A handful of randoms

My week this week has been interesting to say the very least. Fortunately, the boys are still happy, funny, busy munchkins who don't take much notice of the semi-stressful things in life.

I've been really lazy about dragging my camera around lately. Usually it's all but attached to my hip, but it seems that more times than not recently, it has been left on the table at home as I'm whisking us out the door. I'd leave it in my car so as always to have it, but thanks to the lovely person that broke into my car this week at the gym, I have learned to leave absolutely nothing of value in there. If only it were that easy.

So let's see, things that are new around our house this week....

Collin has taken to climbing into the sink while Nathan and I get ready in the morning. He takes his stash of whatever he can find off of the counter and collects it all in the sink with him. He'll sit content like this until Nathan or I kick him out. I figure as long as he's at least in the sink, not attempting to get out, and I'm standing a foot or so away, he's pretty safe. (I've given up on trying to not have him climb at all...).

He's also taken a liking to sneaking snackies. He now opens the pantry (or if he's lucky, manages to get Drew to open the fridge for him), and will steal anything he can get his hands on. He then takes his goodies and "hides" under his high chair. Look at those little chubby cheeks, it's not like he's not being fed around here...

Drew's now graduated from the little lawn mower he used to push around behind Nathan, to wanting to push the big lawn mower with him. Nathan will usually appease him for a few minutes before taking over and finishing the rest of the lawn on his own. I'm pretty sure this is Nathan's way of making sure he's not out mowing the lawn for the remainder of the afternoon (it's a pretty slow process with Drew attached). However short-lived it may be, Drew loves it.

One of the more fun changes around our house is the fact that Collin and Drew now readily play together. I think I've mentioned this in a few past posts, but I really am enjoying watching them actually start to play together and the way they interact. I love overhearing Drew explain something to Collin and Collin "replying" in the gibberish he's so good at right now. I'd be lying if I didn't admit that an added perk to this is that they can now entertain each other, giving me a free moment to oh, you know....pee alone. ;)

Three Things

I missed the three things about each of the boys last month. I think it was one of the posts that should have happened during the two weeks we were all sick.  So here they are. Better late than never, right?

DREW:

1. Loves to mimic us, Collin, or people/things he has overheard somewhere. This is sometimes funny, but has taught me to be careful of what I say and do.
2.  Loves to build things. I've mentioned this before, but I'm amazed at what Drew can make out of a few blocks or pieces of Legos. The surprising part is that it doesn't take much imagination to see whatever it is he's built. He's pretty good at it!
3. Reverse Psychology works wonders with him lately. In fact, it's about the only way I can get a normal smile out of him while taking pictures. If I say "say cheese!", I inevitably get a frown or a major cheese ball smile, but if I tell him to "absolutely not smile", he will smile normally just about every time. We now make a game out of it and it will be a sad day when this no longer works. :)

COLLIN:

1. Is still climbing anything and everything and is scary fast at it. He also like to push the limit on standing on things. For example, he loves to stand on the back of his rocking horse. It will rock wildly and just before he gets so off balance he's going to fall, he sits down. He thinks this is hilarious.
2. Says "Owie" now. He'll trip over his feet, fall and then lay on the floor for a second or two before saying "Owieeeeee". I love the way he says it, so long as no tears are involved and he's ok, of course!
3. Loves to dance. If there is any music on or if you sing to him (or hum for that matter), he'll start to boogie.

Snakes and Mummies and Spiders, oh my!

I'm not really a big Halloween person. I looooove all things fall, but just haven't ever been one to decorate or dress all out for Halloween. I have to admit though that having kids does make it hard not to want to join in on at least some of the Halloween fun. Soooo, in the spirit of all things fun the boys have enjoyed a plethora of new delicacies this week.

We've tasted some spiders....

...Roasted up a snake or two....

...Captured and consumed the mummies that have been hiding out in our kitchen and even managed to taste a finger or two.

(Unfortunately, I have no pictures of Drew happily munching away on these because as I came to find out, he was terrified of the "fingers". Absolutely terrified.)

