Memorial Day Weekend

With this many adorable pictures of the boys, I HAD to do a Memorial Day weekend recap. Last year Memorial Day weekend we were in Hawaii, so we had to make the best out of this year's long weekend. Otherwise we'd just be depressed. We ended up having a lot of fun and it didn't hurt that the weather was near perfect here in Oregon!

Saturday we went to the gym and then spent three hours at the pool. It was our first trip to the pool this season, so we were anxious to see if Sambo loves the water as much as he did last year -- and as much as he enjoys his baths. Enjoying himself was an understatement.

Since Saturday, we keep talking about that experience at the pool and have determined that controlling him and containing him in the pool was like containing a cat in a paper bag. I have never seen that child so happy. He kept dunking himself, squealing with delight, and running around like a crazy baby in the super shallow area. G got a few pics on his phone, but one of these days we'll have to take some better pictures. I'm not exactly sure how easy that will be considering how wiggly he is. He turns into a totally different person in the water! Of course Buddy had fun too -- but we already knew he is right at home in the pool. I was concerned that maybe his 8 months of swimming lessons this fall and winter were a waste, but I changed my mind as soon as I saw him in the water. Thank goodness I only have one un-tamed child to worry about this summer.

After the pool, we came home and washed the cars and worked on some painting projects. We had smores with friends later that night.

Sunday was church and we had naps mostly all around. Monday was the big holiday. G helped a family with some yardwork then we met my parents in Portland at a state park. We took a gorgeous walk and enjoyed being outside. Of course we looked for birds and other wildlife. Unfortunately, we only found a snail. We pushed Sambo half the time in the stroller, but let him out when we got to the creek so he could play.

Sambo is notorious for throwing things (balls, rocks, trucks down the stairs onto the hardwood floors) so he was super excited to throw rocks into the water. Sambo was happy to walk the rest of the way like a big boy. We just couldn't stop remarking how quickly he's grown up and how happy he is when he's outside doing things right along side his big brother.


We headed over to an ice cream shop and treated ourselves and the kids. I feel sorry for you if you haven't ever enjoyed Tillamook ice cream. Mmmm.... We ate our cones next to the water while Buddy gave grandpa a steady stream of comments about all the ducks in the lake. And Sambo chased a pigeon for a solid ten minutes. We weren't exactly sure why the poor bird didn't fly away.

I love the admiration on Sambo's face watching his brother climb. It was the very next day he learned to scale the kitchen table. Which has been so awesome, let me tell you.

That evening we had friends and my brother and wife over for a BBQ and a kid game of baseball in the field.

It was a sunny weekend with lots of time together as a family. Hawaii, not so much, but still it was just what I needed.

Mammals

Conversation between Buddy and I while he was outside gathering rocks. He was freaking out over every other rock. A wolverine claw! A piece of gold!

Buddy: Oh my gosh! I just found a coyote egg!

Me: Coyotes don't lay eggs. They are mammals.

Buddy: They are? Oh yeah-they have fur.

Me: Amphibians and birds lay eggs. Mammals don't.

Buddy: Mammals have babies, so how do they hatch their babies then, without eggs?

Me: How do you think they have babies?

Buddy: Out of the mommy's tummy?

Me: Yep.

Buddy: Just like a birth mom!

Bona Fide Mother of Boys

I couldn't decide what to call this post. Epiphany. A Day in the Life. or The Day My Life Changed for Good.

Today I realized I am the mother of boys. Obviously I knew that before today, but today it really hit me square in the face. I have boys. They are busy, stinky, they eat a lot, and they love slimy creatures.

Here's how my day went down today. The day started with a stinky diaper (hotdogs for dinner last night) and Sambo half-dressed. His new game is to wake up in the morning and take his pajamas and sheets off. Looks like a boy, smells like a boy.

Notice the sheets and mattress pad on the floor and his PJ shirt around his waist

A short time after waking up Buddy was bouncing off the walls, so I sent him to the backyard so I could get the kitchen cleaned and dinner made (I wanted to have it done and in the fridge so I could focus on the rest of my day. A lot to do.) A few minutes later Buddy bounds in the house full of so much glee, I assumed he had seen a turkey vulture. Nope, he had caught a salamander and HE HAD BROUGHT IT INTO THE HOUSE. It royally creeped me out, so I told him to go back outside and I encouraged him to show Sambo rather than me. Sambo is really getting into bugs and other creepy things, so as expected, he was very impressed. He laughed hysterically watching the salamander crawl all over Buddy's hand. Definitely boys.

The boys looking at the salamander

I send Buddy back outside and he gladly goes so he can make a habitat for the salamander. He fills a pail full of rocks and puts the salamander on top along with a few grass blades. He comes inside asking for water because salamanders love water. I tell him I'm not turning on the hose right now because all his rock collecting reminded me that I needed to go shopping for rocks for the primary activity on Saturday.

