Well, the preschool year is over for Aiden. The 4’s classes at his school have a cute graduation ceremony each year at a local golf course. Even though Aiden is going to do one more year of preschool (he’s so little and he’s still 4 when most of his class has been 5 for a while), he’ll be a different school and in “Pre-K” so he happily went through the ceremony with his friends.

All day long, I kept asking him what song they were going to sing at graduation. Last year, Logan’s class sang a cute song that went a little like this, “graduation day, graduation day, graduation day is finally here” plus…oh my, tears welling up in the eyes, “What a Wonderful World” by Louis Armstrong. Aiden just kept telling us his song was “Kirby the Worm”. I was like, “stop…seriously!” He and Logan were cracking up about it. Well, sure enough, the teacher gave them a choice between reciting a poem about a worm or about a frog. The “song” was a little kid’s rhyme thing called HERBIE the Worm. I guess I shouldn’t have doubted.

Aiden marching down to get his diploma. While they walk, the teacher usually reads what each child wants to be when they grow up. Brian and I were both…um…surprised, but NOT surprised I guess, to hear that, “When Aiden grows up, he wants to study all the fish in the sea”. Wow…much better than being a professional video game tester, which is what I would have expected. My son….the Marine Biologist…I LIKE it! Most of the girls wanted to be princesses…me too…where do I apply??

The tent where they do these graduations is beautiful and super fun, but SO SO awful for pictures. Here is the class: Aiden is the one in the front row with his certificate over his face

Bad lighting, bad camera…Aiden is like dead center of this pic with his arm up in the air

I gotta give it to Aiden’s teacher on the details…most other classes just get this certificate rolled up with their child’s name on it. Aiden’s has a star with his personal class picture on it and it’s laminated.

Aiden and his friend Alli. Alli was loving Aiden in the beginning of the year and would bring him drawings from time to time. Now I think they are mostly just really good buddies…they are sort of the same goofy, funny personality. They have also played soccer together twice now. She’s a cutie pie! 

Alli’s mom and I made them hug. It was like the super fastest hug ever, but I got a picture of it!!!

Ok….coolest thing ever! So…Aiden’s teacher had Mrs. Green as her assistant this year. Logan also had Mrs. Green last year…different teacher though. She is AWESOME! Like last year, the class did tie-dye shirts with their hand prints on them. She had a couple extra shirts so she just tie-dyed them for Aiden and Brady…just because. She’s seriously just wonderful. About 2 weeks ago, the “actual” teacher was gone for a few days because she needed to travel to her son’s college graduation. While she was gone, Mrs. Green brought in white shirts and had each child put 2 finger prints on each one. She then took them home, created fish out of the finger prints, tie-dyed them to look like an aquarium, and did these underwater stencils everywhere. It is the MOST adorable thing I have EVER seen come home from school (and that’s saying a lot because Aiden’s teacher is amazing too with individual scrap books for each kids plus there are a LOT of teachers in the school who do really cool stuff). Aiden was the only one in class to do an orange fish:

The back of the shirt has Mrs. Scheidecker and Mrs. Green’s thumb prints. Mrs. S is even wearing glasses!

The front of the shirt: is that not to die for?! It’s a little dirty on top…Aiden wore it to TGIF this week.

The back: Mrs. S is jumping out of the water! Mrs. Green told me that some of the kids, despite her instructions, put their prints up too high on the front of the shirts so she had them “jumping” out as well. Ahhhhhhh…so cute!!!!!!! Well, that’s 1 down and 1 more to go before summer is in full swing!

I’ve been wanting to do a post on Logan and his love of costumes for quite a while now. Every single day, he invents a new “character” and creates something for himself from the costume basket in the play room. Just the other day, after watching a part of a spy movie, he had me take one of his zipper hoodies and cover the front in stripes of duct tape to make it look like a bullet-proof vest. Unfortunately, these costumes are usually created in the morning before school and then there are major tears as I explain that he can’t wear them and show his friends. Last week, the boys got haircuts and I was comparing notes with one of the girls who works there. Seems her son is very similar and will barely leave the house without some sort of costume on. I told her the now classic tale of Logan’s “spring school picture” and I think we declared it the overall “dress up” winner. So here’s what happened: for his 6th birthday back in March, I found several new pieces to add to Logan’s dress up repertoire including a fedora…which he had been looking for one day when he was doing some sort of rapper or singer costume. He has worn this hat INTO school on several occasions with strict instructions from me to put it into his bag before class starts.

