Strawberry Mountain

School Pictures

Here are Brian and Leslie's most recent school pictures.

Happy 5th Birthday Brian!

I can't believe my baby is 5 years old today, I'm not sure where the time went.

He woke up this morning and crawled in my bed and sang Happy Birthday to me.  I thought it was really sweet and cute.  I called in sick today because I managed to hurt my other knee yesterday, so I pretty much spent Brian's birthday sitting in my chair with my leg up.

I did pick him up from school this afternoon though, and right before we left, all the kids in the 4 and 5 year old room sang "Happy Birthday" to him again.  He turned red, and then he was tackled by all the kids running up to give him a hug.

He said he had a good day at school today, and they ate the cupcakes I brought for his class.  When we got home tonight,we have him his 4-wheeler, unfortunately, it was really too cold for him to ride it much.  When we were all throughly frozen,  we came in and let him open all of his other presents, which he really enjoyed.  He was over the moon with the camera his Aunt Rhoda got him, and loved all the spiderman stuff that he got.  Then we sat down to a dinner of homemade Mac and Cheese, which is what Brian requested for his birthday dinner.

On Saturday, he is having his "real" party with all his friends.  We will see what that has in store for us, and on Sunday, we are going to a birthday party for one of the other boys in his class.

Brian's 1st 5 Years!

Coming Soon for Our Enjoyment!

Mount Rushmore in the Fog

Rick and I sat down and started planning our vacation in July in enerst tonight.

The first leg will be a 4 day stop @ Mount Rushmore. I was looking at the KOA site for that area and it looks really fun. There is a train ride we can do with the kids, and a lot of really fun kid-friendly activities. It looks like they do chuck wagon dinners, shuttle to Mount Rushmore, and just a lot of fun camping sort of stuff.

Photo of the Chuck Wagon Dinner at the KOA @ Mount Rushmore.

Here are a few of the websites I was looking at:

Mount Rushmore National Park

The Making of Mount Rushmore

1880 Train

Brian started getting really excited about the trip when I started telling him everything that we would be doing. I think I'm going to buy a few books on it for him before we go.

After we leave Mount Rushmore, we will be heading down to Sioux Falls KOA for the night at the KOA there. We will be meeting fellow May Mommy and crew from Winnipeg Canada, Joelle, Kent, Carter and Grayson for a fun filled night of South Dakota Camping under the stars before we descend on Kansas City MO!

Why Kansas City you may ask? Mostly because it very central, which was important when you are planning a shindig with people traveling from all over the US and Canada.

We will drive to KC the next day and meet up with my May Mommy's for our 5th Birthday Extravaganza. I'm so excited about this. We will be going to a water park, and a Build A Bear.

We are also planning a May Kid's 5th Birthday Party.

We will have a "Mommy's Night Out" so that we Mommy's can really catch up and have some girl time. We are planning on the Dad's taking care of all the kids for that night. I think on the Friday we get there, we will have a "Dad's get together" so that they can get to know each other.

Since we have so many certified Car Seat Techs in our group, we will be having a car seat clinic for us. It's definitely going to be a fun weekend.

After we leave KC we will be heading up through Saint Louis on our way to Chicago to see my good friend Bernie and her Daughter Des. I'm almost as excited about this. Bernie and Brian share the same birthday in March. I haven't seen her since they came to see us when we lived in Alameda.

After that, we will make our way home through MN, NB and possibly WI as well as ND. Hopefully we will make it home by Sunday the July 20th.

Snow Sunday

This is almost the same view as the picture on the top of my blog.

Our snow filled garden.

View off my front deck.

Looking south.

Another garden shot

Looking off the back deck.

One more shot off the back deck. I was looking out my window today and had to go take pictures, it was so snowy and misty out. Brian and I spent about 2 hours out in the snow today playing, throwing snow balls and riding the quad.

Pictures of the Kids

Leslie in the playroom

The kids wanted to camp out in the bedroom in the Thomas tent Aunt Rho Rho got Brian last year for Christmas, so we let them, it was Friday night after all.

My friend Susan sent me some sticky hearts, the kids took them away and wore them all weekend on their face.

School Pictures

Or, should I say "Pre-School Pictures". Nevertheless, they are completely adorable, and I can claim these kids as my own. I'm so grateful for that.

Our Weekend

Sunday Night.

I don’t have to work tomorrow...yahoo! This is one of the benefits of having a state job...every single holiday off. I’ve never had that before. So I’m going to take Leslie to speech therapy and hopefully get a good idea how soon we are looking at discharge.

Little Miss is definitely on the mend, but definitely still feeling rummy. She has been a whiny mess for day’s. Just nonstop incessant whining. The sort that I haven’t heard since she was a baby and I was having such a hard time of it with her. Poor baby, I’m sure that on top of everything else, she is trying to cut some molars as well.

I cooked a chicken tonight for dinner in my chicken cooker, the Ron Popeil one, and it was once again, perfect, no fuss, no muss. There was hardly any chicken left. I don’t know when I’m ever ever going to get over the magic of this particular little piece of machinery. It just always works perfectly. There is very little to clean, and I get a perfectly roasted chicken every time. I think I’m going on year 3, and it still amazes me at how easy and perfect the chicken comes out.

Can you tell I’m wound up? Only a mom wound up on child whine would be blogging about Ron Popiel “set it and forget it” chicken at almost midnight on a Sunday night.

Rick’s birthday was really nice. I made him homemade shrimp scampi with pasta, on Saturday night with the kids. He opened his gifts and we had the cake, it was really nice. Brian was right up in it all trying to open daddy’s presents.

Photo of Rick and I

This is Rick and I in Tahoe before we had kids.

Sunday Night ramblings....

We spent the day today just hanging out with the kids. Today was one of those lazy Sundays, full of laughs, naps and too much coffee. Actually, the whole day was not full of laughs. Rick and I had been trying and trying to get Brian to pick up his toys in the playroom. He will not cooperate, and we've been at our wits end for a few weeks over this.

Finally, yesterday, we told him that if his toys were not picked up by Sunday afternoon, then we were going to put everything on the floor in a black plastic trash bag and get rid of it. All morning today we kept telling him he needed to pick up his toys. Finally, after much goading, he picked up his bedroom, so I thought for sure we were making progress, but no matter how much we coaxed, pleaded and tried to encourage him to pick up his stuff in the playroom, he wouldn't do it.

Fast forward to this afternoon, after nap. Toys were still overflowing the floor in the playroom, and Rick and I finally acted on our threat. We got a black plastic garbage bag, and proceeded to put every toy, no matter how big or small in it. My poor boy cried, screamed and generally had a melt down. When we put his prized red stuffed snake in the bag, (this is the one he got in Seattle on vacation) and then the mask to his spider man costume, he crumpled on the floor in a heap of tears. I felt so bad for him, but at the same time, I know he is testing us. So away the snake and spidey mask went.

I should mention that Leslie gleefully helped us put everything in the bag. As reality finally sank in with Brian, Rick and I came down and had a much needed cup of coffee. I growled at him.."Meeeeeeeeeeen Daddddddddy".

So this week, we will go through that bag and get rid of the junk, and we will put away the prized toys for a time. If you are wondering, I do not plan to get rid of either the snake or the mask, or the other prized toys, but we do plan to put them into hibernation for a time before we bring them back out.

He was a little angel the rest of the day, so I think we made our point, at least I hope so .

Saturday Night Movie Night

Miss Leslie deep in thought.

Me and My Baby Girl

Brian mugging it up for the camera

Leslie giving Mommy a "wink".

My Honey

Say Cheese!

I'm so cute!

Leslie and Brian in the bath