The Collins Five

The ways we play

2012-01-26T14:03:00.001-05:00

I am so interested in the differences between boys and girls...I guess because other than being one I don't have any idea about how little girls play or what life with one would be like. I have watched little girls and heard stories of little girls, but I just get how little boys operate where little girls are a bit of a mystery to me. Ryan truly is my "all boy" boy. He never stops climbing and messing and running. He IS snips and snails and puppy dog tails. I'm sure it's possible that I over analyze Ryan and HJ's behaviors when they are together, but this picture displays my perception of the differences at this point pretty well. HJ is blowing kisses out the window of the house. She walked properly through the door to get in the house, and once there she stayed for a while then came out when she was done playing. Ryan is climbing in the window. He climbed in, ran to the door, climbed on top of it, swung it open and closed a few times while he was sitting on it, ran back around to the window, and climbed in again. I love his energy and his spunk...and now I've gotta run...he has a tv tray and is talking loudly about his plan to turn it into a "wadder" (ladder) to climb!!!

Christmas with the NC Hoppers

2012-01-25T22:36:00.001-05:00

We started celebrating Christmas the day before and opened our last red and white striped packages the day after. Andrew, Anna, HattieJo, and A.P. arrived in town Christmas evening and we got together for lunch on the day after. We ate ribs, exchanged gifts, and had a huge nerf sword war!

After the kids took a rest we headed out to the Winter Wonderland. We have been wanting to go to this for several years…a couple of years ago we even made it half way there before car sickness struck x 2 and we had to turn around and come back home.

We made it all the way this time though. The plan was made for us to tailgate before we went in and tailgate in the parking lot we did. Complete with a 1.5 liter dr. pepper for Andrew and Pepsi for Mike because Poppa Hoppa couldn’t bring himself to pay more for a smaller drink.

The kids ate lunchables in the van then we made a beeline for the elf village for the “snowfall”. Only in Florida would a huge crowd of people bunch up into an elf village for a scheduled “snowfall”. Once we saw it Tyler declared it soap bubbles instead of snow and I think he was right.

HattieJo loved seeing the horses and the kiddos (except AP) all rode the train with Andrew, Gigi, and Poppa.

We finished up the night with a shooting game and all headed home happy and tired!

Christmas!

2012-01-23T15:04:00.001-05:00

We had gone to church on Saturday evening so Sunday when we woke up we had nothing but relaxed fun family time ahead of us. We came down stairs right away to see if we had made it onto the nice list.

The cookies were mostly gone and the milk mug empty so things were looking good…

YES!!!!!

transformers, helicopters, elmo, spiderman, and leapsters too! Our living room was covered in wrapping paper and packaging and the boys were so excited, overwhelmed, and (bragging mama warning…) grateful. I was so proud of how they treasured each gift and sincerely appreciated them.

We had breakfast then a gift exchange with Grandma. My parents stopped by for muffins and coffee too and I finished up the ham while mike opened and installed batteries in toy after toy.

We had lunch at Grandpap’s house - I made ham and dessert (my granny’s red velvet cupcake recipe and the melted snowman cookies that are all over pinterest). Mike brought the boys home for naps and I visited a little more with my famiy and helped clean up. By Christmas evening Mike and I were worn out and the boys were so happy to just have time to be with their new toys.

We tried so hard this year to balance the fun of trees, lights, and gifts with reminding the boys that we are celebrating the birth of our Savior and all that means. I think we succeeded in finding the balance that worked well for us. We were able to teach the boys about the birth of Christ AND spoil them rotten!

12/24/2011

2012-01-22T22:44:00.001-05:00

We started our Christmas celebrating on Christmas Eve with breakfast and gifts at my parent’s house. It was a wonderful relaxed morning, the boys even wore their pjs.

or they mostly wore their pjs…Tyler is in a stage (I really really hope this is just a stage…and a short one!) where every single thing he puts he immediately rips off and screams that it is “itchy”. He goes shirtless or wears one Tom and Jerry t shirt at home, but getting dressed for school has been quite a challenge recently…alright, back to Christmas!

We were all spoiled rotten by my parents and after all that opening and playing with the new gifts Ryan fell asleep in the car on the way home…and stayed asleep standing up with his head in his chair after we got home!

I am a picture taking failure when it comes to our annual Christmas Eve party. I don’t even have one single shot! We ate (and ate and ate) and sang our 12 days of Christmas and other assorted Christmas Favorites!

The boys opened their Christmas pjs and slippers and we put them on and tucked them in bed as the guests were all leaving. I came back downstairs and realized that I had baked cookies for Santa but we hadn’t gotten around to decorating them or sprinkling our reindeer treats in the driveway. The little was already asleep but the bigs were too excited to sleep so I got them back up to decorate. I believe they called me crazy when I told them to get up out of bed but it was fun to have a few more minutes with them before bed. (Black was the only color icing I had in a tube in the pantry wo we went with it…maybe the sprinkles helped to make it a little more festive?)

Before long we were all tucked in with high hopes that we had done enough to make the Nice List!

Happy 5th Birthday Train Ride

2012-01-17T21:10:00.001-05:00

By: Gigi (Guest Blogger)

I have such wonderful memories of my Granny and Grandpap (and I miss them very much). Erin & Andrew have great memories of my parents and I often hear Mike & Anna speak so lovingly of their grandparents so I know the importance of making memories with my grandchildren. This year for Dylan and Tyler’s 5th birthday we decided to take a train trip and what an adventure it was! We booked our reservation to leave from the train depot on Saturday morning and we arrived in Winter Park at 12:27 p.m. The Bigs had been a little apprehensive about the ride and that morning Erin texted me that they were a little afraid that the train would go too fast and make them sick. I think they also had an idea from somewhere that people could get thrown off the train (like throw Mama from the train) …now where would they hear that???? A little fear is good for the soul and worked in our favor getting them ready and on the road (both were unusually quiet)!

Here we are at the station. It is an unmanned depot but has a lot of railroad equipment. The boys enjoyed climbing on things and Poppa told them how everything worked. There was also an information board describing the different types of trains and engines. It was then I realized the boys thought we were riding a “bullet” train that would go so fast it would make their headache! They were very relieved to see the Silver Meteor pull into the station!
We were so excited to board the train and find our seats. Now remember this train originated in upstate New York so many people had been on the train all night. We found our seats-Dylan and Poppa rode together and Tyler and Gigi got seated. As soon as we were seated Dylan whispered to Poppa “there is a dead body on this train-I saw it”! We instantly knew he was talking about an older woman that was stretched out in her seat with a blanket covering her as she slept. I agree she looked dead for sure!

Later we made our way to the club car where there is a snack bar and tables. Walking on a train can be tricky so we all held on to each other. We had brought some homemade cookies with us and we bought the boys some milk and enjoyed a little snack. We then played a “memory” card game and Dylan did some reading.

Tyler’s attention span is not as long as Dylan’s and once he got comfortable with the train the mischief began. Tyler took a sticker from his sticker book and stuck it on my mouth. They all thought this was hilarious. BOYS!!!

We arrived in Winter Park right on time. My niece’s husband Jeff and her two boys met us for lunch. We ate at Diva’s Pizza and Wine - a quaint little café (the chicken alfredo pizza was so good and we drank cold cokes out of a glass bottle!). The proprietor was so nice to us. We ate outside so we could hear the street musician play his guitar and who in their right mind would attempt to sit down inside a restaurant with this tribe of kids????

Our train departing back was delayed so we walked around Winter Park and saw all the shops. There was an ice skating rink; a Christmas concert in the park and the town was decorated for Christmas. AWESOME PLACE! We bought homemade gingerbread men at a bakery for a snack on the way home. Delicious!

By the time we boarded for the ride home we were all exhausted and ready for a rest. The gentle sway of the train makes for some good sleeping.

The other day we were out in my yard and heard the train whistle. Dylan said “Gigi we have been on that bad boy haven’t we”. We all had such a great time on this day trip. It is my hope and prayer that one day when the Bigs are grown and hear the sound of the train whistle they will remember riding that “bad boy” with their Gigi and Poppa and know the joy they brought to our lives that day.

Still Partying

2012-01-13T23:05:00.001-05:00

Happy 5th Birthday Dylan and Tyler! We all love you so so much!

Party Day!!!!!

2012-01-09T16:07:00.001-05:00

The big boys have been talking about their 5th birthday party ever since…well, ever since their last one. They have been begging and begging and begging to have school friends at their party this year so I agreed. Their school Christmas party was on the day of their birthday so Mike took them to that while Ryan and I got things ready. After the Christmas party Dylan and Tyler and 3 friends each (plus their moms and siblings) came over to celebrate the birthdays.

The boys were so uncharacteristically excited about this party. They had a hard time deciding on a theme but Dylan finally settled on Pirates and Tyler was sure his party had to be Spiderman. I first thought about forcing them to agree on a theme, me choosing one myself, or even flipping a coin. While I was talking it through with Mike deciding what to do he mentioned it not really being fair that just because the bigs share a birthday they have to agree on a party theme. If one was born in February and one in November we would have a pirate and a Spiderman party and not even think twice. So…we decided on a Spiderman party and a pirate party in the same place on the same day. Oh, and actually we would need to have two Spiderman and pirate parties on the same day in the same place so we could celebrate with school friends at lunch and family for dinner. At first I thought having two themes and two parties in the same day was nuts, but it turned out perfect. I kept the colors red, black, and white to match both themes and I was able to set up the dessert table in the morning and just refresh it and switch out food in between parties.

These cupcake toppers, the banners, invites, thank you cards, water bottle wraps, etc are all from Easy Invitations. It’s such a cool system, she designed and emailed the order as a jpg file/files and I printed them on card stock or photo paper as I needed! I made the cupcakes (chocolate or yellow topped with buttercream and red sugar). They were displayed on cake boards from Wal-Mart stacked on canned veggies wrapped with the invitations or banner images. The table was also covered in a net and had gold coins, money mints, and Spiderman and pirate fake tattoos.

When my brother and I were little my mom always made us a pin the ____________ on the _____________ game to play at our birthday parties. It was kind of her specialty and she did a great job with this pin the spider on Spiderman’s chest game for the boys. The bigs loved their game, but I think I loved it more! It was just kind of sentimental to have my mom make a game for my kids that I loved so much when she did for me as a kid. We used pirate eye patches to cover the kids eyes and they were so cute sporting the double eye patches! Everyone who played got a marvel superheroes puzzle to take home.

After lunch, the spider game , gifts, and cake we had one last game to play! I had printed a very simple treasure hunt on the back of these maps (also from easy invitations). The maps were tied up with a different colored ribbon for each twin’s classmates so the teams would be going in different directions. The treasure hunt was easy with Dylan and Tyler leading the way and led the kids to the dining room where I had a chest full of goody bags (with beads, chocolate coins, tattoos, and silly string with water bottle labels wrapped around them)

I had made Dylan and Mike freezer paper stenciled shirts with a jolly roger on them but Dylan refused to wear his to the party. He had worn it to school the day before and was not about to put it on again. It’s really cute though so even though he did not wear it for the intended purpose, he has gotten a couple of wears out of it.

We sang to the boys separately this year and after the singing and candles I took Ryan to the kitchen and privately sang Happy Birthday to him and let him blow out a candle (or 4 ) too. He is determined to be just like the twins in every. single. way. and when it came to cake I was willing to concede!

