At the Playground

In this video Nathan is riding a horse at the park. I'm continually impressed by how coordinated he is at a young age.

Justin at the park. He is getting so strong! Its all that gymnastics strength training.

A longer clip of Nathan coming down and climbing up to go back on the slide. Our little monkey. There is nothing he doesnt try at the playground!!!

That Tomato Plant and Evan

Early in Spring I was giddy with possibilities for our YARD! Our first summer with a yard, not a deck, not a driveway, but actual grass and space for the kids to run and play and for gardens. GARDENS! So, I bought waaaayyyy too many seed packets from the store and began my seedlings. Tomatoes, zucchini, squash of three types. Things were looking good until about mid-May when my tomatoes caught dampening-off disease and all died within the span of a couple days. All thirty-something of them. I was so frustrated and sad. This was our first GARDEN, all the plants had to be from seed that I planted and nurtured and grew. Failure wasnt acceptable. Until it was. I sat on the stoop of my back door and packed away all the tomato seedlings that were dead into a bag and brought it to the compost pile. A couple weeks later I went out and bought 30 tomato plants from the garden store and tried not to look back. (All the zucchini and squash incidentally survived and is planted happily in my garden producing veggies for our family.)

Cut to a couple months ago when I noticed something familiar and growing up next to the step of my back door. Could it be? No. Not possible. But, it was. A tomato plant from my cast off seedlings growing right out of the rocky ground next to the door. And wouldnt you know, it has teeny tiny tomatoes on it. In the most impossible of circumstances and unlikely of places it has persevered. Its a gentle reminder to me throughout the day that the unexpected, unlikely, and most amazing things come when you least expect it.

Today I was doing some artwork, a pin the tail on the dinosaur for one of my favorite newly minted 6 year olds. The boys were doing some pictures of their own and Evan was making a card for his cousin's birthday. We were chatting and coloring away and Evan asked me how to spell "dear" and then "Andrew". I rattled off the letters without a second thought. When I took a break from what I was doing I looked over to see the above card laid out on the table, done by Evan (which I had to ask twice to confirm was his work and not Justin's). Evan, my hard working boy, had written every single letter himself, without me even telling him what the letters looked like. This from a boy who 8 months ago could not even hold a pencil. This from the child that my stomach has been in knots over sending to kindergarten so ill-prepared.

The most amazing things do come when you least expect it...

Even More Videos!

Im getting organized and posting alot of summer videos that I haven't had a chance to get around to until now.

Here is a hilarious video of the three boys dancing to a song on the television from last month. This is first date/wedding mortification material. But oh so cute.

More Videos!

I dont know if I ever posted some of the more recent videos of Evan from swim lessons. I was going through my videos and found these. Here is Evan jumping in the water and treading water with no floaties. And one of Evan swimming the length of the pool under water. This is ALOT of work for Evan. The amount of coordination that is required to move arms, legs, and hold your breath is quite challenging for him, but, he is doing so well, we are so proud of him. Evan is one of the hardest working boys that his swim teacher has ever seen. I believe it too, because that boy, he is determined to overcome his challenges in life. What a wonderful spirit he has.

Videos

As with all my videos I caution you to listen with the volume turned low, because, well, if you know my life, you know its quite loud.

Nathan cant quite pump..yet...but he sure does manage to have fun on the swings like his big brothers. Im amazed by his agility at such a young age.

I've been to Chuck E Cheese about two times too many this summer (let the record show, Ive only been twice). I loathe Chuck E Cheese for its crummy pizza, noise level and general chaos that three of my own boys + five hundred strangers' children create. But, my boys do love it there. This was Nathan's first visit. I kept him strapped in to the stroller and occupied with food for alot of this visit (for a friend's son's birthday) but towards the end I caved and BOY DID HE LOVE IT. Here are some videos of him on the rides. Could his smile get any bigger???

Evan and Caleb were having a blast at the beach with the volley ball net. They played frisbee over it, they were very unsuccessful at it, then they played football over it, and were a bit more successful. Finally they used an actual ball and had a ton of fun! Those two love to play together and were so active during our visit, creating all sorts of games and contest with eachother. It was so fun to watch them together.

Visit With Friends

This week my wonderful friend Susan and her boys Tyler and Brayden came up to visit us for the day. Tyler is Justin's first best friend and one of his oldest friends. Tyler and Justin knew eachother when they were just 9 months old. His family sadly moved a couple hours away when the boys were 3 years old. But, we have kept in close contact with eachother over the years. We haven't missed a birthday party over the years! I just adore Susan and her family. Its very special to me that the boys still get along so well together.

Susan's family also loves to letter box. So, she and I decided to drag the five kids out letter boxing for the day. It was so much fun! The boys found two letter boxes in this fabulous converted once zoo now park that I remember going to as a kid.

Here the boys are finding the first of the letter boxes. Even Nathan joined in!
The views and walk was breathtaking on our adventure. Here are the four older boys walking along the lake in the park.
This is where our wild boys belong :) a gorilla cage. Incidentally, Nathan LOVED being caged in, giving me whole new ideas for ways to keep him contained and have fun (IM KIDDING).
The boys found a little puddle with lots of frogs swimming inside. Luckily none of the boys went swimming along with the frogs.
The Old Woman Who Lived in the Shoe with the boys all on her steps. There is a joke in here somewhere about having so many children I dont know what to do....
After letter boxing we all came back to our house for pizza and play. The boys created a beautiful mural on the driveway together. It was so wonderful to see them all play and create together so well.
Brayden and Evan had a game of street hockey.
It was the perfect day. I couldnt ask for more fun or better friends!

Comparisons

The boys (Justin above, Nathan below) both at the same age. While I see the similarities, I think that as Nathan gets older he is looking a little less like Justin and a bit like Evan especially in the mouth and smile.

Vacation with Family

The boys really liked the hotel room. We really got our money's worth out of the free hot breakfast in the mornings. I have never seen Justin and Evan eat so much food. There was an indoor pool too, we were too busy with family for alot of swimming but while G packed the car to leave the boys and I squeezed in some pool fun.
A giant game of baseball in the backyard.The lake is perfect for Nathan, very shallow for many yards out, so he could run around in the water!

Nathan was rocked to Auntie Lori, who has the "touch". He napped for nearly 2 hours like this on the beach.

Evan playing football at the beach.
Evan and Caleb racing in the water.
Nathan enjoying a swim.

We spent the long weekend with G's entire family in Vermont - all four brothers and their kids together with G's parents. What fun! We spent a beautiful day at the lake, the weather was absolutely perfect and the kids all had so much fun together. What a great time!!! We left wishing that we all lived closer to make these get togethers more frequent!

Biking

This is a HUGE milestone for Evan! With his disability it is extremely hard for him to pedal/steer a bike because of the muscle tone and coordination involved in biking. Evan made it around the culdesac for the first time EVER this past weekend all by himself. We are so proud of those little leg muscles of his and his determination! WAY TO GO EVAN!

Andrew and Evan

Team Andrew and Evan managed to build quite the structure, before deciding it was MORE fun to tear it down. I love how Andrew starts punching the blocks out. So fun!!!

Indoor Play

I brought the boys to a local indoor playspace with my cousin Scott and his son Andrew for some energy burn-off. The kids all had a blast. Nathan might have had the most fun of all. Here are a couple videos of him in the playspace easily scaling the obstacles unlike any 19 month old I've seen! Until he hit one he was too short for, then you get to see Nathan's temper tantrum, which by tantrum standards isnt so bad, its almost cute. Almost.