M.I.A.

Yeah, so I've been missing in action for a while, I know.  I hope it won't become a habit.  I've been intimidated by the thought of trying to recap, so instead of worrying about that, here's just a few recent pictures to let you know we're alive, and because I wouldn't want them to be even more out of date than they already are.

Halloween. I wasn't about to get all creative this year.

Of course I went all out for the pie making contest that was part of the Trunk-or-Treat/Fall Festival at the church.
Sheesh, I'm so competitive.
I won a chef's toque.

My little baby burritos. 

Bed head.

Yeah, they all needed hair cuts.

Just one of many shenanigans.

As if the lotion wasn't enough, yes, that's a permanent marker in the middle of it all.

Practicing to be clowns?

Ugh. Breathing treatments for Bronchiolitis. He was so good about it though.

This is a daily occurrence.
This particular masterpiece was done in the medium of yogurt followed by grilled cheese and tomato soup.
(Actually it's warmed up V8, or soup juice as my kids say. And yes, it extended onto the carpet).

This is the lovely Amaryllis I acquired from my Grandmother's house last January.
Don't ask me why it's blooming now. I also have no idea how it survived what I did to it this Summer. 

Just Hangin' Out

(This was February, now it's April. My first line pretty much sums it up.)

I haven't felt like blogging lately.  Perhaps I will get back into the swing of things as the weather gets warmer.

Poor kid. I know how he feels, I wish I could go climb trees too.

He's a quick study though, and is full of his own shenanigans.  This is his new favorite place.  It's great motivation for me to clear the table anyway.

He's apparently developed a taste for granola bars.

as well as ketchup

And washable markers for that matter.  Good thing they're non-toxic.


Valentines day we made heart-shaped personal pizzas.

A few days later we celebrated our 7 year anniversary. 7 years!

However, recently, the wind blew over a mirror I had set out for a DI drive pick-up.

7 years bad luck.  Hopefully it's retroactive, and the future will be bliss. (I'm not really superstitious). My wonderful husband picked up the pieces. 

The snow left, 

and came back

and left,

and came back again.

Notice my husband's solution to gloves being pulled off --duct tape.

We try to make the most of it no matter the weather, but some days that's easier said than done.

It's so nice to know that even when I don't feel like being adventurous, my efforts in the past have not been in vain. The kids planned and packed and executed this lovely spring picnic all on their own!  (notice the snow in the background of the above picture, but they were determined not to waste a sunny day.)

Success!

Fall Fun

If you recall, when it came to choosing which house to rent, I decided against the one we're in now because it had no trees in the back yard.  Through a small mix up, we ended up where we are anyway, and I was sorely disappointed.  What can I say, I am a tree lover, a shade lover, and most of all, a mother of three boys.

Trees and boys were just made to go together.  It turns out though that there is actually a much overlooked tree in our front yard.  The boys discovered that it was climbable a few weeks ago while my husband was out doing some yard work.

They were so happy, and I was grateful for that one little tender mercy.  Not only is there a tree in our yard, but it's a relatively safe tree to climb --not too high, lots of branches to catch you, etc.

Not to mention that it gave us just enough leaves for a good sized pile to jump in but not so many leaves that we were overwhelmed with raking them all up.

It was a first for the baby, and he swatted at the pile for a while, until we stuck him in the middle of it.  He wasn't so sure about that.

Anyway, this one little tree gave us hours of fun as a whole family that day.  We even made a little friend, which is another one of those things that little boys just love, and what's more, it's our neighbor's so I don't even have to take care of it.  It's a win-win situation for sure.

Don't worry, I was right behind the baby.  This is why we don't play in the front yard very often.

As for the lack of shade in the back yard, we took care of that ourselves earlier this Fall.

And it's portable!

Free basketball stand, plus $8 patio umbrella from the thrift store and voila! Portable shade!

Not that we need it now though.  Brrrrrr!

Homemade Sandbox

I have a love/hate relationship with sandboxes. I love how they keep the kids entertained outside in the fresh air for so long, but I hate sand in my house, all over the patio, and on heads and in diapers.

We built this sandbox a couple years ago and the kids loved it.

However, we moved several times and it never got set up again we just hauled the sand around in a big tupperware storage bin.  The problem with that was that the kids didn't like bending over to play in the sand and so they brought the sand out to where they could play with it comfortably (meaning all over my patio).  Also, when they wanted to add water, it stayed wet forever in the tub. Our sandbox has a canvas bottom (the same kind of ugly canvas as the lid -we got it at the thrift store for really cheap) so the water can drain out easily.  Overall it wasn't working for us and we either had to give up on sand altogether, or we had to rebuild the sandbox.

So this Fall we moved into a house that didn't have anything but grass in the backyard.  It's nice and big, with plenty of room for the kids to run around, but they were bored and wouldn't stay outside for very long. So we finally decided to resurrect the sandbox, adding in a new feature that we hoped would encourage the kids to play in the sandbox but not "in" the sandbox if you know what I mean (see above).

Benches!

not that they always use the benches...

  Not only that, but the benches are also the lid!!

This was taken a different day than the above pictures. It was raining. Otherwise they would have been playing in it.

We are also planning to add a lock for when kids lose sandbox privileges for doing things like this:

This was when it was in that blue tupperware. Apparently wet sand is fun to throw.

  or this:

  

 

  ...and thus continues my love/hate relationship with sandboxes.

Heaven.

The other place.

Ah sand.  Can't we just get along?