This has been a busy week, and it's only Tuesday, chock full of firsts for the 554. Here are the highlights

1. 2 kids went off to camp yesterday morning. They were excited, they had fun....no one got in trouble...they came home happy...everyone did the crafts - that's a first!

2. We went swimming for over 2 hours yesterday afternoon. Sadly, our pool has NO areas where small kids can touch the bottom. However, much like his older pals last summer, Logan spent all of his time in the "entrance" area which is shaped like a 1/2 circle and has a sitting area the entire way around where he can stand. He would dive for rockets, swim from one side to the other etc. He didn't have his life vest on even once the entire time we were there - that's a first!!

3. This morning, Logan & Aiden were sitting in the little chairs they like to pull up to the front window (where they sometimes open the window and yell out to anyone walking by). I sent them there to watch the garbage trucks...which they love to do. While peering out, they saw Ella and AJ riding their bikes up and down the street WITHOUT training wheels....go kids of the 560! Anyway...Logan wanted to run right out IMMEDIATELY and try it too. Sadly, he sort of freaked out after I took the wheels off. It was cute though...he brought me elbow pads, knee pads and his helmet, literally saying to me, "mommy...safety!" <-- THEN he freaked out. It was actually not a great experience because I sometimes get frustrated by his lack of confidence. We tried it a little more this afternoon (more frustration...but some progress!). The big to-do about all of this? While the training wheel parts were laying on the driveway this morning, and while I was helping Logan....I'm pretty sure Brady took the nuts that keep the wheels on and threw them somewhere. I couldn't find them and he was walking around with a wheel in his hand (exhibit A!). Guess Logan is going to have to learn now...it's all good...he'll get it!However, FIRST time down the street without training wheels (never mind mom running alongside holding on the whole time!)

4. Aiden is wearing the same underwear I put on him when he woke up today. He also went to the bathroom while he was at camp (he's never gone without me, Bri or his grandparents). I think this is our very FIRST accident free day! There is hope that I could quite possibly be the mother of TWO potty-trained kids! Oh glorious day! Hold on, gotta find some wood to knock on!

5. There are no pictures in this post. There are actually no new pictures on my camera! Now THAT'S a first!!!

This past Tuesday morning, our neighborhood playgroup (most of us anyway) went on an outing to the local zoo. It was a really fun trip...I think all the kids had a great time! There was, however, one very panic-stricken experience for me when Aiden wandered away and was lost for about 3 minutes. I was crying, shaking and imagining the worst as Susan, Anna and I ran around looking for him (good thing he was in his red shirt that day!) Basically, he and I were heading to the bathroom, but he got there first since I had to strap Bray into the stroller and then pry a stick out of Logan's hand before he hurt anyone with it (I also had to convince him to come with us to the bathroom). By the time I got to the bathroom, Aiden had walked in and then OUT an opposite door, up some stairs, across the zoo cafeteria, down the big front stairs and over to the giant fountain. I had run that way immediately after I didn't see him in the bathroom, but I couldn't locate his red shirt. I ran back around and told the girls that he was missing and a few of us RAN. Anna found him wandering back around towards the front of the fountain. It was horrible! I felt like, knowing him, he wouldn't even realize that he was lost and would just keep on going. I was running as fast as I could and scanning groups as fast as I could in an effort to track him down before he got too far away. When we found him, I hugged and hugged him. Phew!! Funny story though, all the kids knew that he was lost and that we were looking for him. After he had been found, we re-grouped and moved on to the sea lions. Once we got to the sea lion viewing "cave", Ryan saw Aiden walk by and proudly shouted "There's Aiden! I found him!"

Apart from that whole ordeal, which happened near the end of the day, we had a fantastic time. The kids played "musical strollers" all day. I always had Brady in the back of my double, but I also pushed Maddie, AJ, Logan, Aiden and Ashley. Logan rode around with Ryan in Susan's stroller for most of the day. I guess strollers are especially fun when they aren't yours and you can ride with someone who isn't your sibling :)

We saw a ton of animals...most of them were out and active (except the lions...they were all being quite lazy). Nothing, however, compared in pure entertainment value to Mackenzie and her milk cup! While leaning over to check out the hippos, she dropped her cup into a deep, dry ravine area. Poor sweetie was just beside herself! Susan looked around for some help and finally found a man who said he could get a grabber from the pachyderm house. Here is the cup:
When the man returned, all our kids were chanting something like "save the cup! save the cup!"
Animals-shmaminals - this guy has a huge grabber!!!!

