Y-E-L-L-O-W Yellow!!!

If you're not beaten down by our color days yet then dive in with us for YELLOW DAY!!

We started the morning with a yellow breakfast of scrambled eggs (a rare departure from the zombie nutrigrain bar that I'm usually giving out to buy me a little time as I slowly come out of the fog in the morning) bananas and pineapple/orange juice.

Then it was on to lemon paintings. We used lemons as our paintbrushes...oooo...ahhhh.

Then we got on our yellow clothes (III asked me if we were going to church :) Nope we just don't have a whole lot of yellow) and made yellow collages. This was probably my favorite activity today, it was easy and held their attention longer than most things. Because of the boys ages I had already cut out lots of yellow stuff for them to pick from, but they chose what they wanted and glued everything on with a glue stick. They were both very opinionated and particular about what they chose and where they wanted it. Stacey also picked out the letters Y-E-L-L-O-W for both collages.

The night before I had hidden six yellow pears around the house for the boys to find. This was no doubt III's favorite activity all day. He wanted to hid and find them over and over and over. You just never know what they are going to like. He kept saying, "Where are dos pears, they sure are tricky." Later he told me, "The reason I am so good at that pear game is cause I love it." Um, and I love you!!

When I was picking up a few things at the store for this day I spotted these yellow marshmallows. My boys are CRAZY for marshmallows so I figured I could incorporate them somewhere. We made a marshmallow and pineapple skewer snack (reminiscent of our fourth of July ones). They had one for a snack and I made some to save for lunch.

you are my sunshine's...my only sunshine's...

Lunch consisted of the pineapple & marshmallow skewer, applesauce, a grilled cheese sunshine sandwich and Squirt - aww refreshing.
I had thought about renting Ol' Yeller, but figured I might scar them for life so we went with the less rabiesish, but still yellow, Wow Wow Wubbsy instead.
We couldn't have yellow day without making yellow cupcakes, I mean it says yellow right on the box!!
We iced them with lemon icing and turned them into sunshine cupcakes with candy corns, followed by a deep dark sugar coma
I printed out a Yellow Things Booklet just like blue day as well as a connect the dots for III.

Clearly there is NO career for me in food photography, because this meal really didn't look as bad as it does in this picture! We had mac & cheese (we do occasionally feed our children things other than macaroni and cheese - occasionally), corn on the cobb, pineapple flavored jello jiggler stars and lemonade. The lemon garnish in the boys cups proved to be very distracting so don't try that at home.

We finished the night fishing for yellowtail snapper (is that a real fish?) in our color day appropriate yellow bathroom. Who knew that the yellow tile bathroom that was on the, "Oh we'll just re-do that immediately" list when we bought the house, yet sits untouched four years later, would be the perfect finale for Yellow Day :)!

Stacey will start preschool after labor day so I'm not sure how many more color days we'll be squeezing in this summer, but you just never know when I'll get the hankerin' for all things green, or purple, or orange or... :)

You knew it was coming...

(tune of If You're Happy & You Know It)

Y-E-L-L-O-W, yellow

YELLOW (shout it)

Y-E-L-L-O-W, yellow

YELLOW (shout it)

Like the Early Morning sun

when the day is just begun

Y-E-L-L-O-W, yellow

YELLOW (shout it)

The Secret Life of Bees

My sweet friend Wendi, who I have blogged about before, that resides in Doha has been back in Texas for the summer. And we have been soaking up as much of her and her boys (Brooks & Barrett, affectionately the "Bees") as we possibly can before they head back to the desert in a few weeks. We also got to see Nick while he was in town - as well as all these fun folks: Kristin & Kieth, Shannon & Brad, Me & Stacey, Shea & Eric, Wendi & Nick.

One night Shannon hosted us for dinner and the crowd pleasing build your own sundae for dessert. Here is the whole posse.

Brooks stuck with plain vanilla while Stacey threw the less is more theory to the wind and created this. Yikes!

Then, last week we got to keep Brooks and Barrett one evening. It seems like our boys are usually keeping us on our toes with the same interests, milestones or mischief so it was especially fun for us to have them all four together. And, after several play dates the last few weeks they were finally buddies instead of strangers.