So our school is now offering a spring picture day in addition to the one in the beginning of the year. This is not the yearbook picture, just another opportunity to get professional portraits. Logan had his fedora on all morning and wore it in the car to school. As he was getting out, he remembered picture day and said, “oh! can I wear this hat?” I said, “no honey…just do a normal picture OK?” When he got back that afternoon, I asked how school was. He gave me a sheepish grin and said, “I wore my hat for pictures”. To which I replied, “seriously? didn’t the photographer or anyone think that was kind of strange?” He said, “no…I told Miss McCluckie (his teacher) that you wanted me to wear it”. After trying hard not to laugh, and after a pretty stern talk about lying, I had to immediately email his teacher explaining the situation so she wouldn’t think I was some sort of goof who would request that her son wear a fedora for his picture. We had a good laugh about it – she knows and appreciates Logan’s personality for sure. Brian thought it was hysterical and said, “um…of course we’re buying that – total black-mail material for his teenage years!” Well…the pictures were returned last week. I guess he was so super proud of them that he had to show our friend and neighbor Kristin whose office is right across from his classroom. She text-messaged this picture to me before he came home that day:

Look how pleased he is with himself! Seriously?! I mean if you’re going to wear the hat, at least make a face that goes with it….not that sweet little grin. hysterical. Of course we bought them! Can you say “wedding photo montage?!”

Both Logan and I like collecting pictures of his costumes so I have a lot saved up. Here is one of his new favorites: I paint his face in camo for him to play “armies” (soldier). The first morning I did this, he went to look at himself in the bathroom mirror and exclaimed, “mommy! you are the artist!!” He wore makeup like this to our first TGIF of the season so his neighborhood friends could see.

This picture was taken a while ago. This is Logan talking on the phone to Nana one morning. He got a new cowboy hat and a long duster coat for his birthday along with the fedora. This is: straw hat, winter gloves, shirt and vest from a how-to-train-your-dragon costume, khaki pants and a tinker toy rifle.

Oh…and a pirate bandana

Super spy: glasses, a “camera” and his laser watch

This wasn’t really a Logan-created character, but still totally funny. The kindergarteners dressed up as old people for the 100th day of school. This is: his bathrobe and slippers, daddy’s glasses and some dry shampoo to make his hair gray.

Cool rapper guy: This is an ensemble that Logan would wear, play the song “Dynamite” over and over again in the living room and dance around with his brothers (even Brady can pretty much sing all the words). It’s: one of my winter hats, his sun glasses, his favorite long-sleeved black shirt (which now has a hole in it that he made me cut so he could put a rose in his shirt like a maitre d’ on valentines day), his “cool guy” button up and his 2nd favorite black track pants.

I was looking through some old stuff in the basement crawl space and came across this Indian-inspired belt I used to have and this giant gold ring…not sure where I got that, but anyway…Logan LOVED them, claimed them for his own and added it to the rapper get-up. He actually went jogging up and down the street one day in this outfit…probably so everyone could witness his awesomeness. Me and Aiden stood at the window inside and cheered him on.

Who could forget his 6th birthday party where he wore: his Wolverine costume and a pair of daddy’s aviator sunglasses. Need I reiterate that this costume is 1. too small and 2. has an awful run down the back exposing his cute little boxer-clad rear? After that party, the Wolverine costume “disappeared” (not well enough though because he came across it the other day under daddy’s bathroom sink. I couldn’t make myself throw it out…but maybe I will)

Even on vacation, Logan chose to spend his money at Legoland on a ninja headband and squishy nun chucks.

I’m not sure about his one…some sort of fighter with an invisible gun, his soccer shin guards and his winter boots…in his PJs of course.

Race car driver…complete with really thick “I’m going to build a snowman” gloves…and crocs.

