Afternoon at the Park

Last Tuesday Brian was home early (he'd had to lead music at a funeral) so we took the boys to the park. Nathaniel loved swinging and try to crawl off the blanket and eat the grass. He also liked sliding down the slide with Daddy. Joshua loved everything - including playing with the new lawn games we got at Walmart awhile back. Yesterday was Youth Day here in Winters...I'll post pictures of that when I have time to download them. Tomorrow is the big day here in our house - Joshua turns 5! He is so excited for the birthday that means he's old enough for kindergarten. Nathaniel hit 8 months on Friday...and his third tooth (and first upper one) FINALLY broke through sometime between Friday night and Saturday morning. Hopefully he'll be in a better humor now! We had a few practically sleepless nights earlier last week.
Here are a few photos from the park...enjoy!

Colds Again!!!

I swear, Joshua has the eternal cold this spring! It goes away, then a couple of weeks later he's got the sniffles and a cough again and starts to lose his voice. Then Nathaniel starts in with a runny nose, etc. Well, part of his problem is his upper right front tooth is about through the skin, so that doesn't help. I stayed home with both boys today instead of going to church...that was fun. Actually, I'd been up with Nathaniel most of the night, so probably couldn't even have played the piano in Relief Society like I was supposed to. I did tons of laundry today - washed sheets, blankets, pillows & stuffed animals...flipped their mattresses and got the air purifier going. This crazy weather isn't helping either...we were up in the upper 80s for a few days, then dropped to the 60s and then rain and now this coming week we're supposed to be back in the 80s!
Joshua is anxiously anticipating his birthday in 8 days. He can't wait to be five. He wants to start kindergarten that very same day, or maybe the next one, but I think we've finally got him convinced that he has to wait until August. He does get to get his own library card at Storytime the day after his birthday (you have to be 5 or in school) so that is helping him some.
I did a scrapbook page yesterday and finished it today...I like how it turned out :)
http://forum.storytellersclub.com/gallery/showphoto.php?photo=21783
It was going to be an entry for a monochromatic contest, but I ran across this dotted paper and loved it so skipped the mono. stuff :)

We're having a crop night at the church this coming Friday...I'm in charge so I hope it turns out and we have a good turnout. We're hoping to do this the last Friday of each month...I've got to get all my stuff together for the mini-class I'm teach at it as well as pull my stuff together to take to work on.
Well, better get the sheets on our bed since I didn't get to that earlier today and try to get to sleep at least for a little while before Nathaniel wakes up. He was in bed shortly after 9, so I'm sure he'll be waking up at least once in the night!

My Silly Boys

Today I dressed the boys in matching shirts that Grandma Lorrayne gave them at Easter time. Quickly, before we headed to Storytime at the library, I had them sit down in front of the tree in the front yard. The lawn really needs to be mowed, but between being gone for Easter weekend and then last Saturday having pouring rain for a good part of the day, it's a little long. (I decided to pretend that they're sitting in a meadow...that always makes for a good picture...if it wasn't for the ADT sign, flower pots, side of the house and garden hose in the far background) It's nearly impossible to get both boys looking at the camera and smiling (a real smile in Joshua's case) at the same time. I think I'd have a better chance at winning the lottery (if I played it) than I do of getting them both to look at me, smile and hold it for three seconds while I take a picture, especially at these ages. I did get one pretty decent picture of both of them looking and smiling...except it's one of Joshua's forced smiles and he isn't really looking at the camera, he's looking out of the corner of his eye toward the street. But Nathaniel looks cute. >This second picture is my favorite of them...Joshua is tickling Nathaniel's foot with a tall piece of grass (okay, it's probably really a weed) and you can tell they are both laughing. The expression on Nathaniel's face is just priceless.

I was going to try again later, but the lighting was wrong later on and people were grumpy (all 3 of us), so these will have to do it for now.

Rainy Saturday

Saturday was a pretty rainy day. We were planning on going to the Sacramento Temple with the Ward for a Ward Activity, but decided that we really needed to spend some time at home. Because of rain off and on (mostly on) all day long, the backyard jungle and the front yard didn't get taken care of, but we got some other things done. Brian put some more shelves up in the computer/preschool/scrapbook room for me...I've got no excuse for not getting my stuff organized now. He also put up some shelves in the boys' closet and rehung the net for stuffed animals that we'd had in there before.

He and Joshua had made a run to the storage place to get some of the shelves and had also brought back Joshua's "giant legos" as I call them. Nathaniel had a blast with these blocks - they're great for teething!

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Later in the evening, the boys played a game while I fixed dinner. As you can see, Shadow thought they were setting up a new activity for her! She is one funny cat!

We watched "Return of the Jedi" (Joshua's pick) and let Joshua stay up a little later than usual. It was so nice to just stay at home and be with our family and not go anywhere for once on a Saturday - those days are just too rare!

