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I missed my anniversary. Last week was my three year blogiversary! I have been doing this blog for 3 years. It is hard to believe! Sometimes I look back through old posts and see how little the boys looked or read a story about something cute that happened and I am really glad that I am still blogging. It is such a nice way for me to get some perspective on my life and appreciate how lucky I really am! So, I am going to keep writing about us and keep telling stories about the boys because I know that three years from now my little guys won't be so little anymore. They are growing up fast and I can't think of a better way preserve our memories than this blog. So, buckle up...the ride continues!
My sweet little Shane has already figured out how to tease his big brothers. Every morning the boys are allowed to watch one tv show while they eat breakfast. They spend time trying to figure out what show they all want to watch and there is usually a lot of negotiation involved. Shane is not involved in the tv show- decision process. Apparently he is frustrated with his lack of influence in this particular area. So, every day this week while the boys are engrossed in their tv show, Shane has crawled over to the tv, quietly placed his finger on the power switch, turned around looked directly at the boys, smiled, and turned the tv off! Then he laughs hysterically while they all FREAK out! I have a feeling that our baby boy is going to grow up to be quite a character!
(BTW...check out the size of Sammy's hands in this picture!!!!)
I have finally completed our calendar for summer. It is a monumental task when I have a daily activity already planned for us from now until the end of August. I can't even begin to tell you how relieved that makes me feel!
Somehow after I had 3 kids (and then 4 kids) I realized the importance of us getting out of the house every single day. And we have done that....pretty much every since day for the last 2 and a half years unless somebody is sick. It helps us all maintain some level of sanity and gives us something to look forward to each and every day.
Yet the thought of summer rolling around and having Wyatt out of preschool home every single day makes me start to panic. I need to have a lot more material to fill up the entire summer when school doesn't fill up three days a week. So, I have been writing, looking stuff up, reading, and planning for almost 3 weeks to get it all planned out. And I am done!
John gets stressed out when I plan it all. He likes the idea of not having anything to do. He thinks that we can do whatever we want whenever we want if nothing is planned out. He doesn't realize that if it is not planned out, then we won't do anything! We can't be a spur-of-the-moment family when we are planning for 6 people! We will stay home and the kids will get bored. Then the kids will get into trouble. They will take all of the mulch out of the planters and load it up in their wagons and dump it in the garage. Then they will drive past the van with their bikes and scratch all of the vehicles. They will turn on he hose and start filling up buckets of water and mix it with mulch and dump it on their toys and their shoes. They will throw rocks and move all of Daddy's tools. We have been down this road before.... It's not a fun trip!
The funny thing is that one of my friends just had her 4th kid and she called me a few weeks ago to see what I had planned for summer because she was starting to work on her summer plans too. She complained that her husband wasn't interested in planning anything and she needed some ideas! Interesting huh?
Having a 4th kid is just the motivation that I needed to get myself organized. Now when the boys are out enjoying themselves this summer they can thank Shane for helping motivate me to get it all planned! Thanks Shane!
I am leaving for the weekend. It will my first solo vacation since Shane was born. The last time that I went on vacation without kids was about 2 years ago! I am in desperate need of a break!
I am going to Washington DC with my sister and my mom. Al and I are going to run in the National Half Marathon on Saturday morning. The course is run around Capital Loop. We will get to see all of the wonderful monuments and attractions while we are running. I am very excited!
John is going to be in charge of the boys this weekend. He will probably do a lot of running himself. I have a feeling that they will have a lot of fun without me!
The pool was a lot of fun today! I could have taken a book and sat by the side of the pool reading...it was that easy! The new life jackets that I got for the kids are perfect. 
They all got in the water and took off swimming like little fish without a fear in the world! They were jumping off the side of the pool by the time we left. It was a great morning and we are thrilled with our new pool!
In other exciting news, we have entered the potty talk phase. Wyatt has been testing the waters lately, but he is still pretty bad at potty talk. At lunch today he said "spinning poopies" and both Jonah and Sam laughed so hard that they had juice come out of their noses. I couldn't help laughing myself! Then on the way home I was entertained with "stinky van" insert hysterical laughter, "stinky vacation" laugh laugh "stinky car seat" ha ha ha and on and on and on. It is a phase that will probably get real old...real fast, but for now it is still pretty funny!
