Fun with Colton

Yesterday, I took Colton to the library. He is such a homebody lately that I have to really "sell" the idea of going somewhere. So, I told him we could find some books about Venus flytraps and horse apples :) His latest curiosity. Just FYI - there's not a big market for horse apple books at the library. I don't even know if that's what they are called but he does not forget that I told him I didn't know if horses really ate them and that we could try to find out at the library. Why I didn't say I would just google it is beyond me!

Thankfully, there is a lot of info. about insect-eating plants! It's really pretty fascinating and I think it points to an amazing creator! But, I digress....

So, I needed to run to a couple of stores before the library and I didn't really tell him until after I got him in the car - he was not too happy about the extra stops but Mommy sometimes needs to get out of the house and the weekends are a great time to run errands because I can just take one boy and leave one with Jack.

After our 2nd store that was not the library, he questioned, "Where is the library?" "This is not the way to the library." I told him it was Kohl's and Mommy needs a dress that was only on sale today. He remarked, "You have plenty of dresses in your closet!" Wow, out of the mouths of babes :) We quickly went in and he forgave me for procrastinating our library trip just a bit longer. He was quite taken by the "short" beds in the home area of the store and decided this was a pretty good stop after all. Plus, we saw an ant hill with angry ants in the parking lot which provided a lot of discussion on the way to the library and led to some of our book choices.

We were finally on our way, when I happened to pass right by Sonic at 3:30, just perfect timing for happy hour so I turned in to the drive-in and Colton immediately said, "Mom, we are not going here are we?" I told him how happy a Sonic drink made me. He said, "I know, Mom". Then, I asked him what made him happy. After telling me I could just get some water out of the refrigerator (again, truth from a 3 year old) he told me, "I'm happy when we go straight to the library without any stops!" That made me laugh so hard!

Finally we pulled in to the library and to make up for the extra errands I parked in the parking garage and let him push all the "magic" buttons on the way in to the library and in the elevator.

Just for fun - Here are the subjects of the 17 books Colton picked out at the library:

Spiders
Ants
Ant Cities
Plant Eating Insects
Thomas the Train (2)
Jumping Spiders
Sharks
Bats
Animals of Africa

This is a fun age! Now if we can just get our horse apple facts straight! Off to google it right now!

Happy Birthday Grandad!

Happy Birthday Grandad!

We celebrated Grandad's birthday a few weeks ago but his actual birthday is today!  

The boys enjoyed "helping" Grandad blow out his candles! They really put their all into it!

Thanks for sharing your cake, Grandad! We are so blessed to have you as our Grandad!

Happy Birthday!

And the SNOW goes on...

Not one member of our household left the house by car* from Monday night to Saturday afternoon at 3. That's a record folks. I'm so thankful I went grocery shopping Monday morning and just happened to pick up 2 gallons of milk. All in all, "Snowcalypse 2011" was a memorable experience. There's something about being forced to slow down and just be. Really, I think the kids could have stayed in the house a few more days. I was reminded how much they love being at home with their family and how little it takes to make them happy. As long as there are couch cushions, Max and Ruby episodes and fruit snacks, they are good to go.

We finally got our gate open about 3 this afternoon and after setting off the most piercing gate alarm ever (which we didn't know existed) for about 5 minutes straight. The wheels had gotten off track and Jack was able to pop it back on track by using his shovel as a lever. Then, our very sweet neighbors helped Jack push the gate through the ice to unblock the driveway. Two minutes later, I hopped in the car with Colton and we went to Sonic! I have never been so excited to run errands. As we were driving, Colton was pretty chatty, so I had to tell him that I needed to concentrate because there still might be some slick spots. He replied, "I won't say any more questions, Mommy." Sweet boy, he's growing up so fast.

On Friday, it snowed about 6 inches at our house. It was beautiful. I took the kids for a walk* and it was surreal. Our neighborhood looked like a Colorado ski resort. Kids were sledding down the streets and all you could see was white. The kids enjoyed their sleigh stroller ride and loved it when I ran through the deep snow. At one point I thought it would be funny to crash into a snowbank (the neighbor's curb) and they both went flying out into the snow, Caden landing on top of Colton. Thankfully, they were fine, in their double layers of socks, pants, and jackets, and thought it was funny. 

These Cinnamon Pumpkin Chocolate Chip muffins were from Thursday. They get better each day :) I used the whole can of pumpkin so they've got to be good for us, right? :) The recipe came from here.

