Our Little Braggs

Laundry System Part 2: When your life is in a place for kids to help...or you only have a few clothes!

2017-11-21T16:11:00.002-05:00

I have a friend overseas I was sharing my laundry ideas with when I realized I've updated the system a bit. Visit my original system when I had littles here to explain some of this.

http://ourbragg.blogspot.com/2012/01/laundry-system.html

I realized I hadn't written out what I do now and maybe it would help someone. We now have 4 kids and laundry is rarely a big deal for us. Yea...not a stressor!! WHAT?! I wanted the kids to start helping (disclaimer: I don't keep up with them helping enough honestly cause sometimes I just want things done).

So, what I started noticing with doing each person's laundry one day a week and having them put it away that night is that the kids were really overwhelmed and hated putting it away. Then I read all the Konmari stuff about not having too much (we still have a lot cause I like to be prepared clothing-wise and my boys ruin clothes)...but we do have less for the boys than we did. We don't have uniforms. So, I maintain about 10 school tops and maybe 7 jeans and 4 pjs plus a pair of navy and kakhi pants for occasions...and a few polo/button ups. The big boys are kind of in the same size now but one is a slim and one is a regular so they have separate pants so they sometimes swap tops. The idea is that they can have a full 2 weeks school days of separate outfits if they want until they start ruining things. Hopefully I can pass on more than half of it to the next kiddo spreading out the wear like that too.

Well, what changed in the system?
I realized that if the boys only had ONE outfit to put away, they weren't overwhelmed about putting away their clothes. Also, I did some testing and our washer would hold one day of winter clothes and PJs for all six of us. (Not thick sweaters). So same for summer which is less fabric. I also started using delay start even more.

The problem people run into with laundry is they run the washer and they forget it and it sits wet all day. I decided though, it's not really a big deal if DRY laundry sits dirty in the washer as long as it has a few hours to dry between loading.

After baths, the kids each (or I after checking for stains) run their clothes to the washer and dump it in. I put mine in at the end of the day and set the washer to run for 6:30am. It's done by 7:30am. That gives me time to move the clothes to the dryer and hang up whatever I want to hang (like pjs because our dryer is not huge) right before we run the boys to school and the laundry is done for the day. So, yes, that means laundry every day...but we don't need clothes baskets very much anymore. Many times I decide we take Sunday off and plan to run an extra load on Monday and I'll hang up their Sunday stuff for them so it stays nicer.

If I were working, I'd have us fill the washer the night before and in morning and set the washer to run when I get home (or just have it loaded and push 'start' when I get home) around 5pm so I know to go down after dinner and move the clothes to the dryer and then they are done.

In both cases in a perfect world, after dinner, the kids meet us at the dryer and I had them one top, one pants, socks, one jammies and then they run upstairs and put that away and we're done. Their drawers are clearly separated plus we still do the weekly clothing packets so they can put a new packet in the empty spot from the day. I do want them to put the new clothes in the back so they don't keep rewearing the same thing.

So, in theory we are never behind on the laundry. It gets done no drama. This system works even if you only have 3 outfits per kid for people happy with that. YES, it does involve sorting but when you are just sorting it to people, it seems like less of a big deal than sorting and putting it away...I do have crazy days though and do a hallways sort sometimes.

Still keep PJS in the shoe hangers and like that. Still do clothing packets. I'm working on moving the socks over beside the shoes by the door as that makes more sense to me as we don't wear shoes in the house. Just do daily laundry and...it works for us!! :) NOTE: Rosie does have more clothes than the boys...and more shoes...but she has clothing packs too and it works fine.

Disneyland!!

2016-09-22T13:02:00.002-04:00

You'll have to forgive my break in blogs! I almost had this one done but had to stop for all the prep that goes into huge consignment sales! Woot!

Anyways, we did Disney for one day. It was crowded. It was HOT (heat index over 100). It took a lot of planning! By the time we did decide to go (persuaded by Nathan's mom), I only had a day or two to do the actual research what with packing for the trip and doing Legoland. There is just an incredible amount of stuff to do and see and there is definitely a better and a worse way to do it.

We were 20 min out so we drove over and parked. Parking my friends...even parking in the front of the non-VIP lot...still involves walking because they don't run the trams as often in the mornings and they don't stop in that closest park of the parking lot!! So, 15 min walking to ticketing and waiting. Then, 10 min boat or slightly shorter tram ride over the lake to the actual park! Then, 10-15 min waiting to get every bag searched. Then, 5-10min ticketing plus more time for our second stroller rental. Then, trying to make it through a main street that looked like this and walking 20 min to fantasyland:

It was really time consuming walking. We arrived there just after it opened for us but it was 10am before we got to do anything at the park. I toyed around with the idea of getting a reservation at Beauty and the Beast and that would have been a smart thing to do to get in the park early and eat there even though it is a little $$. We would have gotten some nice pictures in an empty park!!

I also got a little caught up in the fastpass thing without looking around the park first to see where everything was located. I knew Nathan didn't want to deal with lines and that he and Samuel wanted rides (7 dwarves/Space Mtn) so I got them fastpasses to the most popular rides. Then, I got a group fastpass to the PeterPan midday as well as a princess Belle fastpass early in the day for Rosie and me and Mutti as well as a splash mountain pass. It turned out I had scheduled us for places across the park. Walking places in a certain time frame took time and was a little stressful. I also tried out the rider exchange for both Rosie and Flint. It worked but it was time consuming to break up the group and have one half wait on the other half then switch with half the kids.

I had this plan for the day that recommended doing a whole lot of shows for the hottest part of the day so you can relax. http://www.disneytouristblog.com/1-day-magic-kingdom-plans/ It would have been a great idea but the fastpasses kind of threw me and we should have gotten to the park at an hour before they opened to get to where we needed to be to do this plan! Well, more to know next time. ;) We did not buy the photopass thing where they take tons of pics of you and we honestly did not see people taking pictures with characters much in the streets. If we had I would have recommended buying one mickey band because the pictures for all the rides will assign themselves to your band as it registers it on the ride. Otherwise you have to wait for your pic to show up afterwards then scan your ticket.

Much learned! We still had fun. It was a long day! We left at 5pm for supper and returned just in time for the electric parade and stayed until 11:30pm. Rosie did take a nap in the parks in the stroller but Jon did not! He was out of it at the end. HA! We did this thing for snacks that worked well in the heat. We froze water bottles and put lots of deli meat, cheese and cheese sticks, and peanut butter crackers in there. It worked really well to fill us up!!! I had a few fun things in there too for the kids like fruit leather and frozen applesauce pouches.

