Excuses, Excuses...

We've been awfully busy enjoying our backyard and the sun, the garden, friends, family and fun. And I haven't been blogging. Or taking many pictures. Its apparent that the boys are getting used to not having a camera in their face 24/7 when all I can produce to share is this photo of Nathan telling mom-arazzi ENOUGH. Although it is actually an interesting picture of Nathan's single transverse palmar crease that all my boys have (Justin has two, one on each of his hands, Nathan and Evan each have one). No one else in our family has one, as far as we know.

Anyways, we have been in the garden working the soil. Our plants are growing! We expanded the garden a bit to make room for some additional plants the kids brought home from school - pumpkins galore - if all these pumpkin plants grow you can all come pumpkin picking in our backyard in the Fall!!! Our apple trees are now covered with tiny apples and our peach tree is LOADED with baby peaches waiting to ripen into deliciousness. Yum. Im eagerly googling recipes for all our plants! I have a 200+ page cookbook full of recipes to make with squash and zucchini that Im anxious to start using. The squash has flowers on it already!!!

The kids have been living in the yard. We drag them in every.single.night. I secretly love their shouts of protest when we tell them its time to go in. Shhh...dont tell them. Justin has officially beat me at HORSE, thus proving that at 7 years old his basket ball skills out shine his mothers, which if you know me you know that this is not a stretch of the imagination. Nathan has conquered his plastic slide and has moved on to trying to climb the ladder on the swing set, the ladder which incidently leads to the monkey bars, far above his head. He is convinced he is 5 years old at least and will not be deterred by my words of caution. He is such a boy. We have aquired another sandbox for the boys! I predict that they will no longer want to play in the sandboxes all summer now that they arent all forced into one tiny box together.

Justin finished up baseball season through the town league and Evan has one more weekend of soccer. Evan has turned into a soccer superstar all of the sudden. He has always loved the game but now he loves it and is getting pretty good. He scored three goals on Saturday's game and was VERY proud of himself. His reward for a great game was a snowcone from the ice cream truck. G asked him, "Evan, do you want a snow cone for a treat?" Evan said, "YES! [pause] What is a snow cone?" Very sweet.

School is almost over for Justin, just two and a half more days. Evan said goodbye to his integrated preschool program on Friday. On to kindergarten and second grade! I cant believe how old my boys are getting. The boys will be at the same school together next year, and for the following 3 years together, which is wonderful. They are going to be riding the bus home from school together every day. I requested afternoon kindergarten for Evan for next year (Im hoping that with both the older boys away at school each afternoon Nathan will have at least a chance at a decent nap with a quiet house). The boys are busy planning a very detailed summer party for their friends in July after we get back from vacation. I promised them a party outside in our backyard ages ago and they are holding me to that promise! Its definitely having a pinata (Evan's choice) and a Nerf gun fight (Justin's choice).

This week we bought a new car. G's Maxima was on its last leg/wheel. Im groaning as I write this. Car shopping/purchasing is one of the most tedious, tiring activities I can imagine. Not to mention expensive. We settled on a Camry, although we were all over the map at one point or another. Im just glad its done. This week we also had to buy a new dryer. Copy and paste things I said about car shopping/purchasing here for dryer shopping. We actually survived (barely) no dryer for a whole week. The boys were saying, "I cant find any clean underwear" at one point though, actually Im not really sure how they resolved that issue :) Eh. So, needless to say, its been a very expensive and busy week here with all this shopping and decision making.

Nathan had his 18 month checkup at the doctor this week. He is in the 5th percentile for weight weighing in at a whopping 21-ish pounds. And he is 33 inches tall, which I believe was the 60th percentile for height. His new thing he says is "cheese" when he sees a camera out. He also loves to make the "woo-woo" noise for a fire truck. Or any car that is red. Or any big truck. He pretty much does it all the time. He loves to climb. On everything. He climbed onto the dining room table this week and got an M&M and ate it. He didnt get an allergic reaction. So, we tried butter in a homemade cookie this weekend and he didnt get hives or throw up!!!! This is HUGE. Fingers crossed this is the beginning of the end of the milk allergy. There's still the egg allergy but milk would open up a whole world of new foods for him. I taking it slow, I might try some yogurt this week though.

