Friend's B'Day Party

We went to a 1 year birthday party for a couple here.  They are probably among our closest friends and they have a 1 year old boy who is destined to cause trouble with G.  For the party we went to their house (as well as lots of family and friends of theirs) and A and G decided to take over.  I felt kind of bad but at the same time no one seemed to mind.  I'm not sure the kids were bullies but they were the oldest and most willing to push their wants to the front.  It was a "Monsters Inc." (my comma key apparently no longer works) themed party and they had some fantastic cupcakes made.  The icing for the cake though turned A's mouth all sorts of fun colors. The child also got a "Thomas" for his birthday and my kids took it over.  G did a fantastic job steering and taking it around.  He did so well in fact that it made us less nervous for him to drive the thing than A.  Anyway I'm off to bed but thought the pictures might be nice for everyone to see. 

Pumpkin Season!

Saturday last I went to my fruit stand and bought some pumpkins. G had to carry his (he's quite the gentleman normally and will try and carry anything for me, push anything for me, pick up anything for me -- provided I then pick him up as well!) white (yes, it had to be white) pumpkin around the stand, to the counter and to the car.  He was quite proud of his pumpkin.  A was taking a nap in the car the whole time.  I checked with the seller and apparently white pumpkins work similarly to orange, just not as pumpkiny.

The pumpkins have sat around this week as the fall term is a nightmare.  Chris works late two nights and we have church one night.  That leaves Tuesdays to be a normal family and we are only a few weeks in to the term.  G has played with his white pumpkin most days and wanted to see it/touch it/bonk his sister on the head with it all week.  Since the kids and I typically get home well before Chris I decided we were going to at least get the pumpkins roasted tonight.  A was all for it as she remembered gooping out pumpkins last year (if not the year before). As we goop out pumpkins several times a season, this is a fair thing to remember.  G however was a bit irritated that I wanted to mess up his perfect pumpkin.  A has become quite helpful when it is just the three of us, and is becoming the bossy, worldly older sister.  A tried to help calm G down about the pumpkin, but it just didn't happen.

I just remembered that I still have seeds to sort, so here are a few pictures of our pumpkins thus far in the season. 

Past Weeks in Pictures

Got bacon? or milk. He'll ask for either and loves both. 

I came, I saw, I conquered.  The watermelon that is. He ate the yellow bowl you see full of pasta and about 1/4 of a watermelon for supper this night. 

Why I'm not exactly thrilled with the local school system. This is at the pool we go to weekly.

Pouty princess.  Really, we just ran into a table. I've been told she won't do it again.

G had to have a helmet (head he says) to ride the scooter

Round 1 to the table

We had inaugural handbells last night. A wanted to come with me so I let her. She brought her bears and read them stories, put them to bed, played with the clothespins (used to help turn pages quickly with gloves on for the non handbell players out there) and really just entertained herself.  She did really really well until the last two pages of music. Literally we were on the last page and she ran head long down the center aisle, right into a table. We managed to get lots of blood and a fat lip from the experience. Maybe we will also learn to continue reading her books when mommy says we are almost done. Here's hoping.

Tubing, Pool Style

The lifeguards were bored and since we were the only kids there we got to play with the rescue tubes! 

Ear Tubes

Yesterday G received a set of tubes for his ears. It was a nice quick surgery, I think it took all of 15 minutes. The doctor told us that there was a lot of fluid in the ears that was suctioned out during the surgery. There has also been a bit of drainage.  G will tell us that his ears feel better (we're taking whiplash inducing head shaking of, "yes") when we ask.  He came out of the aesthetic mad as a hornet and then calmed down about half way home. He also took a nap and got the rest of the medicine out of his system. By the time we got home he was ready to play and go about his day.

Overall this has been an interesting week here. We started with a cyclist with several connections to people at work being killed on his way to work.  The driver had crossed over two lanes of traffic to accidentally hit the cyclist. It has caused quite the stir amidst the cycling community here.

Chris is getting ready for a new fall term that brings a new set of challenges. He will hopefully not have to teach at night, or only teach one night a week. 

Anyway, off to face another hot, humid, sticky day.

Swim Lessons + Thunderstorms

The past two weeks we've been dealing with swim lessons and thunderstorms. Swim lessons were only supposed to last one week, but because of the storms, they lasted the better part of 2 weeks. We learned a lot, including that G doesn't really want to swim until you get him in the water. Then good luck getting him out. A will need to continue her swimming, but that involves a bit more time away from mom and dad than she'd like. She hasn't figured out how to move her arms and legs fast enough to effectively keep her head above water. She has a few more years at the current level before she can test out though, so hopefully we will continue to practice and test out next year. 

We've finally gotten some much needed rain. The thunderstorms are understandably at the end of the day as our days are typically around 100 degrees.  We enjoy the storms, but the kids are still not so sure. G will sleep through them if he's asleep, but they wake A up. 

G will be getting tubes this Wednesday. Hopefully it will be an easy surgery and not a lot different than what we have now.  We expect him to "hear a bit better" though we can't really tell that he's lost any hearing. Hopefully any damage that has been done this far will go away and is not lasting. 

I suppose that's the update from NC. How about you?