Easter Part 2

Here are a few pictures of the boys & their cousin Geddy with their Easter baskets. Nathaniel & Geddy had buckets for their baskets and Joshua had a small yellow (of course) wicker basket. The little ones didn't really care about Easter...they just wanted to gnaw on something. Joshua, on the other hand, knew exactly what was up and could hardly wait to go out back and see where the Easter bunny had hid the eggs. Between baskets & egg hunt, we took a bunch of family pictures. I missed the egg hunt because Nathaniel needed to be fed - but Brian got pictures for me :)


Nathaniel & Geddy both enjoy being upside down - it makes them giggle :)

Easter Weekend part 1

We had an enjoyable Easter weekend up in Etna with family. Mom & Dad's house was packed to overflowing with all 4 of us girls home, plus three husbands and 3 little boys! Every room was full...even the kitchen where Sarah & Dave slept on an air mattress the night they were up. It's the 1st time that the 4 of us girls had all been together since Carrie's high school graduation in 2003...and the first time we've all been together, including husbands, since Thanksgiving 2001! The family has been blessed with the addition of 3 grandsons since then. Joshua was thrilled to be up at Grandma & Grandpa's again...and wanted to stay longer. This was Nathaniel's first trip up there and he did quite well...on the trip up he slept for the first two hours...things were a little flustered for an hour or so...I got to ride in the back seat and fed him a jar of food while he thrashed in his carseat...and then sat on the floor inbetween the seats the boys were in and tried to play with him to get us through the canyon before we had to pull over, but no such luck. I'd wanted to make it to Dunsmuir before we had to pull over, but that didn't work. We pulled off before that so I could really feed him & change him. That gave Brian some time to stretch his legs and Joshua, too. Nathaniel fell asleep shortly thereafter and slept the rest of the way. The trip back was much nicer...he slept for 3. 5 hours of the trip...leaving us with about 45 minutes and he played for most of that.
We reached Etna around 10 pm....Carol, Scott & Geddy had arrived about an hour before us from Utah. It was Geddy's first big trip too...though there's was quite a bit longer than ours! The three cousins got to play together for a little while before we all went to bed way too late...Nathaniel & Geddy kept Carol and I up most of the night - each of us camped out in Mom & Dad's recliners. Brian slept through most of it on the couch & Carrie too on a futon in the living room where we all were. The second night was a little better and the last night was much better for me!
Saturday was a full day. Sarah & Dave got there around lunchtime. Grandma Darlene came up and was with us for most of the day. Joshua walked down town with Grandpa Bruce & Daddy...
and then later went back to town with me to see where I'd gone to kindergarten. He & I never get to do Mommy & Joshua time very much anymore, so it was fun for us. We walked around the elementary school and I showed him all of the different classrooms I'd had and where the music room was and where I'd played at recess. Lately he's been on a kick of wanting Brian & I to tell him stories about when we were kids, so I was able to do quite a bit of that - with visuals. Then we walked around down town a little and I showed him where Great-Grandpa Ken's grocery store had been & where Great-Grandma Darlene's ceramic shop had been. I probably enjoyed our time together more than he did, but it was fun.
Aunt Carrie helped him decorate Easter eggs and later I decorated a birthday cake for him & the boys. The little ones (at 8 & 7 months) didn't care and didn't get any cake, but Joshua was excited. For months he's been talking about wanting to have his birthday at Grandma & Grandpa's again. We told him that we were going up for Easter and wouldn't be able to go back up 3 weeks later, so we compromised and had a cake for him. He got a few birthday presents as did the little boys since we won't all be together in July & August for their 1st birthdays.
Joshua'd wanted a Star Wars cake and he wanted stars on it (because it's in outerspace, you know) and then he decided he wanted some colored planets on it - and one had to be blue because that's Earth and that's where we live. I did my best, but I've never taken a cake decorating class...thank goodness he doesn't care what it looks like - he always says it looks just like he wanted it.
I'll post more about Easter later...laundry calls now.

Fun Time!

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Trying something new...

Busy trying to get stuff done around here lately. Heading up north for Easter tomorrow...it'll be fun for the boys to see Grandma & Grandpa & Great-Grandma, not to mention their aunts and uncles and new cousin. Joshua is very excited about this all and packed his suitcase this morning pj's, T-shirts, LOTS of underwear, a pair of jeans, some socks and a light saber. Have to have the essentials :) Tomorrow morning we turn in his registration for the Dual Immersion program for kindergarten. He shouldn't have a problem getting in (so we've been assured by the principal several times) and this will be a great program for him. He'll very much need the challenge - regular kindergarten wouldn't be enough!

Nathaniel's second tooth came through in the night - HALLELUJAH!! Yesterday was a miserable day with him - grumpy, cranky, feverish...all he wanted was to be held and nursed...all because of that tooth. Today was a much better day for him.

I'm trying something new that I've seen several times in a friend's blog (Hi, Melanie!) She always does the cutest little slide shows and stuff in her blog entries. So here's one I tried. Crossing my fingers that it works.

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