I think that brings us up to date on all the important matters. :)

Updates from the 365 Project

Half way through the year and the 365 project is still going strong!


http://onemomthreeboys365.blogspot.com/

Enjoy!!!!

Evan's Last Day of Preschool and Summer Plans

I have been trying to upload this cute video of Evan doing a song and dance at his last day of preschool but cant get it to upload. I did get it on my facebook account, so if you go there, you can view it!!!

Evan had his last day of preschool at his private preschool, his integrated preschool program does not end until the end of June when Justin gets out. Evan didnt seem sad at all for preschool to be over. The boy is so laid back about things, its not that he doesnt care its just that he is such a happy go lucky kid i think he is confident that school or no school, he will have fun things to do once school is out. And boy do we have plans!

Last night we had a family meeting and we discussed our list of things we want to do this summer. The boys came up with some wonderful ideas, alot of them are related to vacation at the beach. The boys look forward to their beach vacation so much, its such a wonderful tradition. And its not far away now!!! The countdown has begun and we are looking at less than 30 days! YAY!

The boys are also signed up for some camps this summer, which will keep us busy! Justin is doing a dance camp, baseball and Lego. Evan is doing a soccer camp. And Evan will be continuing with occupational therapy, physical therapy and swim therapy through the summer.

Mostly though we are looking forward to just enjoying our giant beautiful back yard for the first summer! I cant say enough times how much it means to our family to have a huge yard for the kids to play in. We are so lucky and happy. The boys have already gotten so much use out of our new swingset and the yard. Its amazing how much time we spend outdoors now. Its almost hard to remember what we did with ourselves pre-big yardage! The boys get out of school and immediately go out to the yard and play and play. We usually have to drag them in after dinner well past their bedtime. Its wonderful.

Catch Up

Ive been neglecting my blogging duties. The call of the outdoors has been too powerful to ignore. We have been out enjoying our yard, playing in the gardens and generally enjoying fresh air. All this has left little time for blogging. Dont forget though that here: http://onemomthreeboys365.blogspot.com/ you can find daily photos of us!!!

This weekend was busy, but, thats the norm these days. Justin had baseball, Evan had soccer, we had a visit from all our Vermont relatives, a BBQ to celebrate Dion's graduation and we got our garden in!

My dad brought over his latest toy...tool...and rotatilled my garden for me! Thanks dad!!! Its a huge space, probably 20x30 feet at least. We were able to plant TONS of vegetables in the space. The boys were enthralled with the rotatilling process. Here is the completed space. Plants are in. Now everything needs to GROW!!!

Here are some pictures of the cousins together this weekend, doing what boys do best, playing sports, running around and enjoying the outside!

Justin, Evan and Jayden playing street hockey, note Justin's hand made stick since we only had two. Quite ingenius.

Justin and Jayden playing basketball.

Caleb and Nathan playing at the water table.

The boys eating dinner (we moved in the picnic table so the boys (minus Nathan) could all eat together at a kids table).

Nathan and Doggy 17 months old

Its hard to believe that Nathan is coming up on 1 1/2 years old. Wow. Time sure has been flying and he has come a long way from his doggy pictures when he was first born when doggy was bigger than him!

Nathan is getting quite smart these days - too smart for his own good at times. He figured out how to open a deadbolt lock that we had on our gate at the top of the stairs. Garren has since replaced it with a new locking mechanism that we hope he wont figure out too quickly! He also can take the lid/cap off any object he can get his hands on, to include pens and markers which quickly make a giant mess!

Nathan is all boy. His favorite toys still include balls and cars/trucks. He calls cars "go-gos" and loves seeing real cars as well as his Hot Wheels cars. He also has formed a love of digging, in the sandbox, the garden and the yard!

