Latest Happenings with the boys

Here are a few of the latest phone photos. Not great art work, but it gives you some insight into our recent lives.
Adler gets dragged around a lot. He's still wavering between one and two naps, so often he crashes in the car in the morning before picking LT up from school. Its pretty cute.
One recent afternoon I took the boys to the park by our house and tried to play basketball with LT (as he requested). We managed for about 5 minutes before the game turned into soccer/golf with a shovel.
Adler loved digging in the snow with his shovel.
The DAC has a family night every Friday night and the third friday night of each month, they have extra activities. We took the boys last week and they had a blast on the jumpy castle. Adler went down the steep slide with Brian (LT didn't dare try it).
Classic look of Adler's drinking juice on the porch.
We took the boys to the train museum on Monday (Brian had presidents day off). They rarely have the model trains running on weekdays, but this day they did. The kids loved watching and chasing the train.
LT waiting patiently for the train.
The age gap between the boys is finally starting to close. The other night they played play dough together for quite awhile!
And Adler... oh Adler. I can't turn my back for a minute. This time he was IN the dog dish, just sitting. By the time I got my camera, the humor of it was over and he was climbing out ready for his next troublesome act.

Adler and I have been meeting friends at the Children's museum while LT is in school. Adler loves cooking. He's been into it for quite awhile at home, and everywhere we go. The Childrens museum has a great little kid grocery store/kitchen area that Adler loves playing in.
Opening the oven at the museum.
And he got to paint! He was so serious about his painting and stole all the other paint containers before beginning his piece of work.

Brian took today off so that we could enjoy a powder day at Copper. We spent last night with his mom and she kindly (with grandpa) watched the boys so we could ski! I took the picture above because sadly this is what he has to do all too often, wait for his wife.

Reading with Papa

I couldn't resist putting all 3 up because they make me laugh. Somehow though, Papa manages to get both boys to listen to stories on his lap. Amazing.

Cold Weather

We've had some strange weather the past few weeks with bitter cold temps and lots of snow with no chance to melt. Here are some of the activities we have done to entertain ourselves.
We walked over to Tenn St Coffee one afternoon. Adler loves wearing sunglasses now!
LT looks like a little mountaineer walking over his his coat, books and pack strapped on. He wanted to bring some toys for Adler and he wanted to carry them.
We set up my old backpacking 2 man tent in the basement, which was hours of entertainment. LT even wore his headlamp the whole time.

We also did the marshmallow construction and made some cornstarch shapes. The weather this week is supposed to be warm (upper 50s and 60s), I am hoping we can get outside to play and release some of their energy!

School!

LT has two wonderful teachers at his "big school", the Jefferson County Open School. Cheryl plays the guitar, does yoga with them and even lets them pile on her to "nap". I was lucky to be able to go with LT last Thursday and help out in the classroom. I took a really cute video of a song and dance they did earlier in the day, but accidentally erased it. The ones below aren't as cute, but it gives you an idea of how music is incorporated into the day.

Little Engineer

LT, "Mom, I weawwy [really] need more big ones. They are good for stasility [stability]."

SNOW!

Last night Bri and I had planned on going to Tenn St coffee this morning with the boys when we all woke up. For some reason, neither of us looked out the window before we began our one block adventure. We opened the door to heavy heavy snow falling and 5 or 6 inches of snow (new) covering the sidewalks. With only a block to go, we decided we could make it. By the time we were halfway, the snow was blowing sideways and the boys were cold and wet. However, we made it, enjoyed some treats and coffee and by the time we walked home, the snow was pretty light and the wind had subsided. It was still too cold to play in the snow, but we made plans to possibly play in it later in the afternoon. Luckily, the weather was inline with our plans.
We had so much snow in our little yard that Adler couldn't even walk in it!
But clearly was enjoying himself.
LT made a snowman, knocked it down, made snowballs, destroyed them, laughed, ran, and stayed out in the snow long past Adler and I.
Even the dogs were like little puppies playing in the snow. I would throw snowballs and Hailie would chase them as she did when she was a puppy. The only difference is that she's so grey/white now that its getting hard to tell what is snow and what is Hailie.
Bowen would put his face in the snow and come up happy as could be. He'd then prance around the yard and do it again!
We came back in and made yummy hot chocolate and sat by the fire to warm up.

hubris

There was a time when being alone and in charge of just one kid was cause for fear and trepidation. But nowadays I'm more confident. Kari is working all day today and there's a very good chance all of us will be alive when she gets home. Last week when she was away for several hours getting a massage, I was unfazed and even grabbed my camera to try and get some shots of the boys (at home and at the park). Photos from before things got ugly are posted below.

But perhaps I'm become bit overconfident? Not long after the pictures at the park were taken, Adler fell several feet (at least) off of the jungle gym and landed right on his face in the sand. I figured we'd rebound and keep playing at the park but, as I was trying to clean sand out of Alder's mouth, LT had to be the voice of reason and suggest maybe it was time for us to go home.

Later that evening, as I was getting the boys ready for bed, Adler peed on me.

#1 dad stuff all the way.

atta boy!

Last weekend at the museum I lost track of Adler for one minute. I found him shortly thereafter playing intently with two lovely older ladies.

Characters

King Kong!




And Rudolf.