General Silliness

Here are a few pictures from the last week or so. Nothing exciting, but I thought they were cute!

Christopher is having a really important conversation with Grammy.

Christopher discovered his Thomas coloring book again. Here he is coloring Henry, with the real Henry supervising, just to make sure he gets the colors right. I am not making this up; he was very meticulous.

Patrick, on the other hand, colored for about 2.3 minutes before starting to eat crayons. Here he is concentrating very hard, note the tongue. Probably trying to figure out what naughty things he can do with two plastic balls. There must be something...

Driving Daddy's car after he got back from work on Friday.

Enjoy!

Belated Halloween Pictures

Late as usual, but here are a few good pictures from Halloween.

Helping Daddy clean Patrick's pumpkin - fake shot - he didn't want to touch the gooey insides.

Christopher loved popping out the pieces of pumpkin after we cut them free.

Patrick was not interested in sitting still next to his pumpkin. Christopher was hamming it up, but had no pants on. Oops.

Astronaut Christopher and Robin Hood ready for trick-or-treating. Not sure why these pictures are so blurry.

And they're off to get loot!

Enjoying their goodies after they went the whole way around the block!

Enjoy!

Itsy Bitsy Spider

Christopher was regaling me this morning at breakfast with his Itsy Bitsy Spider rendition, so after we finished I got him to do it again. Unfortunately he insisted on sitting right there in front of the window, so the picture is a little dark. I think it's cute anyway, though! Patrick was sitting next to me doing the motions, but I couldn't get him to sit by Christopher and do it on camera.


We're off to playtime and a picnic at the park today, so hopefully we'll get some good pics then for a post later.

Enjoy!

Raise 'Em and Race 'Em (When Daddy Gets the Camera)

Courtesy of Daddy, because only he would come up with a game as silly as toddler racing. Note the no pants for extra redneck effect.

And another one, just in case one isn't enough!

Enjoy!

We Have Liftoff

I know it's been forever since I posted. We were in PA for two weeks and then we came back and things got really crazy. In the span of four days last week we put our house up for sale, sold our house, found a new (to us) house, and had our offer accepted. Now the craziness of moving is hanging over my head.

But enough excuses.

Christopher decided on Thursday that his hammer is not a hammer, but is actually the space shuttle. Here is a little video clip of his launch sequence, which he perfected watching countless space shuttle launches on YouTube. Note that he has the enviable job of countdown boy - the job my mom always wanted me to have!

And just so he doesn't feel left out, here's Patrick admiring his handiwork. Apparently he needed a snack. I swear, that kid should win the Nobel Prize for Special Achievement in Naughtiness.

Enjoy!

Videos!

Mike showed me how to make videos again, so maybe I'll remember this time. Here are two of my recent favorites. The first is Patrick one of our last nights on vacation grooving in his high chair at dinner. The second is Christopher the Energizer Bunny at open gym the other week.

Enjoy!

Miscellaneous Pictures

We did some fun stuff this past weekend, but my favorite picture is pure Christopher silliness. He decided to get up at 6AM Friday morning and wasn't interested in snuggling with us, so he went in to the living room. When we climbed out of bed, we found this - he had lined up all the cars out of the bucket and was addressing them like they were in a parade.

On Friday, we went to open gym at the place where Christopher takes gymnastics. Here he is flexing his crazy motor skills crawling across a ladder.

Later we caught them reading in the middle of the kitchen floor.

Saturday night we went to the Arizona Sonoran Desert Museum for their Summer Saturday Nights program. Basically reduced price entry after the sun goes down and it's not so hot. We got to see some neat animals and dig for dinosaurs!

Here is my giant boy - who told him he was allowed to be so big?

And because Aunt Jenny asked, here is my newly finished tote bag. My machine quilting is a little wonkier than the Chinese Vera Bradley chicks, but I think it's cute.

Enjoy!

Durango Trip - Part 3

Apparently I'm trying to make these pictures last until I can find something interesting enough to photograph around here. There have been some hilarious potty training moments, but they're all pretty indecent. My favorite is Christopher asking himself, "Peepee, where are you? Are you coming?"

I'm going to try to pare down the last few days to finish in this post. We'll see. I just have such cute boys I can't seem to choose just a few pictures!

Riding up the ski lift with Daddy at Purgatory - he thought this was really cool!

Riding down the "alpine slide" sled track thingy - Daddy thought this was really cool!

Then we drove over the mountain (at 11,000 feet!) to Silverton, CO. It had just finished raining there, and get this, it was only 60 degrees! I almost cried I was so excited. I put pants on the boys! Here's my big helper pushing Patrick on a slow boat to China. Don't worry, we rescued Patrick before the stroller tipped over.

On the way out of Silverton, we stopped at this beautiful alpine lake. Patrick decided a little trailblazing was in order.

