we like to party

On Saturday we had two birthday parties to go to, one right after the other.

Andrew made cards for his friends - he made this one on his own. I had no idea he knew how to spell Sam, but apparently he does.

The second party was a drop-your-kids-off kind of party, and since Andrew and Mason were both invited, we ended up with a few free hours to fill. This is a restaurant called Stone House that we went to for dessert. I thought the place was cute so I made Matt take my picture. : ) It ended up being the only picture we got to remember our fun date night.

yep, that just happened

I'm pretty sure this look was inspired by the biker chicks we saw at the store yesterday. Although I think he's a ninja, not a pirate.

On Friday we saw a couple ladies who were rough and tough, to say the least. One had a bandanna on, the other had tattoos covering both arms and thick eyeliner around her eyes. They were dressed in ripped/spiked clothes and black boots. Andrew got very excited when we pulled up next to them to pick out our steak and asked "are they real life pirates?!". Awesome.

It reminded me of two of my other favorite moments with Andrew.

{runner up} "He looks just like Jackie Chan!!" Or he's Asian... Hopefully he took it as a compliment.

{my very favorite} We were at McDonalds probably a year or so ago, and sat next to a table with four elderly women sitting at it. Andrew looked at me and said "hey mom, which one is your favorite old lady?". Oh man, it still cracks me up.

photo dump

This could be my new favorite thing in the whole world. I'm still in love with Instagram, so this is perfect. It gives me a place to put some pictures up that I love that don't really need their own posts AND I get to play with Instagram. Welcome to my (weekly?) photo dump.

happy birthday party day to you

We celebrated Mason's 3rd birthday tonight!!

I got Mason this dino shirt a month or so ago. It's actually a muscle shirt (that you'll see later because the button up shirt only lasted about 30 minutes) and shorts outfit, but the weather didn't cooperate, so I dressed him up a bit. Andrew wanted to look nice too, so he chose a button up shirt and got in the birthday photo shoot. I love it!

We had a little sampling of some of Mason's favorites for dinner, including dino shaped pb&j's. It was the first time I've ever used a shape cutter - I had no idea how much better they make sandwiches taste!

The rain tried to ruin our fossil dig but we came up with a plan B. We filled my shoe bins up with sand, moved to the garage and pretended it was nice outside. It was actually plenty warm outside and the kids seemed to enjoy it. Mason loved it.

Easton and Owen with their dino tails!!

Matt made all the kids a balloon animal. He's good enough to even give them choices! They got to choose between a sword, dog, or elephant. : )

Mason has been looking forward to his party for quite a while and I'm happy to report it did not disappoint! He had a blast and asked if we could have another one tomorrow. "Pweeese mom"

party

graduation

Andrew has officially graduated preschool!

These two are just a week or so apart in age and have been going to daycare together since they were babies.

These three are pretty good buddies. Sam has also gone since he was a baby, but he is about 6 months younger.

After the little ceremony they had a carnival for all the kids.

Andrew asked to have his name on his forehead so that he could see it in the mirror. Nice work Miss Marissa! : )

I always thought preschool graduations were kind of silly. But now that I have a preschool graduate of my own, I understand they are actually the cutest thing in the whole world. And Andrew couldn't be more excited!

There you have it folks - the cutest kindergartner I know!

and there you got it...a bunny hat

Matt has been working on his balloon animal skills, and apparently Andrew has been watching.

He has been using YouTube to get ideas - Andrew has noticed this as well. Andrew wanted to do a video and asked me to put it on the computer so people could know how to do a bunny hat. : ) Enjoy.

In case you can't hear it, he says:

Today we’re going to...

… I'm a kid and I'm named Andrew

And this time were going to show you how to make a bunny hat.

