So? What'd You Do?

We spent a whole lot of time at the beach. The first couple days we were tormented by algae in the water which ultimately led to the demise of my eyesight for the week as I was plagued with pink eye. Both eyes, mind you. I was not a very happy camper. Especially when Bobby and my dad referred to me as "One Eyed Willy" ( That was before it had spread to the other eye). But, the boys were still cute for a picture. Please note Grant's pirate face. You will notice it is a common theme throughout. My wonderful mother would rise in the morning and make breakfast. She made her famous "Souffle" one morning and, as usual, it was a hit. Unfortunately, this week the kids have been super disappointed in the breakfast bars they are back to eating. I've had to throw out the "Does this look like vacation to you?? Didn't think so." a couple times already.
Something worthy of noting is the souffle ingredient that almost cost my dad his deacon's position at church. The Maple Syrup. It took on an uncanny resemblance to a liquor flask. So much so that the bagger at the Publix wrapped it in a brown paper bag and gave it to my dad! HA! Little did she know that never in my lifetime have I EVER seen my father with an alcoholic beverage. That made it all the more hilarious. That and the fact that she grinned at him when she gave it to him. Just needed to throw this in because it's back. The pirate face. I can't escape it. Out of 299 photos, this is Grant in at least 285 of them.
I did a lot of this. Reading. One of my favorite things to do. It was on this day, when my chair was facing the ocean, that I was taken to some far off place almost catching the killer in my book when a tsunami sized wave brought me back to reality and drenched me (and thus allowing the ocean water to penetrate my eyes leading to the pink eye I'm sure).Bobby spent all day catching jellyfish with the boys. By the end of the morning he had 25 and Cade's goal in life was to be a jellyfisherman. Nothing like high aspirations. They also caught one crab. Obviously all the hours watching Deadliest Catch finally paid off. Sorta.Dad built sandcastles with the boys almost every day. Maybe Grant smiles in this one. Nope. Still a pirate. Preparing the crab for ultimate tourture in a sand bucket. Rhett learned that he could swim if he wore his little lifevest. All summer I have tried to convince him of this and finally it sunk in. He threw out a lot more "CANNONBALL"s and thankfully it was in the pool this time. We headed to Baytowne Wharf for some good dinner and a "Mini Gras" party for the boys. My sister helped us rangle the crazies in the swarm of people. And finally......What Grant had been dreaming of finally came true. He actually got to be a pirate.

Next up: The mandatory family beach picture day.

In Progress

I'm still working on sharing the love from vacation. This is how it is at my house all the time. Just love, sweet love, flowing around for all to experience.

Please do not refer to any of my previous posts in an attempt to discredit any statement made here today.

Coming Soon....

"Daycation" pics. It's hard to muddle through 299 photos and decide which few to blog. For now, here is one of my favs. The annual feet in the sand photo. Stay tuned later this week for a daycation synopsis. (Cade still calls it "DAYcation" and I just can't correct him. I like it too much!)

Lovin' This Photo

I snapped this photo of Little Buddy and my dad back on Father's Day and loved it. Just wanted to leave you with a cute image as we head off for vacation.....as opposed to the images from my last post.

Did I Hear "Canonball"???

I was trying to get all packed for our vacation. The children were driving me CRAZY. We were going to go to the pool to swim off some energy but it was "Closed due to contaimination" for the third day in a row. So, after cleaning up all the 25 dollar i.d bare mineral powder make-up off the floor in my bathroom (and from the face of my precious 2 year old) and just after picking up peanuts that were ground into the carpet, and after running downstairs to the screams of "he's got cuts all over him!! They're all over him!!!" only to find, yes, you guessed it, Rhett, with red permanant marker on his cheeks, nose, palms and belly, I sent the lovelies outside to play. Actually, I demanded that they go before something happened that we would all regret later. I slid up my breakfast nook window so I'd be able to hear the happenings outside while I was cleaning the kitchen. That's when I heard "CANONBALL!!" I looked out to find this: My camera was actually sitting right there because I was packing it up and I took these shots through the screen so as not to undermine my forthcoming discipline. They had filled the sandbox full of water and it was a complete mess. So, you know, I was so sick of threats and spankings and loss of privileges. Therefore, I put on my mad face, marched right out there, grabbed the hose, and completely doused each one of them. I sprayed them until they looked like they had been dunked into the deep end of the pool with their clothes on. I even sprayed them in their faces as they fell to the ground trying to get away. Yeah. I guessed they learned a lesson that time, huh?
I'm sure the neighbors love my sometimes irrational behavior. But, keepin' it real, sometimes having three boys can move you to do sometimes immature and irrational things.

