A trip to the zoo

Well, we decided to take a little trip to the Henry Vilas Zoo the other day when Josh had off. He had to work on his actual birthday (April 18th - the big 3-0!!!) so this was kind of his happy unbirthday. We went down to Madison in the morning, saw the animals, ate our little picnic lunch, then went back in for a little while longer. We left at about 2:00 and the boys both slept on the hour long ride home. It was a really fun and FREE day! (minus the gas money I guess) I love that the boys are both to the age now where I don't have to worry about packing a huge diaper bag with bottles, milk, extra clothes, etc. and Caleb is to the age where you don't have to carry him nonstop. I told my friend this and she's like, "You better hurry and get pregnant before you totally get out of baby mode!" I'm like, "No, I think baby mode will be better if it's when my two boys are like, 4 and 6 and I only have one kid in diapers!" So we'll see...





















Caleb is definitely entering terrible twos. He has this eye-piercing shriek when he wants something and I say, "No." It's turned a few heads lately (at the mall... in Target.... at the zoo....) everyone hears it and I can see them like, turn to their neighbor with this, "Whoa, glad I'm not that kid's parent!" look. And I'm all, "Yup. He's mine. All mine." :) I must say though, I think he is the strongest kid on the block. There are times that I really think he is already stronger than me. I will post a picture of him in his diaper showing off his buff bod.

Caleb's seriously catching up...

One of the ways that I motivate Gabe to eat is by saying, "You better eat it all. Caleb's gonna get bigger than you!" Some days I wonder just how much longer will it be. I think Gabe will always be tall (he is 42" - we measured yesterday.) I think he weighs about 40 pounds give or take. Caleb, I am guessing, is about 37" tall and weighs about 37 pounds. I was going out to buy Caleb and Gabe some new shoes the other day and trying to decide their sizes. Gabe is just going into an 11 and Caleb? He's a 9. Wide. Here is a picture of my little boys comparing feet. The pictures just got funnier and funnier. First, "This little piggy..." then turned into, "Here Caleb... smell my sock!!!" Typical boys....






Then I had to put down the camera and save Caleb....

Easter

Hi everyone! This week we had the craziest weather. Normally I feel weather is a boring thing to talk about but it was insane! We hit over 80 degrees two days last week! I was actually sweating playing in the backyard with the boys. Then on Saturday it cooled down a little. We had an Easter egg hunt at the church on Friday and one in our backyard with the neighbor boys on Saturday. Caleb is a candy fiend. He can't eat it fast enough. As soon as e finds as egg, the candy is out and in his mouth. Gabe is more selective about what he'll eat. I think he just likes the hunt better. Sunday the boys found their baskets and then we had dinner with my grandma and relatives because it was her birthday. They also had a little Easter egg hunt at her house (but she put quarters in the eggs - which I prefer :) Here are some picures of Easter festivities...



"Alright... what is this crap? Where's the candy?"


Gabe actually fell asleep like this. Or maybe he was in a sugar coma...

The Gabe In the Hat and The Cat in the Hat

One of those days...

I just had to post today even though I have recently. Today was just one of those days that you just say, "I can't wait for this day to be over!" Josh was playing in the stake basketball tournament this morning and lured me to come with the promise of shopping at the outlet malls in between games. Unfortunately for me, his team actually did well so the time in between games was not very large. I ended up chasing the boys around a junior high school cafeteria for most of the morning.

When we got home from that, luckily Caleb napped. However, Gabe did not. Which meant he was extra cranky when my sister and her little girl came over at 4:30. I think Gabe had about 5 timeouts in his room between 4:30 and 6:00. Then once he was settled down (somewhat) Jasmine (my niece) got mad at Rachel for telling her to color at the table, and decided to show her frustration by coloring with that black marker all over my white dining room walls. As I was wetting down the magic eraser to clean it up, Gabe starts bawling in the living room. Jasmine had bit his finger pretty bad (in her defense she said he hit her first - which he admitted....) so we needed a band-aid for that.

Less than five minutes later as Rachel is dragging Jasmine out the door, Caleb says, "Juice! Juice!" I was in the kitchen at the time and turned around just in time to see the full glass of orange soda that Rachel had been drinking, fall all over Caleb's white shirt like a waterfall and all over the dining room floor. I pulled his shirt and pants off and left him in his diaper while I filled the sink with hot water and some bleach for his white shirt - which took about 1 minute maybe. In that minute Caleb pooped his diaper so bad it was liquidous and coming out the sides. I quickly carried him up to the bath tub with my hands under his armpits and hosed him down. Yuck.

