Ice Cream Master Piece

Unfortunately, I don't have any pictures to go along with this post, but it was so funny that I have to post about it.

We were eating at Western Sizzlin tonight and I was helping the boys with dessert. Easton wanted ice cream and I thought Lawson wanted cookies. I was holding Lawson with one hand and got Easton a small bowl of soft serve ice cream with the other. I put the bowl down and started to get Lawson some cookies in another bowl. I heard Easton quietly saying, "Momma? momma? Look Momma." I guess I was only half listening but finally listened enough to turn around and look. I looked at Easton and he was standing perfectly still staring and pointing at the ice cream machine still quietly saying, "Momma?". To my great amazement and shock, I saw the largest pile of ice cream I have ever seen. Apparently, I did not quite push the ice cream lever all the way up and the ice cream was still coming out piling higher and higher - in perfect circles I might add!

I quickly put Lawson down and begged him not to run off while I shut off the machine and started grabbing bowls and spoons and scraping ice cream into the bowls. I could only get 2 bowls when I was laughing so hard that I just had to get back to the table.

I told Mat and he went up to inspect my damage. He got his own bowl of ice cream from my master piece as well. He said he saw several people with very intriguing looks on their faces. He just told them, "Well, I don't want it to go to waste." : )

Needless to say, we were all very full of ice cream when we got home tonight and I will never fail to push the lever all the way up again!!!

July and August Recap

I am getting worse and worse about posting. I think about it everytime I check my email and I even read other blogs but can't seem to ever find the time to post myself. I thought I would recap the last few months with a few pictures.

This post is way over-due. My 29th birthday was June 26th and our 9th anniversary was July 1st. Mat took me on a surprise trip and told me it was for our anniversary. We got all dressed up and I didn't know where we were going. He took me to Hot Springs to the Hot Springs Belle where we went on our 1st anniversary. When I walked on the boat, I was greeted by my family and three of my very best friends and their husbands. It was a surprise belated birthday party. Mat decided he would do a big surprise for my 29th instead of my 30th - that way I wouldn't be expecting anything. It was so sweet of all my friends and family to make that trip for me. Jeff and Bridget stayed over with us and Bridget and I had a day of shopping and the spa the next day. It was lots of fun. The sweetest part though was on the boat when Mat had a song played for me. He wrote and recorded the song. It was all about our life together. Oh my- too sweet. Thank you honey, for a wonderful surprise and trip. I love you!!

Me and my oldest. He still talks about momma's party on the big boat.

The whole party.

We drove back on the Fourth of July just in time to get baths, jammies, and go watch the annual Harding display of fireworks. I just love fireworks! Easton covered his ears the whole time but loved to watch and name all the colors with me.

My grandpa had probably his biggest garden ever this year. He worked so hard on it and we all have enjoyed the fresh veggies. He had one very large area of just tomatoes. He let the boys go out one day and pick tomatoes. They loved it!

Pa taught them which ones were ready for picking and which ones still needed to ripen.

This was one day before we went up to Nana's to play outside. I thought they looked so cute in their muscle shirts and hats turned around backwards.

We took a spur of the moment trip to Memphis one Saturday and took the boys to the zoo and to see a baseball game. Unfortunately it rained really hard while we were at the zoo and we could only stay for a couple of hours. They had fun though and we were able to see all the main animals. We all got Zoo Ponchos.

Checking out the elephants.

After the zoo, we ate lunch and went to our hotel and everyone took a nap. How wonderful!! We were fully rested and thankful for the great weather to go the baseball game. The game was lots of fun. The boys thought it was really cool to see the baseball players and the big Redbird Mascot. Although Easton wanted the other team to win because they were wearing blue - and..."blue is my favorite color." They both were so good and we made it all the way to the 7th inning.

Lawson loves to ride the mower with his daddy. Pretty much he will do anything with his daddy, but this day, he had watched him out the window the whole time Mat was mowing saying, "I ide dat." (I ride that.) He was thrilled when I finally let him go outside and ride with daddy.

Ahh.... Easton's first day of Pre-K at Harding. He is going Tuesday/Thursday all day. He has been very excited about going to "big school." He did wonderful! He walked right in to his classroom, found his seat and starting playing. He didn't even blink an eye when I said I was leaving, he just said, "okay, bye." My big boy. He is such an easy, sweet boy. I praise the Lord for him.

Lawson fell asleep on the living room floor. We have been getting up earlier since school started and everyone has been taking good naps. I felt bad this day because he was just watching tv and I looked over and he laid down in this position and didn't move a muscle. Needless to say, he didn't even know when I moved him to his bed.

My little cowboys!! Easton's little children's church had a western day this past Sunday. He looked so cute! Saturday night we were dressing Easton up trying to decide what he should wear. Lawson, "Mr. Monkey See-Monkey Do", said he wanted to be a "ow-boy" too. Even though Lawson was just going to the nursery, we had two little cowboys. They looked so cute!

Thanks for checking in on us. We are doing good - staying very busy but doing good. We are loving the cooler weather the Lord has given us and it is giving me an inching for fall, hay, and football. Easton will start soccer soon. Mat is going to coach his little team. That should be another fun adventure. Lawson is growing up more and more. He is really trying hard to talk and doing very well. He is putting lots of words together and saying new things all the time. He also keeps us all laughing. He is such a ham!! We praise the Lord for our wonderful growing family.

I Believe I Can - Swim!!