We also made these fun snowman snacks.

Caden just took the marshmallows and ran. Scared me to death when he stuck all 3 marshmallows in his mouth at the same time.

This is what our playroom looked like ALL week and still does.

Where did my shoes go?

Lunch time!

Colton's imagination is really fun! I never knew my couch cushions would be off every single day. He loves building elaborate parks with them and it really uses lots of energy so I've decided not to pick this battle. Now the bed is not usually on the floor, but I made an exception for snow days. He came up with this idea to lay the cushions end to end (forest trail) from the playroom to his room and ending at his bed (red castle). If you touch the carpet the alligators and snapping turtles will get you. We also went on several lion and bear hunts.

Sleet, Snow and Ice

 We're on our 2nd consecutive Snow Day! Daddy's been working from home so we've all enjoyed some quality home time! Caden's hair does some funny things in the winter. He has major static!

 Sweet Caden standing on the stool by his plethora of snacks. Colton originally used the stool to reach his snacks as he was keeping them out of Caden's reach. Now, Caden thinks he has to get a stool just like brother when he has a snack.

We read The Mitten by Jan Brett (One of mommy's all time favorite books) and Colton enjoyed pretending the sleeping bag was a giant mitten. All of his animals got in too until the bear sneezed and all of them tumbled out into the snow :) We also made a lace-up mitten, but someone wasn't in the crafting mood :)

 We made a tent/cave.

 Someone line up all the couch cushions along the window so we could have a nice, comfy snow viewing area.

 Excuse the messy backyard! On Friday we played outside ALL day and even got out the water table because it was so warm. Now that same water table is filled with sleet just 4 days later!

 Colton and I braved the weather for a few minutes while Caden napped. Unfortunately the snow was pretty hard so we couldn't construct any snowmen.

 This snow angel slipped and slided on the snow because it was too glazed over to make an imprint.

 Once Caden woke up, we made some snow sleet ice cream. It was pretty yummy! Colton added some chocolate syrup to his.

Hope you are enjoying the snow and staying warm!

Little Moments...

 We will always affectionately remember this past Saturday, January 22, 2011 as "Lightbulb Day". We had about 10 lightbulbs out in the house and dedicated Saturday to getting them back in working order.(Spurred on a little bit by the fact we were having people over that night!) We told Colton we were going on a lightbulb scavenger hunt and he took his job very seriously! He loved reporting on the number of lights that were working or out and declared scavenger hunts his favorite thing ever. Wow! We really need to get out more :)

 Apparently the sight of Jack on a ladder, makes Colton think of super heroes. He sang "Super Daddy, you're my hero!" as Jack replaced each and every lightbulb :) It was pretty cute!

 Caden is 19 months old as of Lightbulb Day and is really crazy, wild, busy, cute when you can get past the wake of destruction and cracker crumbs he leaves in his path. Most of the mess can now be pinned on his tiny little shoulders. Do you see the playroom? Colton is at a really fun stage (save the dreadful time we're having potty training). He constantly asks me why Caden does certain things (like throwing his food across the kitchen or throwing down the "nack" he just asked for) and I usally reply that Caden is a toddler and there is only one thing constant about this stage: his unpredictability!

Today we stayed in our pj's just a little bit longer - wait who am I kidding - the boys usally change into real clothes after lunch unless we are going somewhere. Caden got a huge kick out of sitting on big brother's lap this morning and stayed there for a WHOLE 5 minutes. It was so cute! Colton was nonplussed (is that a word?) as long as Caden didn't interrupt Umizoomi on the tv.

Elmo is about to drive me crazy but Caden loves him! He usally will not touch him but wants him to talk all day long and insists on saying good night to him several times before bed. Today was a breakthrough and he actually carried him around the house all day. You can see he's still a little unsure of actually touching him. Elmo almost ended up in the bathtub but I was able to convince Caden that Elmo could preside over bathtime by standing on the sink.

And those are a few little moments that bring this mommy's heart joy! Sometimes I can only see the mess/work/cleaning/discipline instead of these little guys' wonderful spirits but I am trying really hard praying daily for God's help to see the trees instead of the forest or maybe it's the forest for the trees. I don't know - I'm tired - but I'm trying to choose joy over frustration and opportunities to love and cuddle and encourage instead of moments of overwhelming insanity!