After that I put him to bed and got Gabe settled downstairs with a snack. I was sitting there, looking at my totally trashed house - black marker on walls, orange soda on floor, stained clothes in sink, dinner still on the table, toys covering the floor so bad I couldn't see my carpet... and I thought to myself, "Those moms who say they look back on these early years and miss it when their house was a mess must be crazy!" I always tell Josh I must be different cause I'm pretty excited for when it's just me and him again! But then I went upstairs to check on Caleb because he kept occasionally saying, "Mama..." and when I went in there and picked him up out of his crib he snuggled into me so close and put his head down on my shoulder and started patting my back and I just thought, "Aww...this makes it worth it." Of course this is what I will remember through rose-colored glasses when I am fifty and telling some fried young mom "I miss those days." Moms have an amazing ability to remember the good don't they? They must or else every family would only have one child because no woman would ever want to go through labor twice, right?!

Then I came downstairs from Caleb's room and Gabe was sitting on the floor with this doodle pad he has (the kind you slide a thing across the bottom and it erases it) trying to write his name. It was so cute. I wrote his name on the top and then drew a box under each letter and he went through very carefully and copied each one in the box below it. He was so proud of himself he set it on the couch and told me not to touch it because he wanted to show daddy when he got home. "Awww" again. My kids are so cute. I don't know who those monsters were at my house earlier.... THESE are MY kids. :)

This past week, my brother and his wife, their little girl, Milana, and their new baby, Colter, came to visit from Montana and my dad also came up from Florida. Gabe and Milana both have March birthdays so we had a party for both of them while they were here. Gabe got his Buzz Lightyear toy that he's been wanting for a couple months now when he saw a little boy at church with one. (It talks though so we don't trust him to take HIS to church!) We had lots of fun seeing everyone and going swimming at the Holiday Inn. It seems like just yesterday we had three little babies (my brother, my sister, and I all had our first ones within 3 months of eachother.) Now we have 4-year-olds and two more!!! It's crazy how fast time flies.

Party time!

Our little girl....

Okay, so as if I needed any more incentive to wait to have my next child, I saw this link on a friend's website for a baby generator. I uploaded mine and Josh's picture, clicked that I wanted a baby girl, and this is apparently what our darling baby girl is going to look like. First I burst out laughing. Then I was like, "Oh my gosh... what if she really DOES look like that?!" I better go check to make sure I remembered to take my pills...

Newest pet attempt

I have never considered myself an animal hater. But compared to Josh, who is lover of all things nonhuman - everything from dogs to the baby ducklings he brought home TO MY APARTMENT from a river trip when we were engaged (WHY?), I guess I am a hater. So, after this summer when we had little puppy, Molly, and found her a new home after about 8 weeks of puppy-h-e-double hockey sticks.... I vowed our home would not be a home for animals. I like animals. They are just so much work sometimes! And with two small boys, I did not have the patience for following around a dog all day making sure it didn't pee in the corner.

But Josh? No. He has not given up. He actually wants a HUSKY! Wow. I told him when we move back to Idaho and we have a big backyard with a field he can poop in and I don't have to let him in and out all day, then it's fine. So he was pretty bummed and very, VERY convinced "the boys need a pet" that HE suggested a CAT! I was shocked. I had a cat in highschool and fine with them but had no desire to get another one. But after visiting the humane society a few times we found one we really liked and have since fallen in love with him. He is pretty obese. He looks like a big stuffed animal sleeping next to Gabe every night. (Yes, he sleeps in Gabe's bed.) But he's very good-natured and relaxed with the boys. And pretty much no work for me! Yay! :)

So here's the really funny part. Josh - the animal man - loves this cat too and decided he wanted to make a scratching post. However, somehow the "post" turned into this....



What can I say? Josh is both talented and very weird. The cat looks evil here because of the eyes but he really is a good cat. His name was Lucky at the Humane Society and we decided to keep it that. Gabe LOVES him. Caleb is still just intrigued and points and says, "Kitty!" Here's a couple more pics...

Bam Bam

We have nicknamed Caleb "Bam-Bam" for his ability to destroy a room in mere seconds. He doesn't know his own strength sometimes! He's such a cutie though... so we let it slide.

Blue Harbor

Well, we took our little annual winter waterpark weekend last Thursday and Friday. There's this new one only about an hour away right on Lake Michigan that we tried this time called Blue Harbor Resort. I really liked it. It wasn't so huge like the ones in Wisconsin Dells that take 15 minutes just to walk from your room to the waterpark. The boys, especially Gabe, are real water-lovers so they had a lot of fun. Gabe spent a lot of time on the slides. He even got brave the second day and did some of the non-kiddie ones! Caleb was content to float the lazy river with me. :) Here's some pics!











Gabe doing "This little piggy..." Caleb loves that.


And our other news is that Josh sold his Camry (the '97 one) and we bought a Highlander. (Don't worry, it's an '04 so no recall on it....:) We always planned on getting one and it just happened that Josh's car sold really fast and then we were like, "Uh...guess we need another car now or I'll be stranded at home all day!" Luckily we had already test drove this one and had really liked it. So, we're ready for five kids now!!! JK!!!! Don't even ask me when the next one is. After chasing 2 little boys at the waterpark this weekend I realized I am SO not ready for a new baby yet!