Put the two here… twist, and there you got it - a bunny hat

(What does it look like? Put it on so we can see it)

And there! And now you have yourself a bunny hat.

phone dump

I go back and forth on whether I should just do a picture dump every week with my phone pictures or if I should just blog them mixed in with my real pictures. The problem is, I think most people who do a phone dump don't explain the pictures and I'm not sure I know how to do that... We'll see. It seems like a fun idea. It would look something like this, only without words, and a lot more pictures if I did it weekly rather than just for one day... I guess we'll just all have to wait and see. Hope you can handle the suspense! : )

*UPDATE*

"Problem" solved!  A friend nicely pointed out that maybe I could just do a 'random picture Friday' or something like that to capture all the pictures I take that don't necessarily need their own post. They don't even have to just be from my phone (let that sink in, I know it's huge). : ) So I think that's what I'll do. It will help me organize some things I haven't known what to do with in the past and I think it'll be fun. Phew, glad I got that one figured out...

a few extra hours

It's not very often you're given an extra day in your week, so we tried to make sure to take advantage of it. It kind of felt like a lot of pressure to figure out what to do with our extra time. : ) It was also weird, because the reason we got the extra hours is a really big bummer. Anyway... this is a little of how we spent our day.

Matt made a campfire so we could have S'mores!

Mason loved this swing today! He also decided to wear a winter hat and mismatched gloves. And no, it wasn't that cold today.

We ended the night with a couple games. We're all a big fan of this Lego game Pirate Plank. Mason pulled a "Brooke" and won both times, even though he doesn't quite understand the game 100%. : )

change of plans

We had plans to go to Eburg this weekend but Matt's mom ended up getting sick and her doctor suggested we stay away. So that left us with having to break the news to a couple boys who were very excited to stay the night at grandma & grandpa's and a night with no plans. After going through a bunch of ideas, we settled on a trip to the toy store and game night to help ease the pain.

Mason chose a big dino; Andrew chose a 2-wheel scooter.

Andrew loves the scooter. And he's great on it. It doesn't seem fair that this is the picture I put up, but for some reason I love it. He just happened to fall this once and it was directly across from where I was standing so I took a picture. Just for the record...

kindergarten

On Thursday we went to a presentation at Andrew's school to learn a little about what life will be like once he starts kindergarten. It was nice to meet the principal and the two full-day kindergarten teachers, knowing one will be his teacher. We'll find out who his teacher will be in August - at that time we'll go back and have a chance to meet her and check out his classroom.

The kids ended up going into a different room to play while we sat through the meeting. When it was over Andrew told us he already has a friend. : )

Before we left we headed out to check out the playground. While they were playing, a little boy came up to us and said "he's going to be in kindergarten?! Wow, he looks like a second grader!". It was hilarious. Turns out he's in 3rd grade and loves the school. He was telling us about the lunch menu, the morning bell, the after school Y program... He was awesome.

another day, another change

I have a love/hate relationship with the month before my boys' birthdays. I swear Mason is doing something new or different every single day. Mostly it's awesome, like this...

That's a pull-up free bum right there! Mason went a few days using the toilet 100% so when he asked to wear underwear to bed last night we went with it. He woke up dry! Then today he asked to wear underwear to school. And when I picked him up, he was still dry!! The difference this time is that it was all him. He just all of a sudden really wants to wear underwear and seems to finally understand that if he wears underwear he has to use the toilet.

Today was also the first day that the boys got to bring their lunch to school. They were very excited. I put a little note in there for them and when I picked them up, Mason's teacher told me he asked to keep the note with him during nap. So sweet.

friends

thank you

Never was so much owed by so many to so few - Winston Churchill

Happy Memorial Day - the unofficial start to summer. Yahoo!!

exploring safeco field

We waited in line to meet the moose for the first time. Mason was really excited; Andrew decided it'd be kind of fun. When we got to the front of the line Andrew ran up to give him a hug and Mason started to cry...

Across from the moose is a pitching station - that's what Andrew was the most excited about. It's only $2 for three pitches. Both boys liked this phase of our tour.

It was free growth chart day. Both boys put theirs up on their door right when we got home. It's perfect for Mason's room since (eventually) he'll have a baseball theme.