So again…was I mad that Logan lied to his teacher and took this school picture? Actually no. I wasn’t happy about the deception part, but I’m actually SUPER pleased to have a picture that so perfectly captures Logan’s amazing personality, creativity and inner beauty. I should have had him wear the entire Adidas track suit that he puts on literally every other day. I think this picture will make for some awesome conversations with any girls who come over, years from now, who are interested in dating my son…oh ya…they’re gonna see it! …and they better love it or they get the thumbs WAY down!

Like most moms, I think I often struggle to find the time for “me”. I already feel guilty enough letting the boys watch TV and have the run of the house while I try to sneak in work-outs a few mornings a week. Since I was able to quit my “real job,” which I did at night after the boys were in bed, I’ve had SO much more time to do things that I really love: like watch episodes of Vampire Diaries and read (ok…Brian also has to be out of town for these things to happen, but still…lots more me time). Before the boys came along, I was quite an avid reader. My ideal Saturday went something like this: breakfast out with Brian, lay in bed and read, nap, read, nap, eat again, read…you get the picture. I guess I still try to sneak in a little reading during daylight hours. Sometimes I’ll carry my nook around all day thinking that maybe, just maybe, I’ll be able to get a few pages in while the boys play. But…that plan doesn’t usually work since they can see me…and seeing me means requesting things like drinks, snacks, and creative weaponry (this is when Logan asks me to duct tape stuff together to make more interesting guns and such…not a phase I’m particularly loving, but I was never a school-aged boy and Brian assures me it’s normal). I guess I’ve complained about my lack of reading time…but I got a very clear message that at least someone is listening!

Here are some pictures of the mother’s day gift Logan made for me at school:

My mom by “Logan”:

 

Here’s me: Cute picture, right? I even got a flower in my hair…and I’m either holding a vase of flowers or a drink with flowers in it (works for me either way). She has “brown” hair. She has “hasil (hazel)” eyes, She is “5” feet tall (I thought that was a good guess for someone who is still measured in inches…almost accurate!)

Okay…so see if you can read this:

Translation:

My mom is very special! She can do so many things.

• My mom can “play” (sure can!)
• My mom can “chat” (um…you got that right, kid! mom practically never shuts up – just ask dad!)
• My mom can “bai a toy” (that would be “buy a toy”…and only if you’re on my good side that day I guess).

HERE’S THE KICKER:

• But my mom cannot: “hav 10 minits to read hr book” <—In case you didn’t catch that, he said I can’t have 10 minutes to read my book! Really?! I almost peed my pants laughing! Clearly, I’ve uttered just that complaint to them many times. I ran down the street immediately to show Anne who was, coincidentally, sitting on her porch reading while her children played in the yard…or at my house if I remember correctly. HYSTERICAL! Brian thought it was brilliant.

All I can say is classic! This will obviously be a story repeated for like…forever! He also scored major points when he climbed into bed Sunday morning and said, “happy mother’s day” with a kiss. While the three of us were laying there, Brian said, “let’s name things about mommy that we love,” Logan hugged me, thought for a minute and said, “she never lets us down”. Wow – big words that I guess I need to live up to…tall order, but I’ll try!

So…Logan’s lovely mother’s day gift came the same day along with Aiden’s SUPER cool gift from his school: a scrapbook of all this year’s memories. His teacher is quite amazing. She made a book for every child with pictures of them doing all sorts of things throughout the year (including pages for graduation and a few other things we can fill in). When I say “pictures of them,” I mean that each child’s book had pictures of THAT child…so mine all have just Aiden or Aiden and friends on each page. Pretty cool! I also got a card and hand-made wrapping paper.

The front of the book:

Here are just a couple of the pages: Aiden working on a project, his name on a leaf which they had to find and put on a tree during the fall and a picture of Aiden and daddy at the Holiday party making a ginger bread house (which, I reiterate…could have used more M-n-M’s and was OH so delicious!)

This is the wrapping paper they made the week before mother’s day. I may be biased, but I’m quite impressed with his lemon, lime and orange stamping!

My card by Aiden: It has a mommy song inside set to the tune of “my bologna has a first name…it’s o-s-c-a-r”. It’s like “oh, my mommy has a special name it’s m-o-m-m-y. my mother has a special name it’s m-o-m-m-y. Oh, I love to hug her every day and when I kiss her I will say, ‘mommy, mommy, I love you! I L-O-V-E Y-O-U!’” Ya…now try to get THAT out of your head for the rest of the day!