Anna retrieves the cup from the end of the claw. The kids all clapped and cheered!! Can't beat that for fun at the zoo ;)

This is the kind of post that happens when you 1. Continue to Take Pictures and 2. Compose Stuff (in your head) for a blog, but 3. Do not actually get around to doing the posts. This should have been 5 separate topics. Therefore, I will try to split them up a bit for easy reading :)

Post 1: Crazy for Crazy Bones
So...I had never seen or heard of crazy bones until I went to our favorite toy store with the boys one day. I was intrigued by this big display of carrying bags, tins, a game book etc....but I still could NOT tell what these things were all about. That's because the actual "bones" come in bags like trading cards and you can't see what they are until you open them. I bought a pack, which contained 3 little guys, to investigate. The "original" game is based on an ancient Roman children's game, played with actual bones, called tabas. I checked out the crazy bones web site and it turns out that there are tons of ways to play with these things. We pull them out every few days and make up a new game (or race them down the matchbox car track or....um....carry them around in a variety of containers <-- Aiden). Here is a game we made up called "Roll a Bone". First, line up the crazy bones on the floor...(aren't they funny!)

The older boys went to a summer camp in the mornings all last week. It was a rough start for both of them. Logan wasn't keen on participating, decided camp was boring and refused to make the craft on Monday. We talked about how fun is often about attitude and that if you THINK something is fun, it's much easier to have fun doing it. If you THINK something is boring, well of course you're going to dislike it. After our talk, Logan decided to think that camp was fun. He participated in all the activities and was excited to go each day. He liked it so much, they are going again next week for "Super Hero Week". Yeah Logan!

Aiden's issue stemmed mostly from the fact that he was at camp with ALL the neighborhood kids including his best friend, and personality twin, AJ. Aiden got written up the first day for wrestling around with "another camper". Since that is pretty much how Aiden and AJ communicate with each other (a big bear hug that disintegrates into falling on the ground...and actually doesn't involve much wrestling...), I figured that "the other camper" was probably AJ. He went to camp for the rest of the week with a list of things he couldn't do. He would name them for me on the way "1. no wrestling....etc" He did a great job and had a "much improved" stamp of approval from the girls running the camp by the end of the week.

On Thursday, I told the boys that I would have a special surprise for them if they both had a good day at camp (which means getting a sticker from the counselors). When they proudly showed me their dinosaur stickers at pick-up, I happily showed them the 2 cans of shaving cream I bought at Walgreen's. After lunch, we dragged the wagon, Brady's car and the cozy coupe around to the back yard to play car wash for a little bit. Ella and AJ came down...we even brought out some spray bottles left over from the get messy party. I was surprised at how fast you can use up two cans of shaving cream!

Post 3: Matchy-Matchy Me

Why am I compelled to make everything match? When I do stuff like this, it makes me think of team sports, pictures of ballet recital outfits....and cheerleaders. Like..is this a trait left over from my own cheerleading days when we all had to wear the exact same bow the exact same way?? ....or is this a god-given trait and potentially one of the reasons why I was drawn to cheerleading?? The bottom line is that I like to match stuff...and by "stuff," I mean my children...and by "match" I think I mostly mean coordinate....cause doing all the same color is too confusing. These are the morning milk cups ready for filling.
Post 4: Camp Invasion

As mentioned previously, the boys went to summer camp last week. Of the 10 campers in the class, 7 of them were from our neighborhood. On the last day, the parents were invited to come for a picnic.

