Five and Two

WARNING:  This post is full of pictures:)  In no particular order.  You've been warned.

Last weekend, we celebrated both the boys' birthdays with their friends in our backyard.  Initially I was a little worried about it being too hot to be hanging out in our backyard in the middle of August.  But we had the most amazing weather!  I think it was in the low 80's with a cool breeze.  Perfect.  And perfect for a night full of superhero fun:)  It was a crazy night and I'm thankful that we were able to be outside.  7 families...15 walking kids, 3 babies....and this doesn't even take into the account the babies still in-Utero:) 

We did a superhero themed party for the boys.  I saw some ideas on Pinterest (I have a love hate relationship with that site:)) and went from there.  We had cape decorating and several games to play with.  Throw friends, pizza, and cake and ice cream in there and you have the perfect evening.  So, I will let the pictures do the rest of the talking.  The first half of the pictures were taken by Derek (this is Eli's best friend's dad:))  I was having a very hard time keeping track of all the kids while taking pictures.  Plus, I had a very cute "helper" on my hip most the night and he enjoys pulling the camera strap while I'm trying to take pictures....makes photo taking a challenge for sure.  Enjoy!

 I told B we are going to have watch these two in the future.....they are a month apart in age...and already have a love for each other:)  They are both also kind of loners, and love Love LOVE to eat.  They enjoy their alone time, and apparently enjoy their alone time together.  They snuck off to the same side of the yard and Derek caught them being cute:)

 Party favor bags and capes ready to go and waiting for friends!

I'm having such a hard time grasping the fact that my boys are 5 and 2!  So crazy!!

Back to school

Back to school, Back to school, to prove to dad I'm not a fool.......Oh Billy Madison...such a great movie.  Everytime I think of the phrase "back to school," that's what runs through my mind:):)

I digress.  Back to the cute kids going back to school.  I can't hardly believe summer is over. It almost doesn't seem like it happened this year!  I think with the amazing cool temperatures we've been experiencing and all the rain the last several weeks, I kept waiting for summer to show up, and it's already out the door!  I both love and hate back to school time.  I love having the schedule and routine back again.  I'm a routine kind of girl, and my kids will very quickly put you in crazy town if they get bored!  But I also love not having to wake them up if they choose to sleep in past 7.  Or race around in the mornings trying to get all 4 of them out the door by 8 (this is when my kids being early risers comes in handy!)  But, like it or not, school is back in session.....and this year I have TWO of them gone FOUR DAYS A WEEK in the morning for three hours.  It's glorious.  But I miss them too.  (I'm telling you....having kids makes you crazy).    It's sort of weird having just the two little boys around.  And even though we are only on day 5 of school, it's amazing what I can accomplish with 2 less kids in the house, lol.  And the errands I can actually run without losing my mind?!?  And if I choose to be active, instead of going for the 3rd cookie before 10 am, I can even go for a run or a walk with just two.  I think I may like this whole "kids in school bit":)

The kids like it too.  Which is more important I suppose.  Eli has a new teacher this year.  He seems to like his new class, but I can tell he misses his old teacher (who was fabulous...but so is his new one!).  And Kamdyn has done far better than I thought she would!  I was worried about her being super timid and not wanting to go everyday and it being a fight, but she really seems to enjoy herself.  It only took her teacher and all their paras 3 days to get her to talk at all:)  So that' s progress!  I think she is really going to adjust well and school is going to be great for her once she gets used to it.

So, onto the obligatory first day of school pictures.  I was so proud of myself that I actually had time to get these.  I'm pretty sure it barely happened last year.  Actually, I think I may have taken his "first day of school" pictures sometime in the first week and called it good, lol.  But I couldn't resist a photo opportunity with these two cuties!

 Sidenote:  Daddy doesn't ever get to join us for drop off because he has already been working with kids for almost an hour....but on the first day, their school only has 6th grade and he was student-less, so he got to join us.  Yay!  I think K liked having her daddy to hold her hand:)

Popsicles and Peas....but not together;)

I could eat a popsicle any time of year, but summer is the best time.  Mostly because I can send the kids outside to eat...popsicle eating is messy business:)  The kids sure do enjoy them though!  I will probably enjoy them more for the kids when they can eat them entirely on their own.

And....this little mister turned 6 months old, got his first haircut (and tooth!!), and finally got to start some baby food.  I'm trying to keep this little man my baby as long as possible since he's my last baby, but man does he make it hard!!  He's doing/trying to do everything else so much faster than his brothers and sister did.  Not sure I'm ready for that!  But regardless, he got to start baby food.  We started with peas.  Not sure what he thought of them.  He didn't appear to hate them, but he didn't really like them.  Since then, he's also had green beans, squash, and sweet potatoes.  Carrots up tonight!  And it's very obvious that he likes all of the others much better than peas:)  Can't say I blame him!

Playin'

I've been trying to be better about getting out my big camera and capturing our kiddos as they are.  I love watching them play, and candid photographs have always been my favorite....I figure you might as well capture us exactly as we are!  So I've been working on it.  Capture the everyday moments:)  So here we are just hanging out and playing in the backyard!

 These pictures were taken just because they were cracking me up.....Parker loves to jump on our trampoline, but the older two like to keep the bottom clip clipped, which makes it hard for you to get out.  So sometimes you get stuck.  And it's hilarious because your feet are too short to hit the ground.  And instead of helping right away, I did what any good momma would do and took some pictures;)

I love watching these kiddos play!

Riverside

I bet you all thought I was going to go on a blogging hiatus again:)  It's getting to be time for me to upload some new pictures off my camera, but I still have a few already done that I will share. 

Our kids love the park. It's actually been an awesome summer, and we've been able to spend much more time outside.  Until the last few weeks.  But that's just because of all the rain and now the humidity because of that rain.  Anyways, I digress.  We love Riverside park.  It's not necessarily the closest park to us, but it's one of my favorites to take the kids too.  No sand (on most of it) and it is very shady.  Definitely a must when I'm with Saywer.  I'm pretty sure these pictures are from way back in June, but we had a wonderful morning in the park!

Parker loves to swing.  His sister was pushing him too.  She always wants to do everything herself....such a good little helper.

 And they all love climbing this rope thing.  Even Parker.  He has to do everything the big kids do.  Can't hold him back.  He's far more adventurous than any of his other siblings.  Eli is still sometimes timid on this thing....I'm pretty sure if Parker could actually climb higher, he would go to the top.

The end!