So we all load up to go to the rock store not too far from our house. Buddy and Sambo are in heaven and in the three minutes we spent there, they try to lift every single rock in sight, Sambo throws several, and Buddy starts loading his pockets with stray rocks found in the parking lot. "I didn't steal these. These are just part of the parking lot," he says. That place stresses me out way too much and I'm totally confused about how to purchase the rocks, so I leave and call G on my way home and ask him to go buy the rocks for me later in the week.

We come home and Buddy goes to check on the salamander. It has passed away. He runs in the house bawling and tries to blame the death on me for not allowing it to have water. I tell him that he handled the poor salamander too much or maybe he got smashed by the rocks. Between his tears Buddy says, "I bet he died because he got old." He's extremely depressed but we eat lunch, send Sambo down for a nap and Buddy for a quiet time.

After less than two hours Buddy is bouncing off the wall again, so I tell him to check and see if any of the neighbors are outside. They are, so a bunch of kids go play in the field. A short time later I notice Sambo climbing onto the kitchen table for the first time ever. I cannot believe my eyes.
As a side story -- and I might have shared this one with you before -- I use to judge parents who let their children climb all over the furniture. Years ago a family in our apartments at BYU showed up to church with their 2-year old daughter in a cast. G and I were horrified to learn the girl had fallen off the kitchen table. G and I made a promise to each other that day that we would never allow our children to run around at church or climb on the furniture at home (two things those horrid parents did...). Wouldn't you know, both of our children do both. Buddy was around Sambo's age when I went to the laundry room to put clothes in the dryer and came out to find him standing on the table dumping an entire pitcher of juice onto the carpet. And now at 17 months Sambo is pulling the same stunt (minus the juice, thank goodness.) Let this be a lesson in judging.
For the remainder of the day I pulled Sambo off the table constantly. At this point I realize MY LIFE HAS CHANGED FOREVER. I can no longer let him out of my sight. When I had to go upstairs for a second, I moved all the chairs far, far away from the table and in the minute I was gone, he put them all back and that's when I got the camera. Definitely a boy.

Meanwhile, Buddy has decided he wants to ride his bike in the field. I tell him I don't think he'll be able to. He agrees, but says he doesn't care because "the other kids are doing it." I say fine and help him get it out of the garage (since he's banned from getting his own bike out ever since he scratched the car last week.)

An hour later I've accomplished nothing because I've been running to the kitchen table every ten seconds and so I go outside to tell Buddy it's time to come in. The neighbor dad is helping his kids get their bikes out of the field (the long grass has been cut but not baled yet, so it's impossible to ride a bike). He offers to help Buddy, but Buddy doesn't like being helped. I tell him that this isn't the time to be proud, but he insists he can do it. Fifteen minutes later he finally gets home and he wants to show me the big scratch he got on his stomach from falling off his bike. That's when I notice he has torn his t-shirt. This is the first time he's worn it. He's dripping in sweat from working so hard to get his bike out of the field and his hair is curly as a result. He drinks about a gallon of water and goes to get his t-ball clothes on. At this point I'm no longer in denial. I have boys. Boys through and through.

We go to t-ball and get all the way to the field and although I've reminded Buddy to get his mitt out of the car, I notice he has left it behind. G runs all the way back to get it. I wonder why boys/men are so unable to listen/remember/follow directions. I notice most of the kids on the team have turned the bats into guns. My son is totally impressed.

We get home and have a late dinner (8:15 PM) and my boys consume more food than I thought possible. I come to the frustrating realization that many of the meals I love to cook no longer produce leftovers. I am a huge fan of cooking, but an even bigger fan of leftovers. No wonder Mormon women make so many casseroles. Casseroles make leftovers! In eleven years of cooking for our family, I've gotten really good about meal planning. But in the last two months or so these boys have thrown my planning for a real loop.

We try to put them to bed but they are so wound up (why, I have no idea), so I decide to burn the last of the energy by trying to get Sambo to make animal sounds. He has never been a performing baby. He refuses to talk or do any of those cute things a mom lives and dies for -- like making an animal sound for crying out loud. Well, tonight he did. And that got Buddy laughing so dang hard, we all started laughing. Sambo almost fell off the bed and the sound of the two of those boys laughing seriously hurt my ears. Except I loved it. Loud laughter by boys. I swear I had never been so happy.

(My happiness only slight improved when I turned out the light and closed the door.)

I Voted Today, How About You?

I also voted for two important school board candidates. That's what I call fulfilling my civic duty.

