Santa Fe Lake

Today was a great outing for our weekly "Field Trip". I stepped COMPLETELY out of my box and went along with the gang to Santa Fe Lake to play at the beach. Now folks, I hate to admit it, but I'm not a lake girl. I do enjoy going out on a boat and water skiing or tubing, but let's get real...you jump in don't touch the bottom and just DON'T THINK ABOUT IT! Now the lake BEACH is a different story, mud, slim, yucky water...I was really thinking maybe we should just pass. BUT, I'm glad we didn't!

There was a VERY nice beach area equipped with a very LARGE tree for shade. I sat on my beach blanket and watched Spanky "LIKE A HAWK" but really enjoyed the day! Christy tells me that there is nice sand about six feet out into the water...you know, this time I took her word for it...but might venture out next time! :)

Spanky had a slight meltdown at first when he tripped and got his swim pants wet. I'm like, HELLO! It's just like a big dirty pool! Finally we convinced him that all was well and it was okay to get his pants wet. From then on he was great! He hunted for minnows, made "birthday cake" with the sand and played in the water with the floaties. PRAISE the LORD for Valen. He played with Spanky a lot and Spanky just LOVES Valen! What a nice young man.

So...all in all it was a great time at the lake. OH...and the "Johnny on the Spot" was actually kind of nice...even smelled of sanitizer! Of course I was a frequent visitor so I was very thankful for this!

New Discoveries

This weekend has been full of NEW DISCOVERIES! :)

First of all, Spanky discovered the greatness of sleeping in a BIG BOY BED!! He's done VERY well and I think he really enjoys it!! We are about complete with Spanky's room project, I have everything done and ready to hang, now when daddy has time we'll hang it all, probably next weekend, THEN I will share some photos of his NEW BIG BOY ROOM!!! :)



THEN, tonight we were sitting at the table having dinner....I looked up and saw this....


Can you see the man's face?? WEIRD!!

Scroll down to see the picture zoomed out. The spoon hanging on the wall created that image. How funny is that!?!? Actually the funniest part to John was when I said, "HOLD ON, I'm going to go get my camera" John wondered what I was afraid might change in the few seconds it took me to go get my camera....maybe like the shadow would take a break and head to the men's room? I don't know folks, the wires don't always connect in the brain when your pregnant, but when I say HOLD ON, just HOLD ON! :)



The last discovery tonight was Spanky's little baby clothes! Oh so cute and sweet, I was starting to tear up a bit while I'm going through his clothes in the "Keep for Darla", "Keep for Spanky", "Sell" piles. Oh the memories of when they were little and the times we shared and watched them grow. Now Spanky pops up from behind the catch and says, "Whatcha doing mom?" Let me just preface that this boy LOVES clothes! He proceeded to check out all of the clothes that I didn't already have packed up and started trying them on. YES...the 3-6 month onesies were his favorite, but my favorite was his VERY first Halloween costume of a pumpkin! He was all sorts of mad that it wouldn't zip, well buddy, because you have to have your feet in and the arms are up past your elbows! :) I didn't get a picture of this...Oh I wish I would have and he wouldn't put it back on after I got my camera down stairs. He did however put this ensemble together....YUP, year two clown costume, year one santa hat and a stuffed tigger that he has a new found love of!



Oh the discoveries in a day!

Last night in the toddler bed

Yes, the big boy furniture should be in tomorrow and tonight is bitter sweet. Spanky has had lots of good naps, sleeps, and fun in the crib/toddler bed. It's now time for him to pass it along to Miss Darla. I will be interested to see how he does with the big boy bed. I think he'll sleep better as he'll have more room. Of course if he didn't have to have every stuffed animal, blanket and book in his bed he might have more room too! :) He loves it though...what do you do? :)

So farewell toddler bed and hello big boy bed!

Good times and Good Friends!

