Gymnastics

For the past year the kids and I have been doing gymnastics.  It has been a lot of fun and a great activity to do in this area since the weather pretty much stinks around here!

Today we had our first gymnastics showcase!

There were lots of Ta-Das!

 

And the boys both won gold medals!

Ryker's first medal:

Team picture... except the boys never had classes with these kids... but that's ok.

Tried to get a brother picture, but if you hand Ryker a sucker, you can forget about it.

They did so well though!  Proud of these boys!

The Hood

I'm pretty sure my kids think we live at Disneyland...

Non-stop kid fun in this neighborhood!

The little girls will hold Ryker's hand and lead him around and the other day they took the boys over to the house next door where there are no occupants to play on the play structure in the back yard... it's great!  I get so much done around here!

Then my neighbor qualified for the coolest mom award yesterday when she pulled into the yard towing this:

Dunk tank fun!  I think every neighborhood kid was in our yard once they saw this thing.  I took this picture when she first pulled in, there were probably triple the kids within a few hours!  The kids played hard!

Then Brodie had a soccer game where he made his first goal that wasn't purely by accident... I'm not sure if he even realized he made his first two previous goals, but this one he kicked it all on his own and it went in and he saw it and he was so excited!  Afterwards, we went to, as Brodie put it, "The place with all the pizzas" (pizza pie cafe), to celebrate!  When we got back home the neighbors had a campfire going (they were celebrating the last day of school) so we had to roast a couple marshmallows.  And both boys slept in until 11:00 today!

Mari has been growing so much lately.  She doesn't look like a newborn anymore, which brings a tear to my eye.  She's really been into getting her feet as close to her face as she can.  Love her!

All Moved In!

I hate, hate, hate moving oh so much!!  But we've done it again!  A few weeks ago our landlord gave us 30 days notice to pack our bags because she was going to be selling her home to her sister. It was completely out of the blue, so I was totally shocked.  Luckily we found a nice house right away, but our new landlords wanted us to move in sooner then 30 days, so we gave two weeks noticed and got busy!  We couldn't have done it without the help of our friends and family.  The whole process is just so stressful!

Here are a few cute moments though:

Heber, our neighbor friend two doors down (well used to be) and also a team member on Brodie's soccer team, came and played with the boys pretty much all day on Saturday/Moving Day.  It was a wonderful distraction for the kids!  Here they were eating their lunch on the front porch and then they got the idea to get some moving boxes and turn them into boats.

There were lots of "Ahoys!" and "Arrr-mateys!"

  

Ryker was surprised to find that the stove at our new house produced actual fire.  He sat and watched it for a little while, disappeared for a minute...

And came back with his toy fire truck to put out the fire.

What a cutie!

Now I get to unpack all these boxes!  I feel like I've been downsizing for the last year, but I still have tons of stuff!  What's up with that?

My Monkey

 The boys were playing in the front yard and I hear Brodie telling Ryker, "Quick, go get Mommy!" Ryker ran in to show me a ladybug, but didn't request that I follow him back outside, so Brodie started shouting, "MOM!!!" over and over again.  I walked out to find this little monkey!

My Kids!

Ok, I totally need a filler post so that you guys don't have to look at my nasty kidney stones when you first come to my page, so here are a couple pictures of my latest favorites.

Brodie is still OBSESSED with Mari.  He is definitely her biggest fan.  He is getting better at not being right up in her face, which she really enjoys because she'll talk and coo at him now.

Brodie really is an awesome big brother.  And the things he says crack me up.  Today when we were driving home from gymnastics he said, "Mom, look there is a corn tree."  I just kind of said, oh yeah... you know, when your kid says something and you don't know what they are talking about, but you kind of act like you do... and then further down the road he points to another tree and says, "Mom, look another corn tree!  There are a lot of corn trees around here."  I looked at the tree and it was just a budding tree, but the buds look like little miniature corn cobs.  What a funny kid!

Mari is 3 months old!  I hate that she is that old already, but I just love her to pieces!  She is seriously the prettiest baby I have ever seen and she is so much fun!  She smiles and talks non-stop, has started falling asleep around 10:00 (she'll only sleep for 3 hours at a time, but a little bit of milk puts her right back to sleep, so it's not too bad), and she still fits into her newborn clothes... although I think in another week or two, they'll finally be retired to the closet.  She's also trying to roll over already!  And she can spin herself around 360 degrees on her back, so she can follow you around the room.  Slow down Mari!

 And Ryker is just amazing.  He loves me a lot and that makes me so happy.  He always wants to snuggle or sit on my lap, but he's also super independent and loves being outdoors.  He's actually sitting on my lap right now and he is perfectly content just hanging out with mom, relaxing.  He loves and is doing so great at gymnastics!  Every day he asks me if we can go.  And he is a no fear kind of guy... All the other boys in his class are 4 or 5, but at 2 he keeps up with them and has no problem jumping from tall heights, that even scare mommy, into the foam pit!

I just love having 3 kids!  I feel like I have the perfect ages in my household right now.  A charming 4 year old who says the funniest things and who can follow directions and help me when I need it, a super cute 2 year old who is just so happy all the time and has a great imagination - he's my favorite "movie" to watch right now, and an incredibly sweet little baby.  It is the best!  And now Ryker's  asleep, so this post is done!