45

2011-12-29T08:39:00.000-05:00

Smores kits on a Monday for the kids school friends

Cookies for a birthday celebration on a Wednesday (spiderwebs AND treasure maps because they couldn't agree and I couldn't say no! )

Capri Suns and Christmas cookies for a Christmas Party on Thursday - I bought those!

weasel

2011-12-29T08:30:00.000-05:00

I know these pictures are terrible, but I must use them to document our ...pet? This bird has been named "Weasel" by Tyler (our official namer...he names everything including toys and "#2's"). For several years now around this time of year Weasel appears. He tries desperately to get in our living room...he will peck and peck and peck at our transom windows until he gets tired then he perches with his little claws on the screen below and hangs out. Even Ryan screeching with excitement doesn't run him off at this point, he just keeps on pecking and perching much to our youngest son's delight. There is a bird house gourd on the tree right outside of these windows and Weasel will go in the gourd but never makes a nest or stays there for very long. Weasel used to make me grumpy...he would peck at nap time and I was afraid he would wake the kids up...I have opened the front door thinking someone was knocking before and it was just weasel peck peck pecking...he really is an annoying little guy...we don't even go in the yard when Weasel is particularly adamant about getting in because he seems very aggressive with his pecking. BUT...Ryan ADORES him...he looks for Weasel several times a day, and Weasel was his comfort when "Misser Say-wer" , our Elf, left for the North Pole after Christmas. Some people have a stray cat or puppy attach itself to their family, I guess we have a bird.

smiles

2011-12-29T08:27:00.000-05:00

These boys were so so so excited to get and decorate our Christmas tree. And they were all smiles once it was done! Ryan just ran around like a wild man while we decked the halls. Tyler alternated between running with Ryan and hanging ornaments haphazardly on the tree. Dylan analyzed and considered every possible placement for each ornament before choosing it's home for the season. He was with me from the hanging of the first bauble to the last and he kept me focused and made sure the ornaments were well placed and spaced!

so so much

2011-12-28T07:28:00.000-05:00

Opening Picasa makes me giddy these days! We have had so so much fun this last couple of months and I have so many pictures of our adventures that I can't wait to edit, collage, and share!
The bigs Christmas party at school this year was the same day that we had planned their birthday lunch so Mike went with them to the party while Ryan and I picked up the house and the food. I was excited for Mike to get to share this with them, he hasn't ever been to a school party before! He had a great time, got all the teacher gifts delivered, and even took a couple of super cute pictures of Dylan with his Santa before they sandwiched him in between two clear plates so we could leave cookies for Santa!

There seem to be more parents who participate in parties with Tyler's class so Mike wasn't able to get in his room and take pictures like he could with Dylan but he did spend time there too. I was a little sad to miss the party, but I'm so glad Mike got to share this with them (and that I got to skip the inevitable headache that I get everytime I spend a morning with a bunch of partying 4-5 year olds!).

Happy Birthday Jesus!!!!

2011-12-25T02:04:00.001-05:00

Merry Christmas from the Collins 5!!!!!

Surprise

2011-12-22T22:12:00.000-05:00

I love it when I find pictures on my camera that I forgot I had taken. The boys and I met some friends at the beach when they were out of school for a Thanksgiving break. It was the first time I have ever taken my kids to the beach by myself and it was great! The bigs had their bathing suits on and couldn't stay out of the cold water or sand...Ryan didn't have time to stop and put his suit on but that didn't stop him from enjoying the sand and surf as well. We played for a while, had a picnic, then headed home before anyone melted down. It was the perfect way to spend a warm, no school morning!!!!

night of lights

2011-12-21T20:11:00.000-05:00

On an uncharacteristically spontaneous whim last night Mike wanted to take the kids to see the lights.

I was sitting on the back of the trolley looking through the funny glasses that made all the lights look like Santa, snuggling Ryan or holding hands with my man behind the kids heads, laughing at the sights and sounds, Screaming merry Christmas to the tourists, Just being in this moment where we were all relaxed and enjoying each other.

Other than the dead camera battery I would almost declare this the perfect evening...the kind I hope the kids will have memories of and maybe even tell their kids about one day.

Saturday

2011-12-09T07:20:00.001-05:00

Last Saturday morning after breakfast we got some special visitors! Gigi brought HattieJo over for a little playtime to start our day. Gigi clipped the littles’ fingernails (that’s just one of the many chores she helps me out with around here!). HJ also got a lesson in what happens if we see a belly button in our house! I absolutely can not resist an opportunity to blow raspberries on a soft little baby belly! Blowing raspberries and giggling with the boys is one of our favorite things to do.
As you can see HJ thoroughly enjoyed this game too! (And I think her and Tyler (batman) are a little smitten with each other!)
Saturday afternoon we headed out to the parade. One thing I love about being from a family with such deep roots in a small town is that someone we were with knew someone in almost every group that walked or rode past. We were showered with a constant stream of candy and “hey!”s. The parade was great this year and the kids all did great and had a blast. None of them loved the loud noises but they were ok since they had their Santa hats to cover their ears. Ryan was the most intimidated by the noise but he was fine once he got in his “Paymie”' or “Awie”s arms.
When we dropped off Gigi and HJ the boys got out of the car for a “few minutes”. Gigi was holding races for the kids and when Poppa arrived he started giving them obstacles to complete. Soon the 4 kids and Andrew and his friends were running an obstacle course all over the yard. Over a see saw, under the hammock, over the table, up the ladder…spit on your hands…hang on the fire pole for 5 seconds, back over the table then over the hammock. The bigs had so much fun playing with Andrew, Bobby, Jeremy, and competing with each other. Saturday night Mike grilled chicken and hot dogs for dinner then we said our goodbyes. We had a short but great visit with some of our NC family and we can’t wait to see them again with Anna and HJ for Christmas!

Santa Extravaganza

2011-12-07T23:08:00.001-05:00

We were finally all well and able to head out to the country for the Santa Extravaganza! This is the third annual event and we have never made it to one, but now that we have been I hope we don’t have to miss another! It was so fun! Poppa pulled the kiddos around in a wagon, they bounced in a bounce house, then we ate some delicious soups and chili.

*See that picture on the bottom center? It’s not a great (really not even a good) picture of the boys, but the point is that my brother, who never ever ever smiles for pictures unless someone is “tickling him a little bit” is smiling! *

HJ still wasn’t feeling 100% so she stayed inside with Gigi quite a bit. The Collins boys mostly hung with their daddy and Poppa by the fire or in the sand pile with one of Dylan’s school friends.

It seems that the reindeer were resting so the big man arrived in a trailer pulled by a huge tractor. The kids were so excited to see him drive up and Tyler was very eager to whisper in Santa’s ear about exactly what he wants for Christmas. Dylan was a bit more shy and Ryan and HJ wanted nothing to do with St. Nick.

All this fun and we didn’t even have to wait in a huge line or pay one million dollars for a picture with the man in red!

set...GO!

2011-12-05T23:11:00.000-05:00

We got to have the most precious and unusual time with my niece HattieJo this week. My brother had some meetings in town and brought her down for a visit! Mom took off work and we (ok, she...but I helped!) got to spend 5 days caring for and loving on this sweet little girl.
She was sick the first day they were here and after she and Ryan had coffees together in the morning we didn't see them again, but by Thursday she was ready for some fresh air.
Baby girl loves to ~~run~~ win races!

HattieJo and Ryan got to spend some time together in the morning, then we ate lunch with the bigs and Poppa. After naps we re-convened at Gigi and Poppa's house for dinner, reading, jumping on the beds, choo chooing around the house, a sing/dance along, and to watch some Little Einsteins. It wasn't all smiles between the kids, especially the littles, but the moments where all four kids were genuinely smiling and belly laughing together at their grandparents home literally warmed my heart. I hope it is those moments that these kids will remember and cherish as they grow. And I can not wait for the day AP is big enough to get right in the middle of it all too!

HJ would push the boys down and they would fall dramatically backwards onto the air mattresss. We probably all had too much fun with this game!

GDub

2011-12-01T06:45:00.000-05:00

Happy Birthday Gavin! We think your birthday went swimmingly ;)

So Thankful

2011-11-29T10:43:00.000-05:00

We are so thankful for all of the many many many blessings in our lives.

hat night

2011-11-26T18:25:00.000-05:00

Walking out the door for Cubbies last time I realized that it was crazy hair/hat night. I briefly debated spraying the boys hair with some colored hairspray, but to be honest they had just had their hair washed and I didn't want to have to tackle that again after church so I sent them to get hats...and of course little bit had to wear one too! Some of the kids took crazy hair to the extreme. I can't imagine what it took to get all the rubberbands, spray, and coloring out, but they looked awesome!

Angry?

2011-11-26T08:25:00.001-05:00

These birds might have angry faces on, but we had so much fun at Ryan’s second birthday party I don’t see how they could have stayed angry!

We played our own game of Timmmmmers in the driveway

Each child also had a chalk pig on the driveway and water balloons to use to erase their pig

On the menu for lunch was sliced beef or pulled pork sandwiches (“the pig”), boiled eggs (“the eggs”), chips, dip, fruit, cake, and my new favorite thing to make, cake pops.

Of course there were lots of gifts to open (and lots of little and big helpers)

Ryan did a great job of turning himself into a huge green mess…then my precious Dylan, who loves to “help” me saw that I was busy and tried to clean him up for me…

We are now 2 for 2 on Ryan having to have a bath after enjoying his birthday cake. As a side note, let me dive into the realm of “TMI” just a little…see how that icing looked on his face? It came out just exactly the same way on the other side…since he is still in diapers it certainly left an interesting stain for a few days…

As you can see Noah also enjoyed his cake very very much

After the party had officially ended the kiddos all went outside to play and the grown ups visited a while too before everyone headed home. Ryan is still talking about his “timmers birfday” so it must have been a success!

For more party details look here!

Halloween

2011-11-21T02:03:00.000-05:00

Pamie, Allie, and Dale had their annual Halloween party again this year. We always have so much fun at their house. There’s always so much good food and so many treats. Trick or treating in the neighborhood is fun and the kids always leave exhausted, over-sugared, and happy. Some Mama’s may disagree but I call that a completely successful Halloween!

Trick or Treat

2011-11-20T01:29:00.000-05:00

The last few Halloweens have been crazy. The bigs always place an order with my mom for the specific candy they want and we have always stopped at her house before we go to the annual Halloween extravaganza at the Wilsons. It makes for a busy afternoon/evening so this year my mom offered to have us trick or treat at her house on Saturday instead.

And before long trick or treating at her house turned into a full blown party! Matthew, Susan, and Rob came to join the fun and Allie and Pamie helped with the preparation. We made these balloon and cheesecloth ghosts to take home, ate mummy dogs and apple blossoms, played ghostie bowling and pass the pumpkin, and learned some fun Halloween finger motions.

Once it got dark the boys dressed up and did the trick or treating at the door followed by a walk in the dark to a tree in the back that was strung with ghostie treats and scarecrows for the kiddos.

We learned a little fact about Mat-mo the hard way at the party…he hates masks. Hate might not even be a strong enough word…this situation was complicated by the fact that the masks were all three of my boys’ favorite part of their costumes but we worked it out. For the most part the bigs put their masks on top of their heads instead of over their faces and we all worked together to keep Matthew distracted the best we could.

The boys play a new game with Gigi where they hide in her room and when she plays the drums they come out acting like an animal…here she is waiting for them and a picture of them being super hero cats.

Poppa’s Birthday

2011-11-19T06:06:00.000-05:00

We celebrated Poppa’s birthday in a similar fashion as we had done Gigi’s fake one the week before. Gator cake, grilled steak, sweet potato casserole, corn, bread and butter, sweet tea, and 3 boys’ handprints on canvas. We also got Poppa some shoes he had been wanting.

walphie

2011-11-18T05:59:00.000-05:00

Poppa had a dog for a week or so that he had picked up for Andrew. I think the dog has since been renamed “Opie” but we sure had a good time playing with and letting Ryan (gently!) ya-ya him as “Walphie”.