You know, even a few pumpkins eventually made their way into our mouths this week

And they say toddlers are picky eaters... ;)

Thanks to these two sites for all the fun ideas: justgetoffyourbuttandbake.com and bekicookscakesblog.blogspot.com

As for Halloween itself, Drew went as a fireman this year (shocking, I know). He has worn his fireman rain boots everywhere we have gone for the better part of the past six months. His go-to boots have been proudly worn on his feet to church, swimming lessons, play dates, and through months of 95 plus degree weather. We barely made it down the aisle for Auntie Christi's wedding this summer without the boots on and believe me, it took some major convincing for this to happen. So when Drew saw a picture of a fireman costume in a catalog over the summer and announced that he wanted to be a fireman, it really came as no surprise to anyone around here. What did come as somewhat of a surprise was the fact that Drew had also made up his mind as to what Collin would be this year; his firedog of course. I sort of laughed when he announced this and then the more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea. I only have so many years of getting to coordinate their costumes before they don't think it's fun anymore, so I may as well take advantage of it! I ended up lucking out and finding Drew's costume at Costco of all places. Collin's I thought would be a piece of cake to find, but apparently a Dalmatian costume rather than just a dog is no easy thing to find! We did eventually get everything all pulled together and I have to say, they made the cutest firefighting team I've seen in a while!

Wordless Week

Well, almost wordless. I've had sick babies this week so there's been a lot of lounging around and snuggling up with lovees, but not a whole lot else. At least they're smiling sickies. :)

The Big Fresno Fair

We went to the fair this past week with Grandma (twice actually!). The first time, Auntie Jenn and Uncle Burkie came along too. I've never really been a big fan of fairs, but it is definitely more fun to go with an enthusiastic three year old in tow. He was so excited about everything. I think he was a squealing, pointing, could-hardly-contain-his-excitement ball of energy for the vast majority of our trip.

We rode a few rides....

Drew and Grandma

Nathan originally tried to hop in the front seat with Drewski, but due to some minor size differences between him and the front seat, opted for the back seat instead. 

And thanks to said size differences, Nathan readily volunteered Uncle Burkie for the next ride. 

....Played a few games....

...Won a toy (that he was very proud of)...

...And then headed over to the animals so that Collin could have some fun.

He loved the cows and the sheep!

For that matter, he also loved the goats. If we had let him, he probably would have hopped over the fence to go visit face to face.

 Drew kind of liked seeing all the animals as well. :)

The next time we went to the fair was to go visit Kenny. Remember him? The cow that Drew got to wash a few weeks ago with our friend Cayla? Well, part of the reason Drew got to wash Kenny in the first place, was to get him ready for what he would experience when it came time for the fair. Since Nathan was working, it was just me, the boys and Grandma that were able to go and watch Cayla show her steer. She advanced through all of her classes all the way to the final round and then placed sixth (which wasn't too bad considering the final class had around 20 steers!). 

Drew and Grandma. I finally had to ask Drew to wait until after Cayla's class was done to tell her how excited he was to see her. I'm sure a waving three year old on the fence line is no problem at all in a livestock class. Yeesh. 

Cayla and "Kenny". I'm sure part of the reason he still looks so squeaky clean is that Drew just did a super excellent job in bathing him a few weeks ago. ;)

Just before we went in to go watch Cayla's class, we let Drew go and ride the ponies since we had missed them the first trip. He got a kick out of it. Considering he has two horses of his own, I really should make an effort to drive him out to Charlotte's ranch (where my mares are living) to go and let him ride one day.

Drew and his trusty steed "Aladdin"

This week, the boys also went to a Bulldog's football game with Drew's best buddy Noah and his dad Aaron. Nathan and Aaron have season tickets together so they're at a game usually once a week-ish. It's a good excuse for Aaron's wife Laura and I to get together and also a fun way for the boys to all get to hang out (their boys are almost the same ages as both of ours). This week, Aaron and Nathan wound up with two extra tickets to the game, so at the very last minute Drew and Noah found out they would get to go too. Pretty fun.

Nathan, Drew, Noah, and Aaron

And finally, just because I can't resist sharing. This is how I found the boys watching a movie before bed the other night (and yes, that would be another goose egg on Collin's forehead. The kid is fearless).

Awe....

The great Pumpkin Hunt

Yep, so after that on a roll blogging thing (remember three posts in one week?), I of course, went and missed a week...as in genuinely didn't even catch that I had missed the week until looking back this week, sort of missed it. Ug!

The boys have been mostly interested in two things lately:

Train rides:

Collin is almost always the rider, and Drew is usually the conductor. Every so often they switch. They've been using those coupons that come printed out with grocery store receipts or Target receipts as tickets. Drew will ask Collin for his ticket, and Collin, super proud to be included in the big kid fun, gladly hands it over and hops on the train. He almost always picks the caboose, but occasionally I see him somewhere in the middle. I love seeing them play this way. It's new and I'm sure it will become mundane at some point, but right now, it makes my heart happy.

and Art....lots, and lots of art:

Collin's pretty proud he gets to use the crayons now!