Father and Son Campout (By G)

Last weekend we had the annual ward father and son campout. What was different about this one, was that I was the father this time. That fact in and of itself is kinda surreal for me. The outing was held at Camp Meriweather outside of Tillamook. At the camp, they had places for the tent as pictured above. This was good to keep the tent off of the ground in the event of rain, but it was like sleeping on a deck. Most of my camping equipment was from the days that I was into backpacking so my camping pad only inflates to about an inch. Unfortunately, I'm not as young as I used to be and so by the time morning rolled around, I was pretty sore.

In anticipation of the campout, I bought Buddy his first sleeping bag. It was actually a pretty fun experience for me doing the research and finding something that I thought would be good for him. He stayed warm all night and actually slept really good (as evidenced by his loud breathing all night long).

We had a lot of fun with a lot of friends. We got to play on the beach, which wasn't too far from camp. We had hot dogs for dinner, smores and bisquits for dessert and pancakes and sausage for breakfast. Something about being in the great outdoors makes me hungry, so I end up eating a lot more that I do normally, which is really saying something. Buddy, I discovered, also is the same way. For example, for breakfast he had 4 pancakes and 3 sausage links. Then he continued to talk his friends into sharing their breakfast with him as well.

After breakfast, we hung out for a little while then we got everything packed up and headed with our friends to the Tillamook Cheese Factory. We had a great time looking at old cars that were on display, eating cheese samples and having ice cream. After the fun was had, we got back in the car and headed for home.

It was a really fun experience and it was good to spend some one-on-one time with Buddy. He's an amazing kid. He really enjoyed being outdoors and camping, even if he was extremely disappointed he didn't run across any bears (which he thinks is a requirement for camping). He had been looking forward to the campout for days and I think the experience mostly met his expectations. M wanted me to also take Sambo, but I told her that if I took both of the kids that she would have to choose her favorite because I likely wouldn't make it back with both.

(un)Cooperative Cousins

My sister and her little boy spent nine days here with us last week. It was so interesting and enjoyable having all three boys together. First of all, we had high hopes for her little Hippo and Sambo to be the best of friends, since they are only 3.5 months apart. Unfortunately, they didn't exactly hit it off this time, but hopefully next! Hippo is extremely friendly and just adores kids. So he was all in favor of creating a loving friendship with Sambo, but Sambo is at a very impatient and no-nonsense stage, so he was the fun-hater in the relationship. Besides, somehow we've given Sambo the impression that he's the center of the universe and so he screeched like a crazy baby every time Hippo came near him or did something he did not approve of. Which happened to be every two seconds.

Luckily, Hippo and Buddy got along marvelously. Those two are definitely cut from the same cloth. In fact, I spent the whole week totally tripped out that there is a baby on this earth so much like Buddy was at that age. The non-stop talking, the massive size, the attention-seeking. I just loved having baby Buddy back in my life for a few days! Plus, Hippo was sincerely amused by all of Buddy's crazy antics, so by the end of the week, Buddy proclaimed, "Hippo is the best friend I've ever had." The fact that Hippo is 13 months old didn't phase him at all.

All-in-all, it was so fun having them here. Hippo was darling and so easy to have hang out with us. And Myndi's late-night chats and stories are always welcome. We've dropped tons of hints over the years that its high-time they move back to Oregon, but hopefully having the cousins together was persuasion enough.

Plus, somebody needs to fatten Sambo up, since what we're feeding him isn't quite cutting it.

Hippo feeding Sambo -- ages 13 months and 17 months respectively

Take Me Out to the Ballgame

The Seattle Mariner's hosted a game last weekend celebrating families created by adoption or foster care. My dad and siblings are huge Mariner's fans, so it didn't take too much convincing to get the whole family together for the game. My sister and her husband and baby flew out from Utah and we all made the trip up to Seattle. We had a great time, especially since they won and the weather was perfect. It would have been even more perfect if Ken Griffey Jr. had played.

We got to the game super early to walk around and enjoy the ballpark. Buddy was especially excited about the Mariner's cap and adoption pin they gave out to adoptive families. Sambo wasn't as impressed by the game, but luckily daddy has the magic touch and was able to keep him occupied throughout the game.


The next day we spent a very rainy day in Seattle. We took a ferry ride, which only me and the boys enjoyed. Everyone else thought it was a downer of an activity, but you should have seen how happy Sambo was. His reaction to the boat and the water were worth it, I thought.

Of course no Seattle trip is complete without a stroll through Pikes Market. The fish throwers are a big hit with a sea-animal-lover like Buddy. This guy talked Buddy into touching the fish and wiping it on me, which was nasty, considering I am NOT a sea-animal-lover. Buddy couldn't understand why we wouldn't pay $32 a pound for the salmon jerky he tasted.