The next morning, our last day in Durango, we went to the railroad museum. A fabulous time was had by all, especially Christopher, who had to be dragged kicking and screaming (literally) away from the model train setup after at least 30 minutes.

Patrick at the engineer's desk in a caboose. So much work, so little time...

On our way back to Show Low, AZ, we decided to go through Four Corners. Not something I need to see again. This was pretty much it, although I can now say that I've been to Utah.

Many ridiculously long hours later, we got to the Petrified Forest National Park where we saw many "dinosaur trees" and even a real dinosaur. I didn't quite capture the joy on Christopher's face - this is the first dinosaur fossil he's ever seen in real life. He thought it was super cool!

So there you have it. After this, it will be back to our regularly scheduled boring lives until we go to see Grammy and Grandad in a few weeks!

Enjoy!

Road Trip Part 2

I'm currently hiding from the boys after a long day of potty training. Mostly "Let's try to pee. NOOOOOOO. Let's at least sit on the potty. NOOOOOOO." You get my drift.

Now I have help. Patrick has arrived to make sure I don't get too much done, but I'll try to persevere and get up some more pics of our trip.


The second day in Durango, we drove back about 45 minutes to the entrance to Mesa Verde National Park. It is one of the largest Indian cliff dwellings ever discovered. Too bad it was another 20 miles back a little twisty turny up and down road, which explains Patrick's rather low opinion of the trip.
Once we got to the largest of the ruins (and the most accessible), it was really neat. I was amazed at how much was still intact. I expected foundations, but there were numerous large adobe walls still intact.

Christopher and Daddy ventured down into a kiva whose roof had been reconstructed. Mommy and Patrick stayed topside.

Patrick finally started earning his keep grinding corn for tortillas.

My two giant handsome boys together. Not sure why they aren't looking at the camera, but oh well.

Christopher decided to do a little trailblazing on the way out of the canyon.

The natives are getting restless, so I'll try to put up a few more later.

Enjoy!

The Great Four Corners Road Trip - Part I

We've been back for over a week, yes, but I'm just getting to uploading pictures from our adventure in late July / early August. We took a 6 day road trip through the Four Corners area to Durango, Colorado and back. Overall we drove nearly 1400 miles and saw all sorts of neat things!


Here is Christopher the night before we left with his new suitcase packed and ready to go with the important things - trains, crayons, books.





The first day we drove to Gallup, NM with a quick stop at the Painted Desert Visitors Center. After deciding that we didn't want to drive 20 miles each way out of the way to see the Petrified Forest part, we sat on the "Dinosaur Tree" outside the museum for Daddy to take a picture.


We then went on to Gallup and checked into the hotel and brought in our things.

After we settled in, we went into "downtown" Gallup to the main drag, the old Route 66, just like in Cars!

The next day we got up and finished driving to Durango, Colorado, arriving mid-afternoon. We decided to scope out the Children's Museum, which turned out to be more of a playroom of sorts, but was great for the boys to just get out and run around. Here is Christopher unloading his groceries.

Then we walked a few blocks downtown to find dinner. On the way we passed this GIANT boy sitting on a bench. When did he get so big?

Here's my little love bug and I at dinner. He fell asleep in the stroller so he was snuggly for a minute or two.

And of course, the coolest place in town, Christopher's hide-a-bed. Who would've thought a sleep sofa could be so cool - but I guess a bed that disappears into a sofa during the day is pretty magical when you're 3.

This is a monster post, so I'll put up some more tomorrow. Until then, Enjoy!

Random Pics of the Week

We've done nothing with a capital N this week, since we're going away next week and (of course) Christopher has come down with another cough. So, here are a few pictures of the usual - playing on the trampoline at open gym and giving checkups.

Now take a deep breath...

Jumping like a bunny

Not sure who knocked who over

Look Mom, I found this cool ball. How 'bout I chuck it at you?

Yeah, I'm pretty big stuff.

We're leaving for about a week's vacation to Durango, CO on Thursday. Hopefully we'll do something fun there so we can post it for you!

Enjoy!

Haircut!

Patrick got his first haircut yesterday! I think it was more traumatic for Mommy than it was for Patrick. He just sat around looking bewildered but not fussing or squirming too much.


Christopher is old hat at the haircut thing, but makes sure we remember ice cream afterwards.


From Friday, we moved the trucks into Christopher's room so the piano tuner could come, then found him on his bed playing with all of them at once.


And just for those of you who think Patrick is still fat, here's a skinny boy flexing for the camera, and showing off his driving skills. There was an incident at dinner tonight involving spaghetti and spilled milk that resulted in him losing his clothes. Mommy nearly cried over spilt milk since I finished scrubbing the floor not two hours before dinner!
Enjoy!