So tomorrow is the big day!

I don’t know how I’ll do getting up at 5:30 every morning. Ha!

I had a great weekend. I really enjoyed my day off on Friday. I did NOTHING. It was fantastic!

Saturday night Jarred and I went to Caleb’s dad to watch the UFC fights. They were great until the end. Oh well, next time.

Today I took the kids with my mom and brother to the pumpkin patch. I was highly disappointed in it. Wimples is SO much better and next year I will definitely continue our tradition.



Well anyway, I’ll let you know how the week goes.

Oh and baby girl turned 10 on Wednesday! Isn't she a doll?

Dear Caleb: 7 years, 10 months

Two months and counting until you will be 8 years old. You have decided you want your birthday party at Chuck E. Cheese and I have just booked it. I am STILL in shock that you will be eight.

When you turned one-five, I thought it was the coolest thing ever and couldn’t wait to see you grow. Now that you are turning eight, I realize just how fast time really does fly and I want you to just stay little. I miss cuddling with you. I miss kissing you goodbye without you getting all embarrassed. I miss your hugs, which are hard to get now. I miss you being a little boy.

Caleb I swear you get taller and taller each week. You are a head taller then all the other boys on your soccer team and most of them in your class. Everyone’s first reaction when they meet you and find out how old you are is, “Wow he’s really tall!” You want to play basketball and I think your height will really help you out with this.

Everyday when I pick you up from school I always ask you what your favorite part of the day is. And everyday you always answer, “playing tetherball”. Kid, you love this game! And even though everyday you also have some new cut from a ‘ropie’ or a bruise on your arm from a ‘bomb’ you keep getting back in there and playing. I think this is all you do at recess.

Soccer is almost over and I think you’re happy. You seem to be loosing your enthusiasm when playing a game. You are like me in so many ways, one main way is you go in strong with the best of intentions and bore easily. Then after you haven’t done it for a while you decide you miss it and want to play it again.

I love our playing catch times. We can go on for hours playing catch and we just talk and talk. You like to come up with quirky ways to play catch like, whomever misses the ball is a moose. Oh Caleb, how I love your quirkiness.

I have always tried to take lots of pictures of you. I’m so afraid that I will not be able to remember key times in your life and I never want to forget any part of it. You, however, are not a huge fan of having pictures taken and Lord help me if I’m trying to get a normal picture of you since you think it’s SO fun to make a goofy face right before I snap the pictures. Or better yet you get annoyed and won’t look at the camera. Trust me someday a future girlfriend is going to want to see these pictures!

You have this hair thing going on right now. While I think you are absolutely handsome no matter what, you have decided you want to grow out your hair. This is very hard for me. Dude, your hair is EVERYWHERE! I understand that this is just the beginning though…next thing I know you and I will be having disagreements on what you wear to school. As long as you wear boy’s pants and no makeup I think I’ll be ok.

Every morning I always tell you I love you with all my heart and soul. I do son. I really do. You are an amazing person and I learn so much from you. I thank God every day for trusting me to raise you, although sometimes I don’t know what he was thinking!

Love,

Mom

Fall

I love Fall. Fall means it’s time to break out the pumpkin spice candles and the cute sweaters that get locked away in the closet for the summer.

There is one road in particular that I love in the Fall. As you drop down the hill all you see is an array of beautifully colored trees to each side of you. I get so lost in them.

The days get cooler and shorter and the thought of hot apple cider makes me smile. The pumpkin patch trip will be here shortly and I am starting to get out the Fall decorations with a hint of Halloween.

I can’t wait to help Caleb pick out his Halloween costume and cover the front yard with spider webs.

Oh how I love Fall!

Dear Caleb : 7 years, 9 months

You just completed your first week of 3rd grade. You didn’t really have much to say about it which is like you, unless of course we’re talking about Pokémon or Phenius and Pherb – then you have a million and one things to say about it. Your teacher is ok and nice enough you say and that everything you’ve been doing is review stuff so it’s really easy. However you were with your dad all week, so I only got to talk to you about it while taking you to school. I love being able to take you to school every morning and this is something I will really miss when I get a new job.

