Birthday Weekend Down South

A couple of weeks ago we went down to visit John’s parents and celebrate his brother’s 25th birthday. It was such a fun trip because his entire family was there. We got to spend the weekend with everyone and relax, which is something that we haven’t done in a while.

My in-law’s came to pick the kids up Friday morning to take them down. They had Kylie and Josh and my nephew. My sister-in-law, her daughter and Ryan and I headed down a few hours later.

Once we were all down there the kids went right to their normal play things…Kylie and Carson (my nephew) had their office/school in the back room and Joshie was playing with the little people.

And of course there was the traditional tea party...

John and my brother-in-law came down later that night. It was a packed house but it was fun!

Saturday morning John and the kids and I headed into town to have family pictures done on campus with my family. We had a professional photographer take some pictures with the beautiful leaves as our backdrop. I still have to figure out which ones I want to order :)

That afternoon the kids played outside and I did some work. John's dad took the kids on a bike ride.

Ryan did a lot of this:

John’s other sister and husband came down and we all headed out for dinner for his brother’s birthday. After dinner everyone else left to go back home. John, the kids and I stayed another night so we got to really relax. I took Ryan over to my parents’ house for a little bit because both of my sisters were down and so was my sister’s ex-boyfriend who we are all still really good friends with (including her and I wish they would just stop the “friend” business and get back together!).

Sunday we headed out for breakfast and over to see my parents’. After a few hours there we came back to John’s parents’ house and enjoyed the beautiful fall weather. The kids were outside with my in-laws playing in the woods over the creek (which Joshie kept calling the “cricket”). We all headed up into the woods for a little walk and John showed us all the places he and his friends had played when they were little.

John, Ryan and I headed out later that evening and Kylie and Josh stayed with John’s parents one more night. John and I stopped to eat and it was so weird just having one kid again…we couldn’t remember going out to eat with just Kylie when she was the little!

I picked the kids up the next day and I couldn’t tell who was more worn out…the kids or grandma and grandpa :)

It was a great weekend and I really hope we get to do it again sometime!

Great Kids!

I want to take the time to brag about my kids. I know I say that I have the best kids a lot on here, and it was proven to me again twice within the last week.

Last Monday we had our big filing at work. I had to go into the office because I have to sit with our admin and go over the document. I got up early that day and got the kids up and dressed. We packed toys and snacks and headed out. I got to the office around 9:00 AM and planned to be out of there before lunch.

The kids took up two cubicles by our admin’s desk, which also happened to be two doors down from my boss. Luckily she has four kids and didn’t mind the kids being there at all. So between working on my filing I did potty breaks, changed diapers, got new toys out, started movies and got snacks. While at times I was annoyed with all of the requests, the kids were absolutely wonderful. People kept coming over and telling me that they didn’t even know we were still there because of how quiet they were. My boss kept coming out and telling me and them how good they were. Ryan really was the worst at needing to eat and changing a ton of diapers!

Unfortunately, lunch time came and went with no signs of being done. The kids were still doing great, especially since I didn’t have any lunch for them. Luckily I had packed some granola bars, cereal bars, and most importantly, Halloween candy! Our admin kept laughing at my as I kept allowing them to have some candy because it kept them happy and occupied!

Finally, around 5:00 we left my office. I promised the kids McDonald’s because of how good they were, so we picked up John and headed there for dinner. I really just couldn’t get over how good they were and I still brag about it to anyone that asks me how work was :)

The second instance of how good my kids was just a few days after that. I always go to the outlets to get my kids’ clothes. I save a ton of money and get it all done in one day. With work, I hadn’t been able to think about doing it until after I filed. Luckily for me, the week I filed was gorgeous and the weather was in the 70’s (the outlets are outside). Unfortunately for me my mom and Kylie are on different schedules. My mom teaches the days that Kylie is not in school. And I was determined to go during the week because I had heard from a few people that this particular set of outlets changes their prices on the weekends (not as good deals). So I had to brave the outlets with three kids by myself!

We loaded up and headed out around 9:15 AM. The outlets are about an hour away, so we got there shortly after they opened. It was nice being there that early because I got the first store all to myself! The kids could run around and they weren’t bothering anyone. They did so well with their toys and snacks!

I made sure to give them some time to run around outside in the grass between stores, and we ate lunch around 2:00. We hit more stores, getting great deal after great deal. Again, the kids listened, and helped – Kylie opened every door for me since I was pushing the huge double-stroller. They were absolutely fantastic! We ended up leaving at closing time (9:00 PM) and Kylie even stayed awake the whole way home.

I know there are lots of parents out there that could never do what I did with their kids. I’m very, very thankful to have such great kids!

Halloween 2008

What a day!

I started Halloween day out working in the morning, so that was very stressful. Luckily I finished just in time to take Kylie to school. So I got her dressed up in her costume and off we went! Our trip was sidetracked to the nurse’s office when we noticed that Kylie’s ankle was bleeding because her new purple sparkly shoes were hurting her ankles (even though she assured me 100 times at the store that they DID NOT HURT).

When Josh and Ryan and I got back, I got ready for Kylie’s Halloween party while Josh took a nap. After his nap we headed over to Kylie’s class and watched as the kids made pumpkins. Josh got to make one too which I thought was really nice. John and my dad ended up coming over at that time, so Kylie had a lot of family there! After she was done with her craft they got to eat some cool Halloween food and then play a game. After that we got to take Kylie home early.

Once we got home I got right to work making Chicken and Noodles for our court party. Every year the neighbors on the court have a potluck where we all bring food out and hang out together with our candy in front of us. I really look forward to it every year. I got a little down when our one neighbor called and said the kids had strep throat…but thankfully they were still allowed to trick-or-treat, they just had to keep their distance from the other kids (that didn’t happen, but thankfully my kids did not get sick!).

We got the kids back into their costumes and headed out. We ate some food and then got ready to go trick-or-treating. The sad thing about this year was that our good friends were not there since they have moved. Luckily we got to see them the weekend before, but it still wasn’t the same without them.

We all headed out trick-or-treating together as a court while my mom stayed back with Ryan (who was not dressed up because I couldn’t find Josh’s first Halloween costume and it didn’t matter anyway…he slept through the whole night!).

We were out for about an hour and a half and the kids had a blast! There were 6 of them in total that were going out together. When we got back the adults sat around the fire while the kids played. Then we rounded them up for baths and they went over with my dad to his house to go to bed. The rest of us hung out around the fire for a while until it was too cold for my mom and Ryan and I. We went inside and snuggled on the couch.

It was a great Halloween night!

Then Saturday night John and I went to a 80’s Halloween party at his sister’s house. Can you guess who we were dressed as???