for. she has asked when we can go back. sprout did amazingly well and seemed to enjoy the few rides he got on... once they started moving.

and there is more to come.... stay tuned!! :)

Where were we?? Part III

so where was i in our run down of things that we have done this summer?? hmmmm, lets see....

june 27th:
fancy nancy party at the bookstore. all the girls came in their fancy dresses with lots of accessories. :) there were stories read. there was cookies with sprinkles. there was coloring sheets, stickers, and fans. it was a GOOD time!

here is my fancy girl reading a fancy nancy book while we wait for the party to start.

june 28th:
bean's first birthday celebration. yes, i said first. she ended up having FOUR. this one was with her grandma, grandpa, aunt, and mommy, daddy and sprout. she helped make and decorate her own cake for this one. :)

make a wish!! :)

sprout thinks bean bakes good cakes! ;)

opening a gift from mommy and daddy....

hmmm, do you think she likes it?? she can be so hard to read sometimes.... ha ha ha!

oh yes, there is more to come! silly string wars, fireworks, family reunions, etc, etc, etc! you are going to be so sick of us by the end of next week! ha ha ha!!!!

Where were we?? Part II

so, what have we been up too???

june 18th-21st:
we went to my parents house. the kids were fairly good considering daddy wasn't around (he was in vegas, remember), but of course nana and papa were there to spoil them with attention so i'm sure that helped. we didn't really do anything while we were there but some times it is nice to just sit still. :)

sprout wasn't thrilled about sharing papa's chair with his sister though! ;)

June 23:
we went to the splash park with my sister and her girls. ellie loved the splash park last yer and i hoped chase would too. he was... undecided about his feelings at first but he eventually got into it so a good time was had by all. :)

sprout splashing in the fountains!

bean likes the waterfalls this year!!! :)

june 24th:
ellie was invited to a dinosaur dig at one of her best girl friend's house. there were dino bones in the sandbox the girls had to dig up. we also went swimming, hunted for dinosaur eggs and played with water balloons. it was a FANTASTIC time!!

i think she may have found something!

using the magnifying glass to look for the small fossils! ;)

ok, there is still more to come! a fancy nancy party at the bookstore, several birthday parties (all of them for bean!), a trip to cedar point, feeding exotic animals, etc, etc, etc. stay tuned for all the exciting details!! ha ha!:)

Where were we?? Part I

ah yes, where have we been?!?! well i'll tell you! ;)

june 11th:
went to the butterfly exhibit at the conservatory. it wasn't the best day to go... it was very cloudy and the butterflies (even though they are inside) were not at all active. :( but we still had a nice time.

holy cow! look! a picture with ME in it!!! ha ha ha!

here's a shot of bean looking through some glasses that let you see like a bug. you know, compound eyes and all that. she thought it was pretty neat!

then we stopped by the butterfly "hatchery" to see some "fresh" butterflies. ;) it was pretty cool to see. these butterflies here look pretty drab on the outside but are iridescent blue on the inside! :)

*insert 2 playdates and a trip to the library here*

june 15th: bean's aunt and uncle came up from texas just to see her!! they took her and sprout to the zoo and left mommy and daddy at home. for a while mommy had NO idea what to do with herself!

aunt and uncle spoil bean and let her get her face painted like a kitty! :)

later that night, after sprout headed off to bed, we made smores. mmmmmm smores! (i think she had 3!)

then we let her play with sparklers!!!! OMG!!!!!

OMG! OMG! OMG!!!
it was like the greatest thing she had ever experienced. we went through about 25 sparklers in just a matter of minutes! :)

then daddy left for las vegas. he played in a world series of poker event. he finished in about 700th place out of 2700 people. not too bad but it doesn't win you any money. :(
while daddy was gone we went and visited my family.... but let's save that for another day, shall we? :)

Ummmm, yeah...

so... i'm not even going to pretend that i haven't updated this blog in over a month. our world has been very busy, i've been tired, and... fine, i'll admit it- i've been too lazy to do anything about it. i'm going to try to change that. really. that is until we head out on our next adventure... ;)

what is up with us? hmmm.

