Happy Halloween!!!

Thing 1, Thing 2, Harry Potter, and the King....

Max and Sawyer turned 2!!!

Last Sunday Max and Sawyer had their second birthday. I spent the night before and day of thinking what we were doing two years ago. We could have never imagined the fun ahead. At some point I had imagined grand plans of a large celebration, but as the realities of busy lives happened, we ended up calling Patty to come over (as she is their favorite playmate), pulling frozen oatmeal zuccini brownies out of the freezer, putting a large scoop of icecream ontop with two candles each and we had two very happy boys. After a few runs of blowing the candles out, the little boys spent the rest of the night playing with their candles...the candleswent outside and in the bath. I didn't even wrap their gifts this year. I should have just left it at the candles...they were way more exciting than the toys I gave them. We love all our boys and can't imagine life without them.
Happy Birthday Max and Sawyer!

***Due to the fact that I dropped my camera in the ocean, their two year old pictures were taken on a disposable camera....which hopefully, I will develop before they turn 3:)

Cayucos Aug. 08

In August, we met the Suorsa's at Cayucos and stayed for a long weekend. The little boys have been to the coast twice before, but in the winter. This was their first time to play in the ocean. They LOVED it! Both boys went straight for the water even before we got their suits on. Unfortunately, Sawyer and I stumbled in ankle deep water and the camera went in. Therefore, theese are all the photos I have of the weekend, and I did not get any photos of Ben. Ben had a great time with Jack and Parker. He tried out the boogy board, built sandcastles, flew a kite, and searched for quite a collection of shells. We also fished off the Cayucos pier where someone caught a small fish, spent an afternoon wandering Cambria, went to an art festival in Morro Bay, took in Sacrament at the local ward, visited the elephant seals in San Simeon, and watched the people sailing on their surf boards (not sure what they call this). The highlight of the trip is the many times we saw dolphins. Evidently, there were 2 pods of dolphins just off the coast at Cayucos and we could clearly see them off the pier and as we were sitting out at the beach. There were also brown pelicans that would dive bomb into the water to catch fish....they were very fun to watch, and we saw sea otters too. This was a national geographic kind of weekend:) We had a great time.

Pepper

Max and Sawyer are finally learning how to touch Pepper nice. This is not an everday occassion, but it is getting better. Often, Sawyer is chasing Pepper through the house and swinging things at him. Max is more gentle in his nature and Pep trusts him a bit more.

Sewing with Max and Sawyer

Recently I had my sewing machines out for a few days while I was working on some of Patty and my humanitarian aid projects. I had to sacrifice the thread so I could get my work done. Just Sawyer is in this picture, but both little boys spent a lot of time stacking, unwinding, and basically just reaking havoc on my thread. But it worked as a good distraction and I got a lot of cutting done for the pillowcases.

Max

I was playing with the camera the other day and Max was playing with this towel. He's just so cute I had to include theese pictures.

Brotherly Love?

Max and Sawyer have started hugging eachother. Sawyer is also very thoughtful towards Max at times, getting him something and then going back for his own. We enjoy any acts of kindness they show to one another because most of the time they are biting, fighting, pushing, and pulling hair. On this occassion it turned into a wrestling match. I am sure a sign of things to come.

Summer Book Club

Ben was invited to be in a summer book club. There were 6 boys, each one chose a book then had all the other boys over for an afternoon of doing activities based around the book. Ben's book was Dragon Slayer's Acadamy. We did an obstacle course to test our dragon hunting skills, found treasures with our toes in the bubbles, made castle and dragons, had a fabulous lunch of eel on a roll (just like they ate in the book), told really bad knock knock jokes, and had a scavenger hunt (written in pig latin) to find the dragon's treasure.

The summer book club was a ton of fun. All the parents planned fun things for the boys and it was great motivation for Ben to keep up on his reading this summer. (I do need to add that we spent probably 3 hours each book just looking for the book--one we have never did find). I hope that we do it again next summer.

4th of July

We spent the holiday with the Soursa's which is always lots of fun. Ben was VERY excited for the fireworks. This was Max and Sawyer's real first experience with them. Max was great about sitting on the curb and watching. Sawyer kept trying to stray into the street and touch, etc. Our neighbors the Maxfield's came over to light the fireworks (Corrine and Domonique). It was a great night and a wonderful way to celebrate our incredible freedoms here in the USA.

Our garden

Jason built garden boxes this year and we planted a garden. The boys thought it was a sandbox at first....and then they were plucking out the plants as I was planting them....so I fenced it. (If you look closely, you can see the mesh fence) Some people keep out deer and I have to keep out little boys. Sawyer will eat anything that resembles food in the yard. He has chewed on freshly picked zuccinini, grapes, peaches, but his favorite is to hunt out strawberries. He doesn't care if they are ripe or not. Ben likes to harvest the garden, but not to into eating the vegetables we grown there. Max is just Max and has squeezed his way in between the post several times to discover what he might be missing out on.

Yes, I'll drive!

So we left for Utah Friday afternoon. We did not leave until after 3 pm and got to Cedar City (to stay at GG's house) at 1 am. I started driving because Jason was going to have to drive in the late night. Jason normally is the passenger when the boys are sleeping. After about an hour of passing snacks, fixing the dvd, finding lost toys and sippies, Jason informed me that he "did not like this seat". I was thoroughly enjoying watching Jason try to settle in for a long winters nap only to be roused from his almost slumber by the boys yelling and expressing a new demand. Or Max pelting him with his grapes that had imperfections. As all mothers know, it is always enjoyable to watch your spouse get a full dose of "mothering". And I drove as far as I could until there was hope of the boys settling into the drive:)

Our boys

They are all growing up. Ben is almost to the end of 1st grade and Max and Sawyer will be 2 at the end of the summer. WOW!

35!

So I turned 35 this year. We went to a garden show at the LA Arboretum for my b-day. Grandma Goudge made me the traditional birthday cake-which is always wonderful. Happy birthday to me!

Peacock attack

We were at Jason's grandmothers house in the beginning of May. She lives very near the L.A. Arboritum (sp?) The boys were playing in the backyard with Jason and Max was following a peacock. The peacock flew up and attacked him with his tallons. Max is very blessed that he was hurt supperficially and does not to have had damaged to his eye. To say the least, we don't think peacocks are so great anymore.

Who's watching me?

Jas was on the phone and Max was right next to him and Max managed to color his face with marker. So of course I had to document Jason's lax parenting. Then two days later Max was next to me and I was on the phone....and you can see he colored his face again. And yes that is the outlet safety plug he has removed that he is showing in the photo.