Everybody needs a little quiet time

After a long, busy day we all need a little down time. Grandma was rubbing Jacob's back and he just crashed. I had to wake him up after an hour so he'll be up for dinner...let's see how long he'll be up tonight.
Hunter got some good quality time on the computer because god forbid that boy takes a nap!

More fun in the mountains!

We've had lots of fun running, tickling, and going on adventures in the forest. Right now the boys are with Grandpa searching for bears in the woods.

Jacob chucking rocks under the condo.

Having races around the so-called yard. It was just like the Olympics with the bucket being the hurdle.

A day at the track

The boys and I are up in Pinetop again with my mom and Hank. Today we went to a little family fun park in between Pinetop and Show Low. They had video games, go carts, and goofy golf. The boys were SO excited to do the go carts. We did the family ones first where the boys rode with us. Hunter loved it and had a big smile on his face as soon as we started driving. Our car was much faster that Mom and Jacob's so we passed them the first lap. We would have won but I let them catch up to us.

The boys then got to do the kiddie track where they got to drive their own go carts! They did pretty good and Jacob only crashed into the side a handful of times. Hunter has had practice driving his tractor and gator around our yard. For some reason Jacob never drove very much and his driving skills aren't that great. Both took the driving very seriously which you can tell in some of the pictures.

Trying to figure out the system at 4 years old!

One of Hunter's responsibilities is to feed Indy twice a day. I'm not a huge enforcer of this but if I ask him to do it, he'll feed her. He has told me that he likes to only feed her in the morning and not at night, so I try to have him do the morning one just so we don't have any struggles.

Yesterday morning I asked him to feed Indy and I happened to peer in her bowl after he put it down. There was a lot of food in there!

Me: Hunter, how many scoops did you put in Indy's bowl?

Hunter: 4

Me: How many are you supposed to put in?

Hunter: 2

Me: Well why did you put 4 in there? That's too much for her right now.

Hunter: I didn't want to have to feed her tonight so I put enough to last all day.

Such a little smarty pants!! We got home around dinner time and he checked on Indy's food. He told me see, there's still food in there so I don't need to feed her again!

And the latest chapter in our crazy lives...

We have a punching bag! Yup, we have a workout room now and the newest addition is this much wanted (by Ryan!) punching bag. It has held up overnight so I'm hoping our ceiling is safe from caving in.

The boys love it and while I was at work last night they went out and got everyone punching gloves so we don't injure our knuckles.

Jacob is so tired here.

Check out my gloves! Ryan was nice and got me the more padded ones. I made fun of them at first but they are SO much better than the red ones. So now when the boys are completely nutty I'm just going to send them to do some punching for a few minutes.

This is one of the few pictures of Hunter, he is getting camera shy these days.

In case you were wondering how it was hanging....

*I have no clue why my words aren't lining up with the pictures!)

Watch Jacob, he does this wind up swing...I think he has been watching too much Popeye!

What we do EVERY day....

Play Lego Indiana Jones on the Xbox 360. Every morning I get the same question, "Can we play Indian Jones? Please!" And every morning is the same answer, "If you don't argue with me before school you can play when you get home." As soon as I pick up the little monkeys from school I get bombarded with the question again. They come home put their backpacks down and on goes the TV. They are quiet for a good 45 min while they play one level. Once that level is over I get the other favorite question, "Can we play another level? Please!" And my answer every time, "After lunch you may play one more level." Which I get resounding cheers too.

Jacob has gotten pretty good at playing and I only hear Hunter's exasperated "Jaaaaaaaacob" every now and then. I look at it as good brother bonding and time for me to catch up on my Google reader get more things done around the house!

Poor child just can't hack it sometimes

The first day of preschool has FINALLY arrived!!!

Oh how I've waited for this day to come. 2 not so little boys anymore are both in preschool! Yup, that means I have 3 uninterrupted hours of free time to do whatever I want with!! Ok not so much whatever I want...I guess I do need to clean our house too, but that won't take too long.