We did a little painting. We were technically using the trucks as the paintbrushes and leaving tracks, but it was really more of a freestyle.

Stacey was in his I'm so excited and I don't know how to express it other than to be loud and act weird mode for the beginning of the evening, I think this picture says it all. He eventually reigned it back in. I'm hoping by high school the loud + weird = excited will have somehow been resolved. If not it may be a rough 4 years. :)

Then we hit the sprinklers.On your mark, get set....GO!! Big brothers Stacey and Brooks were always a little faster out of the blocks then their slower shadows Wyatt & Barrett.

We pulled out all the finest in culinary cuisine for the distinguished pallets of our refined guests.

We are going to be missing us some Bees when they're gone :(. But, we'll be looking forward to their next visit to big D!!!

Hawaiian Falls

Yesterday we got to return to Hawaiian Falls with our friends Karla, Noah & Haley for Maui Moms Monday (great discount). We went once earlier in the summer but chose the one rainy day in the middle of endless 100 degree days so it was a little chilly and we ended up running for cover in the storm. Thankfully, yesterday was sunny and beautiful. The above monstrosity has lots of great slides that the boys could go on all by themselves. That, plus a wave pool and "mushroom" pool were all perfect for our guys. III still can't pick a favorite because, as he says, they were ALL his favorites!!!





Noah & Stacey were like fish swimming and playing nonstop. I think they would have closed down the park if exhaustion (and the nap needs of some little siblings) hadn't finally set in.
We can't wait to go back next summer!

Iron Chefs

(We cooked Big dinner for his birthday - this was our "invitation")

Potty Time!

WARNING: If you're not a mother of a soon to be, or recently potty trained or training child you're probably not going to give a flip and perhaps may even be offended by the TMI nature of this post so consider yourself warned. That said I know I'm always curious how other do it so here's you go.

On a bit of a whim we decided to start potty training with Wyatt this week. Stacey (husband, just in case you were worried I was being bullied by my 4 year old) has been suggesting for awhile that we should give it a try, but Wyatt hasn't shown much interest and I was putting it off as long as possible. But, we had a wide open week on our calendar and in a few short weeks things will get much more scheduled so I couldn't deny any longer that this was as good a time as any to give it a try.

I reviewed the three day potty training method. I know it takes much longer than this, but it's just the pep talk I need and I try to honor most of its methods for the first three days. At the very least to gage where we were and commit to giving it my all this week. And as a rule follower by nature I like having a little instruction guide.

Wyatt woke up to a potty present!! I love gifts and getting it ready for him helped me get excited (well as excited as you can get about potty training) too. I told the boys it was Potty Day!!! which thrilled them. I think they were envisioning more of a fun filled Color Day, but actually it was all about potty training - sorry to disappoint. There were a few prizes and slushies involved so it wasn't all bad.

The potty present, just in case you care, contained a new potty seat (the one we used with Stacey is MIA, I turned the house and garage upside down to no avail and finally just bought a new one - boo), lots of underwear (all III's hand-me-downs - I know it looks like a lot but we used every single pair on day one), a potty book (I'm usually not a fan of these, due to my aversion to all things potty and overly graphic photos, but this one is sweet and simple and accept for the highly annoying flushing button I recommend it. Wyatt likes me to read it to him while he is on the potty and both boys can pretty much quote the whole thing after the 1,820 times we've read it this week. I got it for 1/2 off at TJ Max and they have a girl version too), and jelly beans (or belly-jeans to Wyatt), his sweet reward for getting it done.

He was thrilled.

We also "threw away" all the diapers together. Don't worry, I would no more throw away a twenty dollar bill than discard of perfectly good unused diapers, but it was symbolic. And you know how much Wyatt appreciates symbolism. :)

So really there was nothing left to do but take the plunge (that's a little potty humor for you).

Schedule cleared - check

Potty present given - check

All rugs and bath mats rolled up for safekeeping - check

Variety of new and exciting drink options purchased - check

Clorox wipes plentiful and accessible - check

Patience at an all time high - praying for it

I want to show you some pics of his precious bum in his tiny briefs but here are a few G rated ones from his new perch.

Good times.

We're still in the early stages, but so far he is doing great and although he has had his fare share of misses he has also earned many a belly jean. Way to go Wyatt - keep up the good work!!!