Family Reunion

2011-11-17T05:52:00.000-05:00

My mom’s dad’s family reunion is always the weekend after Ryan’s birthday (which is why his party has been delayed the last couple of years). It is a pot luck style lunch – the food is always delicious, the kids have a blast on the playground, and a great time is had by all!

This year Poppa had a yo yo which the bigs were using to “yo-yoke” the older boys.

Pamie had picked up some flags for the kids and the bigs each said the pledge.

Fall “Festibal”

2011-11-16T10:37:00.001-05:00

The boys have several big parties during their school year and the first was the fall “festibal”. The parents are invited to come and “help”…I put that in quotations marks because I was running back and forth between classes and trying to contain Ryan as well so I was certainly not much help, but we had a great time! The kids played games and I got to read a Halloween story to Dylan’s class. When it was time for snacks (cupcakes, cookies, candy, and juice boxes before 10 am!!!) Ryan climbed right up to the table just like the big kids and the teachers were so sweet to share the goodies with him too.

The kids all wore these adorable spider headbands until it was jumping time. So cute.

Once we were outside we ignored the sprinkles and let the kids jump, hear another story, have their hands/arms painted by a clown, and play carnival games too. We are so so spoiled by this preschool and the boys’ teachers. They are always so careful to take time with us each day at pick up to let us know how the boys are doing. They all love on Ryan even though he isn’t in school there yet, and most of all I know that they all sincerely love my kids. Their combination of love for the kids and understanding of how the kids’ little minds work is amazing!! We love these teachers and this school!

Ryans Birthday!

2011-11-02T22:34:00.001-04:00

Since Ryan’s birthday is on a Wednesday this year our usual birthday dinner and cupcake plans had to be altered a little. The bigs have Cubbies on Wednesday nights (and Mama has Sparks) so we are always rushing around in the evenings trying to get dinner and get out the door on time. Instead of trying to add one more thing to our afternoon list the bigs and I decided to take Ryan out for donuts this morning before school. Ryan woke up at 4:30 am demanding to “way brothers” (lay in his brother’s bed). When I told him that was out of the question his next demand was “way Mommy’s bed, way Daddy’s bed”. Mike was leaving for work when I brought Ryan back to our bed so he got some snuggles and a birthday greeting from his daddy to start the morning. By 5 Ryan was demanding “show, turn it on for me, Elmo pwease” and I caved in again. He watched Elmo and I folded laundry until it was time to get the bigs up. I asked Ryan if he would like to go get breakfast at the donut shop and he was so excited…”Donut shopping? Mom, go donut shopping?!?!?” Dylan had the idea to take a candle with us and I agreed. We ordered our donuts, sang Happy Birthday, lit and blew out the candles, and let Ryan choose two donuts to for a nice morning treat. He ate a few bites of the chocolate one then passed some out for us to share and saved some for later…His favorite thing was licking the sprinkles off the iced donut though…that made for a nice little mess, but hey, he only turns ~~four~~ two once. Ryan has been singing Happy Birthday to himself all day and whenever anyone asks him how old he is he insists that he is 4 and holds up five fingers as if that is proof. So cute.

He and I had some fun while the bigs were at school. I didn’t do much housework, but we played pizza shop and I pushed him on the swings and he ate up the extra attention.

We had lunch outside and played some more (I am so thankful for such a beautiful day!) before naps. Ryan slept until I finally woke him up at 5:30 this afternoon. Baby brother was worn out from our morning adventure! On the way to Cubbies we dropped Ryan off for a special dinner date with Gigi and Poppa. They took him to Applebees for a cheeseburger, applesauce, and ice cream!

In between all our running around Ryan got birthday phone calls, texts, and happy wishes on facebook and every time I told him about one he would say “dank ew” . He may not remember this birthday but I hope looking back one day he will know we love him so much and did everything we could to make this HIS special day. The celebration isn’t over yet! To be continued next weekend!

my superheroes

2011-11-01T07:36:00.001-04:00

More to follow about our Halloween festivities:-) Picture by www.kevinfloydphotography.com

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Tis the season

2011-10-31T08:26:00.000-04:00

I know it's not Christmas yet, but this week has been the start of the season for us. With Birthdays and Holidays coming literally one after another from now until the cows come home I feel like the madness has already begun.

We made buckets for the phantom pumpkin to deliver to a couple of neighbors. This is such a fun game our neighborhood is playing. We got "boo-ed" with a basket of apples, pez, toys, and cookies and passed on the fun with these eye-themed buckets. This was the best success I've ever had with cake pops...I think the key is that the coating has to be deep enough to cover the whole cake ball in one dip so you don't have to swirl or twirl or spoon it on. These are totally copy-catted from the amazing bakerella . Once I had the buckets assembled the boys waited anxiously for it to get dark. We laughed and giggled so much as we were deliviering them that I'd be surprised if no one heard us...but we had fun, that's what matters!

I made skeleton cookies for Dylan and Tyler's class Fall Festival goodie bags. They picked these out of a Halloween magazine and I agreed to try them. The bottom picture is my "bone pile" that we have been munching on all week. I got about 45 good cookies for the classes, a dozen totally burned to a crisp, and a pile of bones. After cookie number 22 I wondered if separating the boys into two different classes is really necesary.

Three pumpkins for my three punkins...Ironman, Spiderman, and a Pirate! Wait, why is the pirate's nose on his back? You see Daddy was in charge of pumpkin making and he forgot to leave a space for the nose. I'm not sure who had the idea or how this came to be, but apparently our pumpkin now has an...um....butt cheek....

My Mom also made us a pumpkin that we all thoroughly love! She made one for herself and I kept telling her how much I loved it until one appeared on my entrance table :)

We also painted Halloween Tshirts for the boys with cookie cutters stamps, and acrylic craft paint.

Tricked!

2011-10-30T15:56:00.000-04:00

Last Sunday Ryan was coughing and snotty so I kept him home from church. Since I was home and down to one child I decided to try out my new cake pan (Thanks Patsy!). Instead of just eating the cake after lunch the boys asked to have a surprise birthday party for Gigi - and it was quite a surprise to her since her birthday is in February! We sang, blew out the candles, and Dylan even made cards (he signed one from himself and forged one from Tyler)

Timmmmmmer

2011-10-30T07:00:00.000-04:00

The bigs had a teacher planning day last Friday. When I asked them if they wanted to do something special or fun with their day off they asked me to draw some pigs on the driveway and let them throw water balloons at them. They all love Angry Birds and we had a blast playing driveway "timmer" (Ryan watches us play the game on our phones and that's what he says when the structures fall so we call the game timmer now!). We also had a timmer episode in the kitchen...I guess at least we know the whole kitchen floor is clean now...

Burn Pile

2011-10-29T15:42:00.001-04:00

Rarely does Poppa do any burning that we don't take advantage of the situation and have a hot dog (burnt and crispy for Mommy, with no marks at all for the boys)...sometimes we have smores too!

Corn Maze

2011-10-25T21:19:00.001-04:00

I posted an adorable-ness overload already this week…this one is just a plain overload! As you can see we had a great time at the maize with Gigi and Poppa!
a barnyard to roam in
hay bales to climb
duck races
pedal carts

trikes

corn, sand piles, and a hydroponic garden
slides, swings, and soda

a cow train
a hay ride
a trip through the maize
snowcones
horseback rides
and a pumpkin patch too…this kind of day is exhausting!

*My funny story of the day occurred when the boys were looking at a bunny that was out for petting. We were talking about the bunny being out on display and a lady who was older (but not old enough to get away with this) turned around and stared at the twins. She incredulously asked “are they…?” Yes ma'am, I replied, they are twins. Then she reached out and petted (yes, I mean petted…there’s no other word for it) them each on the cheek, smiled, and walked away…I fought back the urge to chase her down and let her know that they were not a part of the petting zoo.

Comfort

2011-10-24T07:05:00.000-04:00

Comfort noun

a feeling of relief or encouragement
contented well-being

I love the level of comfort between my guys. Tyler holding onto his daddy's leg, Dylan coming in close under his Poppa's outstretched arm...Mike's hand resting on his son's head, Ryan holding on to get as close to his big brother as he can. All subconscious moments...not posed for the camera, but subtle, meaningful, touch born out of the comfort of being together.

Homework

2011-10-23T09:43:00.001-04:00

The bigs got some new pencils so I decided to take advantage of their excitement and have them do their homework. They both eagerly identified the letters B b/P p and M m/N n. They told me the sound each makes and set out drawing objects thats names begin with each. They both drew Poppa. Dylan drew a ballon and tyler a boat. Dylan some mud and Tyler a monkey. Dylan couldn't think of an n object so he opted to write n-o. Then tyler stopped working and got down from the table. Tyler, I said, you aren't done. Yes I am, he replied. What about "n"? Mom, nnnnn nothing starts with n so that's what I'm drawing.

adorable-ness overload

2011-10-17T17:42:00.001-04:00

pj day!

2011-10-16T09:37:00.000-04:00

Now that the bigs are in school I really miss our occassional long, lazy, pj mornings.

They studied nocturnal animals last week though, and got to have a school pj day! Of course, even Ryan participated and wore his pjs all day. Above is a picture of my happy super heroes. Below are my superheroes giving "means eyes" like they give to the villains they capture.

Spidey and one of the self-titled "Bat brothers" had a slight altercation, but not to worry, they are both fine and back to stopping crime now.

Tyler’s the class Super Kid!!!

2011-10-10T14:26:00.001-04:00

Here’s Goldie’s (Tyler’s class fish) journal entry about our weekend together:

Friday Tyler’s Gigi and little brother Ryan picked us up at school. They had already gotten Dylan, Tyler’s twin brother, from Ms. A and Ms. E’s class. Gigi took us to Wendy’s for lunch and the boys were so excited to feed the fish a frosty!

After lunch Gigi read my journal to the boys, read my favorite book, Fidgety Fish, then played Go Fish with us.

Friday evening Tyler and his brothers and parents took me to the Panthers football game.

We had a picnic and I got to meet Poppa. I sat on his head for a while so I could get a really good view of the crowd.

Dylan fed me some cheetos while he was fish-sitting. I also got to meet a police officer and see the big Panther mascot.

Saturday morning we had a silly scary-face pancake for breakfast with Tyler’s family.

After breakfast Tyler and his Daddy and brothers took me to Home Depot to ride the mowers and to the pet store too. We saw lots of fish at the pet store but there were no other lion fish like me.

Saturday afternoon I got all dressed up in my new Gator shirt and we did the best we could to cheer them on.

Saturday night we had popcorn and watched a movie.

Sunday morning Tyler took me to his surf board class at church. It was so fun! My favorite part was saying the pledge and I even put my right fin over my heart! Sunday after lunch with Gigi and Poppa and a rest we constructed a scarecrow for Tyler’s front porch.

This scarecrow was a girl firefighter named "Penny". She got arrested for spraying her chief in the face with cold water from her fire hose so now she sits, hands cuffed together, on the front porch scaring crows.

This is Tyler’s drawing of his favorite part of our weekend. The tall figure on the left is Tyler, the scarecrow is in the middle with his fire hat and cuffs, and I am on the right watching it all.

***Ever since Dylan was the Super Kid in his class I have started dreading Friday afternoons. Tyler wasn’t chosen week after week, and each Friday he was just sad. He didn’t show out or pitch a fit (other than the occasional “I’ll never be the Super Kid, Never!)”, but his mommy could see the sadness in his eyes. His teacher explained to me that one child’s father was getting deployed and one child was having his birthday party…very legitimate reasons for Ty to have to wait, but I couldn’t get his little four year old mind to understand that. He was so excited when Ms. J put Goldie’s bag on his back, and I might have gotten a little teary eyed when Gigi texted me a picture of his big old grin!***

Show and Tell

2011-10-03T19:49:00.001-04:00

The bigs have been so so so excited about Show and Tell Day at school. They made their plans and laid out their toy the night before. They checked on it the morning of and were in the car and ready to go early!