It amazes me how you have jumped from a Kindergartener

to a third grader

Next thing I know you will be graduating high school, but I’m just going to shove that out of my head right now.

I want to start writing monthly letters to you as sort of a way to recap your growing up. Yes I know you are already 7 years, 8 months, 13 hours, 39 minutes, and 2 seconds old and I wished I would have started this when you were a baby, just like I really wish I had a big piece of cheesecake right now! But, better late then never huh?

You were sad to see summer break go but ready to see your friends at school. I was ready to get back into a routine. Summer really throws things off you know. You stayed up waaay too late and watched waaay too much tv, which you totally loved!

I’m not completely sure where you came from; perhaps you were sent by aliens because you really want to do your homework. You have since you started school. It would almost be a more affective punishment to not let you do your homework then to ground you for a week. Don’t get me wrong, this is a really good thing, it just completely surprises me because I would have rather let someone yank out my teeth then do my homework.

I talk about you all the time and how smart you are, because really it’s true and I think everyone needs to know it! Oh and I make sure to tell everyone how much you rock at soccer too! Really, you are like totally awesome at it! I was so upset that I didn’t get to see your last game when you made a goal! So not fair, I think you’re dad should have hit pause until I could be there. Don’t worry I talked to him about it and let him know he should always carry his pause button because you are always full of suprises.

Along with being awesome at school and sports you have a very strong, stubborn side to you which I’m completely sure you get from me. Just ask Grandma and Papa, they’ll tell you. Like for instance you and me went for a bike ride the other day. Remember? The one where you flat out decided you weren’t going to push your bike up the hill. Ya, that one. Now dear, sweet son I would have totally helped you carry your bike up that hill so you could just give in and have someone else do it for you but I wanted to teach you the value of completing something and to keep on keeping on when times get tough. Plus man I already had my own bike I had to push up this horribly steep hill and it really wasn’t possible to push two up! So seriously man, two people having a strong will in the same household, not a good thing. One of us needs to loose it! So you sat there for at least a good fifteen minutes throwing a really big fit while I tried my best to talk you up the hill but dude, you really know which buttons to push to make me jump out of my mind. It’s a darn thing you’re cute because sometimes I want to ship you back off to the aliens.

So little man, here’s to another month.

Love,

Mom

Yes we're alive!

I survived another week with two kids! Good job me!  They were like fabulous until the weekend I went camping again. And then, then they decided that they had to be as mean as possible to each other and spoil all the fun and bite each other’s heads off until their mouths were stuffed like chipmunks and then they missed each other like crazy when Makayla went back home.

Camping was kind of boring this time…Linda & Bob couldn’t go afterall and no one else could on short notice. But I did enjoy the time I spent with the kids (when they were nice).

Next week is my vacation and I am SO SO SO ready!! Nothing big planned. C and I will be spending a lot of quality time together and if he gets it his way there will be a lot of cartoons involved. And if I get it my way there will be a lot of TLC, HGTV, and some good movies involved.

Recap

Holy smokes it’s been busy (story of my life). I had a really really great weekend and not one picture to prove it! After getting some unrealistic people that put me in tears by the end of Friday, I am much much better and the weekend only continued to get better.

Friday night my son found a new best friend. A co-worker came over who thought it would be ok to play just one game with my son. Ha! One game? Hello they’re like total BFF’s now and Caleb wants to do this and that and this and that. One game, never offer to play just ONE game with a seven year old, prepare for like 200!

Saturday I spent with the kids—went to the park by the river and watched Caleb float down then walk up, then float down, and walk up, and float down, and walk up…………..and float down, and walk up. We also enjoyed watching the tubers (which we are totally going to do) go down the river…one guy ‘s ice chest got away and was yelling and yelling for someone to catch it….other’s were a little more careful—one guy had a baby floatie with a shade tied to his tube and his ice chest inside. Smart guy! Protect the beer!

Later that night I had a bbq which no one showed up to except my two single cute friends, geee how ironic is that?? *smile* I swear I did not do this on purpose!

