Brandon Turned 4!!

What fun turning 4!!  Brandon had a busy weekend filled with all kinds of special activities and treats.  He ate hot dogs for three meals (Brandon heaven), went flying with Bumpa (Grandpa) who did a whole bunch of negative and positive G's and Brandon loved every minute of it, had his dream Thomas cake become reality, got to open lots and lots of presents, got to skype with Grandpa and Grandma Horling, and had two straight days of daddy-time.  Let's just say, he's just a wee bit exhausted.  :)

Brandon has been asking for a Thomas cake for a while so last week I found six cake pictures on the Internet and let him pick which one he wanted me to make.  He chose a 3-D Thomas, the one I was the most leery of making.  I think it turned out pretty well, despite taking twice as long as I thought it would to make. 

Brandon watched most of the process to make it and just didn't think it would actually turn in to a Thomas cake.  "Mom, is that my cake?"  "Mommy, it's not blue."  "That doesn't look like a train."  Then he went flying and was gone for about three hours.  When he walked in the door with Bumpa he was all ready to tell me about his flight when he turned around, stopped mid sentence, his eyes went wide and he said, "It's Thomas!"

By the time I was finished decorating it, the back was starting to sag from the weight, but that's as far as it sunk, so not so bad.

We ate outside since it was such a beautiful day.  Gramps and GG are building a new house
so they gave us their patio set.  We are so excited to have something sturdy outside to use.

And then it was time for Brandon to open his presents.  The moment he had been anticipating with VERY eager excitement for days on end.  He wasn't disappointed!

He woke up the next morning (Sunday) and said to me, "Mommy, I will go fishing with Daddy and Bumpa." 
Me: "Yup, you will some day."
Brandon: "Are Micah and you going to stay at my house?"
Me: "Probably"
Brandon: "Yup, cause me and daddy and Bumpa are going to be boys."

Airplane from CARS 2.  The cars fit inside.

Uncle Andrew and Auntie Cheryl gave him cones and a soccer ball.  At first he wasn't sure what they were for,
so he went with what he knew and made them into the hotel for his cars from the CARS movie.

Sunday, his actual birthday, he got to talk to Grandpa and Grandma Horlings over skype.  We had saved a couple of his presents so he could open some on his birthday and one of them was from this set of grandparents.  It was fun to have them "in" our house and watch Brandon open his present from them. They got to see his eager excitement over FINALLY getting James for his Thomas and Friends set.

Later on we also gave him Rocky, who is a crane for his track.  Brandon has this boy thing going on where everything crashes so we got him a crane to help fix all the crashes.  ;)  He really got into it.

And books.  Oh how this boy loves his Thomas books!

 After nap time Bryan taught Brandon the real use for the cones and his soccer ball.  It will be good to work on his feet coordination.  Sometimes he got ahead of the ball and sometimes the ball got way ahead of him, but we're pretty sure he's going to catch on to it sooner rather than later.

And what astonished me the most looking at this picture, was how similar in form he and has daddy are together...

And now Brandon's "present" and "burfday" are all done for another year.

Blessings on your week.

Our Beautifully Sunny At-Home Week

It's been a while since we've been able to just stay home, especially when the weather has been nice, for a good stretch of time to get things done around here.  Well, we finally had that kind of week.  We didn't have a whole lot of errands, special activities to do, or people to see.  It felt like "summer" to me.

Here's our week in pictures.  There aren't very many because, well, we were busy enjoying the "hot" (80's) sunshine.  ;)

When we moved in to this house, there was lattice work between the posts.  With each consecutive
winter and northeast winds, however, they slowly started breaking apart and started looking trashy.
In May I asked my dad to take the lattice frames out completely because there wasn't anything left and they've
been looking like this ever since.  I finally had the time and attacked them--sanded them all down and repainted.
I still have one more coat to put on so I'll put up pictures of them finished next week.

Eventually we're going to put wire between them and put lights on top of them, so there is a purpose to fixing them up.

Brandon really wanted to help and at first I was a little leery, but after laying down some ground
rules he did really, really well and enjoyed it for about half and hour.

While sanding down the posts, I made the mistake of looking around the yard and over at the shed. 
The finishing/frame work on our shed looked like this.  So I decided while there was a mess to just
make it bigger and sand down the white parts on the shed as well, and repaint.  However, as I sanded, I
discovered that the wood frame on the door was completely rotten.

So took it off.

And Bryan came home for lunch to teach me how to use the skill saw and I re-framed it.  The things I never knew I'd do as a housewife.  Bryan was perfectly willing to do it for me, but he's been working extremely long days the last couple weeks so I didn't know when he would be able to get to it.  The frame's not perfect, but hey, it was my first time working with wood in this fashion.  I'm pretty proud it turned out at all!

The stripped door waiting for a frame.

 As it goes, all this started because I found one small wooden tray at 2nd Chance a couple weeks ago.  I've been looking for a sturdy tray for a while because we eat outside so much during the summer.  Well, this one had an ugly duck picture on the whole bottom of it, so I stripped and sanded it to paint...the sanding/painting projects kind of snowballed from there: tray, to recipe book stand, to posts, to shed...I'm not looking any more...

And of course, I played with the boys.  We got the bigger and more sturdy wheelbarrow out after this and both boys got a ride.