sprout:
*he is just shy of 25 pounds. he is 31 inches tall. he has 14 teeth.
*he says a few understandable things and a lot of mumbo jumbo that we have NO idea what it is (but it sounds really important!). he says "ah dah" (all done), "mah-mee" (mommy), "dada", "bah-bo" (bubble), "wha-da?" (we believe he is asking "what's that"), and today i swear he said raisin but i can't be sure. he barks when he sees dogs ("ba-ba-ba!"). he makes vrooming noises when he plays cars. he nods his head yes and shakes it no in response to questions. he signs "more" when he wants more to eat. (he ALWAYS seems to want more to eat)
*he is attempting to jump. the other day he only had ONE toe on the ground!!!!! and oh my goodness does he dance! he is always shaking his shoulders, swinging his arms, marching and just plain wiggling to the beat. it is AWESOME!!! i will totally try to get a video to post. it simply must be seen. :) he also climbs everything is sight. EVERY damn thing. he will be the death of me...
*he is done with the bottle-yippee! now if we could just talk him into giving up his binki... sigh.
*he is starting to color a little bit with sidewalk chalk and crayons. the instances where he eats said artistic tools are getting fewer and farther between, thank goodness. although he did try to eat a green marker the other day......
*he LOVES to be in the pool. he STRONGLY prefers the big pool to the baby pool. he actually tried to swim the other day- arms paddling and legs kicking! he wants to be just like his sister.
*he LOVES balls and balloons with a passion that i just can't really put into words. :)

bean:
*she is 37 pounds. she is 40 inches. she went to the dentist for the first time and was complimented on her beautiful teeth. :) and she's FOUR! as in years old! AKKKK!
*she is no longer afraid to go underwater. she jumps in off the side. she puts her face in and tries to "swim" underwater. she is turning into quite the little fish.
*she is majorly into coloring right now. she never was all that interested but now... she colors 6 or more pages in a sitting. and she is getting SO much better at it. i'm actually impressed.
*her new FAVORITE thing is tinkerbell and fairies in general. we got her the tinkerbell movie for her birthday and that is all we've heard about since. "are fairies real?" "will i get to see a fairy sometime?" "can i be a fairy?" the questions NEVER end.
*she is sassy and just flat out disobedient. and i'm just not sure what to do about that. she is sucking the life out of me....

if there is anything you want to know about the bean or the sprout just let me know! i'm happy to answer. and if you have any solutions on how to deal with little miss sassy pants and be more than happy to hear that as well. ;)

my family also got some surprising news recently. my sister (who believed herself to be done having children) is "surprise" pregnant. that turned into an even bigger surprise when it was discovered that she was carrying twins!! so we have two babies on the way, they should be here around the first week of december... ya know, when her youngest is 13 months old. eeek! 5 children and the oldest will be 6- it is going to be a busy household!! :)

and me... well, i'm here. running here and there. to playdates. to storytimes. to splash parks. to the zoo. we've got something going all the time it seems. i think i'm actually looking forward to school starting back up.
and i'm turning 35 next week.

i'm sure you will want to see some of the great things we've been up to so over the next few days i'm going to post a bunch of pictures. y'all like pictures, right? ;)

Weekend Observation

how is it that my sweet little sprout's chubby, yummy toes have become sweaty, stinky boy feet?? seriously this boy is sweaty! and his feet are smelly!!
i guess he isn't a baby anymore...

;)

Attention!

we have a biter in the house. i repeat, there is a biter in the house!!

sprout has taken to biting. mostly he just bites bean. sometimes she deserves it. and all the time she laughs about it until it hurts- then she screams. i try to tell her that her laughter is encouraging sprout to bite her more. she has yet to listen.

bean never once bit anyone so this is all new to me. i'm hoping that it is related to the teething and that when that is over he will be done biting. until then...

be careful! the wee one bites!!
;)

Sprout's Pool

so, way back when, we got sprout a swimming pool for his birthday. today we finally sat down and inflated it. (good thing daddy is full of hot air! he he!) bean was super excited about it! swimming! woo hoo! sprout, well, i'm not sure what he thought...

"you want me to get in there??"

he kinda lost his little mind when his toes hit the cold water. he ran to his mommy crying!

"oh for the love of pete mommy! that is cold!!! too cold!!!!!!

so daddy grabbed the cooler (it was the biggest thing he could find) and filled it with hot water and added it to the pool. things seemed much better then...

"maybe this isn't so bad after all. i like to splash!"

he splashed and played with his sister for quite a while. they were having a great time! he did make it clear that he wasn't at all interested in trying the slide out. so bean slid down head first over and over, always managing to stop right next to him.

