Mom, we've got a plan.

That is what Jack told me when we were walking to school on his birthday. And, he followed it up with...

"and I thought of it myself!"

I must admit that my curiosity was peaked.

Me: "Ok Jack, what's your plan?"

Jack: "Well, you know how at school, all of the birthday kids get their names said during morning announcements and then the birthday kids get to go to the LMC for a pencil? Well, me and Ben and Drew decided that after they announce our names, me and Drew are going to meet up in the hallway outside of our classrooms, since our classes are right next to eachother, and Ben is going to stand in front of Mrs. M's class so that me and Drew can meet him there so that all 3 of us can go into the LMC TOGETHER!! Isn't that cool...and a great plan?!?!"

I have to say that I thought that was an AWESOME plan! It is true that they are typical brothers that fight over who is the first one to brush his teeth, or take a shower, or get his piece of cake, but they seem very happy to share their birthday with their 2 best friends. Very cool!!

Birthday 2009

The boys were VERY excited about their birthday this year. Turning seven is apparently very cool!

Somehow, a couple of years ago, Dunkin Donuts on May 28 turned into a tradition. The boys talk about having Dunkin Donuts on their birthday everytime they see a Dunkin Donuts. It can be November and when we drive past a Dunkin Donuts, without a doubt, one of them will ask if we can have Dunkin Donuts....on their birthday. Ummmm...ok.

Thankfully, we remembered, and their Dad loves them a lot...and doesn't mind getting up early. Spencer picked up some DD before everyone was awake so, the boys were very excited to see the Munchkins waiting for them when they got downstairs for breakfast. It's the little things in life....

hmmm....something makes me think that Drew was expecting filling in that Munchkin.

We gave the boys digital cameras for their birthday. They seem to like them a lot. When I say a lot, I mean A LOT! They are taking pictures of everything. We ended up going to Vito & Nick's for dinner. By the time we arrived, they had each taken about 70 pictures. It is great having the digital camera because it doesn't matter how many pictures they take, but on the flip side, I'm not quite sure how they are going to learn restraint. I mean, we don't really need 20 pictures X3 of the cars driving next to us on the road. ;)

or, a picture of each of the "Wipeout" contenstants.

or, a picture of me taking a picture. It's like I have my own paparazzi.

After dinner, we came home to a big birthday cookie. Since we were having a "family party" for the boys over the weekend and a "kids party" next week we didn't need a 3rd big cake. When Charlie and I went to Jewel to pick something out, I decided to use his wording for the decoration.

Happy 7th Birthday Brudders!!

We love you!

Last day as 6 year olds...

Wow, the boys are going to be SEVEN tomorrow! Time has gone so fast...it seems like I was just pushing them around in a stroller.

Picture from today...

Wait, I guess I was "just pushing them around in strollers" ;)

Silly Drew!

~

As long as I had the camera out today...

Happy Brothers...

Silly Brothers...

Happy Birthday Eve Ben, Jack & Drew!!!

I hope you have an AWESOME day tomorrow!!!

Two steps ahead, one step back.

The boys have started taking showers on their own. It is so cool!! They get up in the morning, jump in the shower, get themselves dressed and ready for school. all. by. themselves!!! It saves so much time and makes the morning run so much better. Sure, the bathroom is a little wet when they are finished, but I can live with that. In fact, the bathroom is pretty wet when I am giving baths to 4 little boys too.

So, the other day, I happened to go into the boys' room shortly after Jack had gotten out of the shower. He was just finishing up getting dressed.

Me: "Hey Jack, how was your shower?"

Jack: "Good."

Me: "Did you do a good job?"

Jack: "I sure did. I got really wet."

At this point, I walked over to comb his hair and noticed he was really wet....like even though he was 1/2 way dressed, he was still dripping.

Me: "Wow Jack, you are still really wet."

Jack: "I told you that I did a good job and got really wet!!"

Me: "but, did you use a towel when you were finished?"

Jack: "d'oh!"

Well, ok then.

If we believed in "arranged marriages",,,

...I would definitely pick her for Charlie!!!

How sweet is she?!?!?!!!!

This is Charlie's friend Hadley. We got together with Hadley and her mom at McDonalds for a play "date" last week. Aren't they cute!! Hadley is so sweet... she kept saying "Charlie, play with me. Charlieee play with meeee!". Charlie was playing a little hard-to-get, but he definitely likes Hadley and really enjoyed her attention. He was also very excited later to tell Daddy and his brothers that he "played with Hadley".

That's a lot of mulch!!!

Note to self...10 yards of mulch is a lot of mulch....but, probably not enough. :(

Good thing we have so many boys to help spread all of that mulch.

"Mommy, I help ou, Mommy I help ou, MOMMY, I HELP OU!"

Charlie doesn't say things just once.

If only our "helpers" didn't get so distracted by things...like bikes....and Wii....and spitting water on the sidewalk(?)!! Oye.

