Big Week

While visiting Grandma Guthrie back in November the boys saw a glimpse of Toy Story on Ice on one of the morning shows. The boys thought it looked like fun and I mentioned that I would check to see when it would be coming this way. I bought tickets early and then we waited a few months for the event to roll into town on Sunday. The boys loved the show. We had great seats and came home with a couple of new accessories. Owen picked out Woody's hat and Ben got Buzz's helmet along with a bag of cotton candy. We haven't ever bought cotton candy for him before and he was really excited about it. After one bite he looked at me and I could tell that he didn't like it. Ben's favorite part of the show was with the Barbie dolls and Owen's was when Woody rescued the toys from the cages in the daycare.  I enjoyed it every bit as much as they did. 

So here they are in there new head gear and pajamas.

On Tuesday while I was at work the boys belt tested during TaeKwonDo for their yellow stripe belt. I didn't get to see them break the boards but Jeremy said that they did great. Ben will be moving up to next class which is more age appropriate for him at the beginning of next week. He seems a little hesitant to leave the security of his current class but I am sure that he will be fine when he's actually there.



Wednesday with Owen

After dropping Ben off at preschool, Owen and I have been going to story time at the library on Wednesdays. He looks forward to going all week long and has all kinds of fun while we are there. A few stories are read, songs are sung and the hour ends with a craft project. The theme today was things that are found in the sky. He drew a picture of the two of us in the cloud. I'm the one with the blue star on the eye. What can I say, I am easily impressed.

We played the game perfection a few times when we got back home then I chased him around with the camera capturing a few smiles.

Not having Ben around does not stop Owen from coming up with story lines for their super heroes. He looks pretty involved with this scenario.

We had lunch, picked up Ben, went to speech and then came home. The boys took off running upstairs to  play. And that was our day.



We were there

Ben was on spring break from preschool and speech a couple weeks ago. The last few weeks have dashed right by. While he was home we did our spring cleaning. Jeremy and I were able to get closets and drawers organized. I packed up the winter hats and gloves in anticipation of spring. Which was a bit premature considering there was snow on the ground this morning, but the weather was great that week. As I recall, we spent time at the park and hours upon hours out front with our neighbors on scooters and bicycles.

The end of that week we went to Springfield to catch up with my friend Jessica. While there we were able to stop by the Burgin's to meet their newest addition and give big hugs to the rest of their bunch.

We took Jessica's nephews to the park on Saturday. 

Brady and Brock have a little sister who is not yet three months old. It was awfully nice getting to see her. That makes two babies, both girls, so sweet, so snuggly and not one single picture of either of them.

I did manage to take a few of the boys.

Brock and Ben with both be starting kindergarten this fall. 

Ben has to keep up with the big kids. Brady can do the balance beam.

So Ben has to try too. 

Brady can do the monkey bars.

Jess and I talked him out of it.

Jessica is so cute with the boys. When Owen and I got back from our trek to the potty she was running around playing with the others. I take my kids to the park so I can sit in the shade while they wear themselves out. They love her!

Back at her house she had them set up with markers, construction paper and GLITTER GLUE .

The boys are quite the little artists.

Brady taught Owen how to properly use scissors. I've been working on this one for a while but it was still easier for him to use them with both hands.

I sure hope she wasn't traumatized by the madness that is having two rowdy boys over for the weekend.



Overnight

Owen was outside yesterday drawing with the side walk chalk.

And here he is today.

I'm pretty sure I woke up one morning and he went from a toddler to a little man.

 But he is NOT little. He will tell you that he is BIG. 

He posed for these next few when I was taking his picture. Then he wanted to see them in the camera. 

He looked at them, laughed and said, I'm so silly.

I'd have to agree.

Owen- my silly, BIG boy.



Little Leprechauns

Happy St. Patrick's Day!



Fancy Pants

My youngest brother, John got married on Saturday. Emily was an absolutely beautiful bride. John is a fortunate guy to be able to call such a gem his wife.

Ben and Hannah were part of the wedding party and made it up the the aisle without a hitch. There was a moment of upset before service when he realized that he wouldn't actually be bearing any rings. A quick game of Angry Birds was enough to right his world again.

Owen and Wade's only responsibility for the day was to behave in church during the ceremony. They both fulfilled their obligation and were sweethearts sitting with their grandparents. It's safe to say that they all had a great time.

We were honored to be a part of such a special day. Congratulations John and Emily!



Katie Time

We spent Thursday night at Greg and Stephanie's house. They both worked on Friday so I asked if I could keep Katie with me and the boys instead of going to day care. We had the best morning. She is so cute and sweet and is SO funny.

 She crawls by scooting on her bottom while sitting up. They have video of it on their blog and I laugh every time I watch it. At that time she was only going backwards but she has also figured out how to move forward.

Ben and Owen brought some of their stuff along and Katie thought that the lunch box was pretty neat. While she was playing in her exersaucer I thought for a minute, Hey-I could do this again. Then I stood up from the floor with her and my knees reminded that no, no I can't.

The cutest thing about this precious niece of mine is her growl. She sounds somewhat possessed when she does it-so I of course encouraged it by growling back at her. She thought it was funny so I kept it up the entire weekend. If I had a few more days, I think I could have taught her how to bark.

Greg and Steph love me.



Boys

Ben's annual IEP meeting with his speech therapist was a few weeks ago. We had hoped that he would not need to continue with services but his IEP will be following him to kindergarten in the fall. He still has difficulty talking around his tongue so he will get 30 minutes twice a week during the following school year. We register for kindergarten next month, so I will find out more then. In the grand scheme of things I don't think it is a very big deal at all. I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that he will be starting KINDERGARTEN. Gah!

A week later I had an appointment for Owen's three year screening through the school district. I was pretty confident going in that he would not need any extra services and I was relieved when I found out that he didn't. He is on track developmentally but I could work with him on correctly holding a pencil and using scissors. So we have been doing a bit more coloring. He has recently been learning the alphabet with the help of you tube. I pulled up The Letter People for him to watch once and he absolutely loves it. I spent so many hours on the floor with the record player singing the letter songs and flipping through the flash cards when I was in kindergarten. I still like to sing along.  

They are both obsessed with Marvel Superheros. Jeremy encourages this by setting the DVR to record The Super Hero Squad and The Avengers every weekend. They look forward to watching the shows with their Dad. They have quite the collection of action figures but Jeremy is always on the look out for those that they don't already have. I think that Jeremy is really glad to have someone in the house that shares his interests. I can't wait until they are old enough to watch the movies with him. Hopefully I won't have to sit through the 18th remake of The Incredible Hulk.