(Just for the record: this punishment was in no way effective. Do not try it at home. While I was completely wild-eyed and crazed, the children were laughing and loving it. Oh, well.)

Rewind

It just recently occured to me that I never posted about the boy's swim lesson experience. So today I am rewinding a bit to back in June. We once again took swim lessons at Camp Nickajack and the boys had a blast. Cade was already a decent swimmer so basically he was there to get some extra practice and have a little fun. He learned a bit more about diving and did perfect swimming the length of the pool.Here he is so proud that he actually made it without perishing. I'm sure Mr. Burt is glad to see that he has also matured this year and, unlike two years ago, did not throw every poolside item into the water nor did he pull his trunks down and pee in the grass. Small steps, friends. Big progress.
Grant was so excited about swim this year. I was glad that I didn't have to hear any tall tales of Mr. Burt putting his hands around Grant's neck and forcing him into the water. He seriously tried to pull that over on me last year. He made so much improvement this year and in fact, is no longer wearing his little lifejacket. He, too, can swim the length of the pool which is just astonishing when you consider that he rarely uses his arms. They stay glued to his sides and his legs just kick like nobody's business.

I guess he figured when you have hair wings like this then arm usage is totally overrated. Little Buddy wasn't big enough to do lessons this year. But have no doubt, he was planning something totally mischievous for next year. Can't you tell?? I'll have to give my friends at Nickajack the heads up on this one.

Fun With Just One

The Big Boys got to take a trip with Granpa and Grandma to the Space and Rocket Center so I decided this would be a good opportunity to spend some quality time with Little Buddy. I personally have always wanted to go to Build A Bear Workshop and the other boys could care less. Therefore, I hyped it up and convinced Rhett it would be the coolest thing ever. He was ecstatic.

He talked about an elephant the whole way up there. Talked about how much his froggie would LOVE to have an elephant to play with. How much he LOVED elephants. So when we got there he picks out.............no, not the elephant, but the husky dog sitting right next to it. Go figure. I tried to talk him out of it but he would have none of it. Once he had picked up the husky dog it was over. No more looking. Whatever. The elephant would have been so much cuter.
He plumped it up and gave it to the lady. Refused to kiss the little guy's heart but he did warm it just a little.

His favorite part was the bath. Husky dog got several of them. Then it was on to dressing. We are now welcoming fireman husky dog to the family.
We sat down at the computers and Rhett had to name the little guy. I thought for sure it would be "fireman dog" or "fire doggie". Nope. "Chicky Bear". Let that sink in. I have no idea what that is suppose to mean but he said it three or four times and I repeated it for clarification. Once again, whatever. This was not about me although Bobby would tell you differently. He knows I have been waiting for this chance for 6 years now. There is so much sacrifice in motherhood.
We topped it off with a healthy meal from Chick-fil-a. Today was "Cow Appreciation Day" and if you dressed like a cow you got a free meal. Rhett wore this and got a free Kids Meal. Who knew?? Obviously if I had I would've pulled this out and donned it once again. Ahhhh. Circa 1994. Good times.

The Sand Pit

Bobby and I scored some great tickets to last night's Kenny Chesney concert. We were in "the sand pit" that was right next to the stage. I could literally put my hand on the stage. We've had the tickets for a while now and were really looking forward to the show. What we didn't know was that in the sand pit there are no chairs and this particular concert was going to last for almost 8 hours!!!!! MY FEET!!!!! My stomach, too, because anyone that knows me knows that I'm on a toddler diet ( as Bobby calls it) and I eat snacks between meals and get crabby if I miss one. So to pacify myself I had to eat a greasy chicken finger. Which is hardly ever, basically never, part of my eating regimen. Anyway, here's Bobby with the backdrop (at this point in the pic we had been there for five and a half hours.)