Raiders of the lost...memory card?

2011-10-02T19:45:00.000-04:00

I love when I find surprises on my memory cards that I had forgotten about!
The day before school started I woke up with the stark realization that our lives were about to change drastically. The boys and I would no longer be able to take our field trips while the older kids were in school to avoid the crowds because our older kids would be in school (duh). We would have to plan trips around school breaks and would be uber aware of even the more minor holidays. I would not have long leisurely pajama mornings with my boys very often anymore, and I would seriously have to revamp the laundry situation to make sure I had at least two clean pairs of matching socks every day.

I was desperate to have an impromptu special and fun day with my guys and after much negotiation (I love to watch how Dylan and Tyler work out their issues. Sometimes I have to break up physical altercations, but often they negotiate and use their words to work it out)we had a plan. They decided that we would go see the red wolf and elephants at the zoo then have a picnic, splash in the splash pad, and have a shaved ice. It was a great way to spend one last morning of freedom with my boys before school!
We did have a bit of an issue when the bully of the splash pad set his sights on Tyler but I was so proud of how my boys handled it. Dylan stuck up for his brother and neither boy backed down from the bully. Even though they were probably double the size of that little bra...uh, I mean that child, they did not pummel or even lay their hands on him. The perfect balance of not allowing themselves to be bullied without becoming bullies themselves. Well done Ty and Dy!

"HELP!"

2011-09-27T10:20:00.001-04:00

Usually cries for help coming from the mouth of my youngest mean the big ones have something he wants or have bumped into him or locked him out of their room.

But sometimes when this yogurt haired darling calls for "HELP!" he really does need it.

Super Kid

2011-09-17T20:21:00.000-04:00

As the star student Dylan got to bring Teddy home for the weekend and had to bring back Teddy's journal as well as a bag full of goodies to help the class learn about Dylan. He chose his favorite book (? I have never even read this book...it's quite possible that it was the closest one to him rather than his actual fave). His favorite movie, food (popcorn), drink, zoo animal (elephant), color (red), Bible verse (1 John 4:10), toys (firetrucks and transformers), a fire badge and police badge since he wants to be a fireman and a police man when he grows up, and a picture of him and Tyler as well as one of him and both of his brothers because they are his best friends (cue the heart melting).

I had to make the first of what I am sure will be many hard decisions having twins in school regarding the boys bringing their class "pets" home. On one hand it would have been easier to have both pets here together so one or the other of the twins wouldn't feel left out. On the other hand, I wanted each boy to have their own special time as the star student and I wanted us to be able to do a really good job with the journals and bags. With me working half of the weekend I decided to do this one child at a time. It was a great decision for Dylan, but was not very easy for Tyler. Dylan was good about sharing the bear, and Tyler was a huge helper. He did tell me though that he didn't feel like he was as special as Dylan since we made such a big deal about it. As a parent it was very hard to balance being patient with Tyler but not let his sadness rain on Dylan's parade. I am hoping his turn comes soon so we can lavish the special attention of being the star student on our younger twin. This is a lesson that has to be learned, and I'm sure we will revisit these feelings many many many times in the next 10 to 20 years, but it was so hard to see a four year old mind wrestling with these very real and legitimate emotions.

USS Yorktown

2011-09-16T16:56:00.000-04:00

Mike loves all things military but especially planes. He and I have been to see the USS Yorktown before, but while we were in Charleston he mentioned showing it to the kids. They drove past and saw it and didn't show much interest in getting a closer look so Mike dropped the idea until we were getting ready to leave and Dylan announced that he really wanted to go. My mom seemed interested too so we made one last stop before leaving town.
The funny thing is Dylan is (selectively) afraid of heights and my mom is very claustrophobic. If you've never been on an aircraft carrier tour let me explain. You follow arrows through these hot stinky tiny rooms up very narrow steep stairs to the top deck which is very high over the water. Sounds great for a person who is afraid of heights or small (and hot and stinky) spaces right?

Poppa took Ryan (and eventually Dylan because he was too scared on the flight deck) to hang out on bench over the water while Mike showed Tyler around. Ty was super interested, soaking up what Mike was teaching him like a sponge. He said his favorite part was seeing the turrets on the side of the ship. Gigi did great too.

After we toured the carrier for a bit Mike wanted to go on the submarine thats parked (is parked the right word?) at Patriot's Point. Tyler went with him without hesitating and again took it all in. Dylan refused because he heard a lady say it was "boiling hot" on there. I was secretly glad to have a reason not to go...the whole hot stinky room thing isn't my favorite. Gigi said she wanted to try to walk through the sub too and Poppa went to monitor the situation in case she panicked.

Me and Ryan and Dylan waited and waited and waited. Ryan ~~drank~~ poured out a whole cup of pepsi. Dylan ran wild and complained about the whole ordeal (which was his idea). I was nervous that Mom or Tyler had freaked out. We watched for every group to come out and each time it wasn't them I said a little prayer that they were ok and tried to overhear what the exit-ers were saying. I was especially listening for key words like lady, kid, panic, scream, cry, etc

Then eventually they popped out! My four submarine go-ers (plus Dylan who snuck in this bottom pic). They all did great and really enjoyed the tour!

Star Student

2011-09-14T13:55:00.000-04:00

Dylan is this weeks Star Student for his class! He was actually super nervous Friday morning hoping that he would be chosen and he was! Part of being the star student is taking Teddy, the class “pet” home for the weekend and journaling about the time with him. Here is Dylan’s journal entry:

I was so excited when I heard Ms. Angie say D-y-l-a-n was taking Teddy home for the weekend! I knew we would have so much fun and we did! When we first got home I had some important phone calls to make so my brother Tyler watched Teddy for me and gave him a thorough tour of our house. Friday evening we took Teddy to the Panthers football game. My Poppa is one of the coaches for the Panthers. The Panthers played against the Blue Devils and Tyler and our cousin Michelle introduced Teddy to both teams’ mascots. I want to be a fireman or policeman when I grow up so we also showed Teddy the big fire truck and introduced him to a police man at the game.

Saturday we took Teddy to our Gigi and Poppa’s house. They have a milkweed plant with caterpillars all over it. They are eating the leaves and one has already made a cocoon!

We picked up Gigi and went to our Grandpap’s house to swim and eat lunch. Teddy enjoyed relaxing by the pool and we were careful not to splash him.

Saturday evening we realized Teddy needed a change of clothes! We were watching the Florida Gators play football and Teddy was wearing red! We got him changed into his new orange and blue shirt and watched the game. Well, we watched a little of the game then played a long game of war with Gigi. Poppa read us the Itsy Bitsy Spider before bed and Teddy loved it!

Teddy’s favorite part of the weekend was coming to the surfboard class at our church with me. He loved the Bible story about Simon Peter fishing. I had so much fun with Teddy this weekend. I can’t wait to hear about he adventures he gets to go on next!

Dylan also drew a picture of him and Teddy watching a football game and of Teddy meeting a police officer and signed his own name to his journal.

Happy Birthday Sweet HattieJo

2011-09-13T14:29:00.001-04:00

Before we could leave Charleston we had one last order of business...the birthday party! Gigi and the 3 oldest grandkids set up a Dora birthday party in the hotel lobby and we all had pizza and gourmet cupcakes. I will say that the bigs suggested the party and it was HJ's birthday, but I don't think any of them enjoyed it as much as Ryan. Little brother was starving and ate two pieces of pepperoni pizza and a cupcake all with his fingers. He made a mess, but there's no doubt he enjoyed himself.

We had a great party and a great trip! The only bad part was the goodbyes *sniff sniff*

Playing

2011-09-12T21:29:00.000-04:00

Thank God for Anna and her "survival water" on our long hot trolly ride/walk to the playground
and for 4 kiddos that were happy with a playground, swingset, and open grassy field
and a baby thats just happy period
and for a Poppa with a cool hat and very flexible, resilient nose and ears
and for family to share moments like these

SC Aquarium

2011-09-12T06:14:00.001-04:00

Time with my brother's family is too short and too infrequent. This means that even just a day and a half in Charleston is significant and warrants 300 pictures and a ton of blog posts. It's important to me to show my boys that our extended family is a huge and important part of our lives even if not a part of the day to day...and taking pictures and posting them somehow elevates the significance of the weekend in my mind.

We all loved the SC Aquarium and the 4d Dora Movie too!

Charleston

2011-09-10T20:17:00.001-04:00

When the bigs found out that we had missed HattieJo's Hopper Sweet Shoppe 2nd Birthday Party they were so sad...there's nothing my boys love more than a good party with some birthday cake. We were already planning to meet the NC Hoppers in South Carolina the following weekend so the bigs suggested we celebrate HJ's birthday while we were there and Gigi ran with the idea. We got HJ several gifts from all of us, but the boys had something special they wanted to make just for her. The each had a Mickey Mouse cookie cutter and icing decorating set and wanted to make HJ some Mickey cookies. Friday afternoon I made the dough and we went to work.
Saturday morning we left Florida and headed to a water park that was about halfway between us and Charleston. We played for several hours until everyone was good and tired then continued on our journey. We got to Charleston in time to have some good authentic southern barbeque, let the bigs go for a swim, and get some rest for a big day on Sunday.

Sunday morning after breakfast Andrew, Anna, HattieJo, and AP arrived!!!!! If it looks like the kids are playing on a pallate on the floor in these pictures it's because they are. There was a hotel room snafu and after riding all day on Saturday together the 7 of us (Collins 5 + Gigi and Poppa) had a camp out in one room.

I loved seeing the cousins all together and enjoyed spending some time with my niece and nephew and brother and sister in law too. The best discovery of the trip was the free trolly that picked up right outside of our hotel.

Blue Eyed Boys

2011-09-09T17:09:00.001-04:00

I saw a side of my youngest this past weekend that I had never seen before. We went on an adventure to Charleston with Gigi and Poppa (7 in a minivan!) to meet up with my brother and the rest of the Hopper House. As far as I know Ryan has never really been exposed to a little baby and he was completely smitten. "Toes, Arms, Ears, Eyes...Baby ...P" He was fascinated with the baby's parts and just wanted to sit by him and love on him all day. At one point at the aquarium Ryan demanded that Gigi put the baby in his arms. I promised that he could hold "P" when we got back to our room and when the time came Ryan was so excited. He crawled up on the bed and scrunched his shoulders up in what appeared to be nervous anticipation. Look at these beautiful blue eyes! I just know these two are going to be quite the heartbreakers one day!

Cubbies and Bears

2011-09-08T10:14:00.000-04:00

The Bigs have started in Awanas at our church. They are in the Cubbies and they love it! This was their third week and they finally got their vests (yes, I know, the fit is questionable), bags, and books and are so proud! They actually asked me to take these pictures and put them on the blog! They have learned 1John 4:10, Romans 5:8, and an abbreviated Romans 3:23 so far and seem to be retaining and understanding what they are learning. It is so exciting for Mike and I to watch them learn and grow and ask questions and find their own understanding of the foundations of faith that are so important to us. I admit teaching them has been a great stepping stone for me to memorize and dig into God's word as well. Little brother loves to practice verses with them, repeating the words they say and looking for the same celebration dance that I give the bigs when they learn a new verse. I encourage him as well...you can't start too young. Last night he was mad (maybe we need a stronger word here...furious? enraged?) that we left him home with daddy and heartbroken that he didn't get a vest, book, and bag. Fortunately he was accepting (but not thrilled) with an empty purse and old zoo magazine.