I think the most interesting part of the park was that Flint - the guide dog - was able to go on many of the rides. He was kind of treated like a child in the 0-3 range so as long as there wasn't a 'bar' on the ride he got to hop on and come along. He rode things like the "People Mover", "It's a Small World", "Pirates", and he even met a Princess. He took every opportunity to sit down and relax when he could.

Disney Resorts

2016-09-04T16:47:00.003-04:00

So, I was rooting around some Disney websites online and saw more than one recommendation on how to see different resorts. You drive up to the entrance of all of Disney and tell them you want to go to a hotel. They direct you to one of the three that are right near the Magic Kingdom. You drive to the parking lot and tell the attendant you have a restaurant reservation (you can make one on the Disney app). They don't check though. Then you park and go in. We ended up just getting coffee one time and dole whip another time. Yep, we did this twice. The first time was a run with just the gals - me, Sharon, and Rosie. We rode the monorail between the 3 resorts (The Floridian, The Contemporary, and The Polynesian) and past the parks. We got off at each resort and walked around just seeing what was there. I enjoyed exploring the Polynesian the most because it was very family friendly and the pool was so cool to look at! It was fun riding the monorail and we got a Mickey Cookie. We repeated the visit with everyone but Nathan on Saturday in the early afternoon. We got to see some neat things going at that time. When we went to the Floridian (which is fancy), they announced that Cinderella was having a princess parade. This involved little girls following Cinderella downstairs where she danced a dance with Prince Charming. It was pretty neat though Rosie was disappointed to not actually MEET the princess as she was busy dancing. Then at the Contemporary we happened to be eating a huge Mickey Cookie outside of the restaurant there when all the characters - Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Daisy, & Donald - came out after a character visit. They posted themselves on different floors we could view easily from the monorail. :)

A different time of the week, we went to check out Disney Springs which is like a big outdoors fancy shopping area with neat shops including a HUGE Disney store, Lego store, and Star Wars store. The Disney store had the first glimpse of princesses outside (statues). I have no idea how she knows all about Princesses but she does. A key element to her is that they have a crown and pretty dress I think. The lady inside asked Rosie if she would like some fairy dust and Rosie seemed a bit perturbed that it was only a 'sprinkling' of glitter. LOL!

They had some neat restaurants there in Disney springs including a Rainforest Cafe and a T-rex restaurant that the kids and I enjoyed exploring. I thought Rosie might be afraid of the animatronic dinosaurs but she just got out of her stroller and ROARED back at them! HAHA! I decided I would not enjoy being roared at the whole time we ate our meal though. We also enjoyed some fancy Sundays from Ghiradelli's chocolates. It was interesting to walk around.

The best part of any resort...the POOL!

2016-08-31T15:10:00.001-04:00

So, Nathan won this place for all of us in Kissimmee, Florida through his work. It was Sunday-Sunday and we did not get to move the date away from the intense part of the Florida summer. We invited Nathan's mom but Nathan's dad was not as interested in all the Florida heat so we asked my dad to come and stay in the boys' room. It worked out really well. We had to carpool down there as we don't have an 8 passenger van and I couldn't even find one to rent anywhere. Nathan, his mom, and Flint rode down there in my dad's car while my dad and I drove all the crazy kiddos in the van. We stopped by my friend Amy's on the way in which was really nice too. She lives an hour outside of Florida.

To help the drive, I rented 8 movies from the library (6 were for the big boys), bought leappad credits off of ebay and added games and cartoons to all the leapsters/pads, and I downloaded two audiobooks and one chapter ebook from the library to the kindle (which I got for $25 off Amazon the week before!). Nathan added angry birds to the kindle too which turned into a 'thing' for the week. I also had fun shopping at Costco for snacks to keep them busy. All in all it went pretty well though we didn't follow our rule of at least 2 hr before stopping. Oh well. Stops just take awhile with lots of kids and people. We made okay time but not the best time. The way home felt definitely much LONGER than the way there!

We had a GREAT time! Nathan's mom got up with the boys in the morning so we could sleep in PLUS there was the PRIVATE pool right off the living room!!!! We could sit on the sofa and watch them swim. I took a picture of the view from the inside. It had netting all over it to keep the bugs out. It wasn't huge but it fit 4 kids our size perfectly. We loved it. Anytime the kids got wound up or argued with each other, we sent them to the pool. When we got up in the mornings? We sent them to the pool. They had so much fun. There was a deep part that the bigger boys enjoyed jumping into doing tricks. Jonathan improved so much over the week with what he would do wearing puddle jumpers. He even started jumping in and putting his head under the water. He really liked wearing goggles. :) Rosie too was willing to get in by the end of the week without mamma right by her side. She especially liked Samuel to help her swim with her puddle jumper.

The condo also had this big huge pool we visited the last night. It was so warm in that pool it felt awesome with the sun having warmed it all day. There was a DJ playing different music out there too. It was attached to a little commissary AND they had a small private movie theater there! Nathan and the boys watched the first transformers movie one night. They also had a small video game arcade. Nathan got a kick out of that! It was a neat little place that we had the kids ride their scooters beside us while we walked there.

So, I have a ton of pool pictures!

Legoland Rides and Fun

2016-08-28T12:31:00.001-04:00

Finally got to the end of the Legoland pictures! There was just so much to...take pictures of there! I almost think we took more pictures there than at Disney. I read online to go to the very back of the park first. This park is really long so it was quite a hike to do that!! It was pretty empty in the back. They had an indoor area where they were teaching lego building courses that we signed up for and missed. If we had more time that would have worked really well but I think we filled the day up as much as possible and didn't even do the water park. It was a really really hot day. I think cooling off indoors during the hottest part would have been very wise. My dad bought this cooling misting fan there and it was sooo nice!

There was a boat ride that was geared for the kids where they had a steering wheel and a pedal and a little lake and got to slowly steer your way around it. There wasn't really a track but just general boundaries to keep you on track generally speaking. There were little lego guys and lego mice spitting water out at you too! Samuel tried to steer us to the water but it was harder to get wet than you might think!

We got a few fun shots of family on roller coasters. The blue dress in the hanging roller coaster...yes, that is Nate's mom and in front of her is Nathan! We went on a Tuesday and had had problems with the internet at the condo the day before. She had been planning to work a lot of Monday so instead she was answering a lot of business calls while doing Legoland. One time, she got a work call in the middle of a kiddie area train ride that she was able to totally focus on while going round and round.

My dad's crazy hair was after a roller coaster too. Based on his smile, I think his favorite part was firing water at all the people on the Chima water ride from the outside. The big water ride in Chima was extremely simple but surprisingly fun as you are guaranteed to get drenched. Basically it is just a boat that passes under falling water in a glorified oval. Everyone has water guns attached to the boat though and you get to fire out at onlookers while they fire in at you.