As for me, I'm pretty excited to leave the house after a week of lock down. Just to keep myself sane I did make one quick trip to wally world to restock our supply of overpriced individually packaged drinks that are keeping Wyatt (and Stacey by default) excited about the abnormally high liquid intake. And even though that was thrilling, I'm still feeling pretty detached. Did wearing your keys around your wrist with a janitorialish stretchy cord in order to be hands free happen to get cool this week??

No? Too bad.

Happy Training!!

(you can probably tell by the length and rambling nature of this post, I am in desperate need of some adult interaction!!)

Happy Birthday to...Bob??

This tiny cone goes with one of the boys car sets, but they thought it made a perfect hat for Bob and sang happy birthday to him repeatedly.

Oh, Bobbers, could you be a better sport!?! You're the best. :)

I Wear My Sunglasses At Night

My heart belongs to these three!!!

But Corey Hart's hit was the jam of the evening.

Too Cool.

Cousins Camp

Last weekend Honey and GP (my parents) hosted Cousins Camp for Ryan and Stacey and these boys were thoroughly entertained with endless activities, crafts, projects, games and prizes.

Every ounce of creativity in me came directly from my Mother!! Her endless ideas joined with years of teaching (and now Directing FBC Woodway Christian School- I'm so proud) make for a very overqualified, but perfect camp director. And Dad was there every step of the way to keep up with these two rowdy boys and capture it all on camera so I could blog about it! :) Thank you Honey and GP for a fantastic weekend. Stacey keeps asking to "camp out" but know he means go to Cousins Camp - and this indoor girl is just fine with camping out cousins camp style.

Friday night was Game Night. The boys rolled out to Tilt (an arcade in the mall) about 8:00 - night owls!! Then they went to the church for more games in the gym. They thought they were SO cool staying out late and actually getting quarters for games. Stacey is used to just pretend riding them so I'm sure it was a real thrill when he realized with money they actually move and interact with you.

Story time with Honey before bed.
Sat. was Ant day - yep a whole day ALL about ants, how perfect for these boys. Mom had words for each letter: art, nature, treats...and surprises?? can't remember what the S was for. First up breakfast, they made ant cinnamon rolls. (My Dad emailed me all these pics and I uploaded them to iphoto without clicking on each of them individually so sorry for all the random sizes, now I know!)
and edible play-dough

Yum

that eventually turned into these edible ants. Don't let the serious faces fool you - these boys were loving every minute of it.

Collecting rocks for a project

Painting the rocks to make ants out of them.
Of course a little math mixed in- an ant has six legs so here are six coins and three parts of its body so three packs of candy etc.
Mom tied in Proverbs 30:25 "Consider the ants, they are creatures of little strength yet they store up their food in the summer." The boys had a chart and got stickers all day for doing things on their own, getting dressed, picking up toys etc. At the end of the day a full chart = a prize!!
Looks full to me.
They also focused on aUnts for part of the day and made us each a puzzle with a secret message that said We Love Our Aunts. Phew, and that isn't even all, but it's all I can remember right now.

The last day was Water Day so of course water guns,

water balloons and relays,

and a car/bicycle wash.
And then some swimming!! Um, I think that pool is a little small for you Stace.

But, it's just your size Lila!! L got to join the boys for part of the weekend. Kacey had already reserved Honey and GP long before we invaded with Camp.

That is a little more your size.

The crafts included painting with popsicles and making glitter rainbow fish.

They used the magnifying glass to examine a queen ant the day before, but now Stacey is just examining Ryan.
Watermelon - clever Dad!!

And lunch in the fort - could they be any cooler!

What better way to finish off water day than in a big bathtub!!

OK seriously that is just touching the surface of all they did.

They ended the weekend with a trophy ceremony awarding each of them for being such good campers.

Stacey came to me last week asking where all his trophies were. Um, you don't have any trophies?? He seemed confused and obviously did not understand that trophies were earned and not a fixture in every child's room, Oh he is so hilarious. Thankfully he now has a trophy all his own!! Better get started on that case. :)

Thank you Honey and GP for an amazing weekend - you are the best!!!! we CAN'T WAIT for next year!!!!!