A new album----from 2011 :)

I'm desperately trying to catch up our family and vacation albums and I finally finished one! From 2011!! I finished the album from the cruise Josh and I went on when we just had 1 kid....And now we have 3 lol. Here is the link if you want to check it out!

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0BbuGTlo1Ys38w&cid=SFLYOCWIDGET

Catching Up

I deeply apologize to those following along for the extended break between posts. We've been doing a little bit of everything and I wanted to take some time to really enjoy the kids. When they nap I try to use that time to take care of some housekeeping but I promise to post much more frequently as we move into a more scheduled routine with the start of preschool and dance.

Over the last month the kids and I have been back and forth to Nana's a couple times when Josh is/was traveling. The kids love to visit Oak Grove and hang out at Nana's and Grammy's house. There is a pool Nana takes the kids to and there is ALWAYS ice cream in the freezer and Blue Moon's in the fridge for me ;) They get to play with different toys and eat at the little counter with the TV. And mommy gets some help which I'm so thankful for. I enjoy spending that time with my Nana and I also love that I get to see my mom when she gets off work in the evening. Although our visits to Oak Grove have been fun they will be coming to an end with the start of school and dance and hopefully the end of Josh traveling so much. There's a chance he may have a couple trips left but nothing like this summer!

We also made a trip to Grant City and we took the kids to the Allendale rodeo! YeeHaw! Besides the misting and eventual rain, the rodeo was a good time. Isla made some new friends and Aiden hung out with Josh and Papa. We had seats right next to where the bulls came out for the bull riding and we were so close that the bulls kicked mud on us a few times! Josh had planned to take Aiden to see the races in Iowa but he didn't do very well sitting still at the rodeo and the races were going to start later and last longer so he decided to wait for another time. Aiden likes to explore and roam around so it's sometimes hard in those situations to keep him interested.

Josh was home for two weeks in a row which was wonderful. Although when he's home we never seem to be on any kind of schedule :) We just go and do and have a good time. Josh and I took the opportunity to spend some time together this past weekend. We went to the city market downtown and then out to dinner at Garozzo's which was delicious. The Tiramasu was amazing! Josh spent most of the afternoon making salsa and hot sauce and both are hot! I just snacked on some salsa and my mouth is still on fire.

Our tomatoes have been turning red and we are up to 9 eggs a day! I'll write another post about our chicken wrangler soon. That deserves a post of its own :)

So in a nutshell that's what we've been up to. The baby just woke up but I'll post more soon!

Happy Friday!

Nicolle 

ZOO!!!!!

Last week the weather was absolutely beautiful and I had recently received passes from the KC Zoo for free visits, so I wrangled my sister into coming down and helping me take the kids to the zoo last Tuesday. Aiden had only been to the zoo when he was a little older than Evan and I was sure he would love to see the animals and he did :) He loved them so much that it was hard to get him to move on to see other animals. Isla has been to the zoo a few times at various ages so she knew what it was all about. We saw everything except the animals in the Africa part. The map said to make it the first thing you do or to do it on it's own so we may use our next free visit for that. 

The most popular animals were monkeys, penguins, elephants and the deer you could feed. Aiden calls monkeys "ooh-ahhs" and there were tons to see in quite a few places. 

The penguins had an exhibit that the kids just loved. So much so that Aiden just laid down on the floor to watch them swimming! He is so funny!

We arrived at the elephants when the zoo keepers were giving a little speech on elephants so there were several elephants lined up at the fence and the kids had an excellent view of these giant animals. Everyone knows they are huge but I think we forget just how big they are until we are that close! 

There was a little discovery barn that the kids ran around in for a while. They had a few different animals in there like lemurs and some frogs and maybe some birds. Aiden and Isla just climbed all over the tree thing for a while and then we moved on.

 Our last stop was to feed some Koi fish and it was the perfect ending. It was kind of off the path and quiet and we were the only ones there. I gave each of the kids a handful of food to feed the fish and we just watched them swim around for a while. Aiden fed them one pellet of food at a time which is exactly how he fed the deer earlier in the day lol! 

