Independence Day

What? Worried I have my holidays mixed up? Don't worry, I am fully aware today is Memorial Day and not Independence Day. Try telling that to my children though. They think every day is Independence Day. I'm beginning to regret encouraging so much independence in my children. I've been praised by our Parent Educator (from Parents As Teachers) in the past for how independent I encourage the boys to be, by letting them pick out their own clothes 95% of the time, potty training them so early on, letting them dress themselves even though it can take 5 times as long and stuff ends up on backwards, etc.

All of that toddler independence is well and good, but I think it's going to send me over the edge. No, seriously. If I have to hear one more time "no, I do it!" I'm going to scream. If I watch one more child throw an outright tantrum because I "helped" him do something I'm going to cry. Maybe if I scream and cry the boys will see how silly they are. Ha! I just reread that - that definitely won't happen. Instead, I suppose, I'll struggle along with the terrible 2's which are quickly approaching the __________ 3's. Why the blank space? Well it's yet to be seen if my children will fall into the rare "terrific 3's" or into the more common "terrible 3's". I'm praying all this independence stuff will result in the 3's being a breeze.

Hey, a mom can dream, right?

Chase

Happy Memorial Day and a huge thank you to all the men and women who have served our country and are serving right now!

Saturday Savings - What $20 Can Buy You

Let it be known that I hate shopping at the very end of the month. I usually have hardly any money left in the budget by then! Thankfully, with a lot of planning I was able to buy enough to stuff to at the very least get us until Tuesday (the start of June), but likely enough to help get us all the way to next weekend. Everything you see below cost me $23.38. Some of that (almost $5) will come out of a different line item (charitable giving) because I was buying supplies to make a dinner for a family whose son just had surgery. Also, earlier this week the boys and I hit a farmer's market and picked up cucumbers, zucchini and strawberries for $7.

Aldi:
Tortillas
Shredded Cheese (12oz bag)
Canned Diced Tomatoes
Canned Corn
Taco Seasoning
Cream Cheese
Hot Dog Buns

HyVee:
Dozen Eggs
Cheetos - 2 bags
Dutch Country Bread
Ritz Munchables
Artisan Wheat Thins
Oscar Meyer Hot Dogs - 2
1% Milk - 1 gallon
Kraft Melt Downs Cheese
Seedless Watermelon

Price Chopper:
6 ears of corn
cucumbers - 2
Hunt's Ketchup
NorthStar Lotta Fruit Popsicles

The Deals: Let me start of by telling you how much I spent out of pocket at Price Chopper. $1.86. Sweet, huh? I had a $3 off my next shopping trip coupon from when I bought some Kellogg's Cereal a few weeks ago! The popsicles were a bit of a splurge for the boys (Tyler shopped with me and I let him pick a frozen treat out), but they were at least more than 50% off.

At HyVee I was able to buy some snack type items, which Nick has been asking for. Also got some hot dogs for .49 each and the watermelon for $3.49 - perfect items for Memorial Day weekend! The bread ("good bread" I call it) was only .99 and I paid .79 for the Kraft Cheese Melt Downs.

Aldi had the best prices for all of the ingredients I needed to make chicken enchiladas (my gift meal) and the cheapest hot dog buns at .79 a bag.

Total Before Sales, Tax and Coupons: $55.66
Total After Sales, Tax and Coupons: $22.22 - 60% savings

In Less Than 3 Months

In less than 3 months my babies will be 3. I've thought about this a lot recently. What is it about the age of 3 that seems SO much more grown up and so much further away from being "babies" than age 2 did? Last year when the boys turned 2 I knew it was a big deal. I knew it meant we were out of the baby stage and that they'd be learning new skills. At the same time though, they still felt like just bigger babies to me.

Today I look at my boys and see just that - boys. They look nothing like babies or even toddlers to me. They look like little men. They don't have chubby arms and legs anymore. I'm constantly having to pull their pants up because their waists are thinning. They're officially little boys.

The boys talk like crazy, like identifying letters and numbers, telling me what aisle at the grocery store we're in, announcing who has matching shirts, cups or plates at the moment and so much more. They're going to start 1 day a week preschool this fall. 4 hours for them means 4 hours for me. I have a hunch sending the boys off to "school" will give me an anxiety attack and at the same time make me want to dance for joy.