Eight Days...

Let's see, what Drew did for the eight days (leading up to last Thursday).

Hmmm.....

• he went to the zoo,
• went to the playground, like 3 times,
• he played in a soccer game and was even the goalie for a quarter,
• he went to a birthday party where he apparently participated in a game as a "human bowling pin",
• he went to a Mother's Day party at Aunt Jen's where he was participating in all kind of silly games, like push a ball with your nose while crawling on the floor,
• he went to school every day and advanced 3 levels in his timed math tests in 4 days.
• he wrote, cut, colored, glued and played very hard on each of those 8 days.

And, the really CRAZY thing about Drew doing all of those things in the last 8 days, is that he did all of those things with a BROKEN ARM....THAT WE DIDN'T KNOW ABOUT!

Doesn't he look fine?!?!

Oye! Obviously, we knew he hurt his arm. He hurt it last Wednesday night, about 15 minutes before Spencer and I got home from the airport. When we walked in the door, he told us that he hurt his arm and he was pretty sad about it. He told us that he was worried about his "handwriting" in school because his arm really hurt. We looked at it, squeezed it, moved it around and diagnosed him as fine. (Oops.) He moved on and never complained. When my mom and dad asked about it a few days later, he told them that it hurt for a day and a half, but is all better. Seven days later!, I noticed that he flinched when we were "practicing" handshakes at Cub Scouts. Hmmm....I looked at his arm again after Cub Scouts and noticed that his forearm was a little swollen. After doing the math and realizing that it had been 8 days since he originally hurt it, I knew that we had a problem.

I took him to the Dr. the next morning and found out, for sure, that he had a small break in one of the bones in his forearm. Several hours later, he was sporting a cool, new, red, waterproof cast. He was actually pretty funny in the doctor's office.

I think Drew was the only one in the room that was surprised when the x-ray showed that his arm was broken. After the doctor left the room, he kept saying "I really don't think that my arm is broken", "Mom, I really do think that my arm is fine". I think that in his mind, a broken arm means that it is really broken and pretty much falling off. LOL...he was *really* shocked that his arm was broken!! After he let that sink in, he followed it up with "Mom, I'm not going to need a cane, am I?".

"No way Mom! My arm is FINE!!"

And, for inquiring minds, he broke it while playing "Wipeout" in the basement. Surprised??? The 3 of them were playing Wipeout together and were apparently racing by crawling on top of big bouncy balls. Drew just fell off his ball wrong.

Charlie waiting "patiently" for Drew to get his cast. This poor kid did not have a broken arm, but we managed to get a diagnosis of an ear infection for him, as long as we were at the doctor's office. It was a long morning/afternoon for poor Charlie-Barlie and he only had about 2 minutes left of battery time on that toy. Not pretty!

Isn't he cute with his cool cast?!?!

So, I'm at Target today...

It seems like I start a lot of stories that way. Hmmm...

Anyway, Charlie and I made our (almost) daily stop at Target to pick a few things up today. Our Target is a "Super Target" so, I do all of my grocery shopping there. I like it because the prices are pretty reasonable, I know where everything is and if I need any non-grocery stuff, I can get it all in one stop.

So today, we needed frozen chicken. No problem, I buy frozen chicken all of the time at Target. I go to where the chicken usually is and there was no chicken. No chicken at all...no frozen chicken breasts, no frozen chicken nuggets, no chicken at all. Instead of chicken, there was seafood. Ok, no problem, the chicken has to be somewhere cold. I'm sure that I can find it.

So, I walk up and down the freezer section aisles. I didn't see the chicken anywhere. I was about to walk over to where the seafood used to be to check there. Before I did, there was a Target lady stocking shelves in the freezer section. I decided to stop and ask her about the chicken before I walked 1/2 way up to the front of the store to where the seafood used to be just to find out that I missed it in the freezer section. The Target lady took me to where I first looked and said that is where is should be. Of course, it wasn't there. She then proceeded to tell me that Target must have discontinued it. Huh? Target...(the grocery store Target!) discontinued chicken...like, all of it?!?! I kind of laughed...I thought she was joking....she wasn't. Hmmm....I asked her if it was possible if they just switched it with where the seafood used to be. She said "no" because of some Market Pantry mumbo jumbo. Then, she told me that I could look over by the seafood if I *wanted*, but she was pretty sure it was discontinued. She proceed to tell me that she noticed that some chicken had been clearanced last week and that usually when they clearance an item, it means that they were getting ready to discontinue it. Ok, fine, I get that, but we are talking about CHICKEN!!

I did end up checking and needless to say, Target does still sell chicken. Whew! But, if you happen to shop at my Target, it is now located where the seafood used to be.

This public service announcement was brought to you by...

:)

I ROCK!!!