The boys are going to a private in-home preschool that is taught by 2 sisters who are former teachers. They (and I) love it there! Hunter did SO well last year and I can't wait to see how Jacob does this year. I was a little worried about how they were going to be behavior-wise because if you've been around these 2 monkeys it tends to be just a tad chaotic. Thankfully they are in separate classes so that helps keep the craziness at bay.

They both had a great day and behaved well. Hunter was worried about Jacob for part of the morning. Ms. Lou Lou said he looked a little stressed because Jacob didn't take his folder out when he was supposed to. I love how he's so concerned about his little brother and making sure he does the right thing, let's hope that continues!

Hunter was very talkative when I picked them up today. I remember last year how I got nothing out of Hunter on the first day. This year a completely different story! I found out they read The Kissing Hand and how he got 2 chocolate kisses and Jacob only got one and how he shared his snack with Austin. I asked Hunter if he sat next to Jacob at snack and he said no. I asked Jacob who he sat by and he told me 2 girls and that they helped him open his cheese and crackers. That will be Jacob, hanging out with the girls who will help him and do things for him.

I can't wait to find out what they do tomorrow!

It's our very own water slide

The first time we did this was without the pool. Not a good idea, Jacob slid down and skidded across the grass. His poor little butt.

Once we got the pool set up they'd slide right on down and into the side of the pool.

Watch his mouth

If you watch carefully you can see Jacob's mouth opening and closing while he's cutting.

Professional Bull Riding

We got to go to the Professional Bull Riding Show (if that's what the call it) at Jobing.com arena. The boys had been before but this was my first time going. Oh my gosh it was so fun! We got there pretty early because Ryan someone thought the show started at 7 but it really started at 7:50! The boys liked watching the bulls being shuttled back and forth between stalls. The did keep asking when it was going to start. Thankfully we had some Dippin Dots to pass the time.

Ryan had warned my how Jacob doesn't like fireworks. That was the understatement of the year! That child is terrified of them. As soon as the arena went dark, Jacob went into panic mode: tears, crying, pleading with me to leave. So Jacob and I spent the majority of the introduction and pre-game show in the hallway watching on TV. But once the lights went on all was well in Jacob's world.

We stayed for quite awhile watching those cowboys get tossed off the bulls one after another. According to Ryan it wasn't a very good show and the scoring (which I didn't get at all) was pretty lousy. We saw a few who made it the required 8 seconds to get a score. No real good toss offs--no one got trampled or thrown into the wall. Isn't that what you go to see? Just like at hockey games, you go to see the fights, right?!

The 4th and final party

And it was a week after the little man's actual birthday!

My mom, Hank, and Ryan's parents came over for presents and cake. Jacob got an electronic keyboard and a Buzz Lightyear doll. Both presents were huge hits.

All I hear now is Jacob on the microphone with his mouth too close and the prerecorded polka music. Every now and then I get a show with Hunter playing and Jacob dancing...good times. The Buzz toy gets added to our other Toy Story toys. This is the 4th Buzz that we have but he is super special, he TALKS! Along with the piano music I now get to hear, "To infinity and beyond!" over and over.

After the presents were open we didn't hear from either kid for the next hour (or so it seemed like that long). They were both so engrossed with all the new toys it didn't matter if there were 2 sets of Grandparents to play with.


I think this is Jacob's embarrassed faces/poses. We're singing Happy Birthday to him and it's like he just can't stand all the attention on him.

And the celebration continues....

If you don't know, birthdays at our house last for a good week. So on the Wednesday after Jacob's birthday was his Chuck E. Cheese birthday party. He had a great time with all of his friends. I asked him the other day what was his favorite part and he told me playing all the games.

When it was time for the Chuck E. Cheese show, Jacob wanted nothing to do with it. He was so funny, because he had talked about this day for a good week. But by the time Chuck E. came to see us, Jacob wanted to crawl under the table. He did somewhat sit for his birthday medal but after that he was off playing games again.

I think by the end he was definitely birthdayed-out because he was just flinging off wrapping paper and not really looking at what he got. A couple of days later tho all his presents were opened and played with.

After 3 hours at the "place where a kid can be a kid" we all were completely exhausted. Both boys crashed on the way home and the mama got a short nap when we got home.