Samuel really really enjoyed all the roller coasters multiple times while Benjamin and Jonathan got to ride a few tamer rides. Sometimes, Samuel and daddy would catch up with us in time to ride one. Some of the resulting pictures were so funny of Samuel being very 'unimpressed' with a bouncing horse on a track after the excitement of a coaster. We stayed late enough after 5pm that there were almost no lines on most attractions at that point! :)

Jonathan and Rosalind enjoyed Duplo-town but it could have used more rides. I was sooo happy for the air conditioned indoor play area for the littles though! I think we sat in there recovering and watching them play for a good half hour.

It cracked me up that even the horses on the carousel were lego horses. It was a double decker carousel and somehow I missed the picture of both layers. Rosie spent her first ride crying cause she was on the lower level. She is a huge carousel fan so that was a bit surprising.

There was this really neat ride we did last called 'Island in the Sky' and it took you slowly up high and did a 360 pan of the whole area then took you back down. It had beautiful views and even Flint got to go on that one!

I included a few more lego structures not in the Star Wars post. There was a whole land devoted to Lego structures and it was pretty amazing! It was incredible how well you could tell the legos held up out in the weather too. In some cases you could see some fading where the sun hit day in and day out. It was obvious they had been around for a really long time! I was fascinated seeing the NY skyline including central station and the Gugenheim! They had all of capital square in Washington DC (complete with moving marching band in front of the capital) and quite a large tribute to the nearby Kennedy space center. These buildings were sooo impressive! We just needed a little more shade in that section to enjoy it longer under the Florida sun.

Legoland Show

2016-08-21T14:54:00.003-04:00

All our kids enjoyed Legoland but it really is geared very much for the elementary crowd. The coasters there were nice entry level coasters - not 'kiddie' coasters - no upside down ones. Our littlest ones would have enjoyed being able to do even more than their heights allowed. We got lucky when Rosie took a long stroller nap and she didn't realize how much she was missing! There were at least four 'open play' playgrounds in addition to all the attractions. I don't understand it but somehow playing like that rejuvenated the kids for more rides while us adults sat there and recovered.

One show that ALL the kids (and adults) loved was the water-skiing 'Blackbeard' show. Jonathan spent most of the show standing there open mouthed watching all the action unfold. Rosie clapped often and delightedly. Both Samuel and Benjamin laughed at all the right spots. Basically, there is a battle between the 'good' guys (lead by a human lady and including lego guys) and the 'bad guys' (pirates lead by lego bad guy Brick Beard). The battle involves lots of stunts and silly lego men maneuvers. My favorite stunt was when one of the pirates skied backwards using just his feet! It made waves coming off of his feet! The pyramid was pretty cool too! There were water skis and water boards and stunts galore as well as plenty of stage fighting right in front of us. :) Ever since this show Rosie has been really 'into' pirates and wants to watch "Jake and the Neverland Pirates". LOL!

Legoland Photo Ops

2016-08-21T14:54:00.002-04:00

As I mentioned earlier, Nate had won this week long stay in Orlando. We almost immediately decided we would do Legoland because the boys had asked to go so many times.

There are a few cheaper options than buy tickets in advance at $71+tax pp over 2 yr old. Costco has tickets you can buy in store or online (etickets) for $56pp. Way back in May, there was a week where they had these tickets on sale for $46! We get the free lego club magazines too and those almost always have a 'buy an adult ticket, get a kid in for free' coupon. That ends up cheaper than Costco Legoland if all the kids going are over 3 and all have adults with which to pair. I could not find ANY of our lego magazines before we left and of course found two right when we got back! One more interesting option was the yearlong pass was only $99 pp. I figured there might be some way to do a deal with that for maybe one person but never could figure it out. There was enough to do with shows and extra programs that you could enjoy the time there for two days. I think our kids were just the right age for it.

Something really fun about Legoland was all the 'photo ops'. The big guys insisted on wearing their lego star wars shirts that are identical which made them match...I like this for having them in a crowd but it does make them hard to tell apart in photos! Look for their neckerchiefs. Benjamin wore a red bandana and Samuel wore a blue one. They were really into all the posing and we skipped pass way more than this.

I have included a few photos from the actual lego store in Disney Springs because I thought they were a good fit here too being big lego sculptures we took pics beside. They are the buzz lightyear scenes, the dwarves, and the group of doggies. Einstein's face was actually built from Duplos as was the Giraffe. Having carried around 1,000 piece lego spaceships, I know they are heavy! I cannot imagine how heavy these structures must be or what kind of glue and steel holds them all in place so firmly. You could see how the colors on some of the legos had faded and gotten dirty with time. I realized that even outside, legos can last A REALLY LONG TIME!

Legoland SneakPeek

2016-08-21T14:54:00.001-04:00

To get back into the swing of this, I'm going to start by doing the most current stuff and working my way backwards and see how far we get.

The whole reason the last trip of the summer was such a surprise was that Nathan's company does a bi-annual international drawing for a 7 night stay in a condo at a resort in Orlando, FL. He has entered almost every time and happened to win one of the weeks this time. We got this information a week AFTER we paid for our condo in Myrtle Beach. In the end, we did not have a choice on which week we would get to go so we found ourselves going to Florida, at peak season, in the hottest heat enjoying pool-time and going to amusement parks.

I thought I'd throw out a few teaser photos from our trip to Legoland. This was the boys' favorite amusement park. They have been begging for several years to go. They LOVE legos and they LOVE star wars and they play star wars legos ALL.THE.TIME. All these structures are on average THREE FEET TALL and a few are a lot taller. Even the figures were built from legos and are much larger than average minifigures so they fit the scale of the buildings. They also had buttons to push that made objects move or release smoke. The big millennium falcon went up and down 2 feet.

Star Wars I

Star Wars II

Star Wars III

Star Wars IV

Star Wars V

Star Wars VI

Clone Wars Cartoon

And a Funny...these lizards were everywhere in FL!

What a Summer!

2016-08-20T16:28:00.004-04:00

I finally have a few moments here and there because my little ones are in mother's day out two days a week for 4 hours each. I have a huge list of stuff to do during this time but am going to try to get back into something I really enjoy - blogging. I noticed the blogging header picture is SO out of date so I have a picture at the end of this blog.

This is one of the first summers we've had with the kiddos that I had no idea how full it would be last April. In fact I only had a vague notion of maybe two things that happened but not everything. It was surely a summer to remember and a few blessings along the way.