There are no words to the goofy-ness of this kid.  I love him!

Two (2) days of clothes for the boys!!  Whereas I absolutely love the boys getting muddy and dirty, I'm rather loath to let them in the house let alone their beds for nap time this way so they each had an outfit in the morning and one in the afternoon.

It was a fun, busy and productive week.  You will notice we did not go to a park this week.  We stayed home and enjoyed our own backyard which was just as fun.  Besides, I justified it in my head by saying we went to two or three a couple weeks this summer.  It was time to get things done at home.

Now it is time for me to go decorate a certain boys birthday cake.  He has chosen a 3-D Thomas cake.  I'm a little nervous but excited for the challenge.  I can't believe Brandon is turning four tomorrow!

Blessings on your weekend.

YUCK!

I have a tale to tell that I'm sure will have my family rolling in laughter and tears...

I hate fruit!!  Known fact.  I HATE fruit.  The only thing worse than fresh fruit, is rotten fruit.  I have to work very hard to keep down my gag reflex whenever I'm picking up fruit off the ground, or from the counter (probably because of all those banana and orange peels I had to pick up after my family growing up). 

Anyway, this afternoon I was working on weeding by the sand box and the fruit trees and since I was enjoying the feel of the dirt I wasn't wearing gloves.  Because I wasn't wearing gloves, I was being extremely careful not to touch any of the rotten yellow plums lying on the ground, and, might I add, I was being quite successful at it. 

Wouldn't you know, I turned around to see where Micah was and of all things, he had found one of those rotten yellow plums!!  Not only had he found it, but he had SQUISHED it in his fingers.  Then, because squishing it wasn't enough fun, he proceeded to squash and rub it all over his little arm!!

The thought of having to clean him up now so he can have a snack has me gagging.  YUCK! 

I just told Brandon to get a bucket of water and give it to Micah.  Ha ha!  A wet soggy boy is FAR superior to a boy with rotten fruit rubbed all over himself...

Shudder...

Friday Evening

Friday evening, after an extremely stressful week for Bryan and two very busy days for me, we decided to pick up supper and go to the "boat" park for a while.  It's our favorite park in the summer because it's rarely busy and Brandon absolutely LOVES the boat playground there.  For Bryan, it's just good to be around boats and the ocean when he needs to let go of the stress of the week..  After supper we let the kids play and we just sat and talked for a while.  I must admit, it's nice to have Micah in such an exploratory mood right now, without walking.  He can't get far but is content to entertain himself.

After the kids played for a while, we went for a walk and just enjoyed being a family on a quiet Friday evening.

And I had some fun taking pictures... :)

And that concludes last week.  Whew, that was a lot of pictures to work through. 

Blessings on the rest of your week.

Kids, Kids and More Kids

Last week Thursday and Friday I just played with kids.  Thursday three brothers came over for the day making five kids.  We hadn't made it to our park yet, so after lunch we headed out and went to see the Peace Arch State Park.  It is a park that sits directly on the Canada/US border and is a symbol of peace between the two countries.  It's a beautiful park, but not very kid friendly unfortunately, as I was hoping it would be. 

There were several fun sculptures around that the boys did leave alone once I explained why they weren't toys.

They really, really wanted to have a ride on this sculpture.

If you look closely through the arch you can see the American flag in flowers.

On the inner walls of the arch.

On the opposite end of this field is the Canadian flag in flowers.

I was hoping to get some more pictures of all the amazing flower arrangements, but the boys just wanted to run so my eyes had to be focused on them.

And this is the extent of the "playground".

On Friday the same three boys came back for the day and we were joined by two other kiddos.  We had seven kids that were over that day.  What a blast we had!  We walked to the park in the morning and played in the sprinkler in the afternoon. 

Running to the park.  I love the way Sam's legs are pumping so hard!  He was really booking it.

Micah is starting to become braver and more exploratory.

Hmmm...I know those move...

I wonder if I can make it move too...

My rule with Brandon at the park is he may climb on anything, as long as he can do it himself (otherwise I would spend the whole time getting him up and down and he wouldn't learn it on his own).  I'll stand underneath and give ideas on where to put his hands and feet, but I won't physically put him up there anymore.  Well, I turned around and saw his head poking up out of these tires.  I could hardly believe my eyes.  If you know the park, you know that underneath is a tire swing, but it's at least three feet from the top of the tire to the floor of the platform, with one step in between.  It takes muscle for someone this small to get up through there.  I asked Brandon to do it again cause I didn't believe he could pull himself up there, but he sure did!  He is sooo strong!

Matthias cracks me up.  He decided with a leaf in each hand that he would be a "walking" tree.

Micah watching all the goofy older kids having a water fight.  He had his own bucket to play in, but I'm pretty sure that got stolen within the first five minutes of the fight.

These two decided it was getting a little intense so they decided to go play in the sand box for a while.

As the afternoon was winding down, I looked out the screen door and there was Micah drinking the water in his bucket.  He is so funny.  He refuses to drink out of sippy cups, will only use straw cups, but if there's a real cup around that's what he wants to be using.  I guess he decided his bucket was just as good and it had water in it so he may as well drink it.  :)

They were two very fun days of play, but I will admit to being rather exhausted by the time Friday evening rolled around.

Next up, our de-stressing evening...