Vacation Time

We are on our way to the airport. Hopefully we didn't forget anything. Derek says we only need a swim suit and flip-flops anyway. (And actually, he's not sure about the flip-flops). We'll be in sunny San Juan by 3pm.

The kids started their vacation at Casa de la Mandy last night. What a great friend! I know my kids will be safe, loved and have an awesome time while Derek & I get some much needed together time.

In honor of Mandy- there's a new counter to the right.

Click Here for Time Until We Return

Chocolate Milk

I love the two year old stage. Really, I know they say its terrible, but, I enjoy it. They are such complex little people, just trying to figure life out. I've noticed for the last few weeks that Max teeters back and forth between being extremely polite and down-right rude. For example, he frequently answers "no, thank you" when he doesn't want to do something. Like, I'll say, Max its time for a nap and he'll say, quite sincerely "no, thank you". But other times he's down-right rude. Like today at lunch. He had been requesting chocolate milk since right after church finished. Derek got him some water to drink while we were chatting with our friends. (I'll admit we tend to talk for a while and it must seem like it takes forever to a two year old). On the way to the restaurant, Max reminded us several times that he wanted chocolate milk and I assured him we'd get some soon. Once we were at the restaurant, we had to wait a few minutes for a server and I heard him quietly chanting, "I want chocolate milk, I want chocolate milk." I was quite relieved when the waitress took our drink orders. But then she disappeared for a while. Another waitress came over to help and innocently asked if we needed anything at which point my sweet little two year old stood up in his chair and shoved his sippy cup in her face and said:

I WANT CHOCOLATE MILK!!!!!

I could have crawled under the table from embarrassment but Andy & Denise thought it was hysterical. What's even funnier is later I discovered this shirt in Max's drawer. How appropriate. Good thing we weren't wearing it today.

DA Talent Show

Kaylee's shirt says "I performed in the 1st ever Destiny Academy Talent Show and lived to tell about it."

Today was, as you might have guessed, the first ever Destiny Academy Talent Show. Destiny Academy is the home-school co-op that our kids attend. Destiny Academy is designed to give home-schooled students opportunities to experience school-like activities. The talent show has been something they've wanted to do for a couple years but haven't quite had the parents and kids to pull off. In fact 2 years ago they tried to have one and only Kaylee and one other kid signed up. This year 27 kids performed 18 acts (there were several duets and an entire class performed a dance). The parents did a great job keeping the show moving and one of the Dads did an awesome job running the sound. They even had those great t-shirt made up for each of the participants. The talent show was a huge success and I'm sure will be come a regular part of the yearly schedule.

Kaylee performed a lyrical dance and Nate performed a short song, a capella. I'm extremely proud of both of them. For Kaylee, it was her first dance solo and she choreographed it herself (and learned how hard that is- I think she'll have a new appreciation for her dance teachers). For Nate, just getting up on his own and singing in front of a crowd was a huge accomplishment.

I'm trying to load the video of Kaylee's dance to you tube to share. I'll add a link if I can get it to work. Unfortunately, we hadn't quite figured out the video feature on the camera for Nate's performance so all we have of that is him walking off stage to applause. Talent Show Videos

Free Chocolate!

This post is for all my friends that just stay home all day and eat bon-bons. You know who you are.

Bath?

Just when you think there is nothing to blog about....

Nate volunteered to help Max take a bath this evening. Neither boy really needed a bath but they like playing in the water so its fine with me. Good thing neither needed to actually get clean because this is what I found when I checked up on them.



No need for strategically placed stars in this bath photo . You can't see anything!



But the boys played together for 15 minutes and didn't completely flood the house so its good.



For the record, Nate says he was just trying to make the water purple but he added too many of the little color tabs and then decided to add yellow to the blue & red to see what color it would make.

Happy Thursday to Max

When Max says "happy birthday" its sounds a lot more like "happy thursday" so all morning Kaylee & Nate have been wishing Max a "happy thursday" just for fun.



My mom called from Florida this morning around 8am and since I have to work and the kids have co-op we decided to have Max open his presents right away. We put Grandma on speaker phone so she could hear what was going on.



First Max opened Grandma & Grandpa's present. As soon as he saw a bit of yellow he grinned and said "MY Mickey!" You see, last February Grandpa bought Nate a Mickey Mouse at Disney World, and ever since then Max has been trying to claim it. Max & Mommy are both glad that Max now has his own Mickey.





See the look he's giving his brother?



Thanks Grandpa & Grandma!



Max has also been asking for a bike so this was the big present from Mommy & Daddy. November isn't the best month for getting a new bike but I'm sure he'll still get a little use in the garage or basement during the winter. Best thing about this bike is I got it on clearance for $5.99 over a year ago! I've just been waiting for Max to be big enough for it.

So far I think Max has had a "happy thursday!" We'll have the Elmo Cake and blow out candles tonight after Dance & Swim Practice are over (around 8pm) and of course we'll sing "Happy Birthday" (correctly).

Cake Wreck

It's a good thing Max is only turning two or I might have to explain why Elmo's head is cracked in half.



Thing is-- I have no idea why this happened to my cake. Oh well, add more sprinkles and the plastic Elmo face & call it good. After all he's only 2.



If I were a professional you could submit my cake to the Cake Wrecks blog. You should check it out. One of my favorite humor blogs!

The last day of being one.

Tomorrow my baby turns two.







Bring it on.

Oh brother!

This falls into the "he'll kill me for this later" category. But I'm not sure which one will get me first.

Will it be Max? The one that got out of the shower this morning and then ran into the computer room to stand on a chair right next to his big brother, to watch his big brother playing computer games?

Or will it be Nate? The big brother who was so sweetly and innocently playing computer games when out of the blue- he got pee'd on by his little brother standing on the chair next to him?

Yep. You read that correctly. Max stood on a chair and peed on his brother. Then they took a shower together. I guess that's what being brothers is all about.

Max's Message

Due to my job,by law I'm not allowed to engage in political activity. But Max has a message for you.

What I love about fall

Halloween Highlights

We had a busy Halloween weekend. Here are some highlights.

Thursday Afternoon- Halloween Party at the Homeschool co-op. Mommy got to pick the costumes for this event so I picked the Chronicles of Narina. Unfortunately this is the best group picture of the three of them. Individually they are fairly photogenic but together- not so much so.


Max didn't really like the party. I helped out in his classrom and he threw an absolute fit any time I tried to help another child. He also decided he hated the knight costume and it had to come off. Needless to say I didn't get a good picture of him.


But then they served cupcakes and the world got a whole lot better.


On Friday, Kaylee had a sleep over and went Trick or Treating with a bunch of friends. She dressed as a "spy girl" complete with trench coat and brief case. The rest of us went to a Halloween Party at another friend's house. The boys were happy to Trick or Treat with several of their friends. Nate chose to be spiderman and Max chose Elmo.

Swim Meet Results

Nate's particpated in his second swim meet on Saturday morning. It was in Grand Blanc and warm up started at 8am so we had to get up around 6:30. That's just not right for a Saturday.

Anyway Nate did great and had a great time.

25 Free- 28.17- improved time & finished 12th
50 Free- 1.12.77- improved time, awesome flip turn & finished 7th
25 Back- 29.76- finished 9th

Today was his "Marlin Marathon." Each swimmer gets assigned a certain number of laps and they get pledges for those laps as a fundraiser.

Nate was assigned 30 lengths. He swam 85. I think he's hooked on this swimming thing.