It's been a busy week...today was the bigs' teddy bear picnic at school. Dylan took a bear named Teddy ("why do you ask what his name is mom?") and Tyler had Officer Ted with him. Once again determined not to be left out Ryan took his little bear with us to drop the bigs off too. I can't wait to hear all about their day, the kids were all so cute with their bears sitting on the rug this morning.

Just the 5 of us

2011-09-01T11:17:00.001-04:00

This was part of the bigs first homework assignment...and we turned in both boys' family picture and information worksheets on time!

Camp Out

2011-08-25T22:01:00.001-04:00

This past weekend Mike and my Dad went to a Beast Feast with some church friends so the boys and I pitched a tent (ie moved the kitchen table to the living room and covered it with sheets and blankets). Once our camp site was set up we needed to explore the area and make sure it was cleared of wild animals (well, except the lion that Tyler befriended who guarded our tent while we were away). Ryan had the light, Tyler had the gun and Dylan was our bow and arrow man. I was the official trip guide and photographer but I did not do a very good job of either. The expedition had to be paused when our dinner arrived. It was the bigs' choice and they wanted pizza delivered to the camp site.
We climbed up a very steep mountain (our stairs) and into a cave (our bedroom). We found frogs, pigs, and some totem-like statues. Tyler shot a few mountain lions and Dylan got some with his arrows too. We gathered evidence about the people that lived in the cave then the boys drew pictures and wrote some notes about the expedition in their notebooks while we waited for Gigi to arrive for dinner and cupcakes.
Daddy and Poppa might think they were having fun eating up all that venison and gator tail but they totally missed out on the real fun!

O.G.'s

2011-08-22T21:43:00.003-04:00

*Tyler

I may have made a terrible mistake...
Dylan: Mom is this a tank top like you wear?
Me: No, it's a w.b....uh...I mean kind of it's just uh...(praying they didn't hear me while I jabber on mumbling about tank tops and white shirts)
Dylan: Tyler did you hear that? Mom said this is a w.b. shirt. Come on, lets beat on Daddy's wife!!!!!!!!!

*Dylan

Thats how I found myself under a pile of boys...but at least they were cute ones! Now to find some 2T w.b.s...do they make such a thing?!?

If you were a superhero...

2011-08-22T14:00:00.003-04:00

If Tyler was a superhero he would be Doo-Lollie Man. He would wear a doo on his head as a protective mask and when he needed to see he would push it up on top of his head like a stocking cap. He would have the power to throw doo lollies over the heads of all criminals and grown ups so they couldn't see him when he came to capture them. Or maybe he would just be Captain America, but not usually.

If Tyler was a superhero he would have a team of assistants. His right hand men would be Dylan "Serpent Man" or "Spider Man" and Ryan the "Baby Man". Dylan is on a superhero schedule so today he is Serpent Man and can throw sea snakes from his finger tips at his opponents. Tonight after his shower the schedule shows him as Spider Man with all the standard SpiderMan powers...catching bad guys just like flies...I'm not quite clear on Baby Man's super power, but he really is "super" cute.

If Doo-Lollie man was real would he and his assistants, Serpent Man and Baby Man, play little boy as intensely as Tyler, Dylan, and Ryan have been playing superhero today?

Story Time

2011-08-21T20:16:00.001-04:00

*I promise Dylan has shorts on.

End of Summer Fun 2011

2011-08-20T14:01:00.000-04:00

The boys and I were loaded in the van with our picnic packed one morning when we discovered we had a flat tire. Our trip to the Military Museum was cancelled for that day but we were able to reschedule for the last summer fun day before Poppa started back to work. The bigs learned a lot from Poppa about the big equipment and Ryan and I had some fun running and playing together (which is why there are way more pictures of him than the others). There were two areas full of tanks, jeeps, cannons, planes, copters, etc…we even had a snack in a hut made of sand bags. It was something fun and unique to bid adieu to summer 2011.

Beach!!!!!!

2011-08-19T14:32:00.002-04:00

Flying Kites … Digging Holes … Chasing Birds …

Swimming … Carrying Water … Building Castles …

1,2,3,4,5 … Sitting on this “Magic Wall” … sure enough it worked, ice cream came after the big smiles

I wouldn’t want to get on the bad side of any one of these 4 …

Big Day

2011-08-16T22:20:00.002-04:00

The bigs started VPK this morning at the same school they were at for preschool last year. That was only two days a week though and 2 seems infinitely different than 5. They were hesitant with the normal worries about being away from us and each other, but they did great at drop off this morning and had great reports at pick up. Who knows if it is their age/maturity, the promise of a routine, the structure of the new class, the teachers, or a combo, but the boys loved it. Fingers crossed that this will continue…it is so much easier to get teeth brushed in the mornings when we are going somewhere they actually like to go.

Despite my preference the boys are dressed alike down to their shoes today. I’ve never fought them either way through stages of wanting to look the same (and trick people) or stages of wanting to be as different as possible. Although I would prefer for them to dress differently, if they find comfort in their twin-ship and feel closer to each other if they are dressed alike when they are separated I will support them. I guess things will get stickier when/if one wants to look alike and the other doesn’t, but for now they agree and this is a choice I am willing to let them make. Sorry teachers…

After we dropped off the bigs Mike and I took little man to the allergist to see about this peanut situation. We had a scary episode a couple of weeks ago that led us to believe either his allergy was more severe than we had suspected or that he was allergic to something else besides just peanuts so we wanted a specialists perspective on things. He had to do a skin test which was torture for everyone, but we got it done. Don’t let this picture fool you…he laid still on his stomach happily watching Thomas for exactly as long as it took to take this pic. The only positive reaction he had was to peanuts (which is great news – we still have to be careful but are relieved to know that even tree nuts did not elicit a reaction from Ryan!). The fact that he has had a couple of episodes of hives with no known exposure to peanuts is not so great, but we have a good plan in place. We know what to look for and what to do if there is an exposure or episode, and we are glad to know exactly what we are dealing with.

We finished the day off with chicken and dumplins (Tyler’s first day of school dinner request, which earned me a thumbs up from him, my toughest dinner critic!!!) and “i peam” from sonic to celebrate a great day. Dylan placed a to go order for Poppa and ordered a “giant” hot fudge sunday. When the lady asked over the speaker if he wanted any nuts he gave her a full explanation…”No nuts!!!!!…NO nuts!!!…Our baby brother is allergic to nuts so we can’t have any nuts on our ice cream.” I love that the bigs are so protective of our “best baby”.

I have prayed and prayed and prayed over the last few days that God would give the bigs comfort and courage today. That he would give their teachers insight into the workings of their mind, and that he would give the doctor wisdom in making a plan for Ryan. When Miss Angie told Dylan that he was going to be the class door holder for the day he smiled from ear to ear. One of his favorite things is to be a gentleman and hold the door for me (or any ladies) so this was right up his alley. I know it seems like a small thing, but I couldn’t help but smile and think that was a little bit of reassurance for me from God that he heard me and was working on my requests.

beach pool beach pool beach pool

2011-08-13T10:33:00.002-04:00

We totally rocked a Motel for the week at the beach…it was clean, not crowded, had a kitchen and perfect for us. They piped beachy music in around the pool and I could see the portico and neon vacancy sign from my window.

Brothers…Best Friends

This tent was our home away from home during the days. Not that the adults got to spend much time lounging, but it was nice to have a little piece of shade for our stuff.

A big highlight of the trip for my boys was Mike’s cast net. They would dig a trench and fill up buckets with water waiting for him to bring in some fish. Matt Walden would declared the types of each fish and the guys would work together to get them in a bucket, throw them back to their moms in the ocean, or feed them to the birds.

The buckets of fish entertained our boys (and other kids along the beach) for long periods of time and kept the birds close by. It seems a little bit wrong to lure the birds in with fish just for the purpose of letting the boys run and chase and shoo them away, but the birds got some fish (real and crackers) out of the deal and we had one more entertainment option.

No pictures but the bigs also loved “surfing” on their boogie boards. The waves in the gulf are perfect (ie non existent) for the bigs to be safe in the water with their daddy and their boards.

Lowery Park Zoo

2011-08-11T21:54:00.001-04:00

We are back on track with our yearly vacations with the Walden’s!!!! This is something we have done most years since Mike and I have been married. We did cruises and beaches pre-kids and the beach once with 3 kids…but had not yet “vacationed” with 5 of them between the two families. We ventured to Madeira Beach on the Gulf Coast last week with the 5. After two full days of sun and sand we were ready for a break so we hit up the zoo. Let me tell you, my years of counting by fives in the pharmacy did nothing to help me keep up with these kids. I counted 1-2-3-4-5 so many times during the week I was dreaming of counting to five…and you can only imagine the emotional turmoil that resulted from Jerrica and Noah sitting out on our trip to the zoo. “1-2-3-4 uh…MIKE!!!!! Oh, nevermind”….”1-2-3-4… MATT!!!!!!!!!!!…sorry, forgot we only have 4 with us”.

Well, 4 + 2 men that is…See those goat like animals on the top right of that picture up there? One of them pooped right in front of us (for our viewing pleasure I am sure). The 4+2 all really really enjoyed this part of our day…and I could not contain myself laughing between the 4+2 of them and the very proper older lady who was obviously appalled at their jokes.

This zoo had lots of free rides…a little train, safari, carousel, even a roller coaster! Gavin loved them all…Dylan and Tyler weren’t so crazy about the roller coaster. I maintain that their problem was that they were sitting alone in the very front.

Gavin hung with the bigs looking at animals and riding rides, but he and Ryan had a blast sliding down the slide and playing peek a boo with Ryan through the chairs at lunch.

It was hotter than hot but the boys all hung in there until a little after 3 and we got out of there before anyone had a melt down. I call that a successful day!

Visitors

2011-08-10T14:44:00.001-04:00

The boys love to have visitors so they were thrilled to take Grandma and Grandpa to feed the fish.

And when I went gallavanting to Orlando to have some girl time with Jerrica and see NKOTBSBIIMEN (!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)they had a great time eating dinner and playing with Bo, Jocelyn, and Allie.

Summer Fun List

2011-07-31T22:06:00.001-04:00

Chuck E Cheese x
Swimming at Grandpaps x
Bowling x

We are seriously checking some items off our list and having so much fun!We did CEC with Grandma and Grandpa...Ryan loved riding the carousel with a sweet little girl he met, Tyler's favorite was a gun shooting game, and Dylan got lucky with a police badge from the picture id machine on the first try. We went swimming with Poppa at Grandpap's and had lunch with him...Poppa was baptized a bazillion times and the boys all learned to blow water out the end of a noodle. Poppa and I also took the boys bowling. Dylan definitively bowled left handed. Tyler seemed a bit confused about which hand to hold the ball in but admitedly seemed to throw with more power from his right arm. Ryan had a hard time realizing that every turn wasn't his. "POPPA TURN TURN TURN PEASE POPPA TURN" . He really liked the ball retrieval machine thingy more that the actual game though.

New Favorite Gift

2011-07-27T21:14:00.003-04:00

I have a new go-to gift for ...well, everyone!Here are word collages I made for the bigs' teachers, my parents for mother's and father's day, and Mike for father's day too...

life

2011-07-26T14:53:00.002-04:00

People often ask me what life is like with 3 boys in the house...are they wide open all the time? What about fighting/wrestling/arguing/rough housing? Well, this particular night Mike came home from work, sat down in his chair, and was promplty ambushed to the point that the whole chair turned over with him in it...Did they let up? Nope, all three boys just kept coming...laughing hysterically that their daddy was upside down.

Happy Independence Day

2011-07-25T14:49:00.001-04:00

YaYa-ing, a picnic, rc helicopters and boats...We celebrated our independence by exercising our freedom to relax together as a family.