Anyway, these are just random musings from a mom who feels like her babies are growing up to fast and is at a loss as to how to handle it. Hope you at least enjoyed the pictures I added! This last one is of the boys waving good-bye to Nick as he headed to work. This happens on a daily occurrence. When the weather is too cold, the boys wave from inside.

If You Show A Boy A Hose

If you show a boy a hose, he'll probably want to play with it.

Then you'll have to show him how to hold it.

After he holds it, he'll want to learn how to spray it.

After he learns how to spray it he'll think it would be even more fun to spray his brothers (or mother!).

After spraying his brothers in the face, his father will have to take over and just spray all of the children.

The End.

There was a lot of interest in my Summer of Change, so I asked on our FB Fan Page yesterday if people would be interested in a FB Group where we could all talk and encourage each other as we work on our own Summer of Change goals. Be watching our Fan Page later this morning for the link to the newly created group!
 

Another Video Clip

I guess this is just your lucky week; 2 video clips in 3 days! The boys are just being too cute and silly though to not share these right away.

Yesterday evening the boys were playing a little game on the deck. It was cracking me up and it's amazing someone didn't end up hurt and crying.

Oh, and what is it they're saying? "Brothers and Sisters." Earlier in the day they kept saying "I love my sister and I love my hair". Where do they come up with this stuff?! I think it's time to sit them down and have a little chat about the difference between a brother and sister.

Summer of Change

Allow me to take a brief break from blogging about the boys to instead blog about myself.

I have a problem. My children will be 3 years old in just a hair over 3 months and I'm still packing the "baby weight". *sigh* Ok, maybe "packing" is the wrong term. I am currently 26 pounds lighter than I was when I went back to Weight Watchers 6 weeks after I had the boys. At one point this winter I was down 37 pounds though and was only 2 pounds away from my pre-baby weight. Leave it to me though to completely sabotage myself and gain 11 pounds back.

Yesterday morning, after 4 days of eating out and over indulging with the in-laws, I weighed myself. I hadn't remembered to check in on my weight in 2 weeks, so I'm not sure how much of the number of the scale was related to "water weight" or was the real deal. Either way, I knew it was time to crack down. I'm now 13 pounds away from my pre-baby weight and 18 pounds from my goal weight.

The Plan:

•  Right Now: I'm reviewing all of my Weight Watchers materials and I've gotten back into journaling. I also have been pouring over the materials at www.parents.com/babyweight. (Hello, free meal plans and workout routines!)
• In the very near future: We will be getting a membership at a nearby gym. I'm looking forward to taking part in the classes they offer, as well as getting back into using weight machines. I miss that.
• Later this summer: I'll be doing one of those month long boot camp programs. It will mean leaving my house shortly after 5am 3 days a week, but I'm going to suck it up and deal with it. 

With a lot of hard work I should be at my goal weight by the boys' 3rd birthday. I've got 14 weeks and 18 pounds to lose - totally doable if I stay focused! I'm calling this my Summer of Change and you can expect to read about it here several times this summer. You'll also notice on the sidebar I've added a little weight/BMI tracker.

Time to hit the ground running and not look back.

I Heart Faces - Yellow Theme

I found this week's theme at I Heart Faces to be a tough one. The theme is simply "yellow", but you also (as always) need to have a human face in the shot. Hmmmm.... I was beginning to think I was going to need to just pose the boys in front of our yellow car, but then I got lucky when I took the boys to a park this morning. Behold, Jackson in a yellow tunnel!

You can join the fun over at I Heart Faces or just browse through the hundreds of entries this week!

Spiritual Guidance From 2 Year Olds

Saturday night the boys took their bed-time procrastination to new heights. After running through the usual suspects (needing to go potty, putting their books away, etc), they quoted scripture. Yup. Scripture. They totally took Nick and I by surprise by repeating their May Memory Verse from church over and over and over. We had no idea they even knew it!

Yesterday I whipped out the camera and asked them to do the verse for all of you. Left to right in the video is Tyler, Chase and Jackson. We had just finished dinner and Chase had a large spot of yogurt on his shorts and at the very end of the video you can hear Aunt Laura telling one of the boys not to touch her with his ketchup covered fingers.

Remember, you can watch this and other videos of the fam anytime on our YouTube Channel!

What Do You Grill?

