Our New Lake House

This is a picture of the little creek that runs through our back yard. Little Buddy insisted that he run down there, stand next to the new bridge my dad built a couple weeks ago, and get his picture made. I did it to appease him and now I'm glad I did. It can serve as the "before" picture. I took the boys to the book fair at Cade's school and got caught in torrential rain on my way into the school. I had gone straight from the gym so I was already looking rough to start with. However, mix that with the wind and rain and the finished product was not good. In fact, (this is no lie), a special needs girl walked straight up to me in the library and said, "Why in the world does your hair look like that?" and she proceeded to use her hands to push my hair around on my head. Anyway, that's neither here nor there. Just a side note. So, I come home and see our little creek busting at the seams. Little bridge underwater.

I sat down inside and was reading to the boys. Seriously maybe 20 minutes had gone by, if that. This was the view out my back window.

Then just a couple minutes later, it looked like this. CRAZY. I got the boys suited up because we were going to kayak through the back yard but when I got to the garage I realized we didn't own a kayak. Next time I'm at Academy I may price them.

I also now have a nice collection of balls: footballs, soccer balls, bouncy balls, over sized plastic balls, and a sword, and probably some shoes. And plenty of miscellaneous garbage. And a strange pile of weedy things on my little bridge now that the water has receded. Let me know if you ever want to come over and pretend we're at Dale Hollow. As always it's BYOB (bring your own boat).

A Quite Accomplished Six Year Old

Cade and his best bud Cade A. trained their fannies off over the last couple months and ran the Country Music Kids Marathon. It required them to run 25.2 miles leading up to race day and then they completed their 26th mile at LP Field, crossing the same finish line as the rest of Saturday's marathoners.What's a race without a little hula hoop and chalk action beforehand? I think I would have done a lot better on my time when I did the half if I could've enjoyed some cathartic drawing on the pavement before I ran. I may try that next time.Bobby gave Cade some "man encouragement" by making him punch himself in the face while simultaneously roughing him up and making noises that only other men would understand.These two crazy coyotes were tagging along to cheer on their brothers. Rhett was watching too but he had been passed off to Grandma and Granpa. It was obvious that I was not going to be able to keep up with both of them once the race started. I totally became "that" mom.....oh yes I did.

Do you know how impossible it was to get this one really terrible shot of Cade running? I mean, it's one thing if you're there watching your friend, your co-worker, even your mom run the race. But when you have a thousand PARENTS watching their children run it's a whole new ballgame. I had people stepping in front of me. At the finish line parents were stacked on top of one another ten fold. I elbowed one weak looking mom in the gut and then gave her the stink eye........well, not really but it could've easily happened. It's hard to get too many shots in in a one mile run. I would try to run and get ahead of him so I could get a good pic but I was always one step behind. Can you imagine me running in my stack heel flip flops wagging that huge camera and it's case with me all the while screaming "Go Cade!! You can do it!!" Oh me.

He crossed the finish line with a very worn out looking sprint. He later told me he had started out running as fast as he could and then he had no idea where the end was going to be. He "clapped some man's hand" (quote) as he crossed....that man? Jeff Fisher. He had no idea but thought it was cool after the fact.

One pic with the mom.
And one last pic with the running buddy.

I was so proud of him for being so dedicated. He had to get up early before school and meet to run 3 days a week and then run on his own on the weekends. He had a great time doing it and I personally think it was a good character builder. I can't wait to do it again next year. Thanks to all the family who came to support him.....Grandma, Granpa, Nana, Papa, Cooper, Isaac, and Amelia. It made his day to see all of you cheering him on.

A Smile for Wednesday

If you're my facebook friend you've already seen this picture. I still just come over to the computer and pull it up sometimes because it makes me smile every time. It's rare at their ages and stages of life for these two to be lovin' on one another so it makes me giddy when I capture it on camera. If only every day could be filled with moments such as this one!

Lots of Eggs But No Bunny

We had a great Easter day at our house. I'm the loser mom that has forgotten (or chosen not) to do Easter baskets for the boys every year. Think what you will. Throw me under the bus if you'd like. My confidence will not be shattered. My thoughts are that they get enough candy to last the entire year from egg hunts and what not and they are already spoiled with too many toys, and ahhhh, who am I kidding. I don't need to explain myself to anyone! :)

Here I am with my dear husband. I tried to get some good shots of the boys but this is the best I got. They are as cute as ever but the lighting was horrible for good pictures and my time was limited so it is what it is. Walking into church Cade said, "Mom, why'd you dress me in shorts today?? It's freezing!" I had to teach him the hard life lesson of how cute clothes, clothes for specific occasions, and clothes that coordinate in color with your father and brothers pay no attention to comfortability nor temperature. It's a fact of life and you have to learn it some day.After church the cousins came over for lunch/egg hunting. It was a motley crew for sure.Rhett put on his game face and went to town searching for eggs.His basket had a good showing. Unfortunately several of them fell out as he was running.