Conga

2011-07-20T10:02:00.000-04:00

Mike got called into work this weekend and it was pouring rain so I left my 3 boys here with their Poppa so I could go with my mom to a baby shower...lunch was ready, and it was almost nap time so it should have been an easy couple of hours.
When we walked back in this is what we found.
What you can't tell from the pictures is that Tyler was beating on Poppa's head singing "Conga Conga Con-GA" and poppa was laughing so hard he had tears streaming down his cheeks.
If I had found my kids acting like this with any other adult I would have been mortified...but since I knew good and well that 1. Poppa was loving it and 2. Poppa had probably done something to wind them up to this I just told them to freeze while I grabbed the camera. They didn't freeze or you would also have seen Ryan climbing up Poppa's legs and Dylan simultaneously climbing up the right side of his body (and Tyler steadily keeping the beat...CongaCongaCon-GA).

It’s Raining It’s Pouring

2011-07-19T15:48:00.000-04:00

But as long as there’s no thunder we don’t let that dampen our outside playtime…

Love to the Fifth Power

2011-07-18T15:34:00.001-04:00

Love Love Love Love Love these five boys

Youth Camp

2011-07-17T16:30:00.001-04:00

Mike and Poppa spent a week at youth camp again this year and boy oh boy did we miss them. I guess it’s true that you don’t realize what you have until it’s gone…they left on Sunday and by Monday afternoon I was texting them both to say thank you for all they do around here. Mike is usually home in the evenings or mornings to help break up the monotony with the boys and Poppa had been helping me with the bigs during Ryan’s swim lessons. I certainly felt their absence…and quickly made some plans for us for the rest of the week after spending Monday at home.

I tried to talk the boys out of driving down to camp for a visit because it’s a little over 2 hours each way and that makes for a really long day for mommy.

I was definitely not successful.

The bigs really wanted to go swimming in the camp pool and Dylan was sure that Mike would be ”so so lonely if he didn’t get to see us” so down to camp we went.

The drive down was ok, the kids all got a little antsy towards the end, but overall it was alright.

We ate lunch prepared by Chef Zo, played on the playground, swam, ate snacks, played around the camp, then ate dinner. It was a great day with Mike and Poppa and so many of our vine and branch friends!

These were my attempts to get a good picture of the kids for an 8x10 frame in my entry way. Sigh. Maybe next time.

Ya Ya

2011-07-16T08:40:00.003-04:00

Ya Ya - [yah yah ] - imperative verb
1. GO!
2. Run like the wind
3. Hurry up

Ya Ya - [yah yah ] - action verb yaya-ed, yaya-ing
1. The act of holding one end of a dog''s leash and encouraging it to run as fast as possible while desperately clutching the other end and running with all you've got to avoid eating the dirt.
2. Slang for simply letting the dogs out to exercise
3. An excuse to going to my parents house where we can play in the firestation or sandbox, ride bikes, push a pedal cart down the septic tank hill, kill ants, watch hawks, relax in the hammock, eat a picnic, etc.

We use #3 usually a couple of times a week, but last month poppa was gone for camp followed directly by a long weekend in NC. The boys yaya-ed a couple of times a day over the long weekend. I love watching them just play and run outside and be little boys. Watching the bigs put Ryan on the pedal cart and working together to keep the dogs away while pushing him up the hill might just go down as one of my favorite moments.

BEACH DAY!

2011-07-14T21:02:00.002-04:00

At the beginning "summer" seemed like an endless expanse of freedom brimming with possibilities. Poppa was out of school and it was the bigs' last summer before the pressures of a strict Monday-Friday routine begin to bear down on them (us). We started joking about a summer fun list...it seemed that we would have nothing but time to take the kids on adventure after adventure and with two of us willing to go there was nothing we wouldn't try. But Poppa has summer school a couple of days a week, I work a couple, Ryan had swim lessons, the bigs had VBS, I went to NC...suddenly our endless expanse of freedom has a very clearly defined end and it is one month away. WAKE UP MAMA! The summer is slipping away! So we began our list today with a morning at the beach. The bigs jumped waves and Dylan even dove under a few. We They constructed and deconstruced structures in the sand until we were all covered head to toe. Ryan and Tyler chased birds. We found and rescued lots of starfish and some icky creatures that seemed to have fallen out of their shells. We ate sandy granola bars and drank melted popsicles. Then we did it all over again. We followed up with happy meals, ice cream, and Poppa laughing so hard he epitomized the word guffaw. Top it all off with long warm showers for all and I call this a perfect day.

Crazy?

2011-07-13T14:30:00.002-04:00

I've gone and done something that seems kinda crazy. Well, unheard of for me, actually. When I started to think about AP's impending arrival I thought back to HattieJo's birthday (and by that I mean the day she was born, not her first birthday. I was so excited to get the news that my niece had made her entry into the world, but I was pregnant and chasing the twins, and more than a little jealous that my parents got to see her so early on in her life, her Grandmama and Grandaddy did, aunt Bec did, but I had to wait. Ssssooooo, I started making some calls. Andrew and Anna said I was welcome to come for a visit. My mom agreed to help Mike with the boys, and Mike said "uh, OK". (I think they were all more than a little surprised that I was asking, but I was and I am blessed to have such a support system that would make this possible for me). I had never left the boys like this before and I'm not gonna lie, as it got closer to time to go that part of it got harder and harder. At the last minute I even demanded to Mike that I was just going to take Ryan with me...but he talked me out of it and I'm so glad I went.
I arrived at RDU late after a delay on the ground in Jax. I was a little frazzled from flying by myself which I admit I am not super comfortable doing. I was in good company though because when I got in the car HattieJo had just woken up from an unexpected late nap and was a tad out of sorts herself. It didn't take long from the time we got home for her to warm up to her aunt "Eddie", and AP stole my heart from the moment I laid eyes on him. We had dinner together and watched some Pot-tu (nope, I'm not kidding, this not even two year old watches Harry Potter movies. Like really sits still and watches them...and does not tolerate any talking in the room while she is watching!).
The next morning Andrew cooked omlets for everyone and they were delicious. After breakfast HJ and I set off on an adventure.

I didn't remind Anna of my terrible sense of direction when she handed me the car keys to take her oldest child to the park. She gave great directions though and I found the park without incident. HattieJo had some teaching to do once we arrived...in my mind I think of her and Ryan as being the same age and forget that they are close, but are still very very different children. I unbuckled HJ's car seat and she didn't climb out...so I lifted her out and sat her on the ground but she didn't run off...its a good thing she's a talker because I wasn't sure what I was doing wrong until she lifted her little arms up and said "shooshoo Eddie". She wanted me to carry her to see a bird statue up near the front of the park so I did...but she didn't want to touch it or walk on the ledge around it. At that point I realized I had a lot of learning to do about how this girl operated. I wonder if the differences between HJ and Ryan are based in gender, personality, or birth order...since I've never had a true oldest child, or a little girl I'm not sure, but I'm leaning towards a combo of 50% birth order, 30% personality, and 20% gender.

She was tentative and cautious on the equipment and really wanted to play with me rather than for me to watch her play. We had a blast on the slide, zip line, and counting her steps on the bridge. She quickly made friends with some older boys, but had no interest whatsoever in a little girl that was around her age (watch out daddy!).

Once she was done playing (again something I wasn't prepared for) she said la la. I knew she wanted to rest so we got some water and took a break for her to suck her thumb with her lala but she never did get back to it. After our break she told me she wanted to go home and find her mommy. HJ has always been her Mamas shadow so I had wondered how having a baby in the house would affect her. She truly loves the baby and although I know she is in an adjustment period, she really is doing so well ( in my expert opinion of course haha). That being said, baby girl wanted her mommy so i took her home. After Anna fed the baby and knew he would be OK for a little bit I took him so Anna and HJ could have some one on one time.

I hope that was helpful and good for both of them. I know when Ryan was born I was the only one who could feed him so although the twins were never lacking love or attention, I was really missing my time with them. The natural divide was (and often still is) for Mike or my parents to do fun things with the twins and I would stay home with Ryan. I appreciated the help, but sometimes felt extreme jealousy that I didn't ever get to be the one having fun with my bigs.
Sunday evening Anna and I took the kids to meet Andrew at church. Hattiejo wanted me to stay with her in the nursery and I loved that she found comfort with me. It was so sweet watching her hug her friends and play with them but she did let me sneak out to hear the sermon and meet some of the NC Hopper's friends and church family. When I went back to pick up HJ she was so happy to see me. She was squealing "Eddie Eddie" and waving her hands around so excitedly. She "does" excited very well and I loved that it was directed towards me! We went out to eat at Jason's Deli after church. The food was great, I loved seeing a bit of what my brother's family's life is like, and the kids were so good even though it was getting late.
Since they go to church on Saturday night Sunday is their day to rest. We lounged around the house Sunday morning then HJ and I went to see the puppies and play outside a bit. She even hopped in her pool for a few minutes. After the baby ate I took him and their new camera and played for a while while HJ and Anna had some more girl time. After nap time I took HattieJo on a date to the mall for ice cream, lots of me mechanical toy rides, sliding, and even a cookie right at dinner time. It was so fun to have some time to really get to know my niece and spend time one on one with her. The evening was almost without incident...there was only one little time when I sat her in a chair and she folded in half and fell out the back. How could I have known she would poke her butt through the space between the seat bottom and back?!? I was standing right behind her though, and caught her before she even hit the floor at all. She was scared but not hurt and another ride on the merry go round fixed it right up!

Aunt Bec Bec came for the week when we got back to the house and us three girls had so much fun swinging and blowing bubbles together. HJ would fling bubble solution all over us all and we just sat and laughed. Getting her to eat dinner was a bit of a struggle, but she was happy with her belly full of m&m cookie. HattieJo's grandmama sent her a baby bottle and we played with her baby doll forever feeding burping and changing him. Eventually HattieJo decided to be the baby and we girls took turns doing the same games with her.
Another round of Pot-tu and some snuggles on the couch ended up my time with my precious neice. I miss her already and her baby brother too.
My favorites of the weekend:
*HattieJo's talking: I no like it, Fly like Pot-tu, Shooshoo, Eddie, have it, push, ba-ble, and the really long sentences that are properly intoned but the words not so properly articulated. I especially loved these after Anna taught me to listen for the last word to know what the sentence may have been about.
*Reading with HJ, and her excited face.
*AP's sweet sweet sugar lips. Watch out ladies!
*Hanging with my little brother. With the kids running wild all the time, it's been a long time since I've gotten to just really sit down and talk to him. I learned a lot about his job and his life, his plans for the future and the grown up version of him.
*Watching Anna with her husband and kids. She is an amazing host and makes taking care of the house and her family look easy. I certainly learned a thing or two by watching her this weekend.

Andrew dropped me off at the airport bright and early this morning and I was sad to go, but am truly itching to get my arms around my man and three little men.
I know AP and HattieJo won't remember this trip, but maybe some of the comfort and familiarity we gained will carry over and make it that much easier to build on next time. It is hard for me that my niece and nephew, my kids' cousins, aren't nearby and that I can't physically watch
them grow and be a part of their day to day lives...but we are all committed to making sure they know their Florida family and know how much we love them. Plus since I only see them every so often I can get away with special treats like cookies with "lellow m&ms" at dinner time!!!!!

The Red Fingers

2011-07-12T22:05:00.001-04:00

See Dylan sucking his one finger here? The night of Mike's birthday the boys went swimming at Pamie, Dale, and Allie's house. They came home with "the red fingers" from grabbing onto the rough edge of the pool. They slept clutching wet wash cloths to ease the discomfort for a couple of nights and it seems that Dylan has dropped one of his sucking fingers as a result. It's been 3 weeks, the red fingers have long since healed, but still this new comfort mechanism remains.