Nick and I officially became homeowners this week. Yes, we bought this house three years ago next month, but I don't think we were true homeowners until now. Know why? Because we didn't have a grill until now. Sure, we had this beast (seriously, beast) of a George Foreman Grill, but that doesn't really count. We couldn't just fire it up, cook our food and then be done with it. No, we had to then spend 20 minutes cleaning the darn thing any time we used it.

So this week we took some birthday money Nick received and the money I made during our garage sale and we bought a grill. Sweet!

Here's where you all come in... Considering Nick and I are novices at the grilling world, we don't have many ideas of what to grill. I know about burgers, dogs and chicken and I remember an episode of America's Test Kitchen a few years ago where they grilled pizza (I know I want to try that!), but what else is there? What do you and your family love to make on your grill?

A Walk, A Run and A Bloody Nose

I think Jackson is going to be our accident prone kid. He seems to get injured more than the other two... There have been bloody noses, bloody lips, a cake pan on his head and trip to urgent care after smacking his head on our tile floor. The other night he was at it again.

After dinner Tuesday night we took the boys to a park to run off some energy before bed time. They had fun on the play equipment, as usual.

Tyler

Chase

Jackson (serving a time out for throwing rocks)

After all three boys requested trips to the porta potty (ew, ew, ew!), we decided to take a little walk on the path that wound through the woods behind the park. While starting that walk I took what I think is a pretty sweet shot...

There were these fluffy white balls all over the walk way and they just looked so cool! That would be Tyler in the background trying to hold his shorts up. Haha!

Towards the end of the walk the boys were running back and forth across a little bridge. There were some cute moments and then disaster and blood.

I managed to capture a massive collision in the background of this picture. You can even tell by the look on Nick's face that it was an ugly crash.

Poor Jackson. His head + Tyler's head is a bad combo. Jackson had a massive bloody nose. It was more blood than Nick and I had seen from one of the boys yet! Thankfully it didn't take him long to calm down.

It's All About The Shoes

Shoes can make or break an outfit, whether you're male, female or a child. It's just one of those little facts of life. The other day the boys helped themselves to some of Aunt Laura's shoes (she has a serious shoe addiction). Chase was hoping the pink flats and then the pointy toed heels would help dress up his frosting smeared sweatshirt. Not sure it worked...

Party Zone Fun

Sunday afternoon the boys attended a birthday party for one of their friends. They're always excited about a birthday party because they love the cake, balloons and wishing people "happy birthday" over and over. This party was a little different than the other parties they've attended. This one was at one of those wild, children's entertainment centers. I can still say we've never set foot in a Chuck E Cheese, but I imagine this place is pretty similar. You should have seen the looks on the boys' faces when we walked into this wild, noisy place!

They enjoyed trying to win prizes....

They enjoyed large cups of drink, which came back to bite us later.

They enjoyed cupcakes and ice cream! Tyler ate his ice cream so fast he got a brain freeze, which did not make him happy.

L-R: Tyler, Chase & Jackson

They rode in some flying bananas, which freaked Jackson out a bit.

They rode on a train. Tyler picked this car with a little girl in it already. He's going to be our ladies man I think.

The boys all piled into this tea cup with the birthday girl.

Then it was back to the train.

As you can tell from Chase's "thumbs up", they had an awesome time. That is, until the cups of drink caught up with us and Tyler had an accident. Laura and I aren't even sure where or when he had the accident. We just suddenly noticed he was walking funny and his pants were soaked. Whoops.

I Heart Faces Week 20 Challenge

The challenge this week over at I Heart Faces is faces and flowers. There are lots of great shots to admire over at their blog, but here is my entry! It's Mr. Tyler as a flower.

More Funny Things My Kids Say

Most of the recent funnies that I've remembered to record here are courtesy of Jackson and Chase. Rest assured, Tyler says funny things too - I just need to remember to write them down right away!

Jackson (after walking up to the weather radio and pushing the button, he said the following into the speaker): I want a Diet Coke with vanilla please. Nope, that's it.

Chase (after hearing some liquid slosh in his belly): Mommy, I have music in my belly!

Chase (while Skyping with Grandma): I can't fit in the computer too! I too big! 

Any of the boys when wearing a striped, polo shirt: I'm Steve! (They're newly obsessed with Blue's Clues and Steve always wears a striped polo in that show.)

Chase, after fake coughing: Mommy, I need Vicks!

Jackson

Man, these kids make us laugh!