Well, I really don't rock. I wish that I rocked, but I don't. In fact, I am really a music idiot. I don't know bands, I can't dance, I can't sing, I can't even remember the words to songs that I hear all the time. Drew knows music better than me...it is quite embarassing. He'll listen to the radio and shout out song titles and bands and then ask me if he's right. Ummm...yeah Drew, that's right...I think. :( I do like music, I just don't really "get it".

Spencer has always been pretty into music and Bruce Springsteen has always been one of his favorites. So, when he found out that Bruce was going to be in Chicago the night of his exam, he was very excited. When he asked me if I wanted to go a couple of months ago, I told him that I would go if he wanted to go with me, but that my feelings wouldn't be hurt if he wanted to go with someone "cooler". It's ok, he knows that I am a music idiot and I didn't want to ruin his fun.

Lucky for me, he did want to go with me and it was an AWESOME concert. For one night, I was cool...very cool!! My wonderful husband was nice enough to take me out for a seafood dinner at McCormick & Schmick's (mmmm!!!!) and then we headed over to the concert. He got tickets in the first row of the 2nd balcony...which were perfect seats!!! We could see everything really well and we didn't have to stand for the entire 3 hours because nobody was in front of us...very, very cool!!

The music was great, Bruce was fun, Max the drummer ROCKS!! I was watching him in hopes of picking up some drummer tips to help my Swedish Fish band on Rockband 2. ;)

It was really a great show. The audience was really into the music. There was a lot of , ummm, "middle aged" fans and it was cool to see them rocking to the music that they love. There were even kids there. Bruce had a couple of kids in the audience help him out with a song. Someone in the audience asked them to play "Mony, Mony" and they did...it was hilarious! I'm a music idiot, but even I know that "Mony, Mony" is not a Bruce song.

Here are some pictures from the night.

Now, that is a happy Spence. Exam done and feels "pretty good" about it, heading downtown to see his old friend Bruce with the windows open and a hot date....

...and, cool music on the radio

Oh yeah, and we saw the weiner-mobile. Bonus...could this date get any better?!?! ;)

I forgot to take a picture of dinner, but it was so yummy. I had an assortment of oysters for an appetizer and crab stuffed mustrooms for my entree. Um...YUMM!!!

Hi Bruce!!

Rock on people!!

It was fun to be "cool" for a day. :)

Coolest Mother's Day present ever!!!

ETA: I just re-read this and it is quite obvious that I am "out of practice" with my blogging. Normally, I would edit and re-write the mess, but I don't have time today and I don't want to delete it. So, please don't hold my run-on sentences against me and feel free to add commas, in your head, where needed. I was actually quite amused with myself when I was writing it, but I can definitely see that when reading, it is kind of goofy.

Don't you love this?!?!?!

The truth be told, my sister discovered this treasure. I saw her's hanging on her wall last month and had to have it! I usually feel a little guilty "stealing" something original that someone else has, but this was just too cool I just *had* to have this...and mine wouldn't be exactly the same as hers of course....mine wouldn't say "Liam, Aidan & Connor". :) So, I explained to her that any annoyance that she would feel about having to share her cool find with me surely couldn't measure up to the happiness that I would have by having one for myself.


So, she agreed and was nice enough to give me the name of the shop. Well, at least she gave me what she thought was the name of the shop, or at the very least, she gave me some words that could have been the name of a shop that would sell that sort of thing and hope that I got the hint...hmmm....whatever, I couldn't find it on line. I figured that I would revisit the issue another time.


So, imagine my surprise when I opened the present from my awesome boys and found it!! Yay!!! My totally awesome sister passed along all of the info to Spencer and he took care of it. Yay me...what a score!!! I'm a lucky mom...and wife... and sister too.

Trying to catch up...

I have lots of excuses for not blogging for a record 10 days (I think), nothing bad...just busy. I'll try to start catching up. It is really hard to get back into it after not blogging for so long. Where to even begin!?!?!

Cracking up!!!

Look what Ben made in school today.....

It's a one-eared H1N1 with a mustache and bow-tie!!!

Maybe I'm strange, but I laughed so hard when I found this while going through his school stuff this afternoon. Do you think it is a conincidence, or does his teacher has the best sense of humor ever?!?!

I also read an article about how the Mexican people are using some humor to get through all of the craziness. The people are decorating their government issued masks, and making up silly songs and jokes. The people that make the Mexican soap operas have even instituted "safe kissing" on all of their soaps. LOL!

I'll leave you with a quick H1N1 joke...

Did you hear that Mexico is now a world power???

Yeah, now when it sneezes, the whole world gets the flu!!

Have a good weekend!!

Flashback Friday

"Naughty" Babies ;)

August 2003
I always thought the pictures from this day turned out so cute, but Spencer was never crazy about their outfits...not boy enough. So, sorry about the outfits boys, but you all are just too cute, if you ask me.

Ben

Jack

Drew