"watch it sis, i'm trying to splash here!"

so what started out as a catastrophe ended up a splashing success! ;)

"oh yeah! splash-ity, splash, splash, splash!!!!"

happy really late birthday buddy! mommy is so glad that you like your present!! :)

Crafty Tuesday

as promised here are the lovely teacher gifts that bean and i made- bouquets of flowers! the solid red flowers were made by tracing her hand. the other flowers were made from magazines and buttons (directions can be found here). they turned out super cute! then we made a card- side one had an adorable photo of bean, on side two bean wrote "thank you" and "love (bean)" and in between i added the words "for making my first year of school so great!"
what do you think??
here is a closer shot of the flowers made from the magazines and buttons...
and lastly here is a shot of bean holding one of the bouquets on her way into school. i wanted to get pictures of her giving them to her teachers but i couldn't. she was so excited that she ran into the classroom and gave them out before i had a chance to get through the door!
oh, in case you were wondering, the teachers LOVED them. :)

Gone Fishin'

on friday we went to my sister's house to visit the cousins. my brother decided to stop by because he didn't have to work that day (dang economy!). he decided that it would be a great day to take the girls fishing!! now the cousins had been before but bean had not and she was quite excited about the whole thing. they gathered up poles, tackle box, and dug up some worms. then off to the pond they went.
(bean took her job of carrying the cup of worms very seriously. she walked slowly and surely to make sure she didn't spill them. ha ha!)

it was a beautiful sunny day. they walked around the pond until they found a nice spot with some shade near by. uncle put a worm on the hook, cast the line, then handed the rod over to bean. he explained how to know that there was a fish on the line and showed her how the reel worked.
soon she was on her own... waiting... waiting... and waiting some more.
sadly no one caught a fish that day. uncle had several nibbles but he was unable to make the catch. the girls got hot and bored, so we headed home.

bean must have really enjoyed herself though because when she got home she asked if she could get her own fishing pole for her birthday. looks like uncle is going to be busy this summer!! :)

The Last Day of School

remember back in september when bean was so excited for her first year of school. remember when she looked like this...
this week we had this...
a little girl on her last day of school. a little girl who was sad and couldn't figure out why school had to end. a little girl who didn't want to leave her teachers and friends behind for the summer. (a little girl who was also freezing because she insisted on wearing this outfit on the last day of school even though it was actually about 55 degrees outside. )

she did good once she got to school. she played, made crafts, and had a little graduation ceremony in her classroom. then she walked to the "end of the year assembly" holding one of her friends hands.
and the whole class sat together and watched the video that they made showing highlights of the school year. (they yelled out whenever they saw one of their classmates in the movie. it was pretty cute.)
but she really didn't want to leave. after the "all school picnic lunch" i let her linger as long as i could. but eventually all the other kids were gone and sprout NEEDED to go home for a nap. the whole way home she kept asking when she could go back to school....

****

on a completely different note, is anyone else's kid completely losing their tiny little mind??? for the past month or two bean has been a crazy, monstrous, nutcase losing her shit at the tiniest little infraction. tonight she raged and screamed for over a half an hour about brushing teeth... not because she didn't want them brushed but because she insisted that i didn't brush them long enough. seriously. she stood on her bed and screamed and screamed. two days ago it was because the pajamas she wanted were in the washing machine and she said she wouldn't sleep without them. these are pajamas are ones that she normally doesn't want to wear because they don't have princesses on them. gah! this isn't what 4 is going to be like, is it? because if it is, she can stay 3, thank you very much!!

Rose Park Revisited

remember last year when we went to the rose park? well, i thought, "what the heck, let's go back this year!" bean did really love it, even after the thorn incident, but would sprout....

yes! yes, i think sprout did like it!

bean wanted him to smell the roses and she just couldn't understand why he wouldn't. (he more or less wanted to pull the petals off all the flowers.... oops, sorry rose garden!) we must have stopped to smell at least one of every kind of rose there. really. that is a lot of roses people!
oh! bean would like you all to know that roses smell "yummy!" ;)

they have this "observation tower" in the middle of the garden. it is like a gazebo on stilts with a spiral staircase. i don't think i need to tell you that both kids adored being up there, do i?

oh and going up and down the stairs is fun too! ;)

it was a lovely day. not hot (as you can tell from the long pants they are sporting!) and partly cloudy. the kids walked, ran, and sat...
and enjoyed just about every second of this lovely morning- the second they were not fond of? the one where i told them that it was time to go home! ha!
looks like we will be going back again. :)

A Trip to the Park

last week we took a trip to the park. sprout was pretty excited when he saw the big climber and he couldn't figure out what was taking us so long to get there...
i spent a lot of time carefully watching sprout climb up and the steps of the climber. he LOVES to climb! so when his sister did this...
he wanted to do it too. he found it was more difficult than it looked...
after a while bean and sprout did find something that they could do together and they had a blast!
wheeeee! :)

Snacking Outdoors

it was a beautiful day. we had snack outside- mini cupcakes, watermelon, and raisins.

bean ate her snack like this...

sprout ate his snack like this...

boys are a little different than girls, i guess. ha ha ha! ;)