earth day. ♥

Brayden called all the shots on Earth day. I woke up and put on my running shorts since it was my 'on' day. But, I asked Bray if he wanted to play soccer instead. He loves having one on one challenges and its super good exercise. I was not sad to skip my run. Final score 18:20. He won. But the whole time he told me to not go easy on him and to be aggressive, I was!

Then he asked if we could ride our bikes to Subway for lunch, since it was good for the earth. We had lunch, and on the way home, I was trailing pretty far behind him, I saw him suddenly leap from his bike. I kept asking why, but he didn't answer me. He walked back a ways and came back with a water bottle someone had littered. He put it in my bike basket and told me we should recycle it. 

The weather was gorgeous and we were outside all day long. It was a lovely earth day. 

29.

 My mom, britt, justin, and britt's kids...just missing stef from the original four pack. Stef, cut and paste yourself again please.

 Maria (my step mom) 

Wow, you can see yourself in my shiny face. That is with oil-control lotion, people. This was at Yogurtland right before coming home. Refreshed and rested!

I don't think I could ever dread getting older just because birthdays are so dang FUN. This was a very fun birthday week. I had lunch with my siblings & mom, lunch with my stepmom, dinner with us four plus zach, cake with jer's parents, phone calls, cards, and fun things left at my door. Just when I thought the week couldn't get better, Jer called me on Friday afternoon and told me to pack up because he booked the Hyatt for the night. He was so proud of himself for the surprise he kept and the good deal he got through priceline. This was our first ever weekend getaway, if you can believe that after 10 years! I was so excited. We went out to dinner, walked around Fashion Square, and then headed back to our hotel. We sat in the spa and then laid in the coziest cabana ever and talked until midnight. We were discussing how to make the most of our short time and other things. He wanted to stay another night and have his mom bring the boys down. It was so funny. Our one night away, and he couldn't stop talking about the boys. "I wonder how they are doing...I wonder what they are doing....should I call them?....the boys would have so much fun here...." and it went on and on. Lets just say I doubt he could make it longer than a weekend without them. Wait--make that two nights without them. The next morning, we were planning on waking up sorta early so we could go down and enjoy the pool area before check out at noon. We ended up sleeping in till 10:30 with those black out curtains! So we watched a movie and got ready and then went to lunch, and did some more shopping before coming home. Jer was in a mad rush to get to his moms to pick up the boys. Holy moly, this guy is just a little attached. That is what I discovered during our getaway. Well, he is pretty darn sweet to me too. Lucky to have him. 

totally inappropriate but I can do what I want to on my private blog :)

Last night after dinner, the boys got in the shower. Kosty came back in, totally naked. He grabbed his (you know what) and well..... held it a certain way. He said, "Look mommy! Its a gliding squirrel!! Weeeeeee!" as he "flew" it in my direction. I was dying laughing. Then, we were eating smores for our FHE treat and the chocolate was dripping all over him. He was still naked. Next thing I knew, Brayden says, "Hey Kosty. You got some chocolate on your gliding squirrel." 

halle heart museum field trip.

I got to chaperone Brayden's class to the Halle Heart Museum and Kiwana's park. I talked about it earlier in another post, but I hadn't downloaded the pictures yet. I just love seeing Brayden with his classmates and what he's like around them. Worth the crazy museum tour guide and the bumpy bus ride for sure.

 just a happy boy who LOVES rainy days and a wet trampoline.

We met some of our "old neighborhood" friends over at our new neighborhood park and Brayden wanted to bring one of them home to play. Then he looked around at all his buddies and said he didn't want to disappoint anyone or leave anyone out. I agreed, and so they all came to play at our house. They discovered quickly that it was harder to find things to do for so many but they had fun. I love having their friends over. On the very last day of Spring Break, Brayden was over at a friends house and he was climbing up their trampoline ladder. Somehow it unhooked and either he landed on it, or it flew in the air and hit his head. We aren't really sure how it happened, but he managed to split his head open. I felt so bad for my friend, she was so sweet to calm him down and start cleaning up his matted-bloody-hair head. Luckily, we were right by the Dr office so I ran in there really quickly. It was 15 minutes past their closing time, but I just wanted someone to look at it and tell me if it was worth a few hours at Urgent Care to get stitches. Dr. Mueller was standing there filling out paperwork and even though it was past quittin time, she gave me the ok to bring him in and look at it. She took him back and numbed him up and gave him 2 staples to close it. She was just the sweetest and most patient Dr. ever. She even had her mom in town visiting and asked her to take over her daughter's cheer practice carpool so that she could stay and help us. I was so grateful, especially since I knew the alternative was to spend hours in Urgent Care. What a wonderful lady!

amococo exhibit.

