summer fun with cousins

As previously mentioned, my nieces are visiting from North Dakota.  We only see them twice a year, so when they come in town we try and spend as much time as possible with them.

Yesterday we hit the local water playground.  It's not big or fancy, but the kids love it.

Jack has developed a fear of all things water ever since his rub rash incident during our camping trip.  He walked around two long with wet diaper and shorts and got a painful little rash between his thighs.  So now every time he sees the swimmer diaper and swim trunks come out, he sort of freaks out.

But once we got them on him, he calmed down and even had a good time at the water playground.

Little Ms. Thang!

white as a ghost

He was a little stand off-ish at first.  He didn't like his face getting wet.

Little Ms. Thang II

Austin hogged the water guns.

Jacks favorite thing to play with was the water drain.  

me and my other half

Found out Jackson can say alligator pretty much perfectly.

Cousins and Friends

Our little 4th of July!

We had a really fun Independence Day yesterday, actually it was a bit better than I expected.  

My parents were out of town and my sister was spending the holiday with her in-laws.  Then my brother and sister-in-law were supposed to come over, but Audrie was sick and it looked like they weren't coming, so it was just going to be my little family of five.  

We weren't going to let that spoil the day.  We headed out that afternoon to buy fireworks.  The kids were in hyperactive over-drive in that fireworks tent!

Then we headed over to my parents house.  They live out of city limits so we spent the evening out there so we could pop fire works.  

Then we got a surprise when my brother showed up with his two girls that weren't sick.  Gabi and Zoe live in North Dakota and come visit every summer.  They just got into town and we were so excited to spend the holiday with them. 

We did some day time fireworks first, but it was very hot.  

 My kids just played and acted like it wasn't weird at all to be at Nana and Papa's house without them there.  

We did miss them though.  Occasionally, Jack would say "Nana bye-bye?" or "Papa work?"

We made the mistake of skipping nap time, so come about 4:00 Jack was a little edgy!

Jack didn't act too scared of the loud popping fireworks.  He made some funny faces though!

 Gabi caught the first parachute!

It's not a holiday if Austin is crying about something!

The night ended with Jack hiding in my lap.  He decided he didn't like the big ones at night.  

We really had a great July 4th.  The kids are getting older and its nice to be able to sit back a little and just watch them enjoying themselves.  Austin was very into the fireworks this year, where as last year and he spent most of the night playing in the house with toys.  

I hope you all had a great 4th as well!!

Summer Randomness

Let's dive right in shall we?  Sorry for the lack of pictures.  #toolazy

*We are still planning for a closing date on July 19th, and praying that it does not get postponed any further.

*We still don't have a home to move into, but are actively working on it.  We actually made a bid on a house in Moss Bluff, but won't find out anything until Monday.  It's not your traditional house buying process.  This is a HUD home, which is like a foreclosure.  It's sold through bids like a silent auction, so Monday we will find out if we were the highest bidders.  I'm not getting my homes up, but it would be awesome.

*Brent's been working A LOT lately, which leaves me by my lonesome to entertain the childrens. Not an easy job, but somebody has to do it.  It's been soooo very hot outside lately, that most of our fun consists of trips to the mall, target, or walmart.  Not a good way to save money.

*We went swimming at a friends house on Monday, but Jackson was a pain in the neck. He thinks he can get in the water without floaties.  He just absolutely refuses to leave them on.  My friend and I forced them on twice, but he just screamed bloody murder until he got them off.  The catch here is that he also does not want me to hold him in the water.  So basically our visit consisted of me following him around the pool, desperate to keep him from jumping in or going down the slide.  My big kids had fun, but I felt guilty making them leave so early because of Jackson.

*Jackson is rounding out his 3rd ear infection in three months.  We have been referred to an ear, nose, throat specialist for an evaluation and I believe tubes are more than likely in our future.

*Abigail has been referred to an orthodontist.  Her adult teeth are quite crooked and very crowded.  She hasn't lost all her baby teeth yet so  I'm not sure what he's going to recommend we do, but one thing I do know is that my wallet will be hurting when we are finished.

*My weight loss is at a stand still.  I haven't lost or gained any weight in about 3 weeks.  I also haven't been working out or running at all.  It's like I lost all my workout mojo after I finished the couch to 5k app.  I'm planning on starting the 5-10K app pretty soon. Maybe I will get my drive back.

* Jack is supposed to be falling asleep right now, but is instead yelling and somehow talking to Nana even though she is a couple states away in Oklahoma right now.

Enjoying my crazy summer!  Hope you are too!