Here is a snapshot of our summer:
-Short vacation to Myrtle Beach
-VBS (All three boys loved!)
-Family fun weekend here for July 4
-Big boys spend 4 days in Nashville with the grands
-Big boys and Nathan go to Camp Carson for the Baptist Blind Camp weekend
-Sam and Nate go to Six Flags
-Meg and Kids spend a few days in Kentucky then Ohio
-Unexpected Family Vacation including Meg's dad and Nate's mom to Orlando
-Legoland and The Magic Kingdom
-Upcoming family trip to Lake Winnie

With summer mother's day out, I also got to do some special 1:2 things with our big boys that are just not things I would do solo with 2 more little kids around. We continued the Wednesday swim with church friends. Benjamin's swimming improved so much that he was jumping off the diving board and swimming to the edge by the end of the summer. Jonathan went from being afraid to enter the water without holding onto me to jumping in from the side with puddle jumpers and putting his head underwater! Yay! We also did some of the usuals: zoo, creative discovery museum, Chattanooga uniques, and parks. It was a full summer and I am finally ready to get back to schedules!

This summer I found a pseudo solution for Rosie's sleep that is helping my sleep. I just was not thriving on the nightly 2 hr waking and neither was she. First, we are in the process of moving her and her closest bro into the same room so she knows she isn't alone. Second, she also sleeps way better beside me so when she starts to night wake about 3 hrs into her sleep in her room, I just bring her in bed with me and she cuddles up and dozes right off as do I. Part of putting them in the same room will put a bed big enough for me to collapse on with her in the middle of the night so I am not transporting her and so she is used to her own bed as we move her out of the crib. I know this would be so crazy pf a thing to do for the first time mom I was 9 years ago but I'm totally okay with this and in fact, I am feeling soooo much better getting good sleep!! :) :)

The summer wasn't free of a few downers. On a sad note, we also had to put our 15 year old kitty to sleep this summer. He had cancer and that added some drama from me trying a few vet things ($) to fix him up before we saw how sick he was. :( We also replaced our stove, fixed the A/C, finally repaired the outside of our chimney, replaced all four tires plus a wheel bearing on the van, and there was that aforementioned unexpected vacation to Orlando. Plus we are ending the summer with the normal school fees, school supplies, shoes, backpacks, soccer fees (for all 3 boys), etc. So it wasn't all fun and games financially! I may be calling up Kaplan again looking for some work. ;) We sure have so many memories!

Here's a family picture from the beginning of June at Myrtle Beach

A better one for Rosie and Nate:

Long Time No See...again...

2016-02-03T00:47:00.000-05:00

A blog post written in November that I never published due to some internet issues we had for a month....

HELLO!

I am sitting at the boys' musical dress rehearsal this morning and thought I'd take a minute to actually write a blog!!! I guess it is kind of obvious that we have been really busy. I'm trying to figure out our balance and MAY have overdone activities a bit.

Who is doing what?

Nathan: Work Traveling. A. Lot. He just got back from his last trip of this season! I believe that from September to mid-November he was gone a portion or all of 6 weeks. I am SO GLAD it wasn't like this last fall or I might have lost my mind!! It was easier this time not having a non-sleeping infant. I'm not saying it was easy but it wasn't all bad. The tricky part is by myself making the big guys get their homework done, everyone washed, bedtime reading/reading logs done, and then actually getting everyone to sleep!!

Samuel and Benjamin: In August/Sept they did soccer and they continue their Taekwondo program over from the summer. Samuel LOVES it. I mean he just loves going. Benjamin likes it and we wonder if he will grow to love it as he gets to spar more. They are first degree green belts now and just started sparring. (The order is: white, yellow, green, blue, red, brown, black and starting at green there are two levels each belt). I hope to get a post with pics of their TKD fun. They are also doing WALK which is a church choir program. I was able to write up this blog while sitting at their dress rehearsal. Right after WALK, we drive to our church and do Awana.

They have both gotten caught up on their Awana books from last year. There was just too much going on last spring with my mom and also snow days and they got behind. I guess they will get TWO book awards in the spring. In other news, they are in 1st and 2nd grade and I love seeing their reading improve SO MUCH this fall with all the extra reading we are doing with them. Both their teachers say they fly through their math which I believe too. They spend their free time playing with legos and action figures which go on elaborate missions and fights.

Megan: I read the Marie Kondo book "The Art of Tidying Up" and am trying to remove all our YEARS of junk from our house and discover what is left bringing joy. This book is just so good but I would caution that in a few places some I'd read it objectively but, in all those places, we can thank God for what we are given rather than the objects themselves. I feel like it is so healthy for us remove so much STUFF! In America, we just have it all wrong! To that end, the process is a great one but it just takes awhile...months in fact...with little ones in tow. I almost think now that I will have to do 2-3 cycles of this to really get us down to an amount of stuff that normal people have. I also don't think I'm going to be one of those extreme minimalists...this may be a generational thing. I am the 'oregon trail generation' (google this!)...not a millenial and these days I am old enough to notice the difference.

Jonathan & Rosie: I try to take them jumping at the local gymnastics place once a week. I find it so interesting remembering going with the bigger boys at their ages. For Sam & Ben, it was just a race the entire time running and chasing and daredevil jumping and being crazy. For Jonathan, he isn't as busy as they were but he wants me to chase him quite a bit. Rosalind likes the balance beams and hanging from the bars the most. She likes the rest too but I find it so interesting that she just loves the parts the boys mostly ignored. We also go to the park, grocery shop, play outside, and keep active. There is this 5 year gap between the older boys at this age and I also can tell that I am not as hyper as I was with activities. Maybe it is their personalities as they are more laid back but I think some of it is just being tired on my part. I was tired then too so I don't know. Sometimes we make it to a local farm day or do a special field trip to the zoo which is Jonathan's favorite place. Jonathan is just getting into dressing up. We have brought along darth vader and optimus prime to a few places in his place. He dresses up in the batman outfit on a daily basis. Rosalind is showing off her cleverness these days. She is the smallest but extremely agile. This week she got on the counter and then was reaching on top of the fridge for the leftover Halloween candy when I caught her. She is really good at doing something subtly right under our noses.

While Rosalind isn't sleeping through every night, we realized in September that Nathan can go in there and settle her back down within 15 minutes while it usually takes me over an hour cause she wants to nurse and then that wakes her up and it goes on and on. So, I am getting more sleep and feeling better in general. EDITED TO ADD: Still waking. It is hit and miss about sleep with her.

Four kids. I think for some four kids is easy breezy but for us, four is A LOT!!! So many intense personalities and opinions in our group (taking after their parents). I know it will be easier when everyone can take care of their own basic issues. I am also so happy to have four kids and know that the future will be fun with all of them. For now, the weekends are not super relaxing and tend to follow a theme of 'reduce the numbers' where each parent shuffles between 1 and 3 kids doing different things with each group to keep the craziness in check. I think even 6 months from now will make a difference but for now...we are tired parents who are finally seeing the light at the end of the tunnel!

