Be Jealous!

Today was a day that you should wish you lived in Sitka!

The weather wasn't terribly wonderful- it couldn't decide between sunshine and downpour.

No movie stars, great deals, or other events that could be termed "excitement".

But, not living here has you missing out on the funniest show on earth.

My little boys in church.

(are you afraid yet?)

I was feeling exceptionally efficient today. Up at 7 to get myself ready for church. Got the million things I might need for the boys all packed up. Snacks, tissues, toys, puzzle books. Thier clothes were all laid out, ready to cover sleepy little boy parts.

Finally the boys wake up and I get them dressed, and Austin's pants are too big.

They say 2T which should fit, but they look gigantic.

And he refuses to let me take them off.

(that double dose of stubborn is a real pain somtimes)

I roll the top of them thoroughly, and as he wanders around waiting for all the last minute prep to be done, the pants stay up just fine- no problems, no worries.

We're on time for church- that should have tipped me off that I was in for some fun.

Life is smooth, until the middle of the sacrament.

Austin decides to crawl under the chairs in front of us and take off down that aisle to freedom. Pausing as he gets back to his feet, to make sure I'm going to come after him-

so the WHOLE congregation can see.

After that, there's the usual stage whisper comments about the books I'm trying to distract them with. Shane's on a counting kick, so he tries to count the peices of bread, and then the cups of water left on the trays- out loud.

But the best part, that will make you beyond envious, is when Austin decideds to re-enact his previous escape.

Under the chairs he goes on all fours. This time it's straight up and running.

He gets 5 feet (to the end of the pew, into view of everyone)

and his pants drop to his ankles, tripping him thoroughly.

The hilarity of it all is that this morning he insisted on wearing underwear again.

He likes the brightly colored ones.

Today's are horizontal stripes in red, blue and yellow.

Which he's wearing over his onesie.

There were 3 other people in our row, 2 of which are not members- they start cracking up.

The wonderful sister they were with got Austin and headed him back in my direction.

From then on, those pants WOULD NOT stay up.

Once he even made it all the way to front and center of the chapel, just below the podium, and down they go.

It was nice to see everyone smiling so early in the morning.

By the time Brett joined us, I'd gotten fed up with the tears that follow him tripping over mutinous pants- so I took them off and put him in the only other thing I had- a pair of grey PJs with a bright red "heartbreaker" across the chest.

At least his stripped unders were no longer on display.

Eventually you'll learn, want a garuntee of no boring Sunday meetings, come live near us!

Happy Father's Day!

Brett had a good Father's Day weekend. Hope yours was as good!
Then he took Shane fishing.

Shane caught his first fish. Even reeled it in most (part) of the way all by himself.

Something Good Out of Hollywood

So I was flipping through a junk magazine that Brett suscribed me to and ran across a celebrity interview with Sandra Bullock. She's a funny lady, so I took a minute to read it (while the boys were climbing on my head- I only had to run away twice, so they were being nice) Most of it was the usual kind of stuff, asking about her marriage (which she refused to talk about) and advice for the up and coming starlets (she said to be sure to be to work on time). But the very BEST part was the last of the interview. I don't recall the question, but her words are very important.

"If I die tomorrow, will I have gotten everything in the world I've ever wanted? No. But I will have gotten everything that's made me happiest."

For Uncle Pat- It's all your fault.

It's no secret that Uncle Pat and Aunt Cristie are favorites of my boys (mostly cause we see them the most). Well, I know Austin is too young to remember them a heap of a whole lot, but somehow, he's picked up something from Pat that has to be dealt with...

He likes drawing pictures on himself.

Whether he grows up to be a tattoo artist, or the tatooed man, I don't know but with the funny looks I've been getting, I had to do something. So I did.
And he LOVES it.

See.

It's kind of like wearing leopard print underwear.

(no one I explained that to in college is reading this are they?)

A Little Rampage- Don't Mind Me...

I've been reading alot of marriage books lately. Wonderful books.
Love That Lasts (Lundberg), All Moms Go To Heaven, Behind Every Good Man (John Bytheway), and most recently... Strangling Your Husband Is Not An Option (Thanks Mom & Dad Banks!)

All of them were very uplifting, good books. A few things I implemented immmediately.
And the rest I turned into a list of all the things the "experts" advise us to do to keep a happy life and marriage.
From flirting with your husband to allowing guy time. From keeping the house clean, to dressing nice and putting on makeup every day. I'm sorry, but HOLLY HANNAH! How in the world to they keep up with all this stuff, and still have money for food and spend time with their children just being kids? Date nights and personal days and weekend get aways... nice clothes, manicures (yes they mentioned that specifically), hair salons... Super nice dinners at home, college courses, home decorating, family pictures, kids kids and more kids...
They had wonderful ideas on how to save a little on this, that or the other thing, but it all takes time... lots of time. Sorry, but they only gave me 24 hours each day. They themselves emphasized sleep and naps, where does the playing and cleaning come in then?
What really got my dander up (one of many things but the easiest to see) is when they said that by NOT doing all these things it showed that my husband/self/family wasn't priority. I'm sorry, but I'm not the one that hasn't given me a chance to shower in over a week. My husband wants me to look/smell nice, he's gonna have to take the kids for 5 minutes and let me do it- same goes with alot of other things. Somehow I've found time to do better on getting the house clean, keeping up with dirty laundry (clean still escapes me) and getting dishes done. But I've noticed a marked decrease in the playtime I get to spend with the kids. Now add in time I'm supposed to spend on myself- who's watching this boys, the dog?
How do I get all of it squished in? And achieve that imaginary balance that will make my life wonderful and happy?
Right now, 10:30 at night, the kids are refusing bed, there are toys on the floor, dishes in the sink, the stairs and under couches are BEGGING to be vaccumed and I STINK. I don't know about them, but I know MY priorities here...


