Working Woman

Charlotte and I took a morning off from the gym. We had a morning meeting at Starbucks. Charlotte had a lot of work to get done.


After our coffee we headed to the library for toddler story time. Charlotte was so excited to see so many other kids. She really enjoyed dancing and clapping. The best part though as playing with the shakers and toys at the end.

Fashion

Liam has started wearing ties with his T-shirts to school. I need to get that kid some all stars. Here's some random pics of the kids displaying their unique fashion sense.

Liam and his Twister Jersey T-shirt at the Cyclones game.  He had to put it on immediately and it fits perfectly!  I think he will be able to wear it to his first day of college.

Charlotte making a statement in Liam's plaid fedora.  Liam picked this gem out at H&M last year.

Liam insisted on wearing a dress shirt and tie to his friend Kelly's birthday party.  He was very excited about the sunglasses that came in his swag bag.

This is Charlotte's Pat Benatar/Ballerina/Future Olympian look.

Tutu!

Charlotte received a tutu for Christmas!

Belated Christmas Post

Christmas was a blur this year! In some ways it didn't even happen as my entire family came down with the stomach flu and we had to cancel Christmas morning with the Magnus family. Does this excuse my super late posting? No. I do however have a new awesome iPhone with a blogger app that I have just downloaded so now I can forget to blog all the time everywhere!

Summer Blog Ketchup Part Deux!

After all of the birthday madness we decided that instead of taking some time to relax it would be better to pack a bunch of stuff in the car and drive to Columbus for two days of fun!  The Columbus Zoo is pretty great and Liam really enjoyed everything at COSI.  The hotel pool was a big hit too because Normandy had not opened yet.

The boys came to town and June and made things very exciting.  Mark and Jack were in town for the better part of a month and the days that it rained we headed to the museum center and the zoo.  It was some serious work to keep up with three boys and a toddler with a new found sense of freedom!

Another fun summer cloudy day past time is building tents on what used to be my nice chair out of the one crocheted item I ever made for myself (and which took me months!), but I'm happy as long as the kids are amused:

Summer Blog Ketchup!

We've had a very awesome and very busy summer!  I've spent most of it packing and unpacking bags.  I can't leave the house without gym bag, diaper bag, purse, swim bag, swim toy bag...you get the picture.  So I spend every morning or afternoon packing bags, and I should be good at it by now, but somehow there is always something I forget.  May was packed with birthday parties and then the pool opened and Charlotte has been walking for all of it so I have been very busy on defense trying to keep her pretty head "boo boo free".  Especially with Bill travelling for a good part of the time this is seems like a never ending job.  After sending Bill off to Illinois and putting the kids to bed I decided to sit and catch up on my favorite blogs.  This made me increasingly guilty for my lack of updates so I'm going to try and do a blog blitz to catch up on the whole summer.

May = Birthdays

Bill, Liam and Charlotte all in one month.  Lots of invites and planning and food preparation made for a tired momma.  Did I mention Liam's birthday was also Mother's Day this year?  Lots of present buying and celebrating all around.  Liam's theme of choice for birthday #4?  Pirates!

We went to Red Robin for our annual birthday party eve dinner and the boys get their birthday sundaes:

My grandparents treated Liam to Build-a-Bear for his birthday and here he is with Chick making his very own Gapper:

Charlotte's birthday didn't have a theme but involved lots of people and generous gift giving.  Charlotte showed off her amazing mobility and even managed to eat some of her birthday cake.  She did turn one so all in all a successful event.

I only have video of her birthday because I couldn't find my camera and all the people that promised to give/send me their pictures have failed to do so.  This is why I can only have two kids - the second one is already getting the short end of the stick!

Soccer Disaster!

Some days are tougher than others in terms of being Liam's mom.  Today is one of those trying days when I wonder why on earth my kid is wired so differently from others.  We went to soccer practice which is always entertaining with three year olds.  Liam insisted on playing goalie and yelling out "Not Today!" as he blocked the other kids attempts.  Then when they practiced dribbling the ball around the field he would race back to the starting line and scream "I Win" over and over again.
The most amazing moment came at the end when they decided to have the kids play a little 3 on 3.  All Liam heard was take the ball away from the other team and score a goal.  In his head this translated to take it at all costs.  He ran over to this little boy and grabbed his jersey with both hands, threw the kid out of the way and took the ball down field to the goal.  The other little boy just sat down and cried.  His dad came over and I ran to apologize and to have a little talk with Liam about the rules.   I could not get Liam to apologize.  His dad told me that it was okay and that his kid needed to toughen up.  I was mortified!
I know that the next 15 years are going to be quite an adventure with my crazy kid.  Based on his behavior you would think that I spend everyday teaching him to talk trash and that there are no points for second place, but I swear that I am not that parent!  Please excuse me while I go read some more parenting books...