This was on the bridge where we fed the fish

And here are a few random pictures~

There really are no words for him sometimes!

 After we took this picture, Aiden wiggled through a fence and when I pulled him out his flower broke. A few minutes later as we were walking he held his stem up to me with the most serious face and said "Mom! Flower!" and then mumbled some nonsense which Amanda and I were pretty sure was his version of cussing! He was not happy that I broke his flower!

 So sleepy!

So sweet :)

Vacation Bible School

Earlier this spring, we started attending the First United Methodist church in Kearney and we are so happy we found this church. They have excellent programs for kids and Isla was able to attend VBS for the very first time!

The theme was Weird Animals and each day there was a new "weird" animal and the kids talked about how although everyone is unique, we all fit together and have a purpose. Isla really enjoyed going and it was funny to hear her interpretation of what they talked and learned about. She mainly talked about the songs they sang or crafts they made but a couple nights she had more to say. On the first night they made a first aid kit which she called a "bakit" that included a glow stick, tissues, a band aid and  of course some candy. After I picked her up I asked her what she learned and she told me "Even when you're in the dark and you are afraid of the dark and you don't have a glow stick, God is with you." Then a couple nights later, she was in the shower singing "Jesus Loves You". So even though she couldn't tell me everything they talked about or what she learned, I know she learned something and continued in her journey.

Josh was able to pick her up the last night and see her sing on stage and he took her to get some ice cream when she was done. The first thing she asked when she got home is when she could go again! She is looking forward to next year for sure :)

First night 7/13/14

 These are all of her crafts

These are the characters and the verses they talked about

 I gave Isla the change from my wallet the 2nd night to donate and on the 3rd night she asked me for more. I asked her where she thought she could get some more and she grabbed her piggy bank. She asked me how much and I told her it was her decision. She donated change from her piggy bank for 3 nights :)

The decorations were really fun! Here she is on the last night. 

This was her class for VBS 2014

Nicolle

A Mini Staycation

Over the fourth weekend Josh was home and he took an extra day off so we got to spend 4 whole days with him! The third of July ended up being a party here. The park across the street has a big fireworks show every year and we had planned to stay home and watch them from the comfort of our driveway. Well a couple friends asked if they could come and watch and that turned into us inviting people too and next thing we knew we had a party that we spent most of the day preparing for! Next year I think we will just make a thing of it and plan a little more in advance. I know. I'm a planner by nature and I just can't hide it :) We all had a great time and the firework display was awesome! Aiden wasn't a fan at first and he barely warmed up to it by the time it was over. He just kept saying "no firework work!" And he still mentions firework works on occasion. We also felt pretty lucky that we didn't have to spend hours driving into the park and then out of the park like so many people did.

We didn't actually do anything super fun on the fourth but we enjoyed some family time and rented some movies. We didn't even see a firework! Saturday we spent some time getting things done around the house and later that day we went to Robbie and Jess's house to hang out, eat dinner and shoot off some fireworks. By that day Aiden was over his fear and wanted to hold a sparkler which was a terrible idea I realized, when he started running at me with it! That was the last sparkler he got for the night. Robbie shot some fireworks off and they were pretty good for tent bought! Except for the one that fell over and shot at us. Although it was funny to watch Robbie bob and weave to avoid being hit, it was not so funny that it was shooting fireworks at the small children!

Sunday we went to church and decided to go to Watkins Mill lake and swim around because it was soooooo hot that day. We came home, gathered our beach things and grabbed some subway on the way. We had a little picnic and the kids splashed around for about an hour and then we came home. I had to put the kids in the shower immediately as they were full of sand! Diapers and sand equal a nightmare in my opinion.

 This is the only picture I have from the 3rd

And from the 4th

But here are some from our beach trip!

