HAPPY 2ND BIRTHDAY

PARKS AND WYATT ARE TWO YEARS OLD TODAY!!

FINALLY!!

For all three of you that read this blog, thank you very much for your patience. We finally have our new design up and running and we are so happy with the way it turned out. Darcy over at Graphically Designing did a fantastic job. Todd and I still have some work to do on the sidebar, so new things will be popping up here and there.

Turkey Moustache

Leap Frogs

We recently took the boys to one of these converted warehouses that are wall-to-wall-to-ceiling inflatable giants. I don't remember the occasion, a weekend or rainy day, etc., but it was packed full of kids. For the first 15 minutes the boys stood around in awe at the vinyl monoliths and hoards of people. They first resigned themselves to playing it safe and confining themselves to the toy area with kitchens, workbenches, push toys, and the like. It was not until daddy got his shoes off and had to get into the inflatable with them that they perked up.

With their affinity for slides, we knew that they would like these if we could only get them to the top. These things were 20 feet in the air and we knew that they were not going to be able to climb the little inflatable rungs up by themselves. So, daddy had to carry one up at a time under his arm and navigate the slick stairs in only his socks. Good exercise carrying 30 pounds of furious thunder under one arm on unstable surfaces. Just as we thought, they took to it like fish to water after their first descent.

Wyatt, of course, wanted to go down on his belly. Parks wanted to go to higher and higher slides. Wyatt thought it would be fun to go down not on the slide area but on the ladder rungs, tumbling down like a tumble weed or coin being flipped. Parks would run at ramming speed into the corner pillars of the bounce house and then look like a blond projectile into the center of the ring. Here are some pictures we took of the day when we were not fearing for their lives or concussions.

Happy Mother's Day

To the mother of our two wonderful boys, I could not have asked for anything more.

Kentucky Derby Days

On Saturday afternoon, we took the boys to Storybook Farms where they provide a type of therapy to children with life-threatening illnesses, disabilities, and suffering from grief. They opened the farm up to the public during the Kentucky Derby to raise awareness to their cause and to have a little fun. They had train rides, music, a bounce house, games, and a demonstration by the Auburn Raptor Center. They brought out eagles, owls, hawks and buzzards for people to see and take pictures with these animals. We figured that we could get the boys out of the house again to round out a weekend of festivals.

Parks has found a new play place...the car. If we get him out of the car seat, we can't get him out of the car.

Mommy found out about the new alphabet Cheezits that have large letters on each cracker. Wyatt was in heaven!

The one problem with bounce houses.....

.....if you put them in, you had better be ready to go in and get them out.

They had fun with these plush "horseys."

As you can see, we stayed around this area for quite a while.

It took a little while for the boys to figure out how to ride their new toys.

Wyatt was mesmerized by the little details the candy-cane striping, the horse's mane, etc.

I think it is about time for someone's first haircut.

What finally ended the day for us at Storybook Farms was Round 10 of the ongoing saga over who can drive the wagon. They are not really getting the concept of "taking turns" yet.

Slides and Giggles

We made a trip to a spring festival at one of the local elementary schools this afternoon. At almost 2 years old, Parks & Wyatt are still a little too young for cake walks, pies in the face, and football tosses. So after pulling the boys around in the wagon for 15 minutes, we headed over to the school's playground. They had an interesting type of slide that we had never seen....and we are quickly becoming slide connoisseurs.

It was long and not at a very steep pitch, but that was not the most interesting part. The full length of the slide was comprised of rolling bars, much like a conveyor system. We are the worst about forgetting our new Canon XSi, so we had to rely, once more, on my cell phone. I snapped a couple photos of the boys the first few go rounds, but soon after, I switched it to the video camera and got some great moments of them going down.

Both of them just HAD to go down the slide backwards.

We could NOT get Wyatt off the slide. We had to pull him off kicking and screaming
to take them home for bedtime.

Going Green

I must admit I never gave much thought to this whole GREEN thing...or my carbon footprint, but that like everything else, has changed since I've become a mother. Really, it all began as I started to learn that the plastic baby bottles I was using were potentially leaking a chemical called BPA that could be toxic to my children. In the six months since I discovered this, it has become widespread media news. It is now much more commonly known that plastics with a 3, 6, or 7 in the little recycle triangle on the bottom may contain harmful chemicals. How disheartening to think that the people that manufacture baby bottles and serve our children baby food could have this chemical in their plastics.