Overall, an amazing and thoroughly amusing mother’s day. Brian’s family came over for Sunday brunch and we had a FEAST…prepared mostly by Brian and his brother David. Brian gave me lots of reading time that day and a nice long nap too. Perfection!

A week ago Friday (April 29th), Logan’s class did an egg drop. They have been studying oviparous animals (those that come from an egg), have been hatching chicks in their classroom and were given the following assignment:

1. Place a raw egg in a zip lock bag.

2. Put the egg in a container no bigger than 7 X 7 X 7, packing it any way you want so that it will survive a fall from the roof of the elementary school building.

What we did:

1. Wrapped a raw egg in bubble wrap then placed it in the zip lock bag

2. Lined the inside of a deli meat container (plastic) with more bubble wrap, put the egg inside and packed smaller bits of bubble wrap around it

3. Taped the lid on tight with duct tape

4. Attached a parachute and wings (parachute from the playroom, wings from construction paper that Logan made)

5. Per Logan’s instructions, we put on another piece of tape and labeled his creation “The Great American Flying Egg”.

6. Tested it by throwing it countless time from the balcony of the house

7. Gathered at 1:30 to watch Logan’s class and 2 others have their eggs dropped and tallied either as “humpties” or “lumpties” (humpty eggs broke just like the egg in the story and Lumpty eggs survived the fall). Some of the kids creations were hysterical…parachutes, one was stuffed inside a small bear, one had a layer of foam on the bottom to cushion the landing etc etc.

Here is the label on Logan’s egg container:

I refused to cut the army man off the really nice parachute toy Meemaw gave him so we taped him on top.

Logan really wanted to wear something to go along with his “Great American” theme. This shirt has the word “Division” on the bottom of it so we put a piece of tape above that and wrote “Egg Drop” so that the shirt read “Egg Drop Division”

The assistant principal and the head of facilities did the dropping honors. Each kid stood up when it was their turn. The others sat in groups on the sidewalk below and watched. We got really lucky and had a nice day. Plus…daddy was able to work from the area and I let Aiden blow off school so we could go as a family. Aiden helped with design, construction and testing so he was pretty bummed to hear that he would miss the event…couldn’t let that happen ;)

This is like a victory sign or something…Logan’s egg survived the fall!! YEAH!

After the egg dropping was over the kids had a scheduled walk around the school for Autism awareness. Logan said his eyes hurt so I let him borrow my sunglasses…with strict instructions to bring them home…which he did not…but they were found on the playground and I got them back the next Monday.

Daddy videotaped the whole thing:

Last week, starting on Wednesday morning, we had a crew of painters doing some work inside our house and on the outside as well. The outside was definitely in need of a touch up since the builder’s paint started chipping from around the front door about a year after we moved in. I had always hated the way the trim totally matched the siding (while some of the houses in our neighborhood have nice, coordinating trim). Also…we weren’t loving the blue we picked for the front door and the shutters. So…after almost 6 years of living here, we went for an update. We were both FREAKING out on Friday as we saw the whole thing coming together. I’m still a little wary that we went TOO white with the trim, but most of the feedback from neighbors has been really positive. Next week, I think we’re actually getting a new backsplash installed as well. I won’t even recognize my house anymore! :)

Before the painting started, I spent one night (ok…1/2 an hour because it was so easy) replacing 70 cabinet pulls in our kitchen. Before:

After: Not a super dramatic change, but they now match all the light fixtures we have done in the past 2 years. The plants on the counter are tons of different peppers, tomatoes and herbs we are growing for our garden this year.

Family room before

Family room after. The back wall doesn’t look that different, but it’s about 2 shades darker. We think it’s very cozy.   

Outside of the house before:

trim = putty, siding = putty, shutters and door = blue

The front entry way

House after: trim and garage doors = super white, door and shutters = dark brown.

New front entry way.