Nathan is a really good eater. His favorite foods include things that his older brothers never ate at this age: tomatoes, bell peppers, baked beans. He still has his food allergies so he doesnt eat much processed foods, it seems like everything contains milk and eggs! He learned the word "egg" incidently, over Easter. He thinks all eggs are brightly colored and plastic and contain cheerios or animal crackers :)

His new favorite word is "guy". He will point to a superhero and say "guy". He loves little Lego men (although he cannot have them since them immediately go in his mouth). He will point to the Lego men and repeat over and over "guy, guy, guy, go get it". Sometimes throwing a little fit, which isnt so cute.

He continues to be our best sleeper yet! He sleeps consistently through the night. He goes to bed at 7:15pm and wakes at about 7am. This would seem like nothing, except that our other two darling children were not even sleeping through the night at this age, so its HUGE for our family!!! He naps inconsistenly throughout the day, but, this I blame on his loud older brothers and our hectic pace of life more than on him. Given the chance, he is a great napper, he just doesnt have many chances. Poor third child that he is. :)

Gymnastics Meet

I never got a chance to post some of the photos from Justin's gymnastics meet last weekend. What a fabulous event! The gymnastics place he takes class at did such a great job organizing it for the kids. Justin did really well. We were so impressed with his discipline and skill.

School Vacation Week Catch Up

This past week was Spring vacation for the big boys. What a fun and busy week we had!

Justin attended a local minor league ballpark baseball clinic Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday mornings from 8am to 12pm. I wish I could say that I had some pictures to share, but, being at the ballpark with Nathan proved to be anything but relaxing or delightful. Therefore, we couldnt stay to watch and take pictures of Justin at camp. He did have alot of fun and said he learned alot from the camp. Its run really well and the kids get to learn from actual players on the team and from the coaches who train those players. The last day of the camp they had an autograph session and Justin was thrilled to get 7 autographs from the players he had worked with during the week. I did stay for the autograph signing (with Nathan strapped in a stroller crying the whole time) and the players were so nice and friendly to the kids. Really a great experience for him.

On Monday the boys had a playdate with their cousin Andrew which was a ton of fun. And on Monday night Justin had his last gymnastics session until next Fall. With baseball starting up and practice and games three nights a week, something had to give and Justin chose baseball over gymnastics for the Spring.

On Tuesday Evan had occupational therapy and Nathan and I had a quick visit to see Nana and Aunt Mary. Tuesday after baseball camp Justin got to visit my mom at her school and meet her class! Nearly all the kids are his age now. I remember back when Justin was 2 or 3 bringing him in the school to see my mom and all her second graders seemed so grown up compared to him. Now he is nearly one of them! GULP. After that, my mom and I dragged all three of the boys to a local shoe store and got sneakers and sandals for all. Three sizes, many different opinions, and finally some decisions later, we left ready for Spring/Summer for all the boys!

Wednesday after we did the autograph session at the baseball camp all the kids and I headed over to swim lessons for Evan. Afterwards to celebrate Evan's success under water swimming we picked him and Justin up some nice pairs of goggles for the summer! The boys are getting so excited for swimming and the beach! Thankfully the weather is warming up too, which helps believe that summer might actually get here eventually!

Thursday morning Evan had his last gymnastics class until the Fall. We are sad to leave gymnastics class, Evan has been making such great gains. However, with occupational therapy, physical therapy, swim therapy and TWO prechools, there just is no time for everything. Thursday we got new living room furniture! A new sofa and love seat. We also had an all afternoon playdate from some long-time friends in town. Thursday night Justin had baseball practice.

Friday morning Justin had a playdate with a friend from school. And Nathan had a playdate with his little baby friend Kai. Five boys in the house!!! It was quite loud but fun! In the evening Justin had a parade in town to kick off baseball season. He was so excited to participate in the parade with all his teammates and friends on other teams. It was a great community event. After the parade we brought the boys to see some antique cars that were in town. Nathan was riveted, his favorite thing right now are cars which he calls "go-gos".

Today was Justin's first baseball game of the season. He did really well. Its very cute watching him as part of a team, cheering on his teammates and really getting excited to be part of the game. Also today G got his riding lawn mower delivered! All the boys took turns riding on it with daddy and Justin even got to steer for G. I kept thinking, flash forward 8 years to Justin learning to drive a car! We did quite a bit of yard work today outdoors too. The yard is really coming along nicely.