Target Practice

My parents gave the boys these water squirter toys a few weeks ago, and while the weather has gotten cooler, they are still as excited as ever to find new uses for these things. Last night we played outside in the back yard and the kids had fun squirting water from up high in the playset.

Ben filled a bucket up with water and put it up with the boys so they could easily refill their squirters.

They practiced shooting water at all kinds of things.

I love Eli's look of determination here - 

By the end, they mainly just shot water at the different kids' chairs set up in the grass. It was fun to watch them focus on the target.

It was the annual ward fun run again last Saturday. Charlie threw one of his gigantic fits before the kids and I left for the race and it was not a pretty sight. He wanted Ben (not me), who had left early to help set up. Charlie screamed and screamed and my blood boiled from the aggravation of it all, but we finally made it to see the end of the race. Ben ran in the 5K and once again lost to the Northwestern wrestler who is 10 years younger than Ben :) Ben had been training for the last month or so to worked on his speed, and was happy that he beat his expectations for his running time.

We had a nice rest of the day on Saturday and met my family for lunch at Portillo's. Happy Birthday to my mom (her birthday was Thursday) and to my dad (last Sunday). We met my parents, brother, gram, and some family friends there at the restaurant and had fun with gifts and food and catching up. And happy birthday to Ben's dad too, who has the same birthday as my dad!

(We brought birthday hats for my parents and the boys... my parents were sweet to put the hats on for the picture :)

Angels and Seagulls

Tonight we were reading scriptures with the kids (using the iPhone app - Child Stories). We were reading about Lehi seeing an angel, and Ben asked Eli what angels look like.

Eli: "They're white! That's why you can't see them very well when they are next to seagulls."

Of course! :)

This summer we spent a handful of Wednesdays attempting soccer with some neighbors who had kids the same age as ours. Most of the time we met at a park and brought the soccer goals, had a picnic dinner, and tried to give the kids a chance to work on their soccer skills.

Most of the time though, that translated into the kids running back and forth between the goals :)

 

At least it's exercise of some kind!

 

We did our soccer finale in our back yard - here are the kids that were there that day (there were a few other families who participated but weren't able to come to our finale). Of course my child is the one being silly (he has a fruit snack in between his teeth). 

 

After I said we were done taking their group picture, the kids busted off of the bench and started dancing. It was pretty funny.

 

My friend Becca tried taking some pictures of the four of us, but that always goes so well when you have two boys ages 2 1/2 and 4. 

Soooo well. (My hair was crazy in this first shot because Charlie kept reaching down and messing it up. I call him my little stinkpot, which he thinks is hilarious and has now made up a "stinkpot dance." It makes me smile.

Block Party

Helloooo out there. I can't believe how little I've blogged lately. I'm going to start with some quick easy posts so I won't feel so overwhelmed with catching up. Last weekend was our neighborhood block party, which had activities going throughout the day on Saturday. We walked back and forth from our house to the festivities multiple times. Through the alley, around the corner...

The boys loved the bouncy house and had fun jumping with our cute neighbor Sasha. She is so sweet with them.

There were lots of fun activities for kids - a candy scramble, egg toss, water balloon toss, and the street was blocked off so kids could scooter and bike in the street, which seemed very liberating! Eli made some new friends and was so cute every time he would run back over to me and whisper, "MOM! I made a NEW FRIEND!"

I would ask what his new friend's name was, and he had no idea. Gotta love it. That forced me to go meet the little girl's mom so I could find out! There are a ton of little kids in our neighborhood, but we're around the corner from most of them so we don't run into them very often. The block party is a great way to become reacquainted.

In the middle of the day we came back so Charlie could nap and Eli could have a break. Eli wasn't too pleased that we had to go home :)

Ohh the drama, Mr. 4-year-old. The eye roll is just classic.