I was dying laughing because my boys never eat hot dogs in buns. Aiden attacked his from the top...like a hamburger. I better get started on proper dog-eating form if they want to represent at the Cubs game next month!
Auntie Denna was in for the day. She came to the picnic too!! Here she is smooching crazy-hot-dog-eatin' Aiden.I took about 20 group shots of our gang...and I have to post several of them because they're pretty funny. Here are the kids sitting relatively still: Now the exodus from the table. This is Ella yelling "Camp is fun!!" AJ jumps off the back, Aiden jumps off the front. Logan yells and preps for his jump.Ella jumps (Aiden and AJ are actually now back ON the table, ready to jump again...Logan is gone...Maddie poses...Jack observes) Jack jumps. Aiden and AJ eye their next move, Maddie slides off the end. Auntie Denna and Brady play around. A few more minutes of fun before we all head home.
Post 5: Family Fun Magazine Rocks

I used to get a magazine each month called Wondertime, which I totally adored. It wasn't about developmental milestones or how to get your kids to sleep...it was about life as a mom or dad and about how to help your kids grow as real people with real experiences...plus it had totally cool activities, crafts and recipes. I almost cried the day I got an email explaining that Wondertime would no longer be published and that I would be receiving, in its place, a magazine called Family Fun. Well...Family Fun rocks too! Same great stuff....same basic feel!! I've been getting the magazine for a little while now. This month's issue came last week. I already have a list of things we need to try. #1 on list were the sponge balls....marketed, if you will, as somewhat permanent water balloons. Did someone say water? Rockin' awesome! I was at the store the next day for supplies!

Instructions: take 3 sponges (mix up colors if you like...for fun). Cut each into 5 strips length wise (seems like it won't work, but it does). Oh, and they need to be fresh from the pack, like sort of damp. I had a pack that was dry so I just remoistened them, then stuck them in a zip lock for a while before cutting. Here, Aiden and Auntie Denna prep the sponges! I bought 4 packages of 4 so we made 5 sponge balls (enough to share!)
Here is a picture of the article. You can see in the bottom right corner how you sort of "reassemble" 3 sponges on top of each other and tie them TIGHT TIGHT with a string...fan out the "arms", trim the excess string and away you go! (TIE THEM TIGHT...one of ours sort of wiggled loose once it got wet)

Totally fun!

They turned out larger than I imagined. We took them straight outside for a test run - A+ (except the one that wasn't tight enough)

Sort of like pom poms (kidding daddy! kidding!)

Last weekend, we took the older boys camping overnight for the 2nd time. Unlike back in October, it was nice and warm. The theme of the weekend was "Wild Wacky Water" which meant that we brought squirt guns, buckets, our garden hose and lots of swim suits. The main event at the camp site was the "Heyride". Equally awesome and torturous, the heyride is set up like your standard "hay" ride with a tractor pulling an open, wooden-benched wagon (or whatever) behind it. Differences:

1. there is a 10-gallon jug of water on the back so that the riders can refill guns, buckets etc
2. there is a 20-gallon jug of water with a hose in the tractor which is periodically used by the college-aged group of male drivers to squirt the riders
3. every one along the main route of the ride stands by the road armed with anything from supersoakers to buckets full of ICE water (I got TWO of these dumped right on me....there was one mild expletive uttered...I'm truly sorry!) One of the permanent RV sites had something like Brian's "kid wash" made of PVC pipes with holes drilled into it. This one was mounted up on a flag pole and rained down on us as we drove slowly by

Every kid cried...well....except for Aiden who just shivered, tucked under my arm, and nodded emphatically every time I asked if he was OK and was he having any fun. Strangely though...it was a BLAST. We had a bucket of water at our feet and those quick-refill shooters (hard to explain). I can honestly say that I got in a number of good shots at the tormentors on the road. Logan and Brian got into the spirit by "shooting snipers" <-- this is how dad's get boys to go along with such things. After the ride was over, we jumped immediately into the warm campground pool. We did a ton of other fun stuff that weekend as well...and I was, of course, armed with a camera - pictures! Here are the kids doing the most fun thing at the campsite...running around in a big, empty tent. The game they were playing?....I'm thinking it involved bad guys since I got shot at by all of them as I unzipped the door to take some pictures. At least the water guns hadn't been filled yet.
After we set up our beds, they all decided that they were going to take a nap. Hahahahaha....nap! Obviously that lasted for all of 5 minutes.
Mackenzie was the only one who actually wanted to lay there for any length of time and kept telling the boys they were being too loud. I love the look of annoyance on her face as Aiden chats her up.
We tie-dyed shirts this year (we did pillow cases last Halloween). Aiden's is a "rainbow" shirt and Logan wanted to do Cubbies!