We've been enjoying the cooler weather and the trails right beside Nathan's work! During spring break we went hiking with daddy on his lunch break. :) I thought I would share the picture so everyone can see how much the kids have grown!

First Day of School (1st&2nd)

2015-08-13T09:49:00.001-04:00

So...Yup. That was summer! Hahaha! No blogs all summer long. Well, we survived and in the end it turned out really great. The beginning not so much but you can't have fun all the time. The nicest most awesome thing that happened to me this summer was date WEEKEND for me and Nate!!!!!!! The in-laws watched all four kids overnight. I don't think this has happened EVER where both of us were away from the kids all night long!! They came stocked with prizes and awards for good behavior and the boys ATE IT UP! Rosie decided she loved her mutti as much as mommy and stuck to her the whole time...literally. It was such a needed break I cannot thank them enough!!! We got a local hotel, went out to eat for lunch, supper, breakfast, and coffee. Nathan took me to his newest hobby and we got a chance to hang out! :Happy Sigh: :)

So there were a few weeks at the end of May and in much of June that were really tough with sibling fighting and mommy exhaustion to boot! I was about to start sending the kids separately to grandparents just for our survival. They just couldn't stop arguing ABOUT EVERYTHING. And the arguing always turned to wrestling and pushing and yelling. :mommy bangs head on the wall: I really don't get all the fighting either. My brother was 6 school years younger and I loved 'mothering' him about so I never really had this level of fighting before in my life. Closely spaced brothers is both wonderful (can I tell you how awesome and creative their playing is when they are playing?!) and it is also challenging (physical arguments) is all I can say.

On top of that, little brother Jonathan found his 'just turned 3 year old self' having to share mommy full-time all day long (since mommy was constantly refereeing the big boys) and went on a good behavior strike...and that is the nicest possible way to put it. He pulled out the 'screech' and the 'whine' and a lot more. Oh my! Little sis decided she was going to make-up her lost attention/mommy time in the middle of the night and late evenings exacerbating mommy's ability to plan anything that would get us all out of the house consistently much less sleep. It was bad enough that I was dreading Mondays and having a hard time sleeping Sunday nights!

Then, we kind of found a rhythm after vacation bible school and art camp. The big boys seemed to finally realize they were on summer VACATION after their two weeks in a row of morning time-apart...er...activities and the littles got some of their mommy time back for a little while. (Last year was so stressful with Rosalind being so miserable, not sleeping, traveling, and my mom's progression that I wonder too if we found ourselves without our usual school routine and still trying to decompress from all that.)

I happened to read a few good books (ok, I was desperately reading all parenting books I could find to fix the situation) and had a friend who also strongly suggested that spending 1 on 1 time with each kid would help the behavior. And IT DID!! Intentional time. Even short amounts of time. With 4 kids in the house...it's hard to do...but I cannot tell you how much this helped!!! I mean the really bad behavior and arguing disappeared overnight after Nathan started taking the boys out in the evenings from time to time.

Then, our rhythm became more fluid through July with more fun in general. Finally, at the end of July, I hit on the jackpot. It was what I was missing all summer long. It was a way for the big guys to have some time to themselves, the little guy to have some quiet in the house and get to watch TV he really wanted (his brothers hate his fav show), and mommy gets a little break time. This 'rest-time' was just not working for us before because sending two squabbling kids to their shared room to 'play' or 'read' quietly never seemed to have the same pull as just going ahead and fighting some more...loudly...in the room next to their sleeping sister. Gahhh! Sending them to separate rooms (or outside) always had one mad and feeling like he got the short end of the stick.

I finally figured out how to use their school library cards to download audiobooks to my phone....and I found all the kid audiobooks I knew must be out there! We started the summer having about finished all 53 Magic Treehouse from Jan-May (CDs from library). We are members of a very tiny library and the CD availability is really small but the boys actually each got a membership to the Chattanooga library system through school enabling us to start them on the Boxcar children!! (There are so many more I've looked for too and there is no wait! Yay!) If only I had figured out the apps to do this sooner...why are library apps so...counter intuitive??!

So, the way it worked is that when I was going in to put Rosie down for her nap, I sent the boys to their room to listen to an audiobook and I let Jonathan watch 2 episodes of "Mighty Machines" on the main and only TV (via netflix). The big guys LOVED it! They started out in their beds chilling and listening and basically 'being by themselves in their own designated spaces in their rooms' but by the end (sometimes they listen to a whole two hour book before coming out) they were happily playing pretend games with action figures and whatnot while also listening to the book. :) WIN!

Meanwhile, Jonathan is getting a big brother break and getting to watch something he loves. I usually set him up with a pile of wooden blocks and some trucks to play with while that show is running. He has favorite episodes and I kid you not he has probably seen them like 50x! I like that it is not fast paced nor a cartoon show and that it shows him 'real life' stuff. He has become a 'truck-boy'. I find that so funny as Samuel was a 'cars-boy' and Benjamin was a 'train-boy' so they are all different and of course they each loved all three but there is a preference. I mean, Jonathan has spent 45 min in the sandbox nearly every day we were home this summer playing with daddy's old toy trucks. He loves to fill and dump those trucks with anything he can find (his favorite thing is sneaking his brothers' legos...they do make a lovely clinking sound as they pour).

And mommy? Well, mommy gets a break. Sometimes I get food started early, sometimes I take a 20 min nap to make it through the day, sometimes I pick up toys that are all over, sometimes I get chores done, sometimes I just sit there and surf on my phone. AMAZING what a break like that does for all of us though and I am NOT KIDDING!!! After that we usually went and did something in the afternoon and that made things fun too!

I plan to continue the audiobook thing when the boys get home from school this year. It's partly because Samuel tends to try to do everything perfectly at school and then he comes home and combusts...every....single...day. TV alone chill time only helps a little and heaven help me if I try to get him going on homework right away. So, this may be our solution for him. I really hope so!!!!

As to the chores this summer? Well, the boys are consistently unloading the dishwasher in the morning and fairly consistently putting their clothes away once a week. I had higher plans than that but be that as it may it was an improvement! I have more plans for bigger improvements coming their way!!!!

Hm...what else? Well, I never did get the rooms rearranged. It was just too hard to focus for long enough to make a big dent. I did get the legos organized enough that Samuel could rebuild some of his older creations. The closets were rearranged...so they all have clothes in different closets than where they used too! I read the Marie Kondo book "The magic of tidying up" and got a lot of ideas and inspiration from that...especially pertaining to using drawers well!! I read a lot of audiobooks in general because that helps me de-stress while I do chores and cook and whatnot.