Grant was an avid hunter as well. His basket wasn't hurting for eggs either.
He found what he was looking for: chocolate. I like to think of him saying, " Dear God in Heaven, hallowed be your name. Praise you today for your resurrection and this bunny shaped piece of milky chocolate goodness. Amen." hehe.

I didn't get any pics of Cade hunting other than his backside bent over. He was like a K-9 looking for drugs in a hooptie car......sniffing out all the money eggs. He would pick up an egg and shake it. He was mildly happy if it rattled like change but would throw out a "yesssss" if the egg made no sound......confirmation that it contained paper money. He found the "golden egg" that contained the five dollar bill. Total winnings for the hunt: $15! (Bobby's mom had been saving her change for forever to stuff the eggs with.)
We had a great time playing and spending time with our family. Hope everyone else had a great Easter holiday as well!

Of All the Places!

If you recall, a couple weeks ago I blogged about our friend Ms. Robin and how we watched her babies grow during spring. Well, she's back and you'll never believe where she's taken up residence :

MY FRONT DOOR!!! ON MY CHRISTMAS WREATH!!!

Did she not scope this area out very well? Has she not taken note that the tiny suction cup holding this wreath on the door window is quite unstable??? Has she not seen Little Buddy slamming these doors in the morning while we're waiting on the bus?

Not to mention that I am totally late taking these down. Now I'm really breaking winter decoration etiquette. It will be several more weeks before I can change out the wreath. I'll have to wait on the birdies to hatch and then learn to fly away......if they don't plunge to their untimely death beforehand due to suction failure, crazy kids, or get eaten by the peculiar cat that I have never, EVER seen before that was standing on my front porch this afternoon. Not good planning by Ms. Robin....what a birdbrain.

Then He Brought Out His Bag of Tricks

Cade's kindergarten teacher from last year, whom he absolutely loved, got married this past weekend and she was so gracious to invite us. We turned it into a date night....just me and Cade and wow, did we burn the midnight oil! When we first got there we didn't know a soul at the reception. So it was me and Cade, on a date, with not a single thing to talk about. I tried the usual, "So, what'd you do today?" He'd smile and cock his head and say, "Mommy, you KNOW what I did all day." The "So, come here often?" didn't work either. It was little conversation to say the least. We did get to see Miss Ross right off the bat. Cade was so excited to see her in her "ballerina dress but not pink".We made it through the food line where Cade ate his adult sized portion plus a guest amount of food. I cut him off after 5 huge strawberries, a scoop of pasta, 4, yes FOUR, slices of beef brisket (who knew?) and his body weight in rolls. I guess I should've stepped in a little earlier but let me tell ya, it didn't slow him down. About 8 o'clock the music picked up and Cade went bonzo on the dance floor. The ol' quick knees quick hands was his debut.His buddy joined him, along with his buddy's brother. The ENTIRE reception was watching them. Cade pulled out the sprinkler.......I have no idea where that came from and most of his dancing was just completely out of control. I kind of likened it to Will Smith trying to teach Kevin James to dance in the movie Hitch. You know, Will is saying...."This is where you live. This is home." and then when he turns his back Kevin is going berserk. Yeah, we've got some work to do before Prom that's all I'm going to say. There is something rather hilarious about watching small children dance to the likes of Flo-Rida and Usher.

He was lucky enough to catch a dance with the bride. Doesn't everyone pick the Walk like an Egyptian dance for this moment?
He had such a great time. I dragged him off the dance floor at 9 o'clock and finally got him in the car. We weren't driving for 2 minutes when I heard him snoring. His last words when we were walking out......"Man, I was sure breaking it down in there." Ha. He sure was.

We Heart Surprises

The boys love mail period. They also love surprises. So, when you put the two together and get SURPRISE MAIL it's a great day! They just about flipped out when I told them they had gotten a package today. Then, a little peek inside revealed that it was FULL of Star Wars goodies!! Does it get much better than that in this house?!Grant got the Yoda pen and the Falcon. ( Each one took whichever bag they pulled out.)

Cade was all, "Ohhhhh!!! Coooooollll!" when he saw that he had gotten the Star Destroyer. He also chose the Vader pen. Did you know that pens can fasten to your pants and become mini light sabers? I just found that out this evening.

And Rhett came out with the un-named "coolest ship ever" that "drops bombs" and the R2D2 pen. I'm going to have to keep tabs on that pen. I feel it will be a likely source of wall writings and such. The hands on this little body do some creepy things sometimes.......alot of times.The sticker books were a hit. They spent most of their time flipping through them and talking about which movie they were from.
Little Buddy did try the stickers out on his skin. You can see it on his arm there. And, no, they didn't lie.......they ARE, in fact, removeable. He wore it for a bit, peeled it off, and placed it back in the book for later use.

This turned out to be one of the best days ever! A big thanks to our Surprise Star Wars package sender. You're welcome to come and duel with us any time. You've made some very happy Jedi!

And, by the way, have I ever mentioned to you how much I love Jimmy Choo's and Manolo Blahnik's? I'd LOVE to get a Suprise package filled with that. I mean, I'm just sayin'.