One of our little trick-or-treaters is a bit under the weather.
Captain America stayed home from school and slept most of the day.
He rallied after a bowl of chicken noodle soup to join Seth for Trick-or-Treating.
Colin gave it a good go but he wore out half way around the block. He was fine with a piggy-back ride while Seth finished the block. We came home to watch It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown before calling it a night.
During family movie night last week we were watching The Shakiest Gun in the West with Don Knotts.
Don Knotts' character is a dentist who moves west to start a dental practice. As you can imagine he runs into some trouble along the way. At one point he's sitting in his hotel room a bit forlorn. He's polishing a giant replica of teeth and gums and gets his hand stuck in between the teeth. Then there's a knock at the door. He gets up, dragging the giant fake teeth with him. When he opens the door, there's a tall beautiful woman, dressed in a green velvet dress. She tilts her head and gives him a crooked grin.
Colin says quietly, "Well, now he has two problems?"
Aunt Kelly watched the boys a while back. After dinner they walked to a nearby playground and this is what the boys did on the way there. All on their own...
At times they fight and yell and hit, but in the end they love each other.
Their campsite was next to the horse/bike trail so the neighboring campers included a horse.
If you look closely, you can see Colin's head right in the middle of this mess. John sent me this picture with the caption, "Who needs a jungle gym when you have a huge pile dead tree branches?"
I know I've been neglectful of this here blog. It's been a long almost four weeks of weird headaches, doctor's appointments, and trial and error games with different medications but I think I'm on the mend. So...I'll do my best to get this little corner of the Internet updated soon.
We'll start with Seth. About a month ago, we sat down with Seth's teacher for a parent/teacher conference. She could not have been more complimentary of Seth's school performance. She praised his behavior, his ability to focus on task, his social skills, and the example he sets for his classmates. She even praised the fact that he knew how to have a good time when it was appropriate to do so.
We had also noticed a recent change in his behavior at home. He has been working hard to follow directions and help out where needed.
Seth earned the chance to be the star student for the week which included being able to bring home Marvin, the class mascot, for the weekend.
Seth is 7 going on 17. He wants nothing more than to be "a big kid". He wants to drive, have a cell phone, even pay bills, and do his own laundry. I treasure moments like this when bringing Marvin the moose home for the weekend brings a smile to his face. Moments when he enjoys being seven.
To say thank you for all his help around the house lately, mommy took Seth out for ice-cream after school. A special treat for a special kid!
We were able to celebrate the boys' birthday in Oklahoma with Grandpa and Grandma. It was even more special because the boys share a birthday with John's dad.
When John had birthday parties as a kid, his mom would make pocket bread with chili and he and his friends would celebrate at Clayton Lake. Since we would be there for the boys' birthday we decided to do it too!
Grandma made her special birthday lunch. I made a cake (barely...for some reason my birthday baking is jinxed. Things I bake come out fine the rest of the year but nearly every time I attempt to bake for the boys' birthday it goes haywire. One year, ants enjoyed some beautiful sprinkled cupcakes I left out on the counter overnight and I had to make a last minute run for a store bought cake as guests were arriving for the party. This year, I was distracted by a story John was telling me and added three times the amount of oil I was suppose to. There's no grocery store to run to near Grandpa and Grandma's house so we managed to compensate for the oil overload and I got the cake frosted. But on our way to the lake, Seth was tossing a football around the back seat and it veered to the front seat and landed smack on top of the cake! I think my birthday baking is doomed. Next year...ice cream sundaes!)
Aunt Kelly mailed birthday cards to the boys. They love getting mail!
The cards had cut-outs. Seth is Iron Man and Colin is a pirate.
The cake! Not too shabby all things considered.
The Birthday Boys!
Colin got a wii-mote charger (I know...it's very practical for a 5 year old but he did actually ask for it so he could "keep playing instead of not playing when the batteries need charging" - actual quote). He also got this, which I highly recommend to parents of small children. It's like paper dolls only with magnets and they come in different themes...robots, houses, planes, dolls, ballerinas, etc. It's great for the car. We all played with it on our trip home.
Seth asked for "something to play music in my ears" after watching mommy do yard work while listening to her ipod. So, he's now the proud owner of his very own mp3 player and headphones.
I gave the boys Silly String in their Christmas stockings last year and they've been asking for it since. Which is how we came to have a birthday Silly String fight at Clayton Lake State Park.
Seth is clearly winning this battle. Mommy stepped in to aid Colin after taking some pictures. As they get older Colin will figure out how to work those aerosol cans and Seth better watch out. Youngest children always seem to get their revenge.