We also headed out to San Luis Obispo this past week to pick up a desk (thank you love, for bearing with this insane wife of yours!), and since we were in the area and it happened to be October 1st, we decided to take the boys to our favorite (non-picking) pumpkin patch on our way back home. We actually went out to the Avila Valley Barn and played there for a while too, but I left my camera in the car so I have no pictures to show for it. We found Chesebrough Farms while we were living out on the Central Coast and the family that owns it is so, so nice. It was a treat to go back and visit, and the boys loved the freedom of getting to run around and look at all the tractors, scarecrows, wagons, etc. along with all of the pumpkins.

As you can see, we had Auntie Jenn Jenn and Uncle Burkie come along too :)

We gave Drew a wagon and naturally, Collin wanted to get in it. We told Drew that they wagon was where his pumpkin would go once he picked one out. Well, sure enough when we next turned around, he had filled his wagon with probably ten little pumpkins he had picked out all squished around Collin, who was loving every minute of it.

We ended up putting most of those little pumpkins back and swapping them out for two little pumpkins and one big one. We also got a ton of gourds and cool varieties of pumpkins (they have almost any type of pumpkin or squash, pretty fun!).

Collin loved the pumpkins. He kept wanting to pick all of them up. The only problem with this was that they were usually heavier than he could actually hold, which meant they would drop. I'm amazed we didn't end up having to buy a pumpkin that Collin had cracked open by dropping.

I tried to get the boys to take a picture together, but as you can see they were really interested in appeasing me.

Anyway, it was probably the earliest we have ever gone to get pumpkins, but the beautiful benefit to this is that my house is already all decorated and fall-ish. Now, if only we could get some of that delightfully cold back East-ish fall weather....

Art A La Auntie Jenn Jenn

I think I am finally caught up with all that has been going on around here. Christi, I don't want to hear you gripe about how often I blog for quite some time. Go back and look, I think this makes post number three for this week alone.

This week was the first week we haven't had a million and one things going on, and I have to say, it's been sort of nice. I feel like our summer has been packed!

Auntie Jenn took advantage to this break in busyness and got the boys started on a project she's been itching to do with them. I've had red painted canvases hanging in our entry way for a while now. We got them shortly after we were married and they've just sort of followed everywhere we've moved. I don't have much red in my house...ask anyone that knows me. Blue and green (in any variation) are my go-to colors. Because of this, the red canvases have stuck out like sore thumbs to my interior designer sister. After weeks  (maybe months) of begging me to let her re-do them, I finally gave in and let her do what she wanted with them.

She started by sitting Drew down with some paint colors of her choosing. She handed him a paintbrush, and let him have at it.

Drew loves to paint anyway, so it didn't take a whole lot of convincing to get him to help Auntie Jenn out with her project.

When Drew's paintings were dry, Jenn handed Collin a few colored pencils and let him scribble away over the top of each painting. Collin hasn't had a chance to color much, and he loved it!

Finally, when the boys' artwork was all finished Jenn put them over the old red canvases and hung them back up in the entryway. (Sorry about the glare on the artwork. I couldn't get rid of it, they have a gloss coating).

Truth is, I'm glad Jenn re-did them for me, and I love the little kid look to them. They'll be a fun way to look back and remember my boys at this stage in life. :)

The other highlight of this week was a birthday party for Drew's best buddy Noah. Noah had a fireman themed party, and at the very end of the night, a real live firetruck full of real live firemen showed up to let the kiddos check it out. I can't even find the right words to help you understand just how excited Drew was about this. It was adorable. Birthday boy Noah even got to wear his Halloween costume early and was an exact match to the firemen that showed up. So cute!

Engine 85

Not sure if the big boys or the little boys were more fascinated by all of this

Noah and Drew

The birthday boy and his matching firefighter

Even Collin loved it!

These firefighters were so great! They answered the boys' millions of questions and at the end even let them hop into the drivers seat. Do I even need to write that Drew ate this all up?

And finally, three things about the boys this month:

Drew:

1. Has just started saying "Homy Cow!!" (Holy Cow) in response to everything.

2. Loves to build "nests", which basically is a fort without the top portion to cover it.

3. Loves to tell you that you scared him. This usually happens when we walk into a room he is in by himself. He'll turn to us and say, "Oh! Mom, you scared me!". I think I've only actually startled him once, but he loves to say it and then laugh at your reaction.

Collin:

1. Loves (seriously, delights in) getting into mischief. We currently have all of our toilet paper rolls sitting on counters instead of hanging where they should, thanks to Collin's delight in unraveling them as fast as he possibly can as soon as he gets into a bathroom.

2. Says banana (or rather, "nanas") and some form of "Hi Wrigley", which is what we say every morning to our dog Wrigley who is laying outside the sliding glass door next to his highchair.

3. Can now point to his nose and bellybutton when asked.