Company Carnival

We went to the Gen Mills company picnic/carnival the weekend. It was pretty fun. The weather was pretty good too. It wasn't too hot and there was a nice breeze which brought a little rain, but nothing we couldn't handle. Ben was playing at the playground when the rain hit and all the big kids started yelling, "get in the tunnels." Ben started running around outside the playground and yelling, "det ee da tunnel dies" translation "get it the tunnel guys!" It was so funny because he was getting rained on while he was trying to save the other kids.
The boys all started out riding the small ferris wheel. Noah and Jakob had fun even though they hit their heads and stuff. Ben, on the other hand, had a good time until about two rounds from the end and he started crying, so the guy let him out. There were tons of fun activities. Jakob was so responsible and kept an eye on Noah the whole time and made sure he was getting through the tunnels and slides and everything.
Noah had fun too because he could run around and do everything that the bigger kids were doing.
All the boys ate a huge dinner of pancakes, bacon and biscuits at Bob Evans after the picnic and of course, slept so soundly.
Oh, and Steve won a door prize - a croquet set.
Oh and I almost forgot! Steve and his team won the 3 on 3 Basketball tournament as well.

Happy Anniversary!

I just wanted to say Happy Anniversary to my parents. 40 years ago today, they got married and have been together ever since! They met in 8th grade, and could still stand each other when they got married years later at 24!
They are a shining example, not only of 2 individuals, but of how 2 people can grow with each other over the years and still like each other - let alone love each other. In this day and age, that seems to be increasingly more difficult to find.
One of my fondest memories from growing up is of the 2 of them dancing in the kitchen to only the music in their hearts. I have hope that those are the kinds of memories our kids will have of me and Steve when we are celebrating our 40th!!
Anyway, Happy Anniversary! We love you!

By the way, these are the best, most recent pics I could find! They are 2 1/2 years old! And there aren't any pics of them together!

Captain Underpants

Ben has been doing a great job with potty training. We went to a friend's house to go swimming yesterday and he went in their potty. He's been able to go on the potty almost every time we put him there! I have figured out some of his ques and get him there in time most of the time. I hope that I have purchased my last package of diapers for him. Yay, Ben!!! He also loves wearing 'unweer' instead of diapers and being a big boy.

Zoo day

Jakob, Noah, Ben, and Aaron at the Columbus Zoo.
Aaron and Jakob were so excited to see each other when we picked Aaron up that I could tell that they wanted to hug each other or something, but they did 'boy hugs' and hit each other a little. Noah was really excited too.



All the boys had to touch a farm animal at the petting zoo so we could go on the train. This sheep had the craziest under bite! The boys were great they even brushed and combed some of the animals. We created a monster in Ben - he kept wanting to touch everything. He touched starfish in the touch pool, a ferret, and even a snake!







Jakob, Aaron, and a manatee. These were so cool and huge, too. This exhibit had manatees, rays, and tons of fish. For some reason Ben kept covering his ears when the manatees would get close. He did it by the elephants too, but I figured he thought they might be loud. I don't know why he did it at the manatees. I told him they don't make noise but he covered anyway!


This is Jakob's favorite animal. It's called an Okapi (oh - copy). He says it's half giraffe, half zebra, and half horse. Ummm.... It was pretty neat. It seemed to have the head of a giraffe, the legs of a zebra, and the body was a mix of the two. There was another one that had a longer neck than this one. According to the Zoo website, it's the size of a horse but more closely related to a giraffe.

Happy Birthday!!!

Happy birthday, to you!
Happy birthday, to you!
Happy birthday, dear Jakob!!!
Happy birthday, to you!

Jakob is 7 today!!! I can't believe that it has already been 7 years since he came into the world in sunny Southern California. It was the best day of my life.
It is amazing to watch him grow and learn - and of course, he is the smartest 7 year old alive!!
We love Jakob so much.
He also finished the baseball season in 2nd place yesterday. His team lost to the Subway team 26-9! :{ Everybody was intimidated by them, so it was no wonder. And one of the Subway boys caught an unfortunate bounce from a really hard hit ball with his eye. It puffed up right away but he stayed around for pictures and trophies.
Still, we are extremely proud of Jakob and all his accomplishments.
Big day ahead, more later!

New project

Well, I have begun a new project in my life. I have become an Uppercase Living Demonstrator! It is fun and exciting home decorating expressions that can be put almost anywhere in your home and on nearly every surface. Anybody who knows me knows that I cannot paint to save my life, except maybe a flat wall (and let's face it who has the time to hand paint?), but these help put a little personality all over the place. They just stick up on walls, tiles, glass, and a whole lot of other stuff. I am excited to start this new endeavor and hope that everyone who reads this checks out uppercaseliving.com to find the expressions for your life.
I just finished my first project in the powder room and I love it. I can't wait for people to see it.

Something's missing!

Jakob finally lost tooth #3. Steve pulled Jakob's first top tooth Sunday. We've been working on it for about a month. Jakob was a little sad after school got out because he was the only one who didn't get his name on the lost tooth board. Which means that he's the only kid in his class that didn't lose a tooth at school. I guess his dental health is in pretty good shape!