 Note the sand in the air above his head. He really enjoyed picking it up with the shovel and tossing it up in the air

Evan's just happy to be outside :)

We be Jammin

As I mentioned in the last post, Josh and I want to start making jelly/jam etc. We have planted raspberry and blackberry bushes and we have a strawberry garden. We won't have berries this year but if everything goes well we will have lots of berries next year! Josh had picked some mulberries and cherries recently so we used these for our first attempt. We started with the mulberry jelly. There are quite a few steps to prepare the jars/lids so we started with that and we thought we were doomed because we had trouble just getting the jars to stand upright in the water lol! We made it through that part and we started making the jelly. I think we read the directions at least 100 times to make sure we were doing everything right and to make sure we didn't miss a step. Here are a few pictures of the process~

Evan decided to stay up and hang out with us :)

After we cooked the berries and started pouring the jelly into the jars, it started to thicken up like it should and we were very excited to think we may make real jelly! After we filled the jars with hot and placed the tops on, we set them on the counter to cool. This was the best part because once the jars cool down enough, they suck the lid in and make a "pop" noise which means the jar has sealed correctly. That my friends is the sweet sound of victory when making jelly!

And that's the face Josh makes EVERY time a jar pops!

The finished product

The next day we made cherry jam. The jam was much easier to make. There were a lot less steps and we were pros on prepping the jars. The difference between jelly and jam is that jam has chunks of the fruit in it. I had no idea the difference until we started this adventure! And here is a picture of our jam!

Both the mulberry jelly and the cherry jam tasted wonderful. The jelly is a little hard to spread so I think we need to adjust that in the recipe a little and the jam is a little runny so we need to adjust that too. The jam would be perfect for pancakes, waffles or ice cream topping so I'm sure we will find a use for it. 

New Bikes!

This past weekend we just enjoyed a peaceful weekend at home. Josh got home around 9:30pm Friday night so everyone slept in a little Saturday morning and after we all got up and around, Josh had a special surprise for Isla and Aiden! Off to the store we went. Josh and I also wanted to start making jelly, jam etc so we first sought out and bought supplies to make our first batch. Once we found all of the supplies we took the kids to pick out their surprise....new bikes! We have been wanting to get Isla a bike for a while now but because her birthday falls in the winter and Christmas is obviously in the winter we haven't gotten one for her yet. We bought Aiden one too.....mainly to prevent arguments and so I can stay sane :) Isla tried out 3-4 bikes and finally settled on a perfectly girly bike complete with shiny metallic tassels and an attached back-pack! Aiden tried 3-4 as well, even one that looked like a dirt bike, and he settled on a neon green x-games bike. The kids(with Josh's help) wheeled the bikes to the front of the store and got quite a few smiles and encouragement from friendly patrons while Evan and I pushed the cart behind them. When we got outside we had to do some maneuvering to fit everything in the Traverse. Since we've had Evan, the big kids sit in the third row and Evan sits in the middle. We don't have captains chairs so we have to release one side of the middle seat to get the kids in the back. In hind sight, we should have thought that through more before purchasing...oh well! We had to rearrange some seats and carefully twist and turn the bikes into the back but we did it. Whew! Because we had no plan B.

And here they are! It started storming shortly after we got home so we waited until after dinner to take them out for their first spin. The road in front of our house isn't busy at all so we were able to let the kids ride their bikes there with close supervision of course.

Aiden doesn't really get how to pedal continuously so Josh had to hold his feet on the pedals and move them for him. At one point Aiden was coasting across the road and started gaining speed towards a hill that sloped down into the neighbors yard. He stuck his feet out to the sides and started screaming! Josh caught him in plenty of time but we had a good laugh. At that point, Aiden lost interest in riding his bike but we were able to convince him to get back on a while later.

Isla can pedal just fine but she was practicing pedaling as she turns the bike. She wants to stop pedaling and then she gets the pedals stuck in a position that she doesn't have enough leg muscle to push through it. While she was riding, Aiden wondered into her riding path and she ran into the back of his leg and he fell belly down into a puddle! It was also hilarious and we laughed again :) Isla was doing really well and was working on turning when she found herself on some uneven pavement in the middle of turning and down she went! The first official bike wreck. She was ok and it didn't even leave a scratch. After a little crying she got back on her bike and continued to ride. That was Josh's rule. He told her she will fall off her bike and it won't feel good but she has to get back on the bike and try again and she did. I was proud of her.

We haven't been out yet again but Josh is home for the next four days so I'm sure the gets will get a lot of bike riding in!