We really did not invite any friends over and I wish we had but I was kind of too worn out and stressed to take on MORE kids. See, I have discovered that inviting one friend over creates a group of three older kids and at this point, that is a problem. The kid with a friend over leaves out the kid without a friend (which I understand) and it eventually turns into a mess. So that would mean we really needed to invite TWO extra kids over. The house was an absolute disaster ALL of June and I just couldn't do it. Sorry boys, next summer will be different. :)

We got to about all the summer activities I had hoped to do and only traveled once which was our goal. Rosie has improved greatly on her traveling but not on her 'sleeping somewhere besides her own bed' situation. So, we just decided no trips this summer which is okay. So we did the zoo, warner park, outside aquarium play, hiking, more parks, Creative Discovery Museum, and so much more I can blog on. And yes, I got the confidence to manage all four of my kiddos by myself in active and even crowded places. (It's a little different with four sets of running feet than when you are wearing a newborn like last summer.)

The big boys both learned to swim this summer!!! Yay!! Samuel already knew - but he wasn't very confident and this summer made him really confident! He even passed the swim test in the olympic pool by swimming two full lengths of the lane!!!!! And Benjamin one day just suddenly realized he could. That was all it took....hours in the pool and finally it just clicked. I will have to do a whole post on that. :) They also took Taekwondo all summer and are testing for their yellow belts tonight!!!! This is very exciting for them!

Here they are waiting for the bus on their first days of 1st and 2nd grade!!! (Not the best pics tho...the both look a little weird like...yea, I'm gonna smile really big mom that you are sending me BACK TO SCHOOL!!!!)

Woot Woot! Whatever will I do with myself? I have a HUGE list to keep me and the littles busy. :)

Do we have any blog followers left? Give me a shout out!

Tales with Four: After the pool

2015-06-03T23:34:00.000-04:00

For the record...

I have every intention of coming back to the blog! I think what is spurring me on the most is that I know I am forgetting all those "tales with two" stories I had with Samuel and Benjamin at the current ages of Jonathan and Rosalind.

Let me tell you what, most anything can turn a bit crazy these days. It is just something about the close spacing and the ages of young 1's and 3's. I'm helping one with one thing while the other needs a diaper and then the first decides he is going to start wiping himself without telling me and then the second runs into our dining room table and then the first pushes her because she was trying to play with one of his bazillion trains and then the first is getting disciplined while the second climbs down the steps that the big boys left the gate open and sits down to have a nice snack of cat food and fill the cat's water bowl up with food. I could go on and on and on. It is a time of my life I have to be on my toes and that is just hard! On top of all this are of course the fact that there are two other boys who need guidance and discipline also so I have moments where my head is spinning in a ton of different directions.

I have been taking the kids to the pool for swim lessons for the two big boys and the little ones and I are getting in the pool too while we wait for them to finish. Then I do my best to practice with the big boys while holding a baby. The 3yo stays in the super shallow section but I love that there is a life guard on duty and that the pool is small and not filled with a ton of people. Anyways, afterwards I insist on a rinse off and then we change in the van. It is just too hard to change everyone in the family changing area because the boys are just a bit crazy in close spaces. Today, while I was rinsing Ms Rosalind off I realized Jonathan had decided to go over by the toilet in the corner and put his hands all over it so we had to rinse him again and that's when I realized Samuel had sneaked back in the shower which made Benjamin jealous so he thought it would be a grand prank to climb on the handicap rails so he could reach the shower head and spray Samuel in the face. After trying to figure out what he was thinking, I sternly got him down and realized that Jonathan had stripped all the way down and was utterly refusing to put his wet trunks back on. I'm holding baby girl so trying to force them on wasn't working. I finally stepped out and grabbed the Ergo, put her in her towel on my back, put Jon's towel on him and carried him out with that towel tightly wrapped around his hiney. He loved being carried out and repeatedly thanked me for carrying him (35lb) and wearing her (20lb) to the van. They all had to whoop as we passed out the door as there is a lovely echo at that point they are intensely aware of. So, of course everyone saw the bedraggled mom carrying/dragging her wet crew of 'too many kids' out to the car. Sigh. They are finally improving on the swimming though!! Yay! I told them if they wanted to go to a pool at all this summer both big boys had to be proficient swimmers because I can't keep up with four at a pool like that. Jonathan has his puddle jumper to help him and I think Benjamin is finally past his fear of the water. I'm struggling finding something for baby girl to wear because she is SOOOO tiny. I haven't found a life vest at the pool or puddle jumper that fits her. That's why I just hold and swim her around the whole time.

This blog thing is going to be sporadic this summer. Firstly cause I have four kids to keep up with all day...and only one naps consistently now. Secondly because I'm trying to get the rooms all rearranged so that R&J have their own smaller rooms and the big boys share a bigger room. Thirdly because I have a lot of fun plans for this summer as well as activities that hopefully they will learn. Fourthly I'm trying to get the big boys especially going on chores. I had a system and it kind of just slowly ebbed away. It's getting too much for me to just clean the house every night as well as cook and everything else. Shew! Fifthly, sleep is not dependable around here from Miss Rosalind. It seems like one bad night totally derails me and we have maybe 5/7 good sleep nights and the other two are iffy. BUT I miss blogging and plan to get back to it in bits and pieces. Here is a more current picture of the kids from a local park near us.

Columbus Zoo

2015-01-06T00:05:00.000-05:00

THE ZOO! After the crazy week with my mom in her 'methadone' state, the kids and I needed a day out. It was our fall break and I wanted them to have a fun day. So, I drove over to the Columbus zoo. We tend to get there once a year. I have to admit that I was a little nervous doing the zoo by myself with all the littles. I knew Rosalind would need naps and lots of nursing. I also knew my boys would be so active outdoors. When we first got there, there were a few times I just told Samuel and Benjamin that we couldn't do this/that because I just needed to be able to keep up with Jonathan and that we couldn't wait like 20 min for them to get through the line to pet the giraffes. I just had a hard time finding my footing with everyone at first but after about 30 min we got our footing and we combed that zoo!!!! Saw a few things we missed before. I especially enjoyed the baby gorilla. We stood for awhile watching this baby monkey jump off a glass window over and over.

Papa gave the boys money and they enjoyed spending it. Benjamin and Jonathan both got stuffed animals. Samuel got a fancy key chain. It was a great day.

Merry Christmas

2014-12-30T00:03:00.001-05:00

Merry Christmas to All!

It was a tough Christmas for us for several reasons. I think this is probably one of the first times I really can understand Christmas being a tough season for some. I'm glad though there is next year and I hope it is a ton of fun!!