I bought a pool membership for us at a local hotel. I have been researching the whole pool thing for quite a while and finally decided to make a decision. I like the hotel pool over other options for several reasons. First of all, it is heated to about 85 degrees so we will not be freezing our kahunas off. Secondly, the hours are fantastic. They open at 5 am and close at 10 pm, so we have a lot of flexibility. We also have access to the fitness equipment during those hours so John and I could go back and work out in the evenings if we choose. Last of all, the pool does not have a lifeguard on duty. It sounds weird, but I think that we will do better without all of the rules and somebody freaking out about all of the kids. I need the flexibility to let my kids eat on the deck if they get hungry. I also need to be able to have Shane in the stroller on the deck since he will likely not enjoy being in the pool for hours on end. We need to be able to bring our own life jackets and not be forced into wearing something new and different. And finally, I want the ability to let my kids bring some pool toys with them to entertain themselves.
So, we are giving it a shot tomorrow morning. Me and all the boys. It should be fun. If anybody misbehaves I plan to pack up and leave. After all, we have a membership and can go back on Tuesday or Wednesday or for as many times as it takes to get it right!
In other news, Grandma and Grandpa headed back to Michigan this morning. We are really going to miss them. Shane waved bye-bye to them all by himself as they were pulling out of the driveway, but I'm not sure if they saw it! The kids were sad for a while this morning so John took Wyatt and Sam to The Depot and Jonah, Shane, and I stayed home and made cookies.
I have a great new cookie recipe that doesn't contain milk so Shane can eat them. It also doesn't have eggs in it either so Cameron might like them too! Shane and Jonah ate about 30 cookies between the two of them just after they came out of the oven while they were still warm. They were happy boys!
The boys usually have a rough day 24 hours after our visitors leave. They get used to the one-on-one attention and have trouble going back to the pack mentality. So, if my plan works the boys will be so distracted by all of the fun that they are having swimming that they will forget to be sad about Grandma and Grandpa leaving. If that doesn't work I will have to go with Plan B....duct tape and some rope!
Grandma Kathie and Grandpa Bill are visiting us for a few days. The kids have really enjoyed Grandma and Grandpa.
They took Sam and Wyatt to Costco yesterday. I stayed home with Jonah and Shane. Grandma said that she ended up with a few more groceries than she expected by the time they got up to the checkout because the boys were covertly adding stuff to her cart. They sure are sneaky little guys.
Sammy has especially enjoyed having Grandma and Grandpa around. He loves an audience. The bigger the better. Mark my words, he will be on stage someday. I would be shocked if he does not have a profession that somehow involves "performing"! Seriously!
Sammy started calling himself "Bobby" a couple of months ago. If you ask him his name he will say he is Bobby and he is 4 years old. He says it with such conviction that the other day a woman at the gym told me that she thought that Jonah and Sam were twins, and didn't realize that they weren't. I said no they ARE twins. Then she said "Well, that's weird because Sam told me that he is 4 years old and Jonah is only 3 years old"!
John and I have really enjoyed having Kathie and Bill visit too! They have watched the boys each night after they are in bed so that John and I could go for a run together outside. It has been beautiful weather and I am loving spending so much time outside. Spring is almost here!
That reminds me...I am starting to figure out what I want to plant in our garden this year. I am convinced that a raised bed garden is the way to go. So far I have beans, cucumbers, jalapenos, zucchini, squash, tomatoes, and pumpkins on our list. Maybe some herbs too. It is going to be so much fun to grow my own stuff with the kids!
I am also going to have to figure out some kind of fence to put around the garden since we have tons of deer in the yard. That may be a little tricky. I will have to see if Bobby has any ideas.
We survived.
We all got it....within 7 hours of each other and it wasn't pretty.
John lost 7 pounds and I lost 5 pounds in 2 days!
Every towel that we own has been washed in the last 48 hours.
Every bathroom and floor in our house has been scrubbed in the last 48 hours.
Every bed sheet in our house has been replaced in the last 48 hours.
The boys drank gatorade and sprite for the first time in their lives.
The boys all got to sleep on our bathroom floor together for the first (and hopefully only) time ever.
I went to bed before 7:30pm for the first time since I was about 5 years old!