Just (a lot of)Words

2011-07-06T22:09:00.000-04:00

*What does it say about a family when the youngest child, who is not much of a talker, very clearly says (and appropriately uses) the words help, hurt, and OW. Rough and tumble is a serious understatement around here.

*Ryan is allergic to peanuts. We had blood drawn for an allergy test because the last time he had a cold the runny nose and post nasal drip just hung around forever and didn’t improve much with zyrtec/benadryl. We’ve always thought he had seasonal/dust/pollen allergies because of a persistent runny nose, but I wanted to know for sure if it was the dog or the carpet or anything correctable causing his nasal symptoms and maybe even his skin rashes. He has always been my sensitive, rashy skinned baby and his eczema would flare up really bad at times.

SO…he did great for his blood draw…he was much more intrigued at watching the blood flow in the tube than he was upset about the pain. The doctor called me a few days later and said there was only one thing his blood was significantly positive for and it was peanuts. The numbers were high enough to warrant us carrying an epi-pen and we have pretty much stopped eating peanut products around him (which is killing this peanut butter loving mama and her pbj eating bigs). Ryan would refuse to eat peanut butter anyway, even peanut butter cookies, but since we found out what was causing his problems and have been able to keep him away from all nut products his skin has really cleared up. Even though he wasn’t eating the peanut butter I wasn’t making any effort to keep him away from it. I cringe when I think of how many times I made the bigs a pbj and used the same knife to make Ryan grape jelly toast. He has only had one real eczema flare up when someone ate trail mix in Ryan’s tv watching chair. He also had probably the most immediate and severe reaction ever when he ate some hummus one night. He broke out in hives around his mouth, but they went down quickly with a dose of benadryl. Who knew peanuts and chick peas are related? He did have another little skin break out after Mike’s birthday party, but we will probably never know if someone had eaten peanuts before they came over or what caused that one. The plan for now is complete avoidance of all nut products (well, as completely as we can avoid without putting him in a bubble) until he is four. Although tree nut and peanut allergies are two very different things they often go hand in hand and it’s not worth it for us to challenge him with tree nuts right now. We will re-assess at that time and possibly undergo more testing before he starts school.

Ryan had always been such a good sleeper and an easy baby until we moved him out of our room around 6 months old into his own crib in his own room. At that point his sleep became interrupted. He began waking multiple times a night sometimes just crying. He was a spitter-upper, and although he didn’t fit the classic reflux symptoms we had him on zantac to try to control the up-chucking. Also around 6 months old is when he started getting random rashes…I thought it was a food allergy from the beginning, but he didn’t predictably react to any particular solid food that would indicate an allergy. I guess my point is that any medical issue Ryan has had could potentially be explained by this allergy – possibly even the snotty nose! On one hand I wish I had known earlier…if I had only skipped the peanut butter waffle I ate for breakfast every.single.day while I was breastfeeding him maybe we wouldn’t have had the difficulties we had. On the other hand, I am just so glad we know now and are able to keep him away from the source of his problems.

As scary as this is for us, it has really brought out one of my favorite aspects of Dylan’s personality. He is a natural protector, a staunch rule follower, and is fiercely in love with his baby brother. He reaches the verge of an anxiety attack if someone has peanuts around Ryan or if Ryan even picks up a bag of peanut m and m’s at the store. He makes it very clear to anyone who might give Ryan food that he has an allergy and even chooses to forego nuts himself sometimes in a show of solidarity. It is so precious it truly brings tears to my eyes. I think about what a bratty child I was, acting grumpy and often feeling bitter that my brother’s food allergies (corn and peanuts) sometimes affected me….I’m just so thankful that my oldest son did not inherit my selfishness in this regard. Tyler loves Ryan just as much and also would fight with all he had to protect him…but…the draw of a bowl of peanuts on a camp game table is just too much to ask him to endure and I love and relate to that in my precious middle child.

*Today at Wal-Mart a man ran his cart over a bump and at least 1 kazillion cans of diet coke and beans went flying all over the parking lot. I had the boys help him clean them up and he was so surprised/impressed that they helped. He gave them each a can of diet coke and even offered them money (which we politely declined) for their assistance. I loved that they helped and didn’t expect any reward. I loved that he acknowledged their help. I hated that in the state of the world today a mom sending her four year olds to crawl around in the parking lot instead of a fifty-something year old man having to do it was cause for surprise. On a side note the man was honestly probably the tallest man I’ve ever seen in person…I’d say very near if not over 7 feet tall. I was looking way up at him, and I don’t look up at very many people. He asked how old the boys were and they said four…he didn’t believe it and asked me if that was true. I concurred and he said “they are really big boys…and that means a lot coming from me.”

bi bi bi big apple adventure

2011-07-05T21:57:00.000-04:00

The bigs went on the Big Apple Adventure (VBS) at my parent's church this year. It was weird/hard just dropping them off with mostly strangers for 3 1/2 hours the first day, but a couple of the days my dad stayed and helped out and at least I knew they had each other there if they got lonely or afraid...which they most definitely did not! They had a great time and we are still rocking out to the music in the car.

Just Words

2011-06-26T16:20:00.001-04:00

I love love love to take pictures of my kids and have kind of fallen into a routine of taking cute pictures at special events and blogging them. I’m so happy to have these special memories captured, but when I look back at my blog I am missing the day to day…the mundane…the things that seem normal right now but that in a few years I may not even remember…and thus is born the post of words. Just words. Not even spectacular words, just regular parts of our life that when I take a step back and look at the big picture are the parts of this that I’m gonna miss.

*Ryan is starting to use his words more and more every day. It melts my heart when he comes to me with his hand held out and says “hand hand”. He wants to take me by the hand and show me something. So sweet. He also knows lots of body parts (arm toes nose eyes forehead chin ears belly, and his favorite, butt…I know I know, mom of the year award is on it’s way to me for teaching him that one right?).

*One of Tyler’s favorite games (that is not nearly as heartwarming as “hand hand”) is copying what the rest of us are saying. “Tyler stop repeating what I say” “Tyler stop repeating what I say”…gggggrrrrrr.

* For the longest time Ryan would not let me read to him at all, but he has now found a favorite book and he seriously asked me to read it to him again and again for a solid hour while the bigs were at Bible School this week. It is a huge cardboard book with tons of animals and baby animals in it and he flips the pages and points out the dog, bir, cow, hog, horse, baabaa, turtle, etc. When I went to pick him up from church this morning the church ladies even commented on how well he is talking and knows his animals now. Apparently he found an animal book in his class and insisted that they read it to him until they took him outside for a walk.

*Little brother loves to be outside. I know, all kids do, but dragging him in the house or telling him no that it’s too hot out is definitely asking for a little tantrum and he is just not otherwise a fit pitcher.

* Both bigs, but Dylan especially, LOVE the transformers. I’ve started dvr’ing the original cartoons on HUB and the last two times Dylan has earned a new toy he has choosen Optimus Prime and Bumblebee…Mike’s even talking about taking him to the theater to see the third movie when it comes out…He’d love it.

* People often ask us if Ryan can tell the bigs apart. I was first inclined to say no because he clearly calls them both TyTy (except last night when he was calling Dylan BirBirTeetTeet) BUT…when he finds a doo lollie on the floor he always returns it to the proper owner. And when I hand him a snack and ask him to take it to Dylan he does. So, yes, I believe that he can tell them apart, his words just haven’t caught up with his mind on that yet.

4-0

2011-06-24T15:55:00.001-04:00

Last week was celebration-filled at the Collins house. Big Daddy turned the big 4-0!!!!! Wednesday the boys made him big cards and insisted that I decorate the house with streamers. My big boys who never ever color and refuse to write their names actually put a huge effort into these cards. They drew cars and made them into a train and signed their names without any help! I loved seeing the pride in their eyes when they admired their finished work. And Ryan, well he wore the evidence of his efforts on his legs all day in the form of red marker streaks. Washable...ha!

When Mike got home from work he spent some time with the boys before they were all three wisked away to Pamie's house with Gigi and Poppa for dinner and swimming while we went out on a dinner date to Outback. It is so so so nice to get out by ourselves every once in a while and we had a great time just talking and feeding only ourselves while the food was still hot. It's the little things in life...

Saturday Mike knew his parents were coming to town but he was getting frustrated at my, and their, insistence that we not make any big plans. He suggested the beach, the zoo, the Alligator Farm...but we just kept putting him off. My parents came and got the bigs that morning and I busily prepared and put out food on the dining room table. He questioned me a few times and I just kept telling him I wanted his parents to have something to eat when they arrived. And, arrive they did...followed by my parents with the bigs dressed super cute bearing balloons and gifts. And our friends Susan and Matthew, then Matt and Gavin...Pamie, Allie, and Sarah, Patsy, Fred, Grandpap, Michelle, Sam... Leslie, Ian, Lisa, Tim, Skylar, Jason, and Jake. Mike was so surprised! Later he admitted he thought I was probably having a small family gathering when I started decorating and making food, but he did not at all suspect the magnitude of the event. We had a great morning/early afternoon then after a rest for the kids, some clean up time for me, and a shopping trip for Mike and Bob we got to eat dinner with Mike's parents.

From all the feedback I have gotten the food was great, decorations were good, surprise was a success...the photography however? Seriously lacking...this is all I got...Please trust me when I say this is a pitiful representation of the fun we had :)

1st Soccer Season

2011-06-09T22:09:00.000-04:00

The bigs’ first (and last to hear them tell it) soccer season is over and I learned so much over the last few months.

*My boys are super handsome in a uniform

*They LOVE practice but hate games and do not want to invite any spectators

*They hate wearing shin guards and Tylers legs are ticklish right where the socks pull over the shin guards…where I have to touch him to fold them over.

*I kind of like being a soccer mom with the cooler and the snacks, driving a mini van with tennis shoes on.

*They are tough guys, but still my babies. When Dylan got his lip busted before a game one week I loved all over him without even realizing he was bleeding all over my new tshirt. Once the bleeding stopped I sent him right back on the field and he went and played.

*A pair of mens dress socks from the Dollar Tree with the foot cut out makes a perfect little sleeve to keep the shin guards from touching their legs…which made for much happier players and mommy.

* There are some very competitive parents out there. We are not among them. There are also some very laid back parents who just want their kids to have fun. We are that kind

* There’s a big difference between the maturity level of 4 year olds and 5 year olds. Dylan and Tyler were bigger physically than both.

Will they play again in the fall? TBD. Some days they say yes, right now they say no. Maybe we’ll try a music class of some kind instead.

They Wiped Out

2011-06-08T22:30:00.001-04:00

and they LOVED it!!!

I was Senior Splash day at Poppa’s school and since the slides were set up early…

and it was so hot…

We took poppa up on the offer to come hang out and play.

Dylan and Tyler loved (and had no fear whatsoever of) the big slide

As bad as Ryan wanted to he didn’t get to come down the big one, but he loved the sprinkler tunnel and when Poppa would put him “up dere” on the side of the catch pool and slide him into the water.

I LOVE that these kiddos are such water bugs!

BEACH!!!!!

2011-05-29T22:30:00.001-04:00

Hey Mike, I said, “I have a great idea…lets go to the outlets to get the boys some new crocs then take them to the beach for a little bit.

No, it won’t be a big ordeal, we’ll just take some sand toys.

We don’t need anything else…no bathing suits or towels

remember last year? Our kids don’t even like the water. They just want to play in the sand a little bit then we’ll brush them off, put on clean clothes if we have to…”

HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!! Famous last words…it was a big ordeal, they all 3 LOVED the water, we definitely needed (and did not have) bathing suits and towels. I guess the only thing I was right about is that we would all have a great time and that the sun, salt, and sand between our toes would be good for all five of our souls.