Linda's 63 Birthday

2014-12-19T08:00:00.001-05:00

We wanted my mom to have a big birthday party this year around her birthday, Oct 3. We planned to have it at the park near their house and made a reservation but in the end, moved to a shelter closer to the playground for all those kiddies! You'll notice my aunt also is blessed with four grandsons and then finally a granddaughter making the total of kids/babies there to be 10! It was really fun to see everyone on that windy day! A few of mom's friends showed up too. I had left a message on facebook asking for cards and so many many people kindly sent her cards. It was fantastic.

Unfortunately, they had very recently changed my mom's meds and she was having a really bad time with side effects. She imagined sounds, people, actions. I stayed the following week and it was just really awful seeing her like that. Thankfully, when I left, they put her in the facility for a few days and took her off that medicine. So glad for that. I'm not sure she has ever completely come back as herself but she was much better without methadone! She barely remembered the week I was there though and the birthday party was really really fuzzy. Crummy isn't it?! I wish she could have gone another chemo treatment just to make it through her birthday and the holidays more clearly.

Soccer Season 2014

2014-12-19T08:00:00.000-05:00

Yep! Another fall with upward soccer. This year Samuel talked Nathan into coaching. Nathan had always wanted to of course but Samuel's encouragement in front of the staff looking for volunteers definitely did the trick! He did a very good job especially since both boys were in the same age group this year. Having the two on the same team was challenging but then having them go against each other would be challenging too. Well, Nathan managed them well enough. I think everyone improved their soccer skills and had a good time. The boys were so proud that Nathan was the coach. :)

What about momma? Well, momma was kinda struggling with a baby and a two year old in that open space. The baby was trying to take her third nap and the 2 yr old was trying to play on the field too. There was an open area for him to play in but of course he tried to sneak onto any playing field. This trend continued through further practices and games. Sigh. It will be nice next year for him to be a bit older eh?

Fall Leaves

2014-12-17T19:47:00.000-05:00

Our only tree small enough to climb is a little too small! Poor dogwood has 2 enthusiastic boys into climbing. Lots of wind and cold weather had the leaves falling fast this year. We had a decent amount but we did borrow some from the neighbor's maple tree for our leaf pile. This was Jonathan's first year to jump and he loved it. Rosie just tried to eat the leaves.

A Series of Redneck Sledding Incidents. I put 6 videos one after each other.

"Everything is Awesome when you're part of a team.

Everything is Cool when you're living your dream."

School Days are here Again

2014-12-15T23:42:00.000-05:00

The big boys both started school this past fall in early August. They enjoy 1 week off for fall and spring breaks and then 3 weeks at Christmas so that means an early start. :) It was a little hectic meeting all the teachers with the little ones in tow! Samuel has received awards for great behavior this year! His writing has improved tremendously. Benjamin is doing well above his age in all his math testing and he is learning writing pretty fast.

Rosalind is Crawling and Pulling Up!! And She got her 9 mo Professional Photos Made!

2014-12-13T08:00:00.000-05:00

Check out my little girl below! She is NINE months old!! She is doing A LOT of stuff! Crawling, Pulling Up, Exploring all of the house, Sticking Everything in her Mouth, Enjoying bath time and splashing, Preferring tablefood to babyfood, Fantastic Pincer Grasp, Nursing Like a Champ, Blabbing with 'm' sounds and 'b' sounds, Getting 4 teeth, but Still waking all night long. Her weight remains very low (but as it is consistently on the lowest curve, no one is worried about it) so I really need to just keep getting as much food in her as possible and it sometimes feels like things go backwards with quantity once they start so much table food.

I'm still struggling to not only match up her 2nd nap with Jonathan's main nap BUT also do all that before I have to pick up the big boys from school at 3pm. It is much trickier than you might think. It is just hard to keep her morning nap consistent lengths with errands and activities in the morning anyways. We would never get out of the house if we kept things perfect for naps. Oh the ease of having just one! :)

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List of Crazy Things that went Wrong at that Photosession
-I forgot the stroller to strap in the 2yr old the first half
-I forgot snacks for the 2yr old
-Rosalind and Jonathan both randomly woke up 1.5 hr early
-R's morning nap got thrown off and extremely shorted with us needing to leave
-Samuel left school early puking and still had a lightly upset tummy only after eating
-Since he stayed home, I had to take him to the appt too
-I did not clarify that 'play with your little bro for a min' meant 'quietly'
-Another person had made an online appt at the same time and was basically waiting on us
-Rosalind decided she was terrified of the photographer
-Samuel wanted in all the pictures while Jon wanted in none of them after his first
-In spite of our long walk, the studio did not upload photos for about 20 min
-They could not get my group on to work (the "I" looked like a '1')
-The checkout computers were really slow
-Jon was getting really done and aggressive toward the little girl waiting on her photos
-R was ready for her nap by the time it was done and was screaming

AT LEAST THE PICS ARE CUTE EH??!

First Crawl @ 8mo (Nov 14)

Faster at 3 weeks later @ 9 mo

Pulling Up @ 8.5 mo

Bath Fun

Rosalind Catchup: Photos 3-9mo, 6 & 9 mo stats

2014-12-11T00:08:00.000-05:00

Oh Rosalind! We have some catchup to do! I kind of took 5 months off of blogging due to a baby who was just pretty unhappy...reflux...milk sensitivity...teeth..and just a sensitive personality. I had to walk her for hours in the evenings, get up with her all night long and nap when I got a chance. Things are better...not really optimal but much better than the end of the summer for sure. It sure does take awhile to catch up on 5 months of life! I thought I had put her stats out there but turns out I hadn't. This is good for me to do though cause now I have everything together.

How about some stats?? **NOTE: I'm just trying to accept she is a very lean baby. The pediatrician is not worried. She is doing what she needs to do. She is just pretty lean. Samuel was much like this except his heights were in the 80% and his weights in the 30% but it was the same effect. He also probably had the most issues with diary and fussiness as a baby next to her. Note her head size jump! ALL my kids have done that in their first year. It is usually between 3 & 6 months and hers was a little later but their heads get big before their first birthday.

Rosalind Stats for 9 mo visit are:

Weight:   15 lb (3%...increased from 13 lb ...which was 3% @ 6 mo)
Length:   28 in (57% increased from 26.5 in...which was 67% @ 6 mo)
Head:      17 3/4 in (76% increased from 16 1/2 in...which was 26% @ 6 mo)

Rosalind Stats for 4 mo visit are:

Weight: 11 lb 7 oz (5%...increased from 10 lb ...which was 14% @ 2 mo)

Length: 25 in (65% increased from 23 in...which was 55% @ 2 mo)
Head: 16 in (30% increased from 15 in...which was 16% @ 2 mo)

Rosalind Stats for 1 mo visit are:

Weight: 8 lb 8oz (13%...increased from 7 lb 6 oz ...which was 65% @ 2 wks)

Length: 21 3/4 in (50% increased from 20.5 in...which was 35% @ 2 wks)
head: 14 (3% increased from 13 1/4 in...which was 8% @ 2 wks)

Rosalind Birth
Weight: 6 lb 14 oz (26%)
Length: 20 in (72%)
Head: 13 in (8%)

And what about meeting any relatives? We have some pics of that too of course.