For the past two days, there have been a crew of men in the front part of our house painting (and I’m LOVING the new colors…darker versions of the old ones). Having hung around most of yesterday morning, I decided we should get out for a while today. I needed a few things at Target plus we had a couple “free kids meals” coupons for Chili’s. Aiden still had some Easter money to spend so we goofed around in the toy aisle for a bit. In a moment of weakness, I purchased some Nerf darts and clips that go with a gun Logan recently bought (with his Easter money…against my will…because daddy thinks Nerf is awesome). Annnnnyway, the set was 50% off and they lose those foam dart things so quick, I figured it was worth it. After picking it up and declaring that I, magnanimous mother that I am, was going to purchase the set, “for the house”, I received the following praise from Logan, “you’re the best best best besssssssst best mom ever!” While that’s a great thing to hear, it’s not always encouraging to know that he super loves me when I buy him stuff…like ammo…but whatever.

Later, as we were walking towards the check out, he continued with the adoration and said, “mommy…on my word, I promise you can have 10 whole minutes just to yourself today”

wow…that’s (sniff) all I ever ask for!

Scene: Interior of house, mom and dad’s bedroom, 5am Sunday morning. The sun is just coming in the windows. All is quiet when, entering via the bedroom door, a boy of about 6 years bounds in with a happy and expectant face:

Logan (6 year old boy): “Happy Easter! Is it time to hunt for eggs yet?!”

Mom (glancing through 1/2 open eyes at the clock on her bedside table): “Um…hu? What time is it…5!? No honey…it’s still too early” (rolling over to her husband) “it’s like Christmas morning all over again” (to son…in a very groggy voice) “come in and cuddle with us for a while baby…it’s too early to go downstairs right now.”

The boy walks, with slumped shoulders and a deflated sense of excitement, over to dad’s side of the bed where he climbs in and lays restlessly as the clock slowly moves from 5 – 5:30. The boys then sits up and announces:

Logan: “I’m going back to my room now”

Mom: “do you mean to your bed? to sleep more?”

Dad: “don’t wake up your brothers”

Logan: “I won’t”

close up of clock as the minutes tick by from 5:30 to 5:45. Entering the scene via the bedroom door, we see Logan and his two younger brothers.

All three: “Happy Easter!” and “Can we go downstairs yet?”

Logan (with look of innocence, wonder, and the slightly sheepish grin of ‘I’m lying right now’): “I guess I was talking too loud because they woke up!”

Close up of mom with a look on her face that speaks to the thought of, “talking too loud? probably more like shaking them, jumping on their beds and saying ‘get up it’s Easter!’”

Cut to Dad exiting the bed and leaving the room.

Dad: “hang on guys, I have to go find the video camera”

Cut back to mom, exiting bed and shutting the door to keep the excited trio of little men from escaping before this precious moment can be caught on film.

Boys (who are currently being held hostage while mom finds a sweater, quickly brushes her teeth and shoves contacts into her eyes): “can we go? can we go?”

Dad (shouting from the hallway): “OK boys – come on out!”

Shot of boys running excitedly down the hall. Dad is poised near the stairs with the video camera while mom trails after them shooting with the still camera that she placed beside her bed the night before in anticipation of just such a moment.

Dad (to mom in a whisper as they crouch at the top of the stairs, video camera running, while the boys empty the Easter baskets which were waiting on the landing): “Tell Logan to go put on something besides just his underwear!”

End scene.

The boys with their baskets before the hunt. Logan is holding what’s left of his bunny…maybe just it’s end. Speaking of, Aiden had the most genius move all day: he bit the booty off his bunny and stuffed it with other candy…pretty funny.

Brady on the hunt (thing on head = rug burn from his time at Bouncetown last Friday…I think he had a run-in with one of the giant inflatables).

Logan’s Happy Easter drawing

At Meemaw and Grandpa’s house for a late brunch: Our usual attempt to get a picture of all the boys. This inflatable is in the next-door neighbor’s yard, but we had clearance to invade and photograph :)

Not bad!

Being the mother of 3 boys and the Grandmother of 7, Meemaw made sure that her house was fully stocked with nerf guns. The boys chased each other around the front and posed for a picture.

Easter egg hunting time! All 6 participants had a specific color of egg to hunt for themselves. Colors were determined in the fairest way possible…drawn blindly out of a bucket. Logan actually got green, Aiden was yellow and Brady was orange.

Happiness is hunting for hidden candy!