Here is our opener. Gary Allen. Pretty good. Knew some songs. First impression: Jerk. Don't know why. Just a gut feeling. He was also swigging on Jim Beam the whole time and then the entire band was swiggin' on the SAME bottle. Ewww. Gross. I had to cross him off my friend list almost immediately for that infraction. Germ sharing. Not on my list of good things. I am, however, pretty much best friends with Leann Rimes now. Especially since Bobby snagged the coveted hand clap from her. He claims there was a "pause" to the hand clap with eye gaze and possibly a wink.........until he flashed his wedding band. I knocked the breath out of him and he finally woke from that dream. I can't help but to comment at this point on the people surrounding us in the sand pit. We were ever so fortunate to have Weird Drunk Guy that nearly made me lose my religion. He was doing moves that should be reserved for da club or a Fifty Cent concert. All I'm going to say is that I haven't seen hip thrusting like that since the 5th grade when I watched Dirty Dancing at Laura Yelton's slumber party without my parent's permission (sorry mom and dad). Nor have I seen french kissing like that since, like, middle school at the movies. (not by me of course). Nauseating. Purely nauseating.
This is why I want to be her friend. She hopped and danced and ran and jumped all the while wearing these. That's impressive. She didn't take them off until the last song and which time I was just sure she was going to throw them into the crowd to me. They looked like they could be my size. And I'm sure, on a normal day, I would not be able to afford them.
Controversy during the show: Some know-it-all claimed that this person was Kenny Chesney and he had snuck ( sidenote: I googled this and it IS the past tense of 'sneak') under the stage and into the crowd to watch the before show. The rumors were flying all around the place. People snapping pics and whatnot. I guess that guy was wondering what all the paparazzi action was about and the moron that started the rumor felt, well, like a moron when KC came out and this Joe was still standing there.
Best part of the whole concert: Keith Urban. Killer guitar playing. No Nicole Kidman sightings.Finally at 9:30 KC showed up to the gig. Did great. Sweated a lot. Mixed in some new songs with the old. Did not chose me to give the signed guitar to. Not because I wasn't screaming his name. I was. I wanted the guitar. He chose some 5 year old. What was a five year old doing up that late anyway?? It was 11:30! Kenny doesn't know what a mistake that was.
A good surprise was the lead singer from Sugarland happened to be at the concert and KC pulled her onstage to do an impromptu vocal. She sang "Stay" and it was great. Sounded just like the radio.

Well, that's my concert roundup. Good times. Even greater seats.

It's That Time Again!

Bobby has two times a year that he is allowed to purchase and shoot fireworks and this makes him SO happy. Each year he sets up his arsenal table and teaches the children the basic points of being a pyromaniac. Hopefully this won't lead to future jailing due to arsonist activity or worse, ER visits due to lack of judgement.
We had the usual watching of the little roadside fireworks consisting of really loud weird things and little exploding tanks and cars as well as my personal favorite (and the kid's), the little pop-out parachute. They had so much fun running and chasing to see who would get to catch the parachute.I managed to snap one picture of Cade with his sparkler and I am always proud when I get such a natural, unforced smile from this child. I usually say, "Cade, just a normal kid smile. Normal kid." but just didn't have the desire this time to remind him. Sigh. It is what it is.
Rhett had the most fun eating his homemade ice cream. He didn't want any to go to waste. Not even the little bit that managed to escape up into his nostril. Somehow Grant managed to dodge all of my attempts at photographing him this year. He was there though. Somewhere.

Thanks friends for joining us to celebrate the Fourth! It was a good time! And, by the way, I'm sure Jon is going to be upset that his little pic didn't make it on the blog but, unfortunately, Bobby was laughing so hard that he blurred the picture. Nice try, Jon. Maybe next year!

Hello Leg Pump!!!

After months of trying to get the boys to learn how to swing themselves we finally have a taker!! With a little help from his friend, Carter, Cade grasped the leg pump and had himself swinging in about 5 minutes. His kindergarten teacher called him yesterday to check on his summer and they had a conversation that consisited of this on Cade's end:

"I learned how to swing all by myself the other day!"

"Yeah! No. I didn't have to work hard at all! It was like everyone was trying to teach me and stuff and no one could really do it. Then Carter came over and it was like......like magic or something. I was just sittin' there and the next thing you know it was like he gave me the power to do it and I........I just DID!"
Thanks Carter for your inspiration and thanks to your mom for the greater inspiration idea of a prize from Target. Cade is now the proud owner of yet another Lego set to cause me grief.

It's Really Interesting.........

to find this when you open the pantry doors at 6:30am to get your morning protein bar. Interesting and a little startling at the same time......... I'm really surprised he chose such a fiber packed meal when there were SpiderMan gummies to be had. I'm sure all of those raisins will come back to haunt me later. Yeah, you know what I'm talking about................