We are happy to be feeling good again.
Getting sick together is not a great way to bond, but feeling better together is priceless!
I have a bad feeling.... Sam and Shane have a stomach bug. Diarrhea and vomiting. Yipee! My stomach is starting to feel a little funny and John just told me he feels the same way. So, if you don't hear from us for a while we are probably laying in the bathroom unable to hear the phone over all of the puking!
Oh yeah, I almost forgot...we are babysitting Keith's puppy for the next 5 days too!
When you live in Alaska like we do, you don't let the cold weather bother you! The weather can't stop us from enjoying our favorite outdoor activities!
For example on Monday I took the kids hiking down a trail in the woods through the snow. They didn't run ahead of me and try and get lost either. No, they marched right in front of me down the trail crying and begging to be carried and go home. They fell down and refused to move. I pretended not to hear them, and talked about how wonderful it was to get exercise and look at nature at the same time. Then I threatened to spank everyone and send them to bed if they didn't walk and then we went home. Some day I know that they will say "Mom, remember how you used to take us on hikes through the snow when we were little? That was so fun!". And I will say "That's what Eskimo mothers do."
Today we got the bikes out and went on a little bike ride. The kids are getting better at riding their bikes this year. Wyatt is a speed demon. I am going to look into attaching a shock seat to his bike to reign him in when he gets too far ahead.
Sam likes to crash his bike into stuff on purpose. Then he says "Whoa, big crash!". He drives from one snow drift to another crashing away. I have to keep saying "Sam, look where you are going! Pay attention!". Future Nascar driver maybe?
Jonah is not a biker. Or a hiker. He would still ride in a stroller if I let him. I made him ride his bike today and he cried and cried. Then I had to push him 75% of the time. He crashed 2 times by accident. On a tricycle. In the middle of the road! Geez, I hope that he is book smart!
This week we also ventured out to visit the farmer at the end of the road when he was plowing his field spreading "smelly dirt". He let the kids climb up onto his tractor and pretend to drive. Then he told us that if we come back in the spring he will drive them around the field! The kids were pumped. I already wrote it on the calendar!
Monday was Home Depot Day. We spent the morning at Home Depot riding the display lawn mowers that were just unpacked. Those brand new mowers were just itching to be ridden by three little boys. Thankfully the keys are stored in a separate location or we might have been on the 6 o clock news.
Wyatt wants a John Deere 54 inch deck 7 speed riding mower for Easter in his Easter basket. The boys would like the same. I told them that we will put it on the list and see what happens... cuz you never know. I am sure that the Easter bunny has made some improvements since I was a kid!
I took the kids sledding yesterday. There is a huge hill in the back of our subdivision. Last time we went sledding there it was so deep that nobody could even walk. The snow was up to the kids chests. I ended up carrying them all up the hill and decided that it was too much work so we went home.
Yesterday the snow was only up to the kids ankles. They got up the hill and Wyatt wanted to go first. Let me tell you, when the snow is smashed down and has a hard crust on the top, you go really fast. I mean really fast. You can even shoot right off the bank next to the road and end up underneath your van. That is kinda funny though. We can laugh about that now. Because now we now not to park the van right there anymore. You learn a lot of things sledding with Eskimo Mom.
Tomorrow we may hit one of the local parks and see how hard it is to use the playground equipment in the snow. It will be challenging. It will be kinda of like an olympic event. I am sure that there will be some issues, but we will learn something, and best of all the kids will look back someday and say "Mom, remember how you used to take us to the park in the snow?" And I will say "That's what Eskimo Mothers do boys!"
John spent all day painting the twins room. He got all of the furniture out of the room, patched all of the holes, taped off all of the trim, painted the room, let it dry, painted it again, removed all of the tape, and put all of the furniture back.
I spent the entire day with the kids! I took the kids out for 3 hours this morning, fed them lunch, came home, sat with them all in Wyatt's room until they fell asleep, threw dinner into the crockpot, packed up Shane, went to Costco and the library, came home, went to visit my friends new baby, came home, ate dinner, and then put the kids to bed.
I don't know who is more tired, me or John!?!?! But I do know that we love the new paint. John wants to paint Wyatt's room next weekend. I don't know if I am ready to do it all over again though....