Back at the camp site (while we were making the shirts), the dads were cooking up some sandwich packets on the fire. It's like grilled cheese, but you wrap up your buttered-on-both-sides sando in tin foil and throw it on in!

Ready the water guns!

I believe this is after we got back from the heyride and swimming. Everyone needed a little break and a snack.

Scruffy and Checkers enjoyed the camp fire as well. Griffin, a floppy stuffed mouse we used to put in Logan's crib, came along too! Logan has a new-found love for this guy because he's seen so many pictures of himself as a baby with Griff. The other boys have matching "floppy" animals...a frog for Aiden and a brown bunny for Brady. Aiden took his frog camping as well.

Hanging out

Eating fun camp food (who counts calories and nutritional value of foods while camping?!...we sure don't I guess...judging by the amount of cheese popcorn I inhaled over the course of 2 days!)

The moms took the kids up to the main stage for a little show. I was dancing with Aiden, looked down and realized that he was DEAD asleep. Bummer! That didn't bode well for bedtime either. A 15 minute nap moves actual sleeping time from 8:00 to....go ahead guess what time he fell asleep?! 10:30! bugger! And that was only after we drove him around in the car a couple times.

When we returned from our show, the dads had this guy set up at our camp site! They bought it at the camp ground gift shop. It's a hollowed-out tiki man. When you put him in the fire, the flames shoot up through the top of his head and smoke comes out of his eyes and mouth (see later pictures!!)

A shot of our campsite from the path that leads into the woods and up to the bathroom/pool/gift shop area. That night for dinner we had mini burgers, fire cooked potatoes, corn and s'mores.

Here is the tiki man (named Tom Wiskers by Mackenzie)

This was a bit later...cool, hu?

After the kids were asleep, Tom let out a big POP and fell over backwards. Pete propped him up with a stick in front.

Along the back of the campsites is a long path through the woods. There are lots of cool places to climb, like this log, and lots of different games to play. A few the kids made up were: hunting for animals in the rain forest, putting out imaginary fires with their water guns and then just general running.

Ryan wasn't took keen on standing up on the log.

Sunday morning, Memaw and Grandpa brought Brady to the campsite! YEAH!! They were heading out the next morning for a trip to Arizona and we knew they had a lot to do. We wanted to stay for a while longer and offered to run get the baby....they were kind enough to drive him to us instead. Here, he settles in with his coffee and a donut (the coffee cup is empty!)

That morning we rented pedal cars.

It was quite the good workout for the moms and dads. The kids had a blast riding on the front (or in the case of our car, off a jump seat in the back).

Brady was a bit apprehensive at first, but once we got going, he kicked his feet and squealed with delight.

Here's Mackenzie in the jump seat behind me (only Brian could steer so I was free to pedal, snap picture, pedal, snap picture).

Logan took a turn on our cart with his brothers.

This is the pirate ship. It's a group of families that go every year for the water weekend...they're the ones that put ice in their water for the Heyriders!

After the bikes, we did this mining thing where you buy a bag of sand, wash it out in screen-bottomed trays, and collect either fossils or gems. We bought gems. I had this idea to make a stepping stone for our summer vacation every year. Brian suggested we collect things wherever we go and make an overall "summer" stone. I saved the gems in a bag for our future project. (the stone was pretty much the reason why we did this little activity...) well...plus it's really cool.

uncovering the treasures

Brady found a perfect little spot to squat (he's inside the water trough!)

We did one last swim at the pool and headed for home. By the way, I forgot to mention that Logan did an overall stellar job sleeping. We drove him around, transferred him to his bed and didn't hear from him until the morning. Aiden did a good job as well....after he finally fell asleep. Nothing like his hour-long waking at 2am last time we went camping. :)