Egg Hunt

Grandma had an egg hunt at her house on Easter. We had the usual cast of characters: Justin, Sammie, Kyle Thomas, John and Gillian. 

Grandma sets up the egg hunts so that each kid has a specific color or theme to look for. For example Gillian had to look for purple and animals while John had green and dinosaurs. This makes it fair for everyone hunting considering the wide range of ages. This year there were new eggs that were tricky and looked like common things like the grass or a lady bug or a rock. These eggs were free game for anyone to find. 

I stuck with Gillian during the hunt, mainly because John is too fast and ran the whole time. Gillian didn't really need much help. She would see purple and go running. 

All the kids helped each other out. There was a lot of yelling "Hey, there's an animal over here." Or "I see sports over here!" 

We went around the house a couple times looking for some of the camo eggs (they are hard to find). And we finally gave up and everyone counted their eggs. 

Thanks Grandma and Grandpa for an awesome egg hunt! The kids had a blast!

Halloween 2014

Halloween this year was much like every other year. But this year, Gillian asked me "Can you come to my parade?" I said "I'm not sure." She said "Last year all my friends' parents came but you wasn't there." Wow, way to lay on the guilt trip Gillian. It worked. I made sure I was there. Gillian and her class proudly marched around the parking lot. 

And they all gathered together and sang us a little song. 

 

Plus I even got a picture of Gillian and the Elsas. 

After school, we headed to Grandma and Grandpa's house. It is our Halloween tradition to go trick or treating with Justin. Grandma makes a few pots of soup for dinner too. 

The kids were awesome this year. They said thank you at every house. Justin was an excellent big cousin. He warched out for John and Gillian and always made sure they were at the front and didn't miss out on any good candy. 

We went back to Grandma's and ate our soup. John asked if he could have some candy for dessert. I said yes. Of course his picked out a full size Hershey bar. I told him "Only half." He ate half of it and came back over to me and said "But it's melting." I laughed at him and ate a piece. He then reached in and grabbed the last piece of the chocolate bar. I said "John!" He laughed and said "What? It's going to melt!" This kid. 

After Grandma's house, we headed over to Mimi and Poppy's house. The kids rang the bell and said "Trick or Treat!" Poppy was surprised to see them. The kids were excited to see everyone especially their baby cousin, Mackenzie. 

The kids had a great Halloween!

The beach

Yesterday, John got off the bus and we got in the car and headed to Grandma's house. Then Grandma, John, Justin and I went to the beach. The boys talked about John's camp on our way to the beach. It constantly amazes me how well they get along. Justin is 11 and John is almost 7. The boys found the perfect spot on the beach and they headed right to the water. Justin was on his boogie board while John simply played in the waves. 

After playing in the water, John asked Grandma to help him build a castle. Well that turned into Grandma building the castle while John filled buckets with water. Grandma finished the castle and John dug a moat around it. He then tried to fill the moat with water from his buckets. 

They destroyed the castle, actually Justin did. But then he dug a really big hole. He may have gotten stuck. 

Justin got out of the hole and John got a chance to test it out too!

Then Justin asked "Can we go up to Gee-Gee's and get ice cream? I'll buy!" It's hard to say no to that. So they went up and got some ice cream. John got mint chocolate chip with rainbow sprinkles and Justin got chocolate brownie with chocolate sprinkles. Poor John, his ice cream was melting faster than he could eat it. And he kept spilling it on himself. 

After making a mess with the ice cream the boys went back in the ocean to clean off. They spent the rest of the afternoon playing in the ocean. 

John had a great day with his cousin and his Grandma. I also had a great time hanging out with my mom, my nephew and celebrating John's last day of school!

Grandma's house

The kids slept over Grandma's house on Saturday night. I went to pick them up on Sunday. John was not happy to see me. He said "Can I talk to you?" And he pulled me outside and aaid "You know, it's just the beginning of spring break. I thought I would get to stay longer." I told him that he would be back again on Tuesday. 