Last week, we had some swim teachers come to mom and dad's pool for private swim lessons for Isaiah, Grant, and Easton. They were so sweet. Easton had never had swim lessons before and evidently it was the perfect timing for him. He did so good. I was such a proud momma watching him. He wasn't scared and he tried his best to do what they asked him to. While he didn't actually learn how to swim by the end of the week, he learned how to blow bubbles, make arm circles in the water, kick with a kickboard, go under the water by himself, jump off the side of the pool and jump off the diving board!!!! He is so proud of his new found talent!!

Learning how to blow bubbles

Going under to get the underwater toys.

Kicking with the "Batman" kickboards.

Jumping off the side of the pool! Yeah, Easton!! He didn't hesitate at all. And, yes, I do feed my child although he doesn't look like it. : )

He was getting very brave and having a little fun. Without saying a word, he started doing a "super-hero" jump. It looked like this and then in the air he changed his arms the other direction. It was absolutley precious. I couldn't be there the last day of the lessons, but they said he was doing the robot before he jumped. I just thought it was halirious that he was coming up with all this on his own. He was having loads of fun!

This is him jumping off the diving board! Way to go, Easton! I am so proud of you.

Easton's 4th Birthday

On June 24th, Easton turned 4. I can't believe my baby is 4 years old!! He has to be the sweetest little boy that God has ever made. I love him to pieces!! Thank you Lord for letting me be his momma. What a precious gift! I will tell the story of his birthday through the pictures. I can remember it better that way.

We had Easton's party the day after his actual birthday, so we let him open the present his Gammy and Papa Todd sent him from Florida on the morning of his birthday.

Then, we took him to McDonald's for his favorite - pancakes!! He asks for "Nick-Donald's" pancakes all the time. It was also a special treat to get to go inside and play. Daddy left work for a little bit to eat breakfast with us.

Momma and the birthday boy!

After breakfast, we went up to Nana's house to play on the "Rocky Mountain River Race" - Nana and Papa's newest addition to the backyard playground. : ) It is probably the best thing you could buy for kids - especially if you have several children that will play on it. This picture doesn't show how cool it is - Easton had just slid down the slide on his tummy when I took this picture.


The next evening we had Easton's birthday party up at Nana and Papa's house. Easton was so cute while we were setting up for the party. He kept asking
"When are my guests going to get here?"
Easton wanted a Batman Water Birthday party this year. That comes as no surprise because he is absolutely obsessed with Batman. We bought a Batman Wii game for him a month or so and he wants to play it 24-7. That has turned into a complete Batman love affair for him. I have to say he has gotten very good at the wii game - especially for a 4 yr old.

This was the most children we have invited to a birthday party. We had the family, of course, and several of Easton's friends from his Bible Class at church and a few of my friend's kids as well. There were 11 kids total.

This was the best family picture we could get. The cake was really cool. We asked a friend from church who does cakes to make it for us. She did a great job!

Here is Easton with his pick of the cake - the Batman symbol. He was very proud. Shortly after this picture was taken, the cake fell off his plate - almost leading to an extremely upset birthday boy. Thankfully, Daddy was able to cut off the dirty parts and salvage the treasured Batman symbol piece of cake. : )

This is Easton's favorite present. It was the only thing he really asked for. Nana and Papa got him a Bat Cave. Several other people got him the other peices to go with it and he loves it. He has played with it almost everyday since his birthday.

Weeee!!!!!

All the kiddos had lots of fun on the big slide. Mat stood gaurd to make sure no one got hurt.
It was a really fun birthday party. Easton turned 4 in style!!

I love you my precious boy!!!

Happy Father's Day 2009!

Happy Father's Day, sweetheart!
You are the best daddy our precious boys could ask for! We love you!!

Branson Fun

June was filled with lots of fun and not much down time. In the middle of June, we went with my parents to Branson. We had a good time - Mom and I shopped and Mat and Dad golfed. The boys were good sports and got to have some fun of their own. We opted out of Silver Dollar City this time b/c Lawson is still too little to ride most things. He can be a handful with nothing for him to do, so it was better to try to keep both boys busy if possible. We went to a little Kiddie Park that had some rides for both of them. I thought Lawson might be a little scared to ride but once he got on, he didn't want to get off. It was fun to watch them have fun. I am really enjoying Easton being at an age where he can do things like this. The only negative part was how hot it was. It think it was close to 100 degrees the whole time we were there. Here are a few pictures:

Here's E on the swings

This was Lawson's very first ride. I was worried because it went kinda high, but he just sat there so still and didn't try to get up and move at all. He loved it!!

Easton did so good driving his little Go Cart. He was so cute. He kept looking back over his shoulder at the other little boy who was on the track too. When he got off, he said, "Momma, I was ahead the whole time. I won!"

They were soaked by the end of this ride, but I think as hot as it was, they liked it!

I have to explain this picture. One day, Mom and I were waiting for the guys to get finished golfing to come pick us up and take us to the mall. They were running late, so we decided we would put the boys in the stroller and just walk for a while. Mom and I are always up for an adventure!! It was so extremely hot, so after a while, we stopped and got the boys some ice cream. I knew they were going to make a mess, so I just took off their shirts and let them go to town! I am sure we got some interesting looks as we pushed our double stroller with half naked children along the main drag, but we all had fun. I think we ended up walking around 1.5 miles to Tanger Mall from our condo - with a lot of it up hill. : )



The last day we were there, Branson Landing had about 20 or more blow up / bouncy toys set up. Dad took Easton around to each one and let him play. He had a blast!

Going Private!

In a few days I am going to make my blog private. I know this is not the most convenient option, but I feel it is necessary. Please email me at shelley@thinkadvertising.com and I will add you to my blog readers. Thank you!!!