I haven’t laughed as much as I laughed Sat night in a long long time! It was that laugh were your ab muscles tighten up and you can’t breath and your face freezes! Half the time I didn’t even know what was so funny, but man it was hilarious! We all played some DDR (Dance Dance Revolution), Twister, and Yatzee!

Then Sunday, we finished off the weekend at the waterslides! Note to self…always bring a friend for your child. C got bored pretty quick cause I'm uncool and can’t run 50 mph in every direction. But then we ran into our friends  and the boys all hung out and we all traded kids so we could go down the different slides!

C’s getting brave at his old age but still has some fear in him…so me being the sweet, sympathetic mother I am offered him $20 cash to go down the Black Widow (scary one). At first he said that no amount of money is worth facing his fear. And then he pulled out the Bible, THE BIBLE!—“The Bible says that money is not important!” No, I’m not going to hell, geese!

But after all day and much consideration, right as we were leaving he decided to do it. So he headed up the stairs, tube in hand while I waited at the bottom to witness his fear. (See, totally sympathetic!) They come flying out of there, Caleb stands up and screams with his arms up like a champ “That was Awesome!” Then he slowly walks over to me, looks at me like a long lost puppy would and says, “Do I still get the $20?” like he thought he wouldn’t since he loved it!

Ya, I’m so not making deals like that anymore!

What a fun weekend!

So as you will see we spent the weekend camping with some friends and had so much fun!

 

C was his normal self refusing to look at the camera.

Babygirl is much easier to convince....

Such a pretty little lady...

He's a cutie too...

And it's the morning! Can't you tell by C's hair?!

This was the "time out" rock...he looks thrilled huh?

Yep they both visited it! She actually fell asleep sitting there.

Oh boys!

 Day two is time for the hat and no makeup
We all gathered in the truckr and drove up the mountain...well, the kids drove



 This was the smoky view from the top. You can kind of see the lake.

 

 

Then Caleb got a little hungry and decided to eat the bait

We didn't catch anything

But we had fun

 

 

 

 

I think they plot against me

In general I only have three rules in my home:

1. Pick up after yourself.
2. Be nice.
3. Once you’re in bed, stay in bed and go to sleep. (just so we’re clear, my BIGGEST pet peeve is when my child gets up or needs something after bed, yes this may make me the worlds worst mom but I don’t care, once you’re in bed it is my much needed Lynsey time and I only get a short amount of it so if you need a drink that you didn’t get before bed then that takes five minutes of my time, then I only have 25 left, and if you are scared, well then that takes the remaining 25 and now I have no me time…get my drift?)

So having two kids in my home right now has presented a lot of, well, arguing over these three rules. I personally think they’re very simple, not complicated what so ever. They on the other hand have the need to defy EVERY.SINGLE.ONE.OF.THEM. over and over and over….oh and over.

They’re cousins, not brother and sister but you wouldn’t know the difference. Seriously, they cannot be nice to each other more then 5 minutes, if that. The other one is always wrong, one is constantly interrupting the other one which in turn turns into a huge emotional breakdown of “She’s always interrupting me!” ‘sob’ ‘sob’ ‘sob’. And then when Thing two trips for the 100th time in an hour, she gets upset because Thing one laughs at her.

In a matter of ten minutes, I can tell you where at in the house (or yard) they were, what they were doing (or eating) and that they’ve moved on to create another mess. And yes, I’m the mean mom who interrupts what they are doing to make you come inside and put their dishes in the sink or hang up their bathing suite. Yep I’m totally un-fun.

But you know, having two around the house means different conversations and perspectives. Like while Caleb was playing on the computer, Makayla went through old future embarrassment pictures with me and laughed and laughed and laughed. And breakfast isn’t just C and I sitting there saying three words to each other.

It’s kind of nice.

Hats off to parents of more then one!

So we survived morning number one of getting two kids ready. Thing one (Caleb) tried to refuse breakfast and Thing two (Makayla) had a melt down over Thing one hitting her with the toothpaste lid. But once we hit the car, they were both excited for the day! The camp put them in two separate groups so at least I don’t have to worry about getting a call saying they’ve killed each other.

I’m happy, tired, chewed up & spit out, and it’s only Monday.

Here’s to a crazy week!

Our Fun Saturday