The good, the bad, the ugly

I decided early this week that we were going to get all the boys pictures taken at Sears. I had this image of a cute picture hanging at Nana's house of my three boys sitting looking at the camera smiling (I was expecting miracles). Instead Jay's expectations for the boys was more realistic.

I had enough sense to bring Jay with me. I don't think Thomas or Phillip would have survived without Jay. When we got there the lady took her time preparing the room which was the first mistake. By the time she had everything ready, Thomas and Phillip were done playing the "good boy" game and proceeded to chase each other around the desk. Guy had spit up everywhere, and I am peaking behind the desk for any coupons better than what I had (I found a great one, but it was for Sears employees only).

She started taking Guys pictures which we got some great ones:

Then she decided to just add the boys. Which was cute, "just add" Phillip and Thomas. How hard would that be....HA!HA!HA!. During the past five minutes of taking Guys pictures. Thomas and Phillip were running behind the curtain and found two old balloons. Well when it came time to "just add them". I realized Thomas was going to have a total melt down when I took the balloon away so he was able to hold the balloon in the picture:



As you can see, the photographer was a very sweet girl, but she did not believe or did not know how to position kids. These shots went around for a couple of minutes, and then she decided to take a couple of Phillip and Guy.



She should have done a couple of Phillip and Thomas and Thomas and Guy at that point, but instead she took a couple of Phillip with the five.


Now Thomas thought that five was pretty cool, so the lady made a great decision of bringing out the two for Thomas:

Yes Thomas is trying to climb the two....

Then we attempted to take pictures of Thomas and Guy, but Thomas would not even sit on the background. I told Thomas that he was going to regret not having his pictures taken with his brothers someday (Yeah, he could have cared less).

Well, I wanted a patriotic background because that was the whole outfit scheme so I asked for one more. This picture is going to be treasured in my house forever. These are my little boys, that someday are going to be smelly teenagers with girlfriends who show too much midriff. I will look back at this very stressful day with fond memories, and wish they were that small again. However, this picture day we ended up fulfilling Jay's one goal for the kids: all of them be in the frame :

How do the Duggar's get all their kids in a picture looking at the camera and smiling at the same time?

Field Day

Phillip's school had a field day the last couple of days of school. Jay took off work to watch Guy so I could go and help the class. Phillip and I had a lot of fun. The Pre-K class did not participate in a lot of the field day events, but I don't think they cared. They had fun dancing, playing on the playground, and playing in the sprinkler set up to cool everyone down.

After the field day activities we went back to the classroom. It was a very exciting day for the kids because they were able to eat their lunch in the classroom. How cool is that? Phillip and his buddies ate back in the block zone, which I thought was cute. Anytime you ask Phillip what he did at school today he always says "play in block zone."

The kids practiced really hard for their "talent show" performance, and sang a couple of other songs. Phillip told me I would not embarrass him if I taught the kids Princess Pat and Montague. Actually for the first time in a while I was pretty cool in his eyes.

At 1:00 the school was having a talent show. Phillip's class was doing a song about the "abc's" This was Phillip first school performance and Jay and I was very excited. The problem was they started five minutes early, and Jay came in right when the performance was over with. I video taped it, but it still was not the same.

Phillip and I hung out and watched several different kids perform their "talents". It was really cute. Phillip was getting fidgety and so we decided that we would walk home from school. Phillip and I have talked about walking home from school all year. I just could not see walking to the school and back with Thomas and Guy in tow. This was our opportunity. It was such a beautiful day, and Phillip and I really enjoyed that special time together.

Weather night was a disaster!

This Wednesday we had weather night, and even though the kids had a great time it did not go the way I planned. The plan was to have a weather night (Make a tornado, some how show them hail, make a snowman with insta snow, and make a volcano.) The tornado was a hit (Jay has lots of practice from a health fair I did in my Red Cross days).The the rest did not go as planned. We still had a great time. The insta snow was fun (in a couple of weeks we are going to try to make our own with a diaper). You were not able to make mini snowman with it like I wished. I never figured out how to make hail, and realized at the last minute that we did not have baking soda, so the volcano was out of the question. Jay and I were both very tired and was glad that the activity was over with quickly. Phillip is really wanting to make the volcano, and I am going to have to remember to buy baking soda at the store. Next week we are planning on doing Dinosaurs day.

