Sorry....

Okay, so I haven't posted for over a month, guess I fell off of the blogging wagon. Actually, I have become totally hooked on a new website, much to the exclusion of just about everything in my life. I absolutley STALK this site, looking for just the right bargain. Try it, but be warned, it's absolutely addictive!!!

mamabargains.com

So, enough about my addictions. We got some family pictures done this week, of course at Portrait Inovations, my fave studio, and if I do say so, they look pretty good. We only bought one family pose, and one pose of the boys, but I am happy with how they turned out.


I love this pic of the boys b/c they are both smiling exactly how they do when not in front of the camera, and that is rare in photos.

What can I say, I am a big fan of family photos. My children will learn to hate me for this! By the way, Carson is not so close to the edge in the original.

Day at the Zoo

So, Dave's parent' were here for Memorial Day weekend, and all Carson wanted to do with them was go to the zoo. This is one of his favorite things to do with Grandma and Papaw, and of course, they don't seem to mind either!


Here is Carson and David's dad. Carson's feet were tired after hiking up and down all the hills at the Cincinnati Zoo.





If you know my boys, then you know that missing a train ride would be a CATASTROPHE! Here are all three of my boys choo-chooing down the track.




Carson had the most AWESOME experience at the zoo-he actually got to feed the giraffe! He wasn't scared at all, and the giraffe just took that cracker right from his hand. I can't believe that I snapped this at just the right second!

Here are the boys with Dave and his Dad watching the elephants. The boys loved watching them come so close.

Tucker was loving this! He was perched high on Daddy's shoulders just having the best time.

This is the only picture of me all day, generally because I am the one taking the pics. What a winner!

This is at the end of the day, and Tucker is just about worn out. You can almost see hime thinking, OK Mom, this was fun, but let's go home now, please???

Making new friends....

So, I am sure many of you are thinking, OH, how sweet, the boys must have made some new friends, or something like that. Well, actually, the story is a little different...

A few weeks ago, Dave was down in the basement, and I hear him loudly yell, "HOLY COW!" I run to the door to check on him, and he yells at me, "Don't come down here. Everything is OK, but don't come down here!" A few minutes later, he hollers up at me to bring the boys out on the deck, and he comes out of the basement, holding...Our new friend!



Yes, that's right, this big fella was crawling around in our basement! The thought of this still makes my skin crawl! So, David disposes of him, and I do my best not to think about how he got in there. Later that afternoon, Dave and I are headed downstairs to the computer, when Dave stops in his tracks, and says, Oh, man, # 2." I'm thinking, What? Dave then hustles us both back up the stairs, and then goes back down, and a few minutes later, emerges from the basement, with, you guessed it, ANOTHER ONE!




So, in less than 4 hours, we have found 2 HUGE rat snakes in our basement. Literally, these guys were at least 3 feet long a piece. Still have no idea where they came from, and I'm not sure I want to know. But, no more friends in the last 3 weeks, so hopefully it was some kind of fluke! However, I always say a prayer that I won't find one every time I go down in the basement!

Camping we will go....

So, we thought it would be fun to go on our first family camping trip! We were supposed to go with some friends and their kids, but their little boy got sick, so things didn't work out. Strange how family vacations seem to bring on these situations.....
We did all the wonderful family camping things, like struggling to get a fire lit with damp wood, and me (almost) single-handedly wrestling the tent up, and not getting the kids fed until way after their normal time, but we had a ton of fun doing it. We spent some time at the campgrounds playground, and we walked throughout the area, just enjoying spending time as a family. After putting the boys to bed, Dave and I just sat in awe of the beauty of the stars, and the peace of the night.
All was going well until about 2:30 in the morning, when a little voice pipes up,"Mommy, my ear hurts!" After encouraging Carson to go back to sleep, we tried to do the same. This happened twice more in the next half hour, and at 3 AM, Dave and I decided we had to call the trip on account of ear infection. Soooo, we pulled up the tent, packed everything in the van, (all in the pitch dark!) and headed home. AT 6:45 we arrived home, and the only ones who were tired were Dave and I! We got Carson to the Dr. and come to find out, his ear was hugely infected, and actually ruptured while we were waiting for antibiotics at the pharmacy. So much for a relaxing vacation! Oh, well, that's life as a parent!

Here is Carson about to help roast marshmallows for his first s'mores. Why do all men get excited about playing with fire?






Oh, the joy of s'mores in the summer!





This is one of my favorite pictures-there is something about your kids eating s'mores while camping that just screams, "SUMMER!"


Here is David and Carson, after we had walked around most of the campground. We didn't see any wildlife (probably b/c with 2 little boys we WERE the wildlife!), but we had fun being out in the "country" as Carson liked to call it.




And finally, the final photo of our camping trip...Carson curled up in the recliner after seeing the Dr. that morning. What a fun end to our first camping trip!

Carson is 4!

My baby turned 4 today! There is nothing like your child's birthday to make you feel a little bit old, is there? I cannot believe that he has been in our lives 4 whole years now. Our world would be empty without him. What a blessing he is (unless we are at the grocery store, but that's a whole nother issue!)

These pics are from his party. We took him and a few friends to Jump Zone, which has a ton of those huge inflatable bounce house thingys, and let them loose. Then we went back to the church building for cake and ice cream, and let the kids play outside. They had a ball!



This goofy pic is his face pressed up against the mesh side wall. Ain't he handsome!

Here he comes down the slide!


This is him climbing up the stairs. Sorry I don't know how to turn the pic!

Here he is helping decorate his cake. He wanted a Diego cake, so we frosted it with chocolate to look like dirt, and added the sprinkles to look like grass.

He really liked this part of the decorating!

Here he is blowing out the candles!


This is a picture of his Diego cake. He told me when we were making it, "Mommy, this is the best birthday cake ever!" It doesn't get much sweeter than that.


Some pics of the bouncy house place-it was sooo cool!




These final two are of the kids playing outside at church. In his Diego goodybags, we put mini magnifying glasses, telescopes, and these really obnoxious whistles! They had a great time using them to find bugs outside! Carson told us that he was using his whistle to call the bugs! In my opinion, the only thing that whistle did was frighten dogs!

Boys will be Boys

Okay, so today is obviously not my day in the blogger world, I CANNOT put my pictures of text where I want them!!!! This is my third attempt, the pics will NOT relocate, so you just have to read a huge thing at the bottom. The se pics are of my boys playing at David's parent's house, and then playing in his brother's truck. They thought "driving" was pretty cool. I am also including (somewhere on this page) pics of my little "construkshun" workers in their cool (aka Tupperware) hats. Enjoy!

Fun with Grammy

My mom came from Texas to visit us, and while she was here, she took Carson on a special birthday date. He got to pick where they went, and what they did, and he had an awesome time! They went to an indoor/outdoor play area with all sorts of great stuff to do, and both of them had a great time! (I have no clue why this is underlined!)

These next few pictures really let you see both of them having fun. Look at Grammy's face coming down that slide!

We sure enjoyed our time with Grammy, and boy do my boys really miss her when she goes home.