John spent today at Grandma's house with Sammie and Kyle. He looked exhausted when I arrived. They had a busy day. Even though he was exhausted he said to me in the car "Am I going back again tomorrow?" I'm so glad he had a good time with his cousins and grandparents. 

Big cousins

Now that Aunt Missy and Uncle T have let everyone know that they are expecting their first baby in August, I can finally blog about it!

We found out on Christmas morning that John and Gillian were going to be big cousins. I tried to tell John. I said "John, did you hear? Aunt Missy has a baby in her belly! You are going to be a big cousin!" John was super distracted and said "But Mom! There's a big box in the other room!" I said "But Aunt Missy is going to have a baby!" John said "But Mom! There's a door on the box!" He was too distracted to listen to me. I told Gillian, "Aunt Missy has a baby in her belly!" Gillian said "Why her eat the baby?" Not exactly Gilly. 

We talk to the kids a lot about the baby. About how they are going to be big cousins for the first time. One night, I asked Gillian, "Are you going to help Aunt Missy with the baby?" She said "I going to feed the baby bottles!" I asked "Are you going to change the baby's diapers?" She said "No! Stinky diapers!" That same night, John asked "How does the baby come out?" Daddy told him "The doctor takes the baby out." That didn't satisfy John. He asked "How?" Daddy said "Carefully!" John again asked "How?" Daddy said "Sometimes they have to cut the belly to get the baby out." Cutting the belly must have scared John, because he stopped asking questions after that. I asked John, "What kind of baby should Aunt Miss have?" John said "A boy or a girl maybe." Daddy said "What about a baby dinosaur?" John said "Is that even possible?"

One night when I was tucking Gillian into bed, we talked about the baby. She said "Aunt Missy eat a baby. We don't eat babies, but she find a baby and eat it!" I asked her "What should Aunt Missy and Uncle T name the baby?" Gillian said "Baby!"

Last night at dinner, Gillian said "The baby needs a manket! The baby likes green. Grandma can make her a green manket like mine!" Oh, did I mention, Gillian insists that the baby is a girl! 

I asked the kids "What should Aunt Missy and Uncle T name the baby?" Gillian said "The baby is a girl. We name her Gillian!" John said "I know. Name the baby Travis. Cause there is only one Travis!" He was referring to Travis the turtle that his Uncle T gave him when he was born. Daddy and I reminded John that Travis the turtle was named after John's Uncle T (who's name is Travis). John said "Oh yeah, I forgot, but they could still name the baby Travis." I asked John, "What about a girl's name?" John said "How about I come up with boy name and Gill comes up with girl names?" 

One day I showed John a sonogram picture of the baby. John asked "How did they get a picture of the baby?" I explained to him that they have special machines that can show you inside of someone's body. He said "Wow! That's really cool!" 

John and Gillian are super excited to be big cousins! They have wonderful big cousins so they have some big shoes to fill!

The Boat

John and Daddy went to help Uncle T with his boat today. Well, Daddy went to help. The boat is on a trailer in Uncle T's yard and has some engine problems. John mainly played on the boat while the boys were diagnosing the problem. The first thing John did when he got on the boat was to go to the bow and say "I'm king of the world!" John also stood on the boat, looked around and said "I can see Russia from here!"

Uncle Kevin came to help too and he brought Little Kyle. John and Kyle played on the boat. At one point, Kyle was "driving" the boat and John was at the bow telling him which way to turn. They also irritated Uncle T (and everyone else) by running around the console and taking turns honking the horn. Uncle T ended up unplugging the horn from the battery, but the boys thought that the horn wasn't working because they didn't have the keys to the boat. So they got off the boat and found the keys in Uncle T's garage. They were very disappointed to find that the keys didn't help them make the horn work.

After "helping" with the boat, John carried pavers for Aunt Missy. John got a small cut on his hand while playing on the boat. But he said to Aunt Missy "I'll help with my broken hand!" He carried the pavers one by one to the garden. When I asked him what his favorite part of the day, he got up and reenacted picking up a paver and walking to the garden.