And How about a few Monthly Solo Photos?
(After all, we don't want you to think you get less pics than your brothers did as babies.)

Swim Lessons

2014-12-09T09:00:00.000-05:00

I really wanted to give the boys some formal swim lessons this past summer because it is very difficult to go to a pool with so many kids now. We need at least two swimmers both for their own entertainment and for me to have eyes enough to see everyone!

These lessons were a great price for groups of four kids at the 7th day Adventist College nearby for two weeks from 8:15-9am!! Pretty early start in the summer! Ha! Luckily Papa came in to help me with getting them there 3/5 days. I still wanted to watch their progress so I was there with the two little ones too. This is how we managed it: with the double stroller. Jonathan had a stack of books and his reading pen AND a big baggie of snacks. Rosalind lasted oh 15 min in the front and then I wore her and pushed the stroller. She was entertained with all the excitement. The boys had lessons at the same time but in different pools in different rooms. The rooms were side by side with a glass wall you could kind of see through if you peer around plants and if Samuel's group of four wasn't on the far side of the room. It was challenging migrating between rooms, wearing baby, and keeping Jonathan IN the stroller and not running about.

Stroller Time

The lessons worked pretty well for Samuel. He was level 2. He became comfortable in the water and he LOVED the thrill of jumping off the blocks/diving board. He was not completely comfortable swimming on his back so we may redo level 2 before attempting level 3 or we may do a private class session for the two of them to get them really ready for the next level. We want lots of confidence.

Samuel on the left in red shirt with the goggles

Benjamin was not so much so on the lessons. He was enthusiastic to start, willing to play games and even put his head under the water. He just very much afraid of the open water even with his life vest on. He was not willing to let go and even try to swim with a vest in level 1. Or maybe just a set of private lessons to help them out. Soooo...I think he needs to redo level 1 once we've played at the pool more with him. One more thing to do right? I have a huge list this winter to keep us busy...but the active 2 year old and the baby in tow keeps things complicated.

Benjamin Head Under and Holding onto instructor

I compiled a few videos showing Samuel swimming and jumping in. He is always in the red shirt.

Swimming

Jumping off Blocks

Diving Board

Chatty Zoo

2014-12-07T23:31:00.000-05:00

I think I just like zoos. I like walking around in the open and seeing all the animals. It's great for little kids. We have a membership to the Chattanooga Zoo again. Caught a groupon deal on the thing and we are good through the summer of 2015. So, we've been there plenty. Posts here, here, and here are all from the Chatty zoo. It's a nice size zoo for when you have an hour or two.

We invited our friend Olivia to go right after school was out and she did. We have recently learned that she is moving back to Texas. We will miss them greatly. We have known Olivia since about 6 months after we moved here. She and Samuel were great preschool buddies. I thought I'd feature them on the first series of pictures. She is a vivacious redhead. :)

Her mom also promised her that they would ride camels on the next trip so I splurged and let each boy take a turn too. They weren't afraid or anything. Pretty neat experience though at $5 pp for one time around...that was a bit much to me.

Samuel got a hold of my cell phone and began practicing photography. He had a great time with that. Now, we just have to work on stabilizing the phone when you push the button!

ddd

Camel Ride: Ben then Sam

July 4th

2014-12-05T23:26:00.000-05:00

This was the summer of 'daddy goes one place with the two big boys' while 'mommy keeps up with the two little ones who need to go to bed'. Nathan took the big boys to the fireworks at Coolidge Park. I'm not sure how we get the time wrong but we just need to remember that although sunset is 8:45pm, the fireworks don't start until 9:45pm. He said it was so freeing going over there with them. They parked far away and walked - without strollers/diaper bags - to the park with just a backpack of bottled water and snacks. They got directly under the fireworks and really enjoyed them.

Earlier in the day, Nathan and the big boys went to the fireworks store and brought home bottle rockets and kiddie fireworks. Jonathan enjoyed watching them this year. Samuel learned how to shoot off the bottle rockets this year. Benjamin enjoyed the smoke bombs which he figured out how to throw on a downwards surface for maximum colored smoke. We had hot dogs, brats, and hamburgers for lunch (of course). I tried a different drink trick of making colored ice with Gatorade but I will definitely go back to just layering different colors. The ice was pretty but you couldn't taste the flavor. I made a dairy-free coconut cake and iced it with marshmallow creme and topped it with fresh fruit. Fun times. The kids played in the wading pool and outside. It was a fun day. Nathan's side really has fun celebrating the 4th.

Lookout for the Lookouts Baseball

2014-12-03T23:28:00.000-05:00

We try to make it to at least one ballgame a summer. The Chattanooga Lookouts are our team. They have different themese and that night was superhero night. They had characters dressed up as superheros for entertainment on the field. Part of the fun of going is ice cream and hot dogs. Mutti and Papa came into town the same weekend we planned to go. They decided to go too. It was pretty hot until the sun put our seats in the shade and then it was much better. Shew. Rosalind spent part of the time asleep but seemed entertained seeing all the people around. We were glad to get this game in but Samuel wants us to go to the Star Wars game next year.

Lego Convention in Atlanta and Our Lego Creations

2014-12-01T22:18:00.000-05:00

My mom gave Samuel a unique birthday present this year. I had heard about this thing called the "Lego Convention". It is the Lego Funfest. They hold about 7 per year around the united states. There happenned to be one in Atlanta, GA so the boys went! I stayed home with the two little ones which made things much more fun for the older kids and daddy. I have realized there is one this coming year, 2015, in Nashville on April 18 so we may go again!

They had fun. They saw tons and tons of cool stuff made of legos from a wall 'picture' of the TNMT made from legos to three dimensional statues of star wars characters to small cities. One section had tons and tons of legos to build with. The boys spent a lot of time there building according to daddy. They could build characters that they attached to spinning disks and have them 'fight' each other. He got suckered into getting them each a set. Hee hee.

I thought I'd start by showcasing some of the boys' favorite creations and then you can enjoy all the obligatory pictures I insisted Nathan take while I was at home. He did not disappoint! I liked how he included boys beside the different lego creations so you can get an idea of scale.

Atlanta Lego Kid'sFest