Yard Improvements

Sam continues to find more projects to keep himself busy around the house....

A few weeks ago it was pouring a concrete pad and then installing a basketball hoop. We are LOVING having a b-ball hoop again, (it's been a few years!) and the kids are really enjoying learning to play.

Last night it was building a swing set for the kids. The boys and a neighbor boy played on it last night. Bridget was playing at the neighbor's house and didn't see it until this morning. When she got up this morning she said, "Mommy, look what Daddy built for the boys!" :)

I don't think the kids will be spending much time inside any more, with all the fun things to do in the backyard! Of course, before this they already spent all their free time outside anyway. :)

Bridget is our little outdoors girl, but instead of an outside picture I thought I'd put this one up (just because it makes me smile!). "Stickers? What stickers?"

Soccer fun (Fall 2009)

This was Henry's fifth soccer season (he has played fall and spring since he turned four) and Jonah's very first soccer season. Jonah was SO excited and has been waiting to play for quite some time. I was excited for them both but a little apprehesive. I was concerned about having two kids playing on different fields at the same time, but it actually worked out pretty well. Their fields weren't too far apart and their games only overlapped by 15 minutes at the most, but usually they didn't overlap at all. It's so fun to watch my kids learn to play soccer!

Much of Henry's team has been playing together for a few seasons now so they are all great friends. Even though they lost most of their games they learned a lot about playing as a team and they enjoyed every small success. It was a great year!

Henry's team: The Jayhawks

Coach Lyle, Tyler, Bella, Madison, Ethan, Cody, Henry, Dillon, Brett.

(missing Coach Dave and Brianna)

Most of Jonah's team was first time players, but they all did surprisingly well! Jonah LOVED going to soccer but preferred to sit on the bench and cheer for his team. We had to give him a few pep talks to convince him that it is actually much cooler to play than to sit on the bench. :)

Jonah's team: The Red Dragons
Caden, Alexis, Walter, Liv, Dawson, Jase, Abby, Mikey and Jonah
(missing Coach Jennifer and Coach T)

The boys had a great fan section....most games we had Grammy and Grandpop and Ingrid on the sidelines. My friend Valerie made it out to a few games and Jon and Kelly (and family) made it to a few when Jordan was playing around the same time.

Those 8 am games were a little rough, especially as the weather got cooler,

but who wants to sleep in on a Saturday morning anyway? :)

It was a great season and we look forward to more soccer fun in the spring!

Fun Fall Festivities

We love fall around here. Our fall temperatures may seem summer-like to much of the rest of the USA, but for us it's a welcome reprieve from the blistering heat and humidity of an East Texas summer. Don't get me wrong, I do love summer too. I think I just love the change of seasons so much that I tend to over-celebrate whenever a new season comes along! :)

Fall for us is filled with pumpkin patches, hay rides, fall festivals, dressing up in crazy costumes, candy-candy-candy, caramel apples, bonfires, fires in the fireplace, cool early morning soccer games, raking up leaves and jumping in the piles, going for walks in the crunchy leaves, baking pumpkin muffins and pies and lots of turkey and leaf themed crafts. :)

Henry with his second choice pumpkin, after he picked the biggest one in the field and found that it was rotten.

Jonah with his pumpkin on the hay ride.

A lion we found roaming our house...and Bridget with her choice of pumpkin, which she could hardly carry!

Henry carved his own pumpkin for the second year in a row! He's always a little confused how to get the teeth to look right, but he really loves to do it all by himself.

Jonah designs his pumpkin on paper and then I carve it out for him.

Bridget had her hair sprayed bright red at one of JoJo's soccer games. Jonah wouldn't let them near him with the can, but Bridget thought it looked like a lot of fun. And in the shower later it looked like she had drenched herself in kool-aid!

Here are my three little Indians. Henry decided to be an Indian, and Jonah wanted to be Spiderman. But when we got to the fabric store and Jonah realized I wasn't making him a new spiderman costume (since we already have one in the dress-up closet), Joey decided he wanted to be an Indian too. And Bridget always wants to do whatever her brothers are doing, so three Indians it was!

We also had a weekend of birthday parties thown in for good measure. We celebrated with Isabella on a Saturday and with Zach the following day. Both turned 7 years old!

Home Improvements

It's great being married to a handy-man. Nothing is ever broken around here for long. The only problem we've run into recently is that we live in a one-year-old house and there is only so much that needs fixing up just yet. So Sam has started looking for ways to improve on what we have here.