They had the Amococo exhibit down at the Mesa Arts Center and we decided to check it out as we were running out of ideas on our list towards the end of break. Its kind of hard to explain so click on the link if you're more curious. Its a traveling luminary exhibit that goes to 56 different countries. While we were waiting to enter, we walked around the arts center. The kids were excited because they had never been to a real adult art museum. They had this community quilting project going on so we each wove a piece of fabric on the rails. My camera does NOT do pictures with no flash, so I'm well aware these are crappy pictures.

the outside of the amococo

ha. i don't think either of us were ready for the flash.

spring break highlights.

The kids had their usual spring break to do's and we wrote them all up on our white board:

Make fresh lemonade. Have a sleepover with Uncle Zach. Have friends over. Ride bikes to McDonald's & park. Go to the library. Barnes N Noble. Movies. Drive ins. Splash pad with friends. Different splash pad with different friends. Sleepover at Grandmas. Sleepover with Uncle Chase. Trampoline camp out. 

Mall. Museum. Peter Piper. Bounce U. Cousins over. Basha Pool.

We skipped a couple things, but we did pretty well with our list. My favorite part of break is always that these two boys BOND so much in that space of time. They are stuck together like glue, and they are always so excited to wake up and play together and have no schedule. 

somebody was feeling camera shy...and it looks like both of them picked out their pajamas in the dark!

Uncle Zach. Such a sweet uncle he is. (Jer's brother) I don't know a lot of seniors who would give up a night of friends and girls to hang with their nephews. Well, they are pretty awesome nephews. And since Zach LOVES crepes for breakfast,  I can usually lure him with that.

Alex and Brayden at Basha Pool...alex looks a bit cold!

two tired blond little boys. Kosty and Tyson (my nephew)

This was fun. Jer and I were babysitting my sister's kids and we all sat down to eat dinner and we realized that is what it would feel like to have 4 kids! Weird. And we liked it. 

Another crepe sleepover with another uncle! Uncle Chase and Bray playing DJ Hero. 

they both combed their hair right before we went to dinner and I could hardly stand the cuteness.

Peter Piper with cousins Libby and Tyson. 

My favorite little people ever. I could not ask for more wonderful boys. They actually get along and LOVE eachother so much. Nothing better than that. 

google for doodle.

Brayden worked really hard on this google for doodle art contest. To be honest, I don't even know what you win but we submitted it.  I thought I should take a picture since we will never see it again! 

31.

On Jer's birthday, we met him for dinner after work at Joe's Farm Grill and there was a very looong line. It was after bedtime when we finally got our food and sat down to eat. We had also been swimming all day that day and the kids hadn't eaten since lunch. They were both super grumpy and starving out of their minds. Kosty wasn't too pleased with the menu and wanted a plain hamburger patty and fries. Joe's does not have kids hamburgers, so they gave him an adult patty (as big as his head) and it was on a bed of lettuce with fries on another plate. Instead of just scarfing it down because he was so hungry, he threw a fit about its presentation! he didn't like the bed of lettuce. and he wanted his fries next to his meat. Oh, he was ticked alright. So he marched off and sat on the ground under the big (scorpion) tree and pouted. We read him the sign and he knew that it wasn't the safest place to sit, but he was too mad to give a darn. So he sat there, and we laughed. And took pictures. Jer's parents were with us and they sure got a kick out of him. Finally, he snuck over to the table and grabbed his food and snuck back to the tree, only this time he sat on the other side so we couldn't see him give in and EAT. The pride of this child is unbelievable!

Well, when he came back about 60 seconds later, there was not a single crumb leftover. He ate the enormous patty and the fries and came back totally happy and smiling.

At 3:00 in the morning, we awoke to the sound of him barfing. The whole meat patty. It was the grossest ever. And it left grease stains on his sheets. He is still grossed out by meat and hasn't eaten it since. (and that's A ok with me). Jer doesn't know it yet but we are slowly becoming a vegetarian family. And by vegetarian, I mean not really. We still eat chicken. Just no more barf. I mean beef.

a day in the life of a tyrant.

^ a typical day in Brayden's world

I must tell Kosty a million times a day that he is sure lucky that his big brother is NICE. And patient. And does not seek revenge. Kosty acts like he is 10 feet tall around him. And he told me not to post this because of his underwear, but I refuse to abide by his rules. crap, here he comes!

When Kosty was on meds for his pneumonia, he insisted on having a cookie and water right next to him as he plugged his nose and inserted his own antibiotics. Giving him the control makes him controllable sometimes. 

legoland.

Even though I hate clutter, I love his because he works so hard on these creations and I have to agree, this is the perfect wall...they need to be up semi high, and his dresser is not long enough. My sis in law was cracking up when she came to visit. She couldn't believe I had legos as a permanent decor feature in our home. She asked, "what do you do when the home teachers come over?" 

I told her they don't mind.