Happy Birthday Charlie!!

Charlie woke up this morning asking if it was "tomorrow" which he knew was his birthday ;-). He was so excited to be three and tell me all of the things he thought he could now do...go potty by himself (which he did a few times and not others), get dressed by himself, swing on the swing by himself...i quickly noticed a trend of "by myself's". We had a laid back morning then got pizza and went to Lee park to eat it. It sprinkled while we ate but then the kids had a great time playing at the park. Charlie took a birthday nap (we all should get time for a birthday nap!) and then was revived for present opening. After presents and dinner we walked to see the turtles, well I walked, Heather rode her bike, and Jeff and Charlie ran--pretty much the whole way. What a slacker I am :-). Now we're about to have cake, showers, and bed...we'll see how that goes! I know for one thing I am birthday'd out!!

ponies and cars parties

Heather and Charlie had a combined birthday party this morning to celebrate their 5th and 3rd birthdays with friend from their class. About 20 kids total were there (including all siblings) and everyone seemed to have a good time. we had a pony ball toss and pin-the-tail on the pony as well as a cars ring toss and pin the wheel on the car as well as the whole playground to play on. The kids all ate cake and watched the birthday girl and boy open presents. All in all it was nice and the rain has held off all day despite thunderstorm predictions for all day (it was a bit nerve racking!!). Really the party was uneventful and the only failure was that Jeff and I were too busy running games and working cakes and presents to take very many pictures. One more birthday cake to make (for Charlie tomorrow) and my string will end for a while. I think I've made 5 cakes/cupcakes and 1 cookie cake (for Charlie's class in the last 10 days ;-) Jeff suggested taking a cake decorating class, or asking a lady he knows to give me lessons--i'm not sure if that was complimentary or due to the result of my decorating (we didn't get pictures of the cakes either :-(

who likes the dentist anyway??

After a clingy soccer practice we got to go to the dentist this morning. Heather was all geared up for a great visit filled with going to the back and lying down to watch a movie and getting x-rays. We ended with no x-rays and teeth that were cleaned (with much reservation by the dental hygenist) with Heather sitting up. She did lie down for the dentist but he used the scraper and got too close to her gums (although he told her it hadn't hurt--my dentist lies like that too though...) and she started to get really upset. Seeing his sister unsure Charlie didn't want to get his check up until the dentist showed him a tooth brush and sticker that he could have...such a sucker!! We then ran errands until Heather had dance at school--shoe shopping was sooo fun with two grumpy kids...school tomorrow and I don't know who is more excited about that!!

soccer part 1

After a laid back day with lots of coloring (including charlie's legs and toes) and heather tracing her hand to draw in the blue fingernail polish that she is currently wearing (thanks grandma easter bunny!) I took Heather to her first soccer practice. She was so excited to put on her shin guards, new shoes (wal-mart) and bring her red star ball. Then we got there and started walking to where her team (the 5 kids and 2 coaches) was stretching out. We got to the fence and she dug her heels in and cried and cried that she did not want to play soccer anymore and she wanted to go back to the car. I calmed her down enough to watch what they were doing (running around the field and jumping up and down) and managed to walk to the bleachers so she could actually see and hear what they were doing. She watched the whole practice and about 20 minutes into it was so interested that she stopped clinging to my arm like I might vanish. We watched teh rest of the practice and then she helped the coach pick up a ball and had cake for one of the boys birthdays and popped bubbles with the kids on her team...better luck next week...so my new saying is...all the stuff we got for heather to play soccer...sitting on teh bench for teh first practice WITH Heather priceless...

in her defense Jeff had said that he was going to come and help coach--of course he got an "urgent" call from his commander and got to sit out the practice waiting for him to get out of a meeting...she also thought that she would know one of the girls on the team who was not there...maybe next week ;-)

happy easter!

The story of the last few days for the kids has been egg hunt, egg hunt, egg hunt...double that and that's how many they've done! Two big ones in the community and on base, 1 easter bunny hunt around the house and at least 3 set up by each other, friends, or dad with no candy but the joy of finding the eggs :-). This morning the kids eggs were "color coded" charlie had yellow and orange and Heather had pink and purple but they seemed to find more of each others than their own and delighted in "hinting" to the other where their egg was. Sometimes subtly, sometimes, "Charlie the egg is RIGHT here!" It was really fun to watch and we were cracking up.

We got Heather all set up for soccer with wal-mart cleats (she needed shoes to wear in the mud/etc. anyway), shin guards and long socks. I was going through the cost of each thing and ended with, "heather lasting 15 minutes at practice before she never wants to play again...priceless" First practice tomorrow and we'll see how it goes...

Happy Birthday Heather!

I can't believe Heather's turning 5 today! It doesn't seem like we've had kids that long and at the same time I really don't remember life without them. Today she chose to help decorate some cupcakes, meet up with some friends at the "big" park on base for a picnic, have a friend over (currently), then we'll have her selected dinner--pizza, broccoli, and beets followed by cake which she wants to help decorate when her friend leaves and then watch a movie--with the anticipation of staying up "extra late" since she's five. Since her bedtime varies depending on the day and if she took a nap or not I'm not sure what "late" is...

I haven't posted but not for a lack of activities. We left the first of March for Ohio and spent two weeks at my parents house. We got a heap of snow and did some sledding, snow soccer (with an ice ball), rolling in the snow, and the kids built a snowman with my mom. The kids got to go to two Ohio basketball games and proudly the first word charlie can spell is o-h-i-o and he will do it with the chant with the student section very well. We also got to see Kelly for a weekend and went to her bridal shower which was fun and the kids were REALLY good at. It gives me hope that it will be possible for them to behave at the wedding and reception...The kids got lots of good grandma and grandpa time, walking up the hill, feeding the pets, making zucchini bread, painting birdhouses and more. Heather cried on the way home because she wanted to go back...

the last weekend we went up to Cleveland to see Jeff's family. Everyone was home which was nice and resulted in some sears pictures of the group. Getting four kids to smile was (surprisingly) no problem for the photo lady so if anyone knows of magazine shoots that we can sign up a group (two girls and two boys) we had the right four that day! The kids enjoyed celebrating birthays at each house and loved the time with their cousins.

Now we're back and although I didn't mind leaving the snow on a Sunday and arriving to 75 on Monday evening I didn't enjoy the disaster of the house and back to cooking, etc. that I didn't have to do in OH.