It was kind of nice having a small little party. Big parties with
friends are fun too but this year it felt nice to relax and enjoy these
two boys. We didn't plan for things to be so simple but I felt
especially grateful for it on this day. The boys felt sufficiently
celebrated and I wasn't stressed about keeping people entertained or
well-fed (although most of the time I enjoy being the
hostess-with-the-mostest!). We didn't rent any air-filled climbing, jumping, sliding apparatus or reserve a party hut, tent, cabana or room. As I watched the boys splashing around in the lake with their dad, squealing on the playground, and smiling as they opened their small stack of gifts I was struck by how easy it is to over indulge the emotions of our kids. We, of course, want them to feel special and loved on their birthday (and every day) but it may not take as much as we think it does. I credit John's mom for helping us have such a great time together. She may not have meant to,but she was the mom of two small boys once who kept things simple. Maybe somewhat out of necessity (not a lot of party places close by). She fixed a special lunch, went to a special place and decades later one of those boys did the same with his two small boys and they loved it!
The boys will get older and the pressure on them and us to create the biggest, most magical, most spectacular birthday ever will come, no doubt. I hope we all remember this year and what it was that made it feel special.
The official end of summer weekend found us visiting John's parents in Oklahoma. We enjoyed a long weekend at the cabin. It was pretty hot so we didn't have energy to do much other than fishing and swimming, but we definitely took advantage of the opportunity to do both those things.
Check out this haul! Sorry if your squeamish but we're pretty proud! This was definitely a group effort. Colin caught the biggest fish in the first five minutes of being on the pond, which is good given his current attention span. It was his only catch of the day. We think Grandpa caught the most. Seth gets the prize for getting the most fish in the fastest time. With his lucky fishing pole in hand he caught two fish in two minutes.
John took the boys to one of the "swimming holes" he played in as a kid. The boys thought it was "awesome" and said it was more fun than our local aquatic center with water slides, lazy rivers, and climbing walls. I think there's something innate in little boys when it comes to the outdoors. There's a little Huckleberry Finn in all of them.
Look for a separate post today with pictures of the boy's birthday!
Almost every Thursday night, this is where you can find us. Skyping with Grandparents. We each take turns and we each have our regular skyping agenda.
Seth quickly runs through information about school, which usually involves discussing what he's had for lunch and what he did in gym class. And then Grandpa and Seth discuss sports.
Colin always requests to play the "animal guessing game". They usually play several rounds. It's 20 questions with animals. It can get quite involved. Then Colin wants Grandpa to read him a book. It works out well because while Grandpa reads to Colin, mommy and Grandma head off to get some evening chores done in our respective houses. While Grandpa read Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel, I unloaded the dish washer and Grandma did some laundry.
We've done show-and-tell this way. Grandma and Grandpa got to see all the boys school supplies. Only grandparents would ooohh and aaahhh over glue sticks and No.2 pencils. We've shown them new projects around this house.
It's not the same as living close by (we miss them a lot) but we're grateful to live in a time where this kind of communication is possible.
We've been sprucing things up around here and while cleaning things up around the garage, John found a cocoon (or a chrysalis, if you're like Colin and know that proper scientific names for things in the animal world) attached to a paper bag. He wasn't sure how long it had been there but we brought it inside. Seth and Colin have kept a watchful eye on it and this morning it opened.
I asked Colin what he wanted to name it and he said Franchello. So this is Franchello II. You might recall that things didn't turn out so well for Franchello the first.
He/She/it hung onto the jar lid for a couple minutes and then poof...off
he/she/it went, fluttering up and over the garage. Off to face a brave
new world...this time with wings!
We're having a group of John's co-workers over tomorrow night. John brought giant joysticks home from a work event to serve as party entertainment. They boys tried them out tonight before bed.
Seth vs. Daddy
Check out the concentration
I think it's adorable that Colin has to look underneath to see the video game.
The day has finally arrived. The first day of the 2013 school year. I'm not sure who was more excited this time around...the boys or mommy. The weather kept us indoors for most of the last couple of weeks which made our days long and somewhat frustrating. We've all looked forward to this day.
Seth left today a first-grader, which means that he'll be at school for "the whole day". He's most looking forward to being able to eat lunch at school. Colin left for his second year of afternoon preschool. He's a veteran now. He already knows his teacher and classroom so he left on the bus after lunch and told me he wants to go to his class on his own.
I counted down the days this summer just like the boys did, because for the first time as a stay at home mom...I have the afternoons to myself! I've dreamed of what I'll do with my time. Even being able to get a haircut or go to a doctor's appointment without coordinating childcare is a treat. I thought I'd feel relief and excitement. I put Colin on the bus and turned to make the walk back up the driveway to a quiet and peaceful house. And instead of skipping my way up the driveway saying, "YIPEE!"...I cried. What is it about the first day of school?!?