 

Are those ear plugs? (Abigail update)

Ok, so this post is a sort of update on what my oldest has been up to lately.  She is 7 almost 8 years old and often times she seems to fly under the radar because she doesn't need me quite as much as the boys do.  I do feel guilty sometimes, like I've totally ignored her all day because Jackson takes about every ounce of energy I have.

Austin, my 5 year old doesn't get as much attention as Jack either, but Austin is more of a loner type.  He doesn't need or crave a whole lot of interaction from others.  Wow, I don't want to make him sound like a hermit or socially awkward or anything because he's not.  It's just that he can entertain himself more easily than Abigail or Jack can.

Anyway, so here is a little update on what my funny girl has been up to lately.

Back in May she had her dance recital.  She did such a great job.  She took Ballet and Tap this year.

For the entire month of June she went to Art Camp 5 days a week from 8:30-11:30.  She loved it, but it wasn't super easy getting myself and three kids up every morning during the summer to bring her and pick her up from camp every day, but it was worth it.  They had their Art Show yesterday.

She did a lot more pieces, but I didn't take a picture of them all.

The of art camp was South of the Border.

They had these funny little mustaches for people to have. 

 Abigail and Austin were cracking up at themselves.  

One of the things Abigail and I have been talking about a lot lately is being healthy.  Let me just preface this next topic by pointing out that in no way am I putting Abigail on a diet, it's all about being more healthy.  

One undesirable trait that I passed down to my daughter is the love of food.  My girl loves to eat.  She loves all types of food and would eat every hour if she could.  

In the past year her body has changed a little.  She has gotten thicker and has a little bit of a pouchie belly.  She has already voiced to me her concerns, and told me she thinks she's fat.  It breaks my heart!!

I really hoped to not have to deal with this until like teenager time, but here it is.  I do my best to encourage her and tell her she is not fat, but maybe we could be healthier and exercise more as a family.  We've made some new rules around the house about asking before getting snacks and playing outside more.  

I've also been encouraging her to stop eating when she feels full and that she doesn't have to eat every bite off her plate.  

She is also short for her age, which doesn't help. There is so much pressure out there for young girls to look a certain way, even at 8 years old.  Body complexes and eating disorders are on the list of a mothers worst nightmare.  

What I don't want to do is act like I'm in denial that she is a tad bit overweight for her age and if not dealt with properly can turn in to a lot overweight really quickly and there are so many health risks for obese children.  

It's a fine line trying to encourage Abigail to eat healthy and exercise without making her feel like there is something wrong with her.  I hate that she is having to go through this already at such a young age.  I just pray that God will help me to say and do the right things to help her.  

Let's end this post with a laugh shall we?

The kids and I were watching TV the other day when a Tampax commercial came on.  It had a lady swimmer on the commercial.  Towards the end of the commercial Abigail turns to me and asks:

"Are those ear plugs or something?"

Hahaha

Luckily I was quickly distracted by Jackson and couldn't really answer her and she didn't ask again.  

It won't be long until Abigail and I need to have some serious talks about some serious things and I'm not super excited about it.  She will be 8 years old in September and starts 3rd grade this year.  I was sort of thinking that maybe next summer would be the time for "the talk".  I don't want her to learn from kids at school and the kids at school know WAY TOO MUCH, WAY TOO YOUNG!!  

Anyway, what do y'all think?  

When did you give your kids the talk /or when do you plan on giving your kids the talk?

Austin's M&M, Jackson's sick, and closing update

Funny quick story..

Austin came into my room last night and told me he had an M&M with a peanut on the inside and he liked it.  He normally doesn't like anything with nuts.

 I told him that was awesome and asked him when he had a peanut M&M.  He said he found it under the TV and wanted to know if we had any more???

 LOL I have no idea when the last time we had peanut M&M's in the house.  He didn't get sick or anything so it must not have been too old.

Well, I love that kid.  Thank goodness for my two silly, happy fun big kids that make me laugh.  Jackson lately has been no fun at all.  He's been running fever for a few days now and started screaming about anything that makes him mad.  He's got this cross between a scream and a yell that just makes me want to pull my hair out.  I'm thinking another doctor visit might be in our future.  I seriously just want to fast forward to when Jackson is 4 years old.  I'm so over this baby/toddler age.

Oh last but not least we found out our closing date has been moved back from June 28 to July 19.  Geeze louise!!  Oh well, what can you do?  These things happen.  We now have to live in a half empty house for almost another month, but we'll survive.

Sorry no pictures, maybe next time I'll have a picture of my bald spot from pulling my hair out!!!