lunch at the park

last week sometime, we met papa on his lunch break at a small park near his office. it was a dreary day, but i was happy to get the kids out of the house for a while. here's some pics from our excursion.

the play area is a little pirate ship.

here is captain jagger steering the ship and wearing some snazzy st. patrick's day beads.the kids love the slide.

jagger was the first to go down, beads a-flyin'cash was next, bringing his cup along for the ride.
slade was a little nervous to go down by himself.

jagger is a little impatient behind him.success :)
build-up at the bottom.

after playing for awhile on the pirate ship, we headed down to the riverfront to take in the view. the kids are running all crazy here.
cash and slade taking in the view.
the view
the walk back to the car took longer than usual 'cause jagger insisted on blowing on all dandelions he came across :)

i love mail

i've said it before, and i'll say it again.

getting the mail is one of my favorite things to do.

even if it's just bills.

i know is weird & quirky, but it's the truth.

today, however, was an excellent mail day because it contained a package.

a package from my friend, jessica.

it's for my birthday (which was a few weeks ago) and was completely full of goodness.

all the fixin's needed for a girls night:

pjs

funky socks

a chick flick

and chocolatey treats. but the best part of all was the card.  

not only did it sing to me that i was getting old to the tune of kumbaya, but it included jessica in it.  

well, a miniature version.  

since she couldn't be here to have a girl's night with me, she sent her twin instead :) heh.
totally made my day.

thanks jess, i love it all!

(and i need to take classes from you and melissa on how to put together the perfect gift and then following through and sending/giving it -- you guys are so good at it!)

the future begins

have you seen this yet?

corey and i were lucky enough to get a sitter on friday (thanks alicia!)

we did dinner and a movie.

this was corey's pick.

i have to say, having no prior old school star trek experience (i'm only familiar with the next generation), i thought the movie was pretty awesome.

and corey was completely geeked out :)

i think the best part of the whole night was watching corey watch the movie. he was so happy :)

i recommend it, go out and see it!

hot, sticky fun

it's been pretty hot and humid the past couple of days.

and i'm holding out on turning on the air for as long as i can.  

so in looking for things to do to cool off, i decided it was the perfect time to introduce the boys to freeze pops.

jagger instantly loved them.

cash and slade weren't sure what the heck they were and what they were supposed to do with them.  and they were a bit shocked by how cold they were.  but they watched big brother and soon had it figured out.

i think the freeze pops were a success :)the water table has been such a great toy for the kids.

thanks again, rob, lee, and fam!

slade decided it would make a nice pool and climbed right in.  he was pretty pleased with himself.jagger has been punching the water a lot lately.  i guess he has a bunch of aggression he needs to get out.  i'd rather it be water than one of his brothers, so this works for me.

and cash loves to splash. he just goes crazy, laughing hysterically, while soaking everything in the vicinity.  (you'll notice i took the picture from inside, to keep the camera from getting soaked!)
and last week, jagger received an early birthday present from nana.  this jump-o-lene has been a huge help in keeping the kids happy.  thank you nana!it's really hard to get a picture of the kids in it, they're bouncing around so much.  they love it and just laugh and laugh while tumbling around inside :)and the funny thing about this jump-o-lene is that it has one larger hole for the entrance, but the boys refuse to use it.  they keep trying to go through one of the smaller ones and then they get stuck.  i'm forever rescuing the little rugrats :)

we'll see how long these distractions work, before i have to come up with some new ones.  

any suggestions?

happiness

i love walking into a room and seeing my boys looking at books.

we keep a bunch out in a basket in the living room, so they can browse them whenever they feel like it.

as i said before, i would love for my boys to be readers.

books bring such happiness to my life, i would love for them to share in that joy :)

yogurt

all my boys love yogurt.

love it.

jagger has been on a yogurt kick.  asking for one every morning.

apparently he abandoned this one before finishing.

slade happily stumbled upon it and helped himself.

yum :)

cherry festival

friday evening we went with a bunch of friends to the cherry festival in washington.

i expected some quaint little street fair.

nope, it was a regular old carnival, carnies and all.

didn't even have anything to do with cherries.

the kids enjoyed the sights, the mama enjoyed the food :)

the best part was the fireworks that evening.

the boys enjoyed them :)