Building Project Family Style

Remember how sad I was when we had to sell our kids swing set structure when we left Pennsylvania?? Well I do. I don't know why I was so attached to it. It represented a lot of things and letting go of it was one of the hardest parts about moving again. We purchased it in Washington for our first little toddler. So attached to it we decided to break it down and move it to Arizona. It went into storage. Then our house there had a tiny yard and a big HOA so no play structure. We stored it in big pieces on the side of our house. When we left Arizona just a short year and a half later, of course we were taking it to Pennsylvania. Yards had to be bigger there and besides we'd hung onto it this long. Well Pennsylvania was just what we had hoped. Found a house, had a yard and got that thing back up! Well, you know the rest. We had to go before we thought and we knew we couldn't move it again. Craigslist and a couple days later it was gone. It felt like a little piece of my kids childhood had died.

Anyway. God gave us a new house with a big yard. (We tried to get the one with a small yard, but He knew better;) ) A new baby and a new house and a move in the same year gave our tax refund a great boost and ta-DA we're building the kids a dream backyard. We got the swing set and started building this weekend. We're all really excited!

When we built the first one we had lots of family help. They worked for about 12 hours and then the next day Rand and I finished it. This time. It's just us...and we have Easton. It's going to be slow, slow going. Good lesson in patience for the little ones. :) Bordering on frustration we just had to go with it and enjoy the moments we were having with these babes of ours. What good would it do to spend all our money on them, build them the back yard of their dreams and then yell at them for the whole week while we put it together??

So here's our construction project (in process) family style.

 

 

 

Case.And.Point. Did I tell you? I think there may have been some spills that went along with all this dirt. Water (and/or beer) and dirt...even better. :) That's how we roll!

This is for my Papa Jim, because if he were still here....this is exactly how he would be wearing his hat!

 

the boys just want to use the drill!

Like this, Dad? Like this?

 

side note: visitors coming next weekend, so cross your fingers we get a HUGE chunk of this done this week! AND for all those worrying hearts out there...our pool fence is getting installed next weekend as well. Phew! thank you to the government for taking our money and then giving some of it back just in the nick of time. ;)

Learning New Tricks

So many people say they don't want to rush their children into walking. As if walking would bring about a whole new string of parenting problems issues that would be better to wait as long as possible for. I have never felt this way. Once crawling is in full swing, in my opinion, it would just be better for everyone if the child would walk already! And with Easton, walking could have happened 10 pounds ago. :) Since he has been crawling he is filthy almost all the time. He has his hands and face so close to the ground that every wrapper, piece of food, rock, and anything else ends up in his mouth or on his clothes. He has scraped up his toes, feet, knees and legs, he crawls through dirt and dead grass. He knows he can move and he wants to go and oh how I can't wait for him to be on the move....on his feet!
That being said we are getting closer every day...I'm pretty sure. He has no interest in practicing walking, but he will walk around the furniture. If he wants to go somewhere, though, it's hands and knees speed crawling time.
Yesterday, I brought in a little kid chair for him to sit on which he thought was just super fun. I'd sit him down and he would stand up and then plop down...and then giggle. He's getting good. I can't wait until he's walking!

You can tell he felt like such a big boy sitting on the chair rather than the floor. :)

It looks like he is practicing his walking here, but he's not. Just his balance.

I know. He looks a little crazy. It was the third outfit of the day after an impromptu mid-day bath and his hair dried like that. I thought maybe the baby legs would save the little knees. It worked for a while until the speed crawling started pulling them down. (or maybe it was the fat rolls pushing them down)

This is what he looks like when I try to make him practice walking. :)

Look at his precious baby curls.

Chicken Chronicles::Vol. 5 (Treats)

Turns out, chicks LOVE hard boiled eggs. Seems weird to me, but I read it enough times to try it and sure enough, they go nuts! We're trying to offer treats more regularly from our hands as opposed to just tossing them on the ground so they get a little more friendly (tame?). They are perfectly kind but can be a little tricky to catch if you haven't done it a bunch. Some of them are more skittish than others.
 They are officially outside full time...thank heavens! Spent 2 nights out in the coop. Their coop is very open to air, purposely, so that they have the best circulation for summer, but it makes for chilly nights for pretty young chicks. At night I close off the coop a little bit with some cardboard to block the wind and have a lamp out there for now...just in case...maybe just for another week or so.
 I really love them! They are so, so fun!! They pup is doing okay with them. She gets a kick out of pouncing towards them and watching them scatter. Worries me a tad. Sammy somewhat enjoys doing the same thing. It won't be long though and those chicks will be bigger than those dogs, and I think they'll hold their own! ;)

Daisy looks a little hungry with her tongue out like that! :)

 

 

Look at this stare down!