Sam's most recent project idea was to put up a tile backsplash in the kitchen. Last week on our date night we went to Lowe's so we could look at the tiles available and get ideas on what we wanted. Next thing I know, Sam came home with boxes of tiles and got started!

Last night he invited his parents over for dinner, and after dinner he and his dad tackled the tiles. It took them only a few short hours and they had the whole thing done! Tonight Sam and I will work on the grout, so these pictures are not quite the finished product. It is just so pretty and makes the kitchen feel so warm and inviting. (It doesn't hurt that I just LOVE checkerboard patterns, does it? :) )

I know it looks like Sam just supervised while his dad did all the work, but Sam really did work too! :)

Way to go, handyman Sam! I appreciate all your hard work. Our kitchen looks absolutely beautiful!

The Advent Conspiracy

This is a really great video...a great perspective to begin the holiday season! :)

Six Flags, Markers & Wasp Stings

I love blogging. It's a beautiful way for this non-scrapbooking mama to keep a record of our lives and chronicle some of the things going on in our family. I love everything about it...except that I don't always make time for it. I'm trying to get back in the swing of things but might still be posting older things, just for the sake of getting them on here. This is one of those older posts that got missed during my I'm-too-busy-enjoying-the-summer-and-outdoors-to-blog break. :) Won't you take a minute to step back into the heat of late July with me?

Last year in kindergarten Henry received a free ticket to Six Flags for participating in a reading program. He had never been there and was SO very excited to get a trip to an amusement park. He had seen the rides from the road a number of times so he had an idea of what it was all about.

Sam stayed home from work with Jonah and Bridget so that I could take Henry and have a fun day with only my oldest. With three little ones at home and a busy husband I don't get a lot of time one-on-one with any of them, so this was something we were really excited about.

Henry was feeling pretty brave and wanted to start out on one of the BIG roller coasters. I led us through the small rides in the kids area, but Henry just wasn't interested. He wanted to go straight for the big dogs. So we made our way to the one he had his eye on...a huge old wooden roller coaster.

If you've been on an old wooden roller coaster, than you probably know the crucial tip that I had forgotten....they can really whip you around! So Henry was pretty much terrified after the first dip and tried REALLY hard not to cry for the rest of the ride. Turns out he didn't really want to ride the big ones after that. :) However, I was so proud of the way he handled it. He wasn't scared of the other rides and tried almost every one that he was tall enough to ride.

After a long morning/afternoon of running from one ride to the other, the carousel caught Henry's eye. He's not usually very excited about carousels, but this one is HUGE and he thought it might be fun. We were almost the only ones on it and Henry kept asking the attendant if we could ride again and again, so we ended up riding five or six times in a row. It was a great break for my little guy (who was getting quite tired but wasn't about to admit it!).

These old-time cars were Henry's most favorite ride of the day. We kept seeing them but getting confused about how to get to the entrance of the ride, so when we finally figured it out we made this the last ride. It was such a fun day and I really appreciated getting the whole day with just Henry.

When we got home, we were greeted by a couple of surprises.

The first was a blue-Sharpie-covered Bridget. Sam had left her playing in one place for a little bit and when he found her she had covered her legs and stomach, her socks, her little dog (Rufus) and a little bit of the edge of our comforter in lovely blue scribbling. She was quite proud of herself!

The second surprise was this one:

Sam got stung (on the INSIDE of his mouth!) by a wasp. It really was a great story....he had been practicing casting a new fishing pole out in the backyard. Somehow he got the lure caught way up high in a tree, and he started tugging on it to try and snap it free. While he was focusing on that and looking up (apparently with his mouth gaping open) he heard a strange buzzing sound....and the next moment felt the sting right on the inside of his top lip.

And being the stubborn man that he can sometimes be, he decided not to take any benadryl (even though he has had severe allergic reactions to bee stings in the past). So he was pretty swollen up by the time we got home a few hours later. His voice was funny and his upper lip and lower cheeks were huge. He finally agreed to take some benadryl, but by the next morning it had worn off and besides his fat lip his entire face was swollen! Even the bridge of his nose was swelling so much that it was starting to hold his eyes shut. Sheesh.

All's well that ends well and the swelling did eventually go down with no permanent damage. :)

Quick Updates

When Bridget picks out her own shoes (or in this case, her brother's shoes!).....

This little girl's smile can light up a room! :)
Jonah is just as silly and sweet as ever.

And Henry has discovered his new identity...he's an Indian! He wears the pants to this costume EVERY..SINGLE..DAY. You can imagine what that look like as we wander the aisles of Walmart or the grocery store. :)

More soon.... :)