Lars' 7th Birthday

It must be impossible that my little Lars is now 7! You have brought such joy to our family and I am so proud of the boy that you have become! You have such a wonderful sense of humor and happy-go-lucky attitude, and are completely driven to be able to *hang* with the big boys. It is this same determination that makes me admire you, yet also creates some challenging moments for me as your momma. This challenge is good for me, and even better for you, and I hope you always keep that level of determination as it will serve you well someday!! You are a bright, lego-fanatical, video game loving, momma snuggling, action packed, energy filled kid and I am completely and totally in love with you!

Happy Birthday Lars!!

Flag Football

Football time is here once again and the boys are playing flag football--Drew for the Jaguars and Lars for the Redskins. Lars was *BEYOND* excited that he finally got to play a sport this fall, now that he is a big 1st grader and all. The first game of the season found Lars at the QB position and he relished the spot. My favorite moment is a toss up between the time when Lars tried to yell out "HIKE!" and the kid playing center didn't hear him, so he literally SCREAMED it the second time, and the other moment was when one of the kids tried to yell hike! and his mouthpiece fell right out of his mouth. These little munchkins with these huge mouthguards making their mouths/lips look ginormous just cracks me up. That being said, Lars' team is 3-0 as of this writing, so something must be going ok!

Drew has also had a good learning year. His team is 2-1 and during the second game of the season he caught a pass and ran it in for a touchdown. Very EXCITING!! It is interesting to see just how much bigger the 3rd/4th grade teams are compared to the 1st/2nd grade teams, and kind of sad to remember that Drew was in that league just a few short years ago, and is now going to be ready for pads next year!!

We have lots of fun watching the boys play this fall, and even Maddi is capable of making a friend or two each week to play with for our 3-4 hour marathons at the football fields!

Bike Ramp

One of my sons' favorite pastimes includes riding their bikes over ramps and they LOVE that they get "AIR" when they fly over the ramp (read--a few inches). Here are some pics of the two of them tearing up the pavement...

GNO

Another great visit from one of my best friends, Clare, who lives in DC. Catching up is so effortless, and we always have a wonderful time together. I love that.

Another great friend Erin and her hubby Mickey also joined us, and Jamie I never laugh harder than when we are together listening to one of Mickey's stories...Jewish kid from South Brooklyn-he's got some good ones :)

Love ya both and until next time...

Lei

One of my patients is from Hawaii originally, and is skilled at making leis. Here is a picture of one she made for me and brought in at her last eye exam. The tiny little flowers were beautiful and it smelled absolutely WONDERFUL!

I've decided my next lei needs to be one I actually get in Hawaii :)

Hawkeye Fever

We had a busy weekend, and to start it off we took the kids on the "Hawkeye Express" train to Kinnick Stadium for some tailgating. The kids always have a blast doing this and it's a great way to start off a football morning...snack foods and pop for breakfast, playing football in the stadium parking lot, and just watching all the people hoping for a Hawkeye win!

The train is a pretty awesome way to get to the game sans traffic, and then we take it back to the "station" (aka IHOP) so we can get home just after kick-off to finish watching the game. We grabbed some Culvers on the way home and lunch was even served! Although the game wasn't that pretty, it was a win nonetheless.

Go Hawks!

Jamie is 40!

Here are some pictures of the big 40 birthday bash celebrated at the Riverside Casino! We had never been there and haven't even been in a casino for YEARS, so I though it would be fun to get away for the night to play with the "big kids". We had a great time and Jamie couldn't have asked for a better way to spend his birthday than with his 2 brothers (and their adorable wives, of course!) We also had a few extra friends that were able to make it our for the big celebration and we all had a blast between dinner and slot machines, and of course the blackjack table!

Happy Birthday Jamie! I love you!!

Drew

Hard to believe I have a fourth grader in the house. I remember when we moved here he was going into first grade, and that's the grade Lars is now entering! Time sure flies and Drew has become a son that any mom would be proud of!

Maddi and Julie

Maddi wanted me to post some pics of her and Julie, her new doll she got for her birthday. She has had fun changing her clothes and having her sleep in her bed with her, even though Julie does have an actual bed of her own. One day, after Julie had been "sleeping" in her bed for 3-4 days, Maddi said, "Wow! She must be tired. She's been sleeping for days!!" Ahhhh, the mind of a 5 year old...

Storm Cloud

This is a picture of a cloud coming in from a storm we had on 8/9/2009. This was taken from my front porch. It was pretty hazy/muggy out and the cloud was moving really fast. Kinda crazy!

Kindergarten Kinks

So my big kindergarten girl gets off the bus today and is in tears; hysterics really, because she had a bad day at school. No one would play with her at recess today and she was just devastated. I tried talking to her about it and teach her that maybe she needed to introduce herself to someone and then ask if she could play with them.

No. That didn't work.

Then I tried to tell her that maybe the other kids were just playing something she didn't want to so it just SEEMED like they didn't want to play with her.

No. It wasn't that either.

Poor girl, she is convinced that they just didn't want to play with her.

I am sure things will be better tomorrow; those long days of kindergarten have a way of sneaking up on you, causing complete exhaustion and temporary meltdowns. Nothing that a cookie can't fix, right??

Vacation Colorado Style

I don't even know where to begin when it comes to our Colorado adventure we took in August. We got to enjoy a week long adventure exploring the southern *middle part* of the state and got to enjoy it with great friends as well. We got to go to the Sand Dunes National Monument, Lake City/Creede (mining towns), and ended up in Crested Butte for our mountain bike adventures. It was nice to get home, but it was so fun falling in love with yet another area of one of my favorite states!!