Best Friends

We started vacation-palooza** off with a bang this weekend with the arrival of the Roberts clan. The arrivial of Susanna, Keith, Kinley, Blakely and Derby was met with much excitement. Kinley is Quinn's best friend (and Greyson's future wife if I have anything to say about it) Guinness and Cooper love playing with Derby and at this point Keith and Susanna are more like family then friends. Plus this was the first time we got to meet baby Blakely. So needless to say we have been waiting for this visit for a long time.

Quinn got to have her very first sleepover and was pretty much attached to Kinley the entire time.

Greyson was showered with attention from Ms. Susanna and found another guy to play sports with in Mr. Keith.

That left Raif and I to spend the weekend with a child who slept a lot, stayed where you left her and didn't once talk back (there are some things I miss about babies!!).

Best Friends Forever...


**I have dubbed this summer vacation-palooza because from now until August we pretty much are booked every weekend. Lots of fun but man are we going to be tired.

Sunday Rain

The sun did not shine
It was too wet to play
So we sat in the house
All that cold, cold, wet day.

I saw there with Greyson
We sat there we two
And I said "How I wish
We had something to do!"

After a beautiful 70 degree Saturday where we spent all day outside it was quite disheartening to wake up Sunday to cold, miserable rain. Though the Cat in the Hat did not step in on the mat we managed to keep busy.

We spent the morning working on a little modern art**


And in the afternoon Quinn and I enjoyed some quality girl time by stringing beads and making necklaces.


While the men went off by themselves and worked on some serious construction projects.


I think we had almost as much fun as if the Cat in the Hat had been here himself.

**Our art was inspired by my new favorite book "Kid Made Modern" It is a kid's arts and crafts book with a modern art twist and has a lot of great, easy ideas that break the traditional kid's craft mold.

Fruits of Their Labor

This past week saw the first glimmers of spring. The warm weather not only brought out the first buds of the year but the Erim gardeners as well. We spent last week and Saturday planting flowering bushes out front, strawberry plants in the garden and one very special project: the kids' very own blueberry bush. They filled the pot with dirt


helped plant the bush

and watered it.

They have been tasked to water it every day after school and hopefully in a few months they will be able to enjoy their very own blueberries.

G.O.A.L. (Part II)

Week 2 was slightly better than week 1. While Greyson cried most of the time, he was out there 'skating' and he finally got a crack at the puck. Even through his tears when I asked him if he wanted to come off the ice he said no. Hopefully this week will see even more improvement.

Spring Joy

A warm day with sunshine
Two energetic children with energy to burn
One twisty slide
Equals sheer joy

Game Face

The Quinncess and the Grumpy Fish

It is school picture time and as you can see some pictures are a bit better than others. To be fair to my little man, the school did call me about a half an hour after he got his picture taken to let me know that he was running a fever. Obviously he wasn't at his best. Oh well, I guess we will have to rely on Raif's expert picture taking skills!


*BTW I don't know who combed my son's hair forward to make him look like he has a bowl cut but it wasn't me!!