Yellow Belts!

I know what you're thinking -

WHY we would arm these boys with MORE fight knowledge?

;-)

But - I was thinking along the lines of them learning some self-discipline - ya know, that sort of stuff.

Anyway, Austin and Logan's grandparents and us paired up to give the boys karate uniforms and 6 weeks of lessons as our Christmas gift.

Needless to say, the gifts were a HUGE hit!

And...there was some self-discipline learned in there.

Somewhere!

Mid-February, they tested for their yellow belts.

Logan is the boy closest to us.

And Austin is the one further away.

Austin getting his certificate and belt.

Logan

My attempts to get better pictures after:

Not the best photos, the lighting sucked.  - but the memories of a wonderful adventure are there!
Next stop, baseball!

Mummies!

We recently went to the local museum and learned all about mummies!  Boy - I got a slight taste of what the teachers must go through on a daily basis!  I'm glad my boys like learning, but my oh my - the questions were non-stop!  ;-)

Our "old" neighbors, Sean and Ryan completed out the foursome on this trip!

 Sean (he's HUGE), Ryan,

Austin and Logan

Austin is in the red, Logan front and grey.

This picture cracks me up...and freaks me out! 

I just interviewed the

boys to see if they could

"add" to this post so that it's not just pictures!

Logan says, "We were REALLY freaked at first!"

and then he sang the Backyardigans song: "What's so fun about Ancient Egypt..."

He continued, "The symbols on their tombs means special stuff.  And I learned that they got wrapped in cloth. And that one of the mummies at the museum had a bowl stuck to his head where the oils had dried!  And afterward, me and Austin got scared of the Mummies because we had nightmares."

[..although, I don't think Austin really did!]

And after all of that, I asked Austin what he wanted to say about the day at the museum and he said,

 "We didn't have ANY snacks!!"

Tru dat, my little man. Tru dat!

;-)

But, we did have outside play time!

I think this is our second "cultural" experience in 5 years.  This time, nobody yelled at us like they did here!

Blizzard of 2012!

We've spent most of this winter in short sleeves, yet....the snowgods shined down upon us and brought us a real snow storm this weekend!

After we got home from church, we had a real wet, icy snow.

But enough for Daddy and the boys to have a snowball fight!

Then, not much else happened.
Or rather, we sorta missed it.
Inside watching a movie, on the way to bed - this is what had happened outside!

I went to bed crying, SO upset because we hadn't taken the boys out in the snow, and the weather forecasters said with the warmer temperatures, it was going to melt quickly in the morning.
;-( 

I had Gary wake me up at 5am!  I tried to wake the boys up.
;-)
But...they wouldn't bunch.
I let them be and at 7am, they woke up ran to the window, saw we still had snow on thr gound and
we ran out of the house and were on the hills by 7:19am! 
;-)

YAY!!!
And dear lord! I must have dressed them TOO warm, because they never complained about the cold - not once!
Austin just fussed about his gloves every two seconds.
Our dear friends joined us.
And THREE HOURS later,
we finally got them to come in for hot cocoa and an insdie playdate.
By 1:30pm - the snow was gone!
What an AWESOME, AWESOME day!!

(And I learned that 8am sunlight makes for amazing photos!)
Logan -  blue, Austin - green
(Their Power Ranger colors!)

Now, we are fully ready for Spring!

Valentine's Day

Holidays just take on soooooooo much excitement and fun these days!!!

For Valentine's, Austin wanted to make birdfeeders - found a super easy way to do that, but haven't heard back from the birds, yet.

We mixed gelatin with the bird seed  and then filled cookie cutters.

Too cute!  If not a little sticky!

Logan wanted to make everyone special cards.

(Austin, left. Logan, right.)

They were intense with their car making!

And for Nonnie's card, Logan wanted me to make the BIGGEST heart that I could.

Sweet!

Then, a few month's back, the boys wanted Tinkerbell to have a birthday, so based on estimations, we calculated her birthday to be sometime in February...why not Valentine's Day!

(Why, yes it DOES say "Tink" and it does have a little pink paw print, too!)

HUGE side story: 

This is Cake 2 two.
Cake 1 exploded!
Yes...exploded! I had cooked the cake in a glass dish.   Then, set it on top of the stove...where I had just removed the pan with the melted gelatin for the bird feeders and suddenly, I had to duck a flying power ranger morpher that was being thrown at a brother in anger. I stopped to reprimand everyone...and in less than 5 minutes...KABOOM!  Exploding cake!   Cuz when ducking flying power ranger morphers, one tends to forget to turn off the stove.  And glass pans do NOT like to cook on the top of a burner.  Yikes!  Kids and I were just a few feet away. Thank GOD no one got hurt. Austin saw the whole thing - the cake got BIGGER and BIGGER and then when it exploded, and the glass went flying, he thought that ice had come crashing in through the windows!  He wants to me to "do it again!"  Logan, my angst filled child would like to move to another house where cakes don't explode!

Okay, so back to Tinkerbell's party.

Logan wanted her to have a bone cake that she could eat.
Don't ask me how to gods shined down on this one, but lo and behold, one was found.

[dang picture won't load, errrr]

Tink -
You are tiny. You are precious!
You hang with the boys for fun and play.
You snuggle down with all of us at night.
You wake us up withkisses each morning.
You greet us like we are the best thing to ever happen to you.
You are my only other female companion in the house.
I LOVE taking you to work with me!
I LOVE watching my big, burly husband run down the street after you, calling out "Tinkerbell! Tinkerbell!"  It really makes me giggle!
We didn't expect you. We weren't planning on you.
But you are such an awesome little addition to our family!
WE love you, and Happy Birthday, precious!

 (Logan, Austin, Tinkerbell and Nonnie)

Kisses for Logan.

Kisses for Austin.

Annual Superbowl Picture!

Superbowl through the years!  Click here to see the first 3 years, and now adding to that post!

2010

Bonus, we added our good buddy, Van to the shot!

2011

So big!  Ack!

And now 2012

 With a bonus add of Van's little brother, Zak!

;-)

I love seeing them "grow" like this, the time stamp of it.

I do NOT like my boys growing up, though!

;-)