Guy eating his first bites of cereal

This week Guy started eating cereal at supper time. Okay, he is not really eating it. He is doing that thing with his tongue where he pushes it back out. He is still cute, he is starting to open his mouth when he sees the spoon coming towards his mouth. I know we are a month early from when all the books say to feed them, but this is just really practicing at this point. Plus, supper is such an important time for our family it is nice that he can be a part of it rather than on the side line watching the fishes. With me getting Guy's and Thomas plate together and feeding Guy, I am not going to eat supper for awhile. I guess that will help with the last five pounds.

Territorial Fair

The boys and I in the log cabin....
Thomas is doing his usual group pose position.
We are going to laugh about that someday.

We thought it would be neat to go to the Territorial Fair at HAM. HAM is a museum dedicated to the Frontier Day's. The Fair included crafts, reenactors, and many activities for the kids including square dancing and sidewalk chalk. It was all free, and we were able to go at the kids pace. I was also able to see some friends that I have not seen in a while.

One of the activities was whitewashing a fence with Tom Sawyer.
Phillip enjoyed it (Thomas was scared).
The boy who played Tom did a wonderful job.
You can tell he had done his homework.

The kids enjoyed playing with toys popular in the past.

Thomas walking on stilts

The boys enjoyed exploring all the old houses. There favorite by far was the recreation of a frontier's day bathroom.

There were a lot of craft opportunities. They were crowded and the kids did not seem interested so we were able to skip that part. What I enjoyed was the guys randomly playing his fiddle. The sound of a fiddle through the air on a beautiful Saturday morning made you feel like you were actually there. Jay enjoyed looking briefly at the Bowie knife display. However, it was right next to the furniture exhibit which was just begging a two year old to jump and climb on.

Phillip had the opportunity to make rope. The guy who was doing that had to be so patient. He rotated the kids through three different parts of making rope. When they got to the last one they got the rope.

Phillip and Thomas each got a recorder and played them all the way home. We ended the adventure with Speed Racer happy meals, and mini ice cream sandwiches.

A weekend at the "Fort"

The boys and I went to the "Fort" for the first time by ourselves. We had a great time and the trip there and back was thankfully uneventful. We went to mom's work to show off Guy and the rest of the tribe. Then, we went to visit with Robyn and her clan. The boys had a great time playing with Greyson. I can not get over how big Hailey is. It seems like yesterday she was 2 years old.

Phillip, Greyson, and Thomas playing in Greyson's room

That night we went to Papa Mickey and Bamaw's house. Papa Mickey took them walking all over his property. The boys really enjoyed playing with Papa Mickey and Bamaw, and they love exploring Papa's new front porch.

Phillip, Papa Mickey and Thomas

The next day Guy hung out with Bamaw and Papa Mickey while the rest of us went to the ABF picnic. We meet up with Nana and Papa Lewis as well as Aunt Becca and Dean Bean. We all had a great time. There was a couple of clowns making balloon animals, which stop Thomas in his tracks. He was terrified of the clowns. He put on his serious face and stepped away from them. They received two helium balloons which they played with the rest of the time we were at Nana's.

Nana, Papa Lewis, Aunt Becca, and Phillip, Thomas and Dean

After the picnic we hung out for awhile at Nana's house and watch the Care Bears and let Thomas take a much needed nap. We were adventurous enough to go to Western Sizzling, and had a great time. We then went over to Uncle Casey and Aunt Becca's house for a while. Thomas and Dean played wonderfully together, and Phillip loves playing with Uncle Casey's superhero toys and playing the Wii.

The next day we left pretty early, to get back home. We did not get a chance to do our Sunday visit with Theresa because she was at a scrap booking retreat.

On the way home, Phillip said wouldn't be neat if we lived down the street from Mrs. Robyn, and we could just go over to her house and play whenever we wanted. I agree that would be fun!