Cincinnati

We took a quick trip to Cincinnati Thursday for Steve to do a workshop at the plant there, and have a mini vacation. The boys and I went for a swim in the hotel pool before dinner. Jakob remembered how much he loved the water from California, and would go under water, except he wouldn't really go any farther out than the third step. Noah went in to about his waist and didn't even like it when I tried to carry him around.
Ben didn't like to get in past his knees but he kept going between the pool and the hot tub to dip in his toes and run back to the pool. He slipped on the tile 4 or 5 times until he finally bumped his head on the floor and I made him sit out for a little. Then he agreed to just sit on the side of the pool and not go back and forth. We decided to go over to the hot tub and he was sitting on the side again. He kept putting his hand in the water and would pretend to drink it and then laugh. He got brave again and went back over to the pool and did the same thing with his hand and wouldn't you know it, he lost his balance and fell in. As he was flailing around trying to get himself out, I ran across and jumped in to get him out of the water while some crazy woman said 'oh, he'll be alright' like I shouldn't really be concerned - but her largely prego daughter was sitting in the hot tub with her, so what does she know?! I got Ben out of the water and he was just fine, he was pretty scared and crying, but he didn't swallow any water or anything, so we left the pool. The whole thing probably lasted only 10 seconds, but it seemed like a lot longer, and I am really glad I didn't have to do CPR because a lot has changed since I was 11 and took the course for baby sitting! Jakob thought it was pretty cool that Ben swam but he didn't understand that that wasn't real swimming.
I also got to go to the new Ikea store in Cincinnati. It was great. Jakob and Noah got to play in Smaland for an hour, and Ben has new motivation to become potty trained. He'll get to play the next time we're there if he's out of diapers. He was very sad that he couldn't play yesterday, so he tried sitting on the potty a couple of times today.
After Ikea, we picked up Steve and went to a really cool grocery store. 'Really cool grocery store?' you ask. It's called Jungle Jims." It has really cool international food and fresh fish and produce and you can watch the fish coming in to the tanks, and they have cooking classes, and so much more that we probably didn't even see. It would have been better if we weren't so tired and the boys actually liked shopping.

stormy

We had some more storms again last night. Two scared boys came and slept in our bed after Steve went to work. Keely was scared of the lightning even before there was any thunder. I guess she knew what was coming. It wasn't as bad a storm as last week, but there was a lot of lightning that sounded pretty close.
In the morning, we discovered a downed branch and the power was out until 2pm. The electric company said at about 1pm that the power wouldn't be on until 2pm tomorrow, so I was very happy when it came back on.
While the power was out we went to Jakob's school library and read books (and soaked up some of the air conditioning!). It's pretty neat. All the elementaries have their libraries open one day each week. The kids can read books and take a computer test on them and earn points to get prizes. It's the same system they have during the year.
After the library it was a little cooler outside, so we went to the garden and planted corn, spinach and finally transplanted the eggplants. I hope it's not too late for any of these things. We are getting a lot of lettuce in and having salad most nights with dinner. The tomatoes are coming along, but there aren't any ripe ones yet. I don't know about the beans and peas. They don't seem to be growing very well.
I hadn't seen hide nor hare (get it?!) of Little Bunny Foo Foo, until today. I put bacon grease along the entrance to the garden hoping that that is where he was getting in because it is the most obvious place. Luckily, Foo Foo wasn't in the garden but around the back side outside the fence.

Busy Saturday

Jakob had a great game on Saturday. He had 3 great hits in his baseball game. It's supposed to be the last game, but 3 more got rained out so we are waiting to find out if they are rescheduled. Plus, there might be a tournament in a week or so. Jakob finally got some good pitches and really took advantage of them. Here's the compilation of the 3 hits. Please excuse the screaming child, it wasn't one of ours.



After the game we rushed to a birthday bowling party. Jakob had a lot of fun and said he got 2 strikes - without bumpers.
And in the midst of all that, we (mostly Steve) managed to do the yard work. And by the way, make sure you wear sunblock even when it is cloudy because I got pretty sunburned yesterday while it was overcast. The boys wore sunblock, but I didn't.

No wonder she hates him

I think this speaks for itself.

Peter Cottontail

We have a bunny in the garden now. It's eating all the strawberries. It also is eating all the clover that is growing wildly. It's time to mow down the weeds again and finish the tilling and planting. I had read that bunnies don't like bacon grease, and if you put it around the garden they won't cross it. I made bacon with dinner intending to put it out there to see if that was true, but somehow, it got thrown out. Oh, well, I guess we'll just have to have more bacon - darn.
Despite the critter frustrations, I was able to get some lettuce out of the moat that is currently the garden.

Last night there were some major storms in the area. We had some terrible lightning and horrible thunder. It lasted all night and most of today. Keely was so afraid of the thunder that she slept in Jakob's room, then Noah and Ben's and then ours. She's such a scaredy dog!

Susie Homemaker

A long weekend away seems to have brought out my inner decorator. Monday we went to Wally World and bought paint. I guess I figured that all the kids were home, so why not take on another big project?! Jakob's room is now a beautiful shade of blue (Anchors Away). Jakob picked out the color and loves it. He and Noah helped tape and paint.
Also, the powder room needed a face lift, due to the boring white color. And it is now Victorian Sage. I wanted it a little lighter but it turned out nice.

It's good to be home!

So, I went home for the weekend to surprise Cathy for her birthday (she turned 21 on Friday). Unfortunately, she wasn't there! She took a job in another state and is gone for the summer, but it sounds like she is having a great time. She seemed to be really surprised because she emailed my mom and asked what I was doing at home. So, we celebrated without her with dinner at Gorozzo's Italian restaurant and pedicures and a fun Saturday night on the town.
After a fun and relaxing girl weekend, it was nice to come home to a vase full of flowers and 2 welcome home pictures drawn by Jakob and Noah. Noah was asleep on the couch as if he had been waiting up for me to get in. Keely was excited for me to let her outside. I missed my boys and I am glad to be home.