Two of my bestess girlfriends were at the house tonight! We once all lived together and we're all still friends...more like SISTERS! :) NOW, we all have boys (K 3 1/2, Spanky 2 1/2 and R 1 1/2) and Libby started the second round of girls. Lil Mags is 8 months old and "Darla" will be just 10 months behind her...so Christy, better get started on that girl! :) We are all spread out now, well, Christy is in Derby, but sometimes that's seems farther than it really is and Libby is in Western KS! The girls get together twice a year for girls weekend to scrapbook, but this was the first time I think we have had ALL 3 boys and Princess together to PLAY! And PLAY they did. We duck taped them to the steps for pictures before they got too messy and busy! :) JUST KIDDING on the duct tape! :)

They ate pizza and impressed one another with what the other one could eat! Then we played in the basement, ran through the sprinklers, swam in the little pool, gave rides in the arctic cat...Spanky was driving of course and K or R would get in and he'd say, "BUCKLE UP"...and then drive off looking somewhere other than in front of him. YUP, buckle up cause I might run into something is really what he should have said. What can I say...he gets his driving techniques from his mom! :) We ended the evening with feeding the fish. It was a great time and so much fun to watch the boys interact and although all about the same size on different levels. SUPER FUN! I can't wait to do it again soon!

Here they all are on the steps before any of the action. Libby took many more so I'll post more later!

"Shall we have birtday cake?"

Yes, I misspelled "Birtday" on purpose...this was the morning wake up call i received this morning from Spanky. To get him to FINALLY lay down last night I told him he wouldn't get to go to the birthday party if he didn't go to sleep, SO, bright and early this morning he woke me up and said..."Shall we have birtday cake?". Well...not for a couple more hours!

Today was our great friend K's birthday party. The kids had a blast in the back yard playing on the slip and slide, shaving balloons, but they popped in the grass faster than they could shave them...but that was better yet because they got showered with shaving cream! Good times!! And they all smelled so clean and fresh! :) They swang on the swings, jumped on the trampoline and just had a glorious time!

Spanky finally got his piece of birtday cake! He very gently liked all of the icing off the cake, who needs forks anyway? And left the cake for someone else to finish! :) That's my boy...all about the frosting! :) He handed K her birthday gift and said, "Here's your game, you wanna play"?? He's been DYING to play "Pretty Pretty Princess" since we purchased it last week! He enjoyed checking out the "Princess Toolbox" too...Oh Spank...we got to get you some more boys to hang out with! :)

We finished up the day with a trip to the new water park at the YMCA. It was great!! Spanky had a blast and having no fear kind of stressed me out, but we got it figured out and once we new the pool a little better I was more comfortable with him playing more independently. Our friend C and J met us at the pool and the boys had fun playing. C is a little more "Cautious" than Spanky, but they had fun!

Funniest story....Spanky figured out that if you pull this lever water shoots out these holes. SO he would wait for a kid to lean up against the ledge and then pull the lever to spray the kid. The kid thought it was just happening and Spanky would lower the water down and then another kid would come along and he'd do the same thing. He'd just GIGGLE as he'd wait for his next "victim" to lean on the ledge. TOO Smart for his own good!

Good day at the Willson house! We are hitting the hay as we my great friends and kids coming to play tomorrow! THREE BOYS! 3 1/2, 2 1/2, and 1 1/2....Watch out! And pretty princess will be there too!! :)

Night night....

Wordless Wednesday

Swimming!

This week we started Swim Lessons at the Public Pool. Spanky loves the water and has NO FEAR of the water. Therefore, I've been excited to get him into some lessons so that he'll "respect" the water a little more and learn at an early age how to actually swim. Yesterday he did a great job and TODAY...he went down the slide all by himself! He had a BALL!! He even came down once with his arms up like he was on a roller coaster! It was a crack up!

After lessons we went to a little boy's birthday party from Play Group. They have a pool in the back yard and so all the kids swam. The dare devil he is...jumped on the BOARD! Three times to be exact! I of course was there to catch him but oh did he think that was cool! The last time he jumped, from the edge of the diving board he says, MOVE BACK MOM! I'm like um...NO. I'll be right here to catch you! He had his wings on and looked like a pro! He even kicked and "swam" to the side to get out on the ladder. Such a big boy!!!

No pictures...I was busy catching! :) I'm going to try to take some at lessons tomorrow to post.

Good times...Good Friends

Miss Rascal has really enjoyed her new friends in Augusta. This weekend she went to a middle school girls "Lock in" and three of the gals stay over at our house. What nice young ladies they were and Spanky LOVED the extra from all of them! :) Miss Rascal attended another party with her friends Saturday night and enjoyed Sunday school and Church with them this morning. We love it when Miss Rascal is with us. Spanky will be in shambles for a couple of days. Come back soon Miss Rascal! :)

PS: We love it when Alfalfa is with us too....he popped in for a quick visit between football camps this weekend. Can't wait to have them both in a couple of weeks.

Miss Rascal's HERE!