Thank you for letting me get that out. Now I'm done. G'night.

A Father's Education

Every day that we head into town, Shane exalts in the educational tidbits his father has given him. We go up the bridge, and as we reach the top, looking out over the inlets and harbors, Shane spots the cruise ships anchored off shore. He is VERY dissapointed when the bay is clear of the "big ships" (yes, he will correct you if you call it a boat).
Today there were 2 Big Ships, with the little shuttles bringing the passengers ashore.
"Yook, yook at em big ships! Ships carry crazy tourists!" "Yook! Yook at all a crazy tourists!"
Brett spent MONTHS teaching Shane that phrase and is tickled to DEATH that it finally took. And boy did he take to it! We have to keep the windows rolled up as we inch through town so that no one hears his giggles and yells.

The Sitter's Tale

Ok, Saturday, Brett wanted to go fishing again- so he set up for the boys to go to a friend's home while I was at work. Brett woke up sick, but I took the boys over anyway- they LOVE to go play! I was late getting home from work, so Brett had already picked up the boys. His beg grin and silent chuckling worried me a bit. When I asked what was going on, he said that Austin had had an adventure- he sketched out a few of the bits he remembered and insisted I ask my friend for the rest of the story. Here it is... in her words...
(Others' names omited or changed to protect her privacy and ease embarassment- hope you guys like the ones I picked out for you.)

I was very careful not to let Austin get out on to the porch since the rails are too far apart. (This was discovered the first time they played there) Since that escape was blocked he decided that it was fun to open the front door. Bev and Gabe stopped by to pick up Brandy and the next thing we knew, Austin was at the bottom of the stairs by the drive way. We had a nice little laugh about how fast he is and how he climbs everything. After they left I put boxes in front of the door so he couldn't get out again. When Kaylee left to play outside with her friend the boxes didn't get put back and I forgot about them. When I went to use the bathroom, he made his escape. The next thing I knew my neighbor was bringing my dogs back because my door was opened. I thanked her and jokingly asked if she had seen Austin. (I had just come out of the bathroom and hadn't had time to see where he was. The other two were playing games on the computer.) She looked absolutely shocked and asked if I was talking about a cute little one year old whom she found in her garden climbing on some big rocks. She said she didn't recognize him and had asked the other neighbors who were outside if they had seen him before and since no one knew who he was, they called the police. The officer showed up about 5 minutes later! Here I was looking like I couldn't handle the tiniest little boy and having to explain to strangers about my bathroom habits. I'm glad Brett is laughing because I'm still in shock. You would think since the dogs were out too that they might have made the connection. So you can see that no cookies (as apology) or cameras (for documentation) were needed, just a story to add to his baby book and a friend who needs different door handles.

Brett says the Police Officer stayed to lecture my poor friend. I feel awful! Now you know why I don't get out much, they always come up with something like this to find trouble.

Dinner Time

After months of begging, Shane got to really help me prepare dinner. He's been fascinated with the process of making oven-fried chicken, so that's what we put together.

His job was to sprinkle the cracker meal onto the egg-dipped chicken pieces. With every spoonful, he'd chant, "sprinkle sprinkle sprinkle". Then we tried shakin' and bakin'. That was fun for a while too.
Austin did NOT get to help, but I'm sure it will be no time before he's ready for a job or two of his own.

We've visited our "backyard" playground alot this week as well.

Shane wasted no time in teaching Austin how to become Superman.

They also found a very nice, large dust patch.

When it wasn't getting into everyone's eyes, it was immense fun- as you can see.

Playground

More friends, at the park!

Everyone swing!

Adorable, I know.
Everyone remembers thse fun bouncy critters that used to be just about in every park.
These ones weren't all that bouncy- at all, but the boys enjoyed sitting on them regardless.
Here's Austin on the motorcycle, he'll be just like Daddy yet!

Shane wasn't too sure about this one. He insisted it was a shark that was going to eat him.
But we were good with the giant bumble bee.

Cones

With the wonderful weather, came popcicles and ice cream everyday! Yeah!

Drumsticks w/o nuts were on sale.
Both boys loved the chocolate coating. But Austin was the only one to discover the chocolate stopper in the bottom of the cone. That kid can smell chocolate from a mile away. He'd finished of the layer on the ice cream, then flipped the whole thing over and started in on the bottom. i had to steal it and finish off the creamy goodness before it met it's doom on the living room floor (moms have it so tough sometimes!). I saved him the bottom part, which he enjoyed thoroughly! As you can see.

Surfin' USA

The amazing weather gave us a chance to play at the beach with our friends too.

This is our little buddy Woods, trying out his Alaskan sea legs. He's an adventurer all right!

Armed with buckets and shovels, we played ourselves thoroughly sandy.

Austin even got a sunburn across his back from refusing to let me put sunscreen on him-

or his shirt, I wasn't picky about which but he was.

Some other kids playing there were hunting starfish to keep as pets for the afternoon.

They were great about showing the little kids, after a while, they even gave Shane his own to have. He quickly showed me his prized, and ran to throw it back into the ocean.

What a hero! (It didn't get very far out, so when he wasn't watching, I moved the little guy to a rocky pool where anoth star fish was already clinging to the stones.)

Cheese!

Sunny Sundays

A beautiful Sunday afternoon deserves a quiet adventure.

The boys were beyond excited to have Daddy coming on our ramble with us.
Shane was in charge of Paco.As with all boys, throwing rocks into the water was the main source of entertainment.

Shane proved himself posessing quite the form- he poses at every step!

Austin had his share of the fun too.

Daddy found a starfish for us to see.

Austin wanted to throw rocks at it.

Shane wanted it to 'swim with [his] whales'

(the little bulbs of seaweed)

What a great day!