Easter

On Easter Sunday, we went to Mimi and Poppy's house in the morning. We arrived and waited for the neighbors to arrive. When the neighbors arrived, we sent the kids outside for an egg hunt. The kids eggs were hidden by the deck. John was the oldest and we told him to not go for the easy eggs. We didn't realize that by telling him that he wouldn't get many eggs. He walked past all the easy eggs so that Gillian and Nolan could get them. Gillian loved the egg hunt. She was very competitive. At one point, we caught her stealing eggs from Nolan's basket.

Mimi also set up an egg hunt for the big kids! I was smart and teamed up with John. He is really fast and he found more eggs than I did. Gillian teamed up with Aunt Missy. But that didn't last long, because the first egg Gillian saw John grabbed it and she cried. So Daddy took Gillian. But Gillian was able to find a few eggs that the big kids missed! After the hunt, we had some yummy breakfast.

Then we went to Aunt Trish and Uncle Kevin's house. Gillian was super excited to go and see Sammie. "I see Sammie. Sammie my cousin!" The kids got to play a little while then it was time for the next hunt. This hunt is set up so each kid has specific eggs to find. John had dinosaurs and orange eggs to find. Gillian had purple and animal eggs to find. Justin had camo eggs. Kyle had sports eggs. Sammie had flowers and yellow eggs. Since the kids ages range from, 2.5 to 10 this hunt can be made more difficult for the older kids and easier for the little kids. The kids had so much fun! We timed it well, because it started to rain just as we were going inside.

The kids had so much fun with their cousins. Gillian cried when it was time to leave. "I don't wanna go!" She refused to put her coat on. She wanted to stay and play with her cousins.

Here are some pictures of the kids Easter

Inside out PJs

John heard on the radio the other night that we might get snow today. This morning he woke up and wanted to know where the snow was. We explained to him that the snow probably wouldn't come until after school. I also told him that I had a secret way to get it to it to snow more. I explained that if you sleep with your pajamas on inside out that sometimes it snows. He didn't believe it. I said call your cousin Bert. He did it and they got snow. Daddy also explained to him that you need to get a lot of lot of kids to wear their PJs inside out. The more kids that do it makes more magic. This whole thing really stuck with John. In the car on the way to school, he said "How can we get more kids to wear their Jammies outside in?" Inside out, I corrected him. We talked about how we could call our cousins and he could tell his friends at school. I'm sure he told everyone about it at school. By the time I left work it was snowing. John was so excited. After dinner he called his cousins and asked them to wear their PJs inside out. At bedtime both John and Gillian wore their PJs inside out. Gillian kept saying "It's backwards!" I snuggled with John for a little bit and he said "we didn't tell everyone yet. We have one more person to tell." I said ok, should I text Uncle T? He said "No. It's someone that lives far away." Jokingly, I said should I tell Mr. Matt, because he lives far away. John said "No! You know! Mr. Matt loves really close. No. You know this guy. He lives far away and we see him once a year." It took me a little while and I finally figured it out. Santa! John said "Yes! But he probably has snow up there. Maybe he can send us snow!" My little man is always thinking! I hope the snow lasts until tomorrow and John gets to play in it.

War

Today we went to Grandma and Grandpa's house for lunch. We met Aunt Betty, Uncle Joe, Uncle Bob, Aunt Trish, and the cousins. We had lunch and the kids went outside to play. Sammie only stayed outside for a little bit and ended coming inside to play with Gillian. The girls decided to watch Cinderella. The girls snuggled on the couch and watched Gilly's favorite princess movie.

I was talking to Grandma and Aunt Betty when we saw Uncle Joe, Uncle Bob and Daddy walk past us. All three of them had Nerf guns, with additional magazines and bags full of extra darts. They headed out back to blindside the boys.

When I got out back I saw Daddy on the deck firing down to the boys below while Uncle Joe and Uncle Bob were running around shooting at the boys. Justin and John were running around and giggling. It was chilly outside so I only watched for a few minutes.

When they came back inside they shared their stories. At on point John got a Nerf gun set it up with the bipod and laid down on his belly. He aimed and fired right at Uncle Joe. He hit his mark and shouted "I got his gut!"