Mommathon

It was a beautiful day today and we needed to get these boys out of this apartment, so we went to the arboretum. We love the arboretum in KS so we knew the boys would have fun.

Liam pointing to the mountains in the distance.

The trees are TALL in these parts. 🙂

Moss grows on everything around here.

Checking out the map.

Glad we saw this after our hike. The sign says that coyotes won’t attack humans, but I don’t think we would have been able to get Liam to go if he had seen this sign beforehand.

This is what Mt. St. Helens looked like from where we were on our hike today. This picture does not do it justice. It is breathtaking.

I remember a time, maybe a couple of times, when Sean REALLY tried to talk me into a gas stove, but I would hear nothing of it. What was I thinking???* We have a gas stove in our apartment and I love it. Gas is awesome. 🙂

*Actually I do know what I was thinking. I was thinking at the time that we had two young boys and that open flames and little boys do not go hand in hand.

I absolutely LOVE the toy store by our house. I love it because we can walk to it. I love it because it reminds me of a toy store in KS and I love it because they let you check games out. Yes, that’s right. You can check games out. Isn’t that awesome??? We checked out Castle Keep and Make ‘N’ Break. Castle Keep is great. I have played it with both of the boys and they both really liked it. I like it because it’s fun and there are several different ways you can play the game making it easier or more difficult. Make ‘n’ Break isn’t my favorite. We can keep them for a week, take them back and then get some new games.

You know my life must be somewhat back to normal if I am posting menus! 🙂

Sunday-Hot Italian Sausage with Peppers, Tomatoes and Onion, Red Grapes and a Baguette
Monday-Crockpot BBQ Chicken and Cornbread, Red Grapes
Tuesday-Pasta with Meatballs
Wednesday-Sloppy Joes, Corn, Fruit
Thursday-Kitchen is Closed
Friday-Foil Tilapia, Asparagus, Noodles
Saturday- ????

Do you know what is so great about this dishwasher? It actually gets all of the dishes clean. It is fantastic. I could not STAND my highly overrated stainless steel dishwasher we had in KS. It was supposed to be super quiet. You know why it was so quiet? Because it wasn’t doing anything. Anyways, this circa-1986 dishwasher is loud AND it cleans my dishes. Hmmm….a dishwasher that actually washes the dishes. Genius! 🙂

One of the benefits of half-day kindy is that you have lots of time on your hands time to do lots of enrichment activities. Colm expressed an interested in swim lessons, so after searching high and low, I found him some. (I enrolled him on Tuesday night and swim lessons started on Wednesday morning. I had been warned that swim lessons fill up fast so I felt very lucky to have found a spot open. Granted, we weren’t able to get in at the pool closest to us.) Anyways, he has a guy for a swim teacher which he thinks is pretty cool and there are only two other kids in his class. He did a fantastic job on his first day. 🙂

I have had my eye on a certain Vera Bradley pattern for a week or two now, but just could not get myself to buy it. Those darn things are expensive!!! So, when I saw a “50% off Vera Bradley” sign outside my local Hallmark store I just had to go in and check it out. This was not the pattern I mentioned earlier, but at 50% off, I just couldn’t say no.

It was a nice, sunny day here so we decided to head to the zoo. I am so glad we went. It is a great zoo and we had a fantastic day.

Making animal footprints in the sand.

I don’t know that I have ever seen a wolf in person until today, but I will tell you that they are VERY big!!!

Feeding the lorikeets…I ended up feeding two lorikeets at the same time and one of them would not leave me alone. He crawled up onto my shoulder and started pecking at my purse. I finally had to ask a zoo worker to help me. Of course the boys thought it was hilarious. I thought it was funny too, for a little while. 🙂