 

 

School with Easton

Doing school with Easton around is no easy task. The messes are enormous and never ending. He just doesn't sleep enough for it to get done without him. So he toodles around the area, around the table, and around the book shelves and basically rips everything within reach and throws it onto the floor. Crayons, markers, papers, workbooks, glue... He usually has a colored pencil or marker hanging out of his mouth...or a bottle of glue. Trouble, I tell ya.

The point

Pets

My little hobby farm is coming to life...even on my relatively small plot of land in the middle of Phoenix. :)
The chicks are outside most of the time. In fact, tonight I am moving the heat lamp outside and setting them up out in the coop for the night. They are too big for the house. Noisy, messy and poopy. Aren't they starting to look like real chickens?? Hoping for some eggs sometime this summer.

Moving on to some un-introduced pets. This is Trooper....as in "Storm Trooper". I have been looking for this fish bowl since I first saw it at a friend's house five years ago. I could never find it. Well a few weeks ago I grabbed the last one at a pet store when I was there looking for something else and of course, we had to fill it with something. It's hanging on the wall near our front door.

This guy right here, while not a real pet, is now nicknamed Scare Bear. Rand set him up to deter birds from eating our freshly spread grass seed. It is so not working.

And last, but not least, a co-worker of Rand's had a puppy that needed a home. He asked me and I said maybe we could meet her and have a little trial with her, because if she is going to rip the heads off the chicks we can't keep her. Well when they brought her over I realized you don't really test drive a  6 week old puppy!!! 6 weeks! You either commit or you don't because who knows what you are going to get. And how exactly do you send her back after your little boys have fallen in love?? It took about an hour and she had a name and I'm pretty sure she isn't going anywhere. She is a chihuahua mutt, just like our other dog, but very different coloring. I hope she is just as good of a dog as Sammy!
This is Daisy (you know, Daisy, from Super Mario Brothers).

First Swim 2011

I don't know why I always think it is so important to capture the "first swim" in photos, but yesterday when the boys suggested they jump in the pool I yelled, "Wait! I have to take pictures!" Then I went back over the past blogged years and looked at the previous swims.

There was a January swim in 2008.

First swim in our yard in March 2008.

Swimming in the Atlantic Ocean in May 2009.

Back to Phoenix swimming in February 2010.

And yesterday was the boys' 2011 first swim of the year...in our new house!
It was getting close to 80 degrees yesterday and the air was warm enough for sure, but the pool. is. freezing! After a lot of screaming, they got numb and swam a couple times yesterday. It's just the beginning! Let the swimming begin! Oh, and Easton got in too. I had to hold him from the edge and he could hardly breathe, but everytime I pulled him out he just flung his body back over the edge. He is so one of them. I have a feeling I will be joining them in the pool long before I think it is warm enough!

 

 

Easton Swings

It really should be no surprise he is picking up on this whole baseball thing all by himself. He started throwing and "catching" about 2 months ago. We thought it was hilarious, but you could easily entertain him through most of one of the boys' baseball games just playing a little catch with him. He loved it! Well the other day he picked up a "bat" and started swinging it. We were shocked, but what should we expect? Two baseball practices a week and two games on Saturdays. He's been to them all for the last 8 weeks...just watching and apparently learning.

Rand taught both the big boys to bat lefty but Easton is naturally going righty. We may just have to go with it. Why mess with natural talent? ;)

(Please pardon all of Wyatt's yelling in this video. Always trying to get a giggle out of Easton. I kept thinking he would stop, but he sort of just kept on doing it. sorry.) :)

Citrus

One of my favorite things about living in the region we live is all the citrus trees. While not native to the Sonoran Desert they actually do quite well here, especially once they are established (they need more water than we naturally get. Surprise, surprise.). And they are a very common site in people's yards, in parks, and even lining the streets.
We do not have any citrus trees in our yard....yet. There are plans for oranges, lemons, limes, grapefruit and pomegranate (although not citrus). I can't wait. In the meantime we have a neighbor who has a HUGE orange tree and a HUGE lemon tree right up against the wall between our yards. I'm working up the courage to go ask if we can pick a few of the hundreds of lemons. The orange tree is close enough that many are hanging over on our side within reach and we just pluck away. De.lish.ous. They are a small variety, but very sweet and very juicy. We've saved some of the seeds. Maybe we will start our own tree!