We were all ready for this day to come but I find myself a bit heartbroken now that it's here. I'm proud of their confidence and I love that they love school. I feel though, that I've sent little pieces of my heart out into the world. Tomorrow perhaps I'll skip and cheer but today I'll cry a bit and pray. I'll pray for their teachers and friends. I'll pray that they find ways to be helpful and kind. I'll pray that they find kindness too. I'll pray for safety.
Colin wanted to give his bus driver a flower so he's picking out just the right one.
A look back to last year for those that like that sort of thing. Seth 2012, Colin 2012
We've had an unusually cool summer which means our garden is bursting at the seams with cucumbers, tomatoes, and herbs. With an onslaught of 20-30 cucumbers we needed a plan.
What else...PICKLES!!
So the boys and I collected our tools and received our job assignments. Colin was in charge of cucumber procurement. Mommy marked a line from the tip of his finger to the cuff of his shirt so he would know what size to look for. Seth was in charge of the pickling pot. He mixed ingredients and stirred...and stirred...and stirred. Mommy was in the middle, slicing and packing jars.
We now have 6 quarts of bread and butter pickles! Yummy!
Side Note: John and I were talking about how blog posts like these make people who check in on the blog every now and then think this is how it is all the time. Flawless domesticity! Perfect children, beautiful crops, and family time spent on things like canning pickles. The truth is this was the only thing I could think of to keep the boys from fighting which they had done all morning. Colin wanted to pretend to be gorillas and Seth wanted to play imaginary baseball and neither side was willing to compromise (even after mommy suggested gorilla baseball). Violence soon followed, more than once, and escalated quickly. So really this session of pickle making was my version of a peace summit. For the 45 minutes it took to finish it was calm and cheerful.
Another August...another trip to the local county fair. This time we went to the youth rodeo. A little muttin' bustin', a little bronco ridin', and barrel racin'.
Colin has been wanting to dress like a cowboy since going to the Snake River Stampede in Idaho. This night was no exception. Both boys wore their belt buckles and cowboy hats. It took us 40 minutes to walk from one end of the fairgrounds to the other, because people (teenage girls mostly) kept stopping to compliment the boys outfits.
Cowboy Colin and Baby Ellis
We sat near the announcer's booth to take advantage of the shade, but as soon as the bronco riding started the music got much louder and much more obnoxious. This was the scene while the announcer played "Let the Bodies Hit the Floor" by Drowning Pool. Come on announcer guy...it's youth night at the rodeo. Can't we get something sweet and festive?
Here's a look back at previous visits to the fair. 2012, 2011
The Grand Finale of our trip was a night at The Snake River Stampede. It was a surprise for the boys. Having never been to a rodeo they weren't quite sure what to expect. Colin, who loves horses (especially "buckin' broncos"), has seen videos and read books about cowboys but hadn't seen anything like this in real life. And when you ask him what he wants to be when he grows up he'll say a "horse rider".
Colin spent the entire night with an awe struck grin on his face and yipped and hollered at all the right times. Toward the end of the night Colin was even more convinced that "horse rider" was his life's calling. Seth decided that when he grows up he wants to be a clown. We're all blessed with certain gifts I suppose.
Showing up the proper technique for riding a "buckin' bronco"
They did a cool drill team routine all on horse back. The arena was dark and the only lights were those strapped to the horses and riders. It was like a choreographed routine only sped up a thousand times. They performed to Ghost Riders in the Sky.
It was Breast Cancer Awareness night, which is the only reason you'll ever find so many cowboys wearing pink.
Colin tippin' his hat to the rodeo.
Wearin' Grandpa's hat
I have exhausted my apostrophe ending (endin') allotment for the week so I'll go ahead and declare this vacation in the books. And that's fairly easy to do because we're settled back in a home, the laundry is done, and we're headed full force into the start of the school year.
Thank you Grandpa and Grandma for planning such an amazing trip. We've been home two weeks now and every day some memory of our trip will come to mind and we talk about how much fun it was and all the amazing things we got to do. They'll remember it for a long long time.
Some time soon I'll share how we survived the 44 hour road trip. Now that it worked just as we hoped we can call it a genius plan. Had it not worked, we wouldn't be talking about it at all.
We all headed up to McCall for the weekend. We spent Saturday at Payette Lake.
Does this look like a kid having a good time or what?
Sand Sculpting with Aunt Kelly
Wave-Running with Daddy
We gave the boys a disposable camera to take their own pictures during our trip. Colin was the photographer on this one and he had very specific instructions about where and how we were supposed to stand. It turned out to be a great picture. Too bad it looks like a vacation we took in 1984.
Ice Cream Alley in McCall. This is another highlight for the boys. Having ice cream right before dinner was one of their favorite things about the trip.
Another picture from the disposable camera. Seth directed this shot.