As I read more, I become even more concerned and more convinced that we really don't know what our children are being exposed to on a daily basis... whether it be something in the food they eat, the toys they play with or the air they breathe. There is a thin line that you have to walk on these issues. Since switching the boys to milk, we have given them nothing but organic whole milk, but we are not so restrictive in our actions that we cannot order milk at a restaurant during lunch or dinner. We try to no let them play with our cell phones and turn off the wireless router in our house when we are not using the computer, but when we walk outside, there are three cell towers within a viewing radius. For us, "going green" has little to do with geopolitical issues. It is about arming ourselves with as much information as we can about the potential dangers in our surroundings and making rational decisions according to the best options we have available to us.

While We Were Out

While daddy was out on the road for 26.2 miles this weekend in Nashville,
and mommy watch and cheered,
our boys had their Grammy and cousin, Abigail, come stay with them to watch some Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.
They played in the backyard together on their fort.
They laughed and snarled and skinned up their knees.
They became little graffiti artists.
They played with their toys inside, showing their new playmate how things are done around here.
Mimi also came to visit and they all made the trip to the annual City Fest. Parks rarely let Abigail out of his sight,
but when he did the air was filled to pleas for "Abi, Abi, Abi."
Wyatt got to show off his extensive knowledge of all things "Moon Book." We were glad to get back on Sunday & the boys were definitely glad to see us, but they will miss their Grammy and cousin, Abigail, until they come back for their birthday weekend.

P.S. - Check out Todd's new blog, Running Avenue, for further insight on running, triathlons, and a Good Reads section.

Horse's Behind

Prologue: In telling this story, I want inform our readers that Randi and I face our ups-and-down in our relationship as the stresses of life pull on us just like many of you. All in all we still do our best to be Christ-like as we love and respect each other. This is a short vignette when we were a little testy with each other and ended up laughing the whole thing away.

One day Randi and I were in a ill mood towards each other over some dispute. Although Randi might have the reason for this instance on the tip of her tongue, I cannot for the life of me remember what it was. We were playing with the boys, and Parks started playing with his Little People farmyard animals. At this point in time, the boys were pointing at objects and wanting us to them the name of it. We were going along fine, naming the cow, the chicken, the goat, etc. He picked his horse and said "'dis." I replied back "horse," and he mimicked back with his hand the sign language for horse. Next, the horse's tail (see picture above) caught his attention and he again asked "'dis?" Mommy informed him "that's the horse's behind." Adding even more, she chimed in with all her wit that "daddy is a horse's behind."

Parks looked at the horse's backside and then looked at me with the most bewildering look we had ever seen. He then pointed back at the horse's behind and confirmed "da-da."

Easter Festivities

The boys thoroughly enjoyed all of the Easter festivities. They had their first Easter egg hunt on Wednesday at Preschool, another Thursday at Mom's Morning Out, one on Saturday at a local park and the last one at the lake on Easter Sunday. Mimi, Opa, Papa and Grammy all came to town for the community festivities on Saturday and I believe the boys enjoyed all of the attention, not to mention all of the goodies from the grandparents. The best thing about it for this Momma is that they don't yet know what candy is so they would just open the eggs and dump the candy on the floor. Something tells me this will be the only year we have that problem.

Our church had their first meeting in our new facility. It was very exciting to finally be moved in and extra special that our first service was on Easter Sunday.

Here are a few pics from the weekend.

Death of a Purist

Although I am no Luddite, I swore in my youth that I would not make the jump to digital photography and, God forbid, Photoshop. I was a purist, using only film in my hand-me-down Minolta Maxxum. I would make endless trips to the same destination at different times of the day just to capture suitable light. Now with two boys, there is a certain ease to just getting a good shot and worrying about getting around to making corrections on the desktop later. Also, if you know me, you know that I am a horrible portrait photographer. I would much rather take pictures of undisturbed wilderness.

Here are some of my recent attempts at breaking in my new Canon XSi and touching my photos up with Adobe Photoshop Elements 6, great for a beginner like me in a digital world.

Little People

One of Parks and Wyatt's favorite new toys a the Playtown Little People. As you can see in the pictures below we have amassed quite a lot of the town folk. The individual people come with little 3"x3" books that the boys also love and are great for stuffing into the diaper bag. While the boys were playing with their Little People the other day, I was playing with my new Canon XSi. "Lovin' it."

This how I found Duke asleep on the floor.

The boys are really getting good at calling each one by their names. They know the mommy and daddy ones. They know the doctor, firemen, and policeman. They call the dog, "dud" and cat, "mou" - like meow.

A group shot.

Parks plucking the dada up in his grasp.

We call him Goober, the mechanic.