*Dylan in green stripes, Tyler in orange, and Ryan pointing to the birds saying tweet tweet *

Mother’s Day

2011-05-27T16:03:00.001-04:00

Flowers and gifts from my guys…yep, that was great... But these are the gifts that really really really made my day:

I absolutely eat up being the mommy who gets all these precious handmade school and church gifts. Above are my cards from Dylan and Tyler…Mommy, my love for you grows, and grows, and grows, and grows.

The bigs made lady bugs and they all took pictures at church. The bigs gave me coupons too. A big hug from Dylan…so thoughtful because he knows I like the biggest tightest hugs around the neck possible and he has let me redeem this coupon over and over and over again! Playtime alone with Tyler which I have also redeemed for quite a few games of angry birds. More important than the games is the gift of knowing my little boy needs me and my time.

And the tear jerkers…one from each boy…

“Sometimes you get discouraged

because I am so small

And always leave my fingerprints

on furniture and walls

But every day I’m growing

I’ll be grown some day

And all those tiny handprints

Will surely fade away

So here’s a little handprint

Just so you can recall

Exactly how my fingers looked

When I was very small”

I can’t even look at these without tearing up…my mom has one of these with my handprint on it from when I was little too.

I worked on Mother’s Day, but Mike grilled for me, our moms, my dad, Mrs. Sublet, and the kiddos when I got home.

ZOO!!

2011-05-24T15:06:00.001-04:00

Mike was on call all weekend…those weekends always seem ssssoooooo long. I can usually depend on my parents to help with the boys or just for a change of scenery but this time they were out of town so it was just me and my boys…and my dog and my dad’s two… for the majority of four full days.

What to do? How can I keep these kiddos busy and safe by myself?

I asked the boys what they wanted to do and the older ones immediately demanded that they take me to see the dinosaurs at the zoo. They had already seen them, but I hadn’t… and to be honest I wasn’t sure about taking on the zoo without help, but with Mike’s encouragement we did it.

The bigs promised to help me with Ryan, stay with me, and keep their good listening ears on all day…and they DID!!! We had SO MUCH FUN!

We rode the train, saw the dinos (an awesome exhibit!), rode the carousel (Ryan hated it) ate lunch, back tracked to the dinos then the carousel looking for Dylan’s misplaced hat (which turned out to be our one of two glitches in the day…but we found it and recovered quickly).

We had so much fun at the splash park. It was the part I was the most apprehensive about just because of the clothes changing and sunscreening x3. The bigs got kind of shy last time we were there and only stayed in the water for a little bit…I didn’t want to do all the work of getting them ready if they weren’t going to play a while.

That was not a problem this time. It was funny because Ryan led the way onto the splash pad and the bigs hung back. Once they got to playing though my only issue was finding that sweet spot where they were tired enough not to complain about leaving but not too tired to walk back to the car without any whining.

After playing we were all ready for a snow cone (which we love despite the fact that it’s *just sugar dumped over chipped ice*. duh. )

We rode the train back to the front of the zoo and the bigs found their second wind. I buckled Ryan in the stroller and we headed around the Africa loop. It was cooling down quickly and I could tell rain was coming, but apparently so could the animals. We saw 4 baby warthogs playing and running together, the rhinos wallowing in the mud, even the lions were up and around. The little bunny in the middle left picture is a “wild” animal, not a zoo animal, but we have seen him in the same area before. The bigs spent a long time postulating what might happen if it accidentally hopped into the lions cage…I’ll spare you the details.

The other glitch in our day was the red wolf…Tyler’s only request other than the dinos was to see the red wolf but when we walked by his enclosure he was on the train track side and when we rode the train by he was on the other side so we didn’t get to see him at all. I guess we will have to have a re-do soon!

Brothers

2011-05-16T18:55:00.000-04:00

and the best of friends most of the time

disappointed

2011-05-15T18:14:00.001-04:00

our black berry crop was meager this year. we believe we had a mystery animal in the yard eating our fruit and let me tell you I know three little boys who would gladly teach that animal a lesson if they could get their hands on it…except after Dylan’s experience picking up a mystery creepy crawly centipede thing and getting pinched I suspect he would not put his hands on it without asking first.

There’s no shortage of fun at Poppa’s though.

Or of those icky black grasshoppers. The guys decided if they collected a jar full they could feed them to the fish in our lake. That would make the fish happy and make Gigi happy at the same time because she hates them. The only thing that would not be happy would be the grasshoppers but they aren’t really happy anyway because they aren’t even welcome in their own home… Or something…

We didn’t get enough berries for jelly or even cobbler this year, but have great memories of berry picking the last couple of years and high hopes for next year.

Easter Sunday

2011-05-14T15:48:00.002-04:00

We woke up Easter morning and found that the bunny had been here. He left a baskets for each boy filled with all kinds of goodies.

The boys got dressed up in their coordinating outfits and we went to church then back here for lunch with Gigi and Poppa, Grandma and Mrs. Sublet, and Pamie, Dale, and Allie

Ryan took a nap after lunch…the bigs did not. They fell asleep in the car and didn’t even stir when we passed the fire station and I told them the ladder truck was out. I know lots of (most?) kids have dropped their nap by now, but these boys NEED one…and I am not complaining!

We had our annual Easter egg hunt at Patsy and Fred’s house. It was Ryan’s first time hunting eggs and he wasn’t so sure about what to do. The bigs hunted so fast I barely got to see them!

After the eggs were all found (or at least all the real ones were…we still have some plastic eggs that were officially declared MIA) we had snacks and drinks and family time before heading home for a movie night.

We also did resurrection eggs with the boys before lunch. They really enjoy the activity and I feel great knowing that we make the story of the resurrection a central part of our celebration.

Eggs!

2011-05-12T15:47:00.001-04:00

Sometimes I give myself too much credit. I really thought I’d be able to take pictures while helping three wild men and their egg-dying loving father dip fragile eggs into permanent dye…

The picture taking didn’t pan out, but the bigs had a great time choosing their colors and dipping their eggs. Checking and re-checking them before deciding they were done and ready to be removed. They did one egg after another until they were bored then Mike and Ryan finished the rest.

catch up…

2011-05-10T21:59:00.001-04:00

Holidays always throw me for a blogging loop. I’m doing the best I can to stay on top of our day to day stuff then I get inundated with bazillions of super adorable pictures of the cutest kids on the planet.

(Like these sprinkler and stump parties)

When I get overwhelmed I tend to shy away, and that’s what holidays do to my blog. I get overwhelmed with the sheer volume and cuteness of pictures and find myself ~~cleaning toilets~~ just staring at, instead of dealing with, the photos. Combine that with our afternoons of soccer practice, sprinkler-ing, or running dogs and there’s just no catching up.

But, deal with them I must, so here we go. These pictures catch me up to egg dying so now I have no choice but to dive right in to Easter followed by Mother’s Day.

(even the dogs are photogenic!)

Lawn Men

2011-05-10T14:19:00.000-04:00

sunflower (s)

2011-05-02T13:31:00.000-04:00

Sunflowers the boys planted as seeds at school. We just happened to get the twins.

The Park with the Green Toad Statue

2011-05-01T19:28:00.001-04:00

The boys LOVE the park with the green toad statue. It’s a huge park on the water and with wild man Ryan at this age it is ~~really really hard~~ impossible for me to manage by myself. The good news is it’s close enough to the office where my mom, aunts, and uncle work that we can usually stop to pick up one or two extra sets of hands on the way.

This set up is awesome for me because I had a photographer (Pamie) with us so I actually got to be in some pictures and my Mama was in rare form. She was climbing trees, “horseback riding” on the branches, and swinging boys.

Sometimes my mom doesn’t get to be the typical fun, laid back grandmother. I have always been outnumbered by my kids so more often than not I depend on whoever is with me to help – “get me this, take care of that, get that kid!” I don’t care who you are, if you are with this crew you have responsibilities. This day, however, she threw caution to the wind and just had fun with her grandsons!

Maybe it’s the ages of the kids or the experience we have under our belts four years into this kid wrangling adventure, but we were all able to relax a little and just have a great afternoon. Thanks for your help Gigi and Pamie, I couldn’t have done it without you!

Do you need to Potty?

2011-04-21T20:29:00.001-04:00

Why is this (almost) 18 month old doing this?

The thing is about a week ago Ryan walked into the bathroom while I was cleaning. He never even acknowledged that I was in there. He walked up to the toilet, held up his tshirt (ala TyDy) stood for a minute, nodded his head, flushed, and walked out. He had his diaper and shorts on the whole time.

It was HILARIOUS

So I got the flip video camera and asked him if he needed to potty again. He nodded that he did so I let him in and he walked up, held up his t shirt, and plunged his right hand as far into the toilet as it would go. ga-ross! That will be on the list of videos to show future girlfriends.

We busted out the potty and it has quickly become Ryan’s favorite place to be. He hasn’t actually made any sort of deposit in it yet, but he sure loves it.

I have no expectations (although wouldn’t it be nice if he was one of those kids who potty trains himself without any trouble? Do those kids exist in real life or just on the blogs of super moms?) but he sure is having fun on his new perch.

And here’s a flashback of the bigs’ first encounter…

Driveway Time

2011-04-20T21:54:00.001-04:00

We often have our family time in different increments than most families. We may not have dinner together every night, but we often have breakfast around the table together. The boys aren’t always tucked in by both parents at night, but they do get full days alone with each of us every week.

When we do have evenings together one of our favorite ways to spend them is in the driveway. The boys love to spray water, ride bikes, hoard toys, wave to the neighbors walking and riding by, play in the van, and catch fish in a net from the side of the (parked in the garage) boat.

Maybe I appreciate these nights even more because they are not the norm…Looking at the pictures it doesn’t look like anything special, but to me it is.

I love these family evenings and the smiles and memories that linger even after the sun goes down, skeeters come out, and little boys come in for mubs.

Spiffied Up

2011-04-15T10:12:00.001-04:00

Little boy style

Bir Bir

2011-04-14T10:14:00.003-04:00

Me, Tyler, and Ryan were trying to feed the fish but attracted this huge flock of seagulls instead.

County Fair

2011-04-11T15:30:00.002-04:00

music, farm equipment, checker games…

welcome signs, animals, and spiders falling from the ceiling…

trucks and tractors to drive, pretend farms…

and rides…rides…rides…

Don’t Blink

2011-04-05T09:40:00.000-04:00

I know it’s not Mount Everest or anything, but our kitchen table is a pretty high bar top – high enough that I never had to worry much about the bigs climbing on it... I blinked my eyes the other day and when I opened them Ryan was enjoying Dylan’s breakfast cookie sitting at the table. It scared me enough that today I have vowed not to blink at all.

armadillo

2011-04-03T19:31:00.002-04:00

This is what's left of Tyler's beloved armadillo doo lollie. It started as a burp rag, then according to Tyler an armadillo snuck in his room one night and dug a hole in it. The hole turned into rips and each time a strip would tear off Mike would knot it back together. Dylan has never liked that rag because of it's distinct armadillo smell. Tyler will rarely allow it to be washed so it definitely has a not terrible but very unique smell. Suddenly about a week ago Dylan discovered the tag on the armadillo doo. Apparently it is a rare but coveted "curly tag". At this point when I tuck the boys in bed at night I am not only covering them up with the same blanket but they are also sharing this ripped up doo. Dylan gets the tag, Tyler gets a knot, and when they sneak it downstairs I may just catch them snuggled up to watch a show with it too.

Little MRC

2011-04-03T11:57:00.001-04:00

Wordless...

2011-04-01T10:08:00.002-04:00

Because the words I'm thinking of would shatter this happy fun image of the bigs' second soccer game.

Thanks for taking these great shots Mom!