Per usual, I’ve let the blogging slip. I haven’t stopped taking pictures though so I have a lot to post. Yes, still no vacation pictures and no Easter (there are just so many!!!) Here are some of the things we’ve been up to at the 554:

 

This picture is actually from Easter, but I took it because it shows the hair style Logan wanted (for a very brief amount of time). Up until recently, I’ve just had their hair cut….the same….whatever I told the girls to do. Well, Logan has formed an opinion on his own style and at one of our recent hair-cut trips, he and I paged through a few books of boy’s hairstyles so that he could pick out something “better”. He had the stylist leave it long and we spiked it up like this. However, he soon tired of having me yang on his hair every morning to gel it up and has since gone back to wearing his bangs down….but longer.

Teacher appreciation week: This is the project Logan and I made together for teacher appreciation week (which was last week). The school sent home a list of suggestions like “send in a pack of highlighters and thank your teacher for making you *brighter*” etc. etc. There were some cute ideas, but I wasn’t sure if Logan’s teacher needed 29 packs of highlighters so Logan and I came up with something different. First, I asked him to name things he liked about his teacher, Mrs. Stith. He said things like smart, creative, caring etc. We then took the letters of her name (which worked out well since there are 5 letters and 5 days of appreciation) and made an acrostic poem (Logan told me it was called an acrostic poem….I looked it up and he was right!) For example S = Super Smart, T = Terrifically Creative etc etc. We matched up a small gift card for each letter (Michael’s = creative etc) and I made an envelope for each day using my cricut. We put his “poem” in each envelope with the day’s letter filled in and the corresponding gift card. I started the week with an envelope and a letter explaining our gift and how much we’ve enjoyed having her as Logan’s teacher this year.

These are the backs of the envelopes

The fronts:

I punched two holes in each one and bound them together with little rings to make a book:

Ta-da! Logan had a blast having her open one each day at school. I was in the classroom last Friday and spoke with Mrs. Stith - it was nice to hear that she had fun with our gift as well. She also sent home a very nice thank-you note. This will double as our end-of-year gift :)

Speaking of last week….Logan had his “Ozzie’s book club” trip to the local Kane County Cougars baseball game (the kids can win a free ticket for reading at school). Bri was out of town, but I took all three boys with me. I let them each have 1 ballpark treat – Brady selected cotton candy….and then it attacked him!!

Two weeks ago on Thursday, as we were driving home from Lacrosse practice (which ends at 7:30!), Aiden asked if I would push him on the swings outside when we got home. Well, bedtime is 8 so I told him I would do it Friday morning. He said something like, “you always say ‘in a minute, just a second’, but that means you never actually do it!” Well…didn’t that make me feel sad! I usually am doing something like dishes or straightening up or whatever. I really have been trying harder lately to drop my household stuff and play more. So…Friday morning, I told Aiden to make an agenda of things he wanted to do that day. I thought it was going to say “swing, play soccer, play a game” etc, but he made the list below (how frequently we change direction!)

So Brady and Aiden spent Friday morning “cooking”

Last Friday, Aiden was really pumped up about making a lemonade stand. I’m not sure where he got the idea, but it was just NOT going to be a good day unless it happened. I really wanted to say no – it was the middle of the day and no one was around, but I stopped at Walgreen’s on the way home from swimming and bought a big yellow poster board and some cups. Lemonade was donated from our house :) This happened to be the Friday of the town-wide garage sale so our good friend and neighbor “Mr. Pete” had taken the day off to run his own sale. He was solicited by Aiden and Brady (joined by friend and co-preschooler Isabella) and came down to buy a cup (25 cents please)

After the boys made a small profit from the stand (25 cents each from Pete, Anne, 3-year old Matt, Isabella and her mom Jen plus the $1.00 in quarters I put in for “change”), they took their earnings and negotiated the purchase of 3 stuffed puppies from Pete’s garage sale. They were marked for $2, but Pete is very generous and let them go for 50 cents each!

When Logan got home, he wanted in on the fun – but he wanted his stand to offer FREE lemonade….right next to the one charging 25 cents. As you can imagine, some disagreements broke out amongst the various stand owners until they all agreed that the drinks should be free….

Suddenly, we had lots of customers ;)

So….back to Pete’s garage sale. After Brady and Aiden bought their puppies, Brady saw this toy cleaning cart that he could NOT, simply WOULD not live without (ie: cried madly all up and down the block for at least an hour). I said no and I fought hard! It was only $3, but we’ve been having some pretty major issues with him asking for things EVERYWHERE we go – and then throwing temper tantrums when we say no. I had decided that we were NOT going to get him even a tiny little vending machine toy for at least 3 weeks. Well….after 2 days of garage-sale-action, Pete and Susan still hadn’t sold the cart. Brian was driving back to our house on Saturday afternoon when Pete stopped him and gave him the cart. !!

We made sure he understood that it was a gift from Mr. Pete and NOT us ;) He spent the next two days “cleaning” anything he could. Too bad he can’t run the real vacuum

Mother’s day pic: me and the boys

We hung out for the afternoon at Brian’s older brother’s house. The day after Mother’s Day was Grandpa's birthday so we all had cake. Here is: Grandpa with 2 of his 3 sons and 6 of his 7 grandsons

This is my mother’s day gift from Logan. It’s another acrostic poem (wow – I just love my new-found word) with MOMMY. M = Magical, O = Outstanding, M = Makes a grate sue chef (sous chef…the person who assists the main chef…as in daddy), M = Mothering and Y = Yummy Food

Here is the card Aiden made for me

It had cute things inside to go along with a poem

On the last page, he drew a picture of our house. I’m upstairs, Brady is climbing the stairs, Aiden is downstairs, the van is in the driveway and Logan is on the sidewalk “drawing with chalk”

Brady’s card.

He must have dictated to his teacher. It says “Mom, I love you! I like your waffles”. haha!

This is the card I got from Brian and the boys the morning of mother’s day. It’s a cute list of stuff they like about me. I have it in my “keepsake box”

And finally, this is the place mat Aiden made. It says I’m 36 (close), that my favorite colors are pink and brown (why not), that I like to eat salads, that I like to spend time with Aiden and his brothers and that I always say “go clean your playroom” (that’s true!)

For a few days after the lemonade stand, Logan took to stacking lots of the cups and having someone knock them down. I was impressed by his efforts, but REALLY impressed when I tried to duplicate this tower 5 times and failed miserably!

Here is cup stacking one night in our foyer

Here are Aiden and Brady on a field trip to the local fire station. The guys at the station have all these GIANT chairs to sit in at the end of the day in their entertainment area. Even 2 little boys don’t fully fill one up!

When I started writing this post (last week!!!), Brady and Aiden were playing with stickers. They first stuck google eyes into a People Magazine which I found hilarious (all those celebs don’t look so hot with wiggle eyes on – ha!), then they stuck them on their fingers. I drew the faces. Brady has: himself on one thumb and then me, daddy, Logan and Aiden on his other hand. I’m telling you – it’s just endless fun with those stickers!