Miss Rascal got to come a day early this weekend and BOY HAVE WE HAD FUN! Since she's been here we've fed the fish. They really like dog food and you can entertain Spanky for hours...well, minutes with throwing one piece of dog food in at a time! :) He loves it. The fish are what John calls, "Trained". He whistles for them and throws food in and amazingly enough, they come! It's pretty funny and Spanky things this is just fabulous! The fish have been fed dog food so much in the last 8 years that they are huge and they may even speak "bark" to each other. I'm not sure though.





After the fishing extravaganza we headed back to the yard for a little baseball. NOW, I know I'm Spanky's mom and all, but I'm quite impressed that a 2 1/2 year old can swing a full size wood bat and hit a ball the size of a softball. It's really a SOFT ball so no one gets hurt. If he gets a hold of it, watch out! If he takes a couple swings and doesn't hit it, he corrects you on how your throwing it. This cracks me up!! He says, "No, throw it like this" and shows you what he thinks is the proper way to pitch the ball. (The bat in these pictures is the plastic bat...we actually think there might be less injuries to all if we can get him to play with this one instead of the wood bat...we shall see.)




After he got tired of chasing the ball, we moved on to the dealership of vehicles we have in the garage to ride. He likes the tricycles, however when it's late and he's tired, he has a hard time getting them back to the house. You see, the drive way has a LITTLE hill in it and he has to "walk" them back. He says, "i can't ride mama, I have to walk". It's too cute! He's favorite or course is the Arctic Cat...It's gets him back up the hill and he drives a bit like his mom...FULL SPEED AHEAD! And not ALWAYS paying attention to the details that might get in his way.





Just when we thought the night was over, John decides that ice cream sounds really good. So we all hopped in the car and to Braum's we went. Spanky and his ice cream cone...MESSY! But still cute. He and Miss Rascal "Cheer's" their ice cream cones for a great night!






And to think....this was ONLY Thursday!

Wednesday Adventure!

What a day! Amy and I decided it'd be fun to do a "Field Trip" once a week this summer. Today it was just K, C, and Spanky...but BOY DID THEY HAVE FUN! We went to All Star Adventures in Wichita. They all were over 36 inches...Nolan stood on his tip toes just to be sure! Then they rode ALL of the kiddie rides. They had so much fun trying to decide which ride to ride next. Since we were the only people in the park the workers just followed them around and let them ride whatever they wanted! It was FABULOUS! We ended the "Field Trip" with an educational lunch at Freddy's! YUMMY!!!

The baby bedding is PICKED OUT!

Oh, what a time in your life...preparing for a new baby in the house, getting rooms cleaned out, day dreaming about what she'll look like and her personality. Will she sleep? Eat?? Be laid back or fussy? Will I get to sleep?? What should we do in her room, where shall we put her? These are all questions we've asked and figured out some of the answers! :)

We have decided to let Spanky keep his room, I think it's unfair to have to move your room for your little sister to be 10 feet closer to mommy. Also, he has a smaller closet and a girl needs her closet space! So 10 feet further from Mom she'll be. And dad too...but you know, daddy's need their beauty sleep so they can "pay the bills". At least in our household. :) Love you daddy!

I decided to give Spanky a new room too so he feels special. A basketball theme is what we decided on and today is the day to PAINT! We are painting Spanky and Darla's room today...THANK YOU ROBIN for helping. I'm excited to get started and I really would be fine doing it myself if it weren't for the trim. I HATE TRIM! SO we'll see what happens...hopefully we can post pictures tonight of the finished project. Spanky's furniture should be trinkling in this week and next and hopefully by Father's Day weekend Spanky will have an ALL NEW ROOM!!

Which brings me to Darla's room. This weekend Megan, Nolan and I headed to KC on Sunday to meet my parents who were visiting my brother so mom and I could go to Joann's to pick out fabric. OH...that is harder than it sounds folks! We looked and looked and matched and mismatched and I think mom and I were both about to throw in the towel...and then the magic happened! It's so fun when it finally comes together and then all of the frustration is worth it. Well, grandma still has to make it so hopefully the frustration won't continue. :) Anyway, it's super cute and I can't wait to get it done. I can't explain it...all I can say is think brown and pink, soft and vintage, but not TOO babyish! :) We'll see what happens, I have the upmost confidence in grandma and I'm always amazed at how she can take that folded fabric and make it a masterpiece!

Okay...better get changed to get painting! TTFN!