hello

Things have been so busy here!! The kids are back in school, but I am now babysitting 2 little girls. They are both 'part time' but it overlaps a little. I am loving them, they are so fun! But of course it's much different watching 2 or 3 toddlers than it is to watch 1!!
Barb and I have been trying to walk whenever we can. It's been so nice.
School is going well. Still need to rent Will a trombone.

Art has been switched to a 'night' shift, but it's actually 2-10. Which means I have the kids most of the time again! Oy! And it's hard for Art because his schedule is all messed up. We've been getting a lot done though when he's home for the day! He's such a hard worker.

Colby cut his hair with scissors. Booger.
Owen can now eat a whole apple, it's very cute to watch! BUT- he is now screaming all the time. ALL.the.time.

Gotta head to bed.

Back to Life as we knew it before summer...

The kids are back in school! I'm sad to see them go because I miss having them around all of the time. However, they were getting bored with being home, and very bored with eachother. They are doing good at school and are happy to have things to do. So far, they haven't had much homework so that is nice. I'm sure it will be soon enough though!
On Labor Day we brought the kids to the Chatham Fair and let them ride the rides. It was fun, until Will got a belly ache and felt like he was going to throw up. His favorite ride was the gravitron, where they spin you around really fast. It's no wonder he was sick!!
And then a quick trip to Dair Queen for some ice cream!!!
And then school started...
And on Thursday, Will and Colby tested in tae kwon do... they are now high red belts. Woohoo!!
On Friday Art and Will went camping with the BoyScouts. They just got back yesterday. It was a fun trip, except that is rainy and windy when they got there on Friday night. But it was mostly good weather the rest of the time, and they were able to fish and hike and I'm sure Will had a great time.
Sam joined a new Girl Scout troop. The did face painting at a school ice-cream social on Friday, and Sam was able to do Nellie's and Braelyn's faces! That was exciting. Colby wanted nothing to do with the face painting. But they were giving away free ice cream, which we enjoyed-- a lot!!!
Yesterday the troop went mini-golfing. I hope Sam likes this troop.

Owen spilled water on my laptop, and now some of the buttons don't work right. Very annoying!!!

An update!

It's September already.
Today we took the kids to Helen's for her annual Labor Day picnic. There were a lot of people there, and a lot of kids. Some friends of Art's have a little boy named Parker who is 14 months old, so I talked with his mom a lot and he and Owen "played" together.
Yesterday I took the kids to FunPlex to use up a 3-hour gift card Sam had. They were able to ride the go-karts numerous times, do the bumper boats, the big trampoline, the funny basketball hoops, and also the water wars a couple of times. It was really hot so the water wars felt great!!! After that we used our coupons to get ice cream at Lickety Split-- yum!
When we got home Owen felt hot-- because he had a 103.8 temp. Tylenol brought it down and it went away, but today it crept back to 100.5. Poor buddy. He seems fine otherwise.
Last week our neighbor made a homemade gokart for his grandson, so of course these guys had to ride on it too! Luckily we live on a street that is perfect to ride a gokart down! How fun!
The kids are ready to go back to school, which starts this Tuesday, the 8th.

Samantha just finished the 21-day meds for the lyme disease. She's still not feeling great so I'm not sure if she'll have to do more. She has had her school supplies labeled and ready to go for weeks now! I can't believe she'll be a 7th grader!

Will has been feeding his gecko huge crickets that Art finds at the other house. He's also been giving her a taste of grasshoppers. It's really fun to watch the gecko eat! Will is lucky that Samantha enjoyed labeling things and organizing things-- she organized all of his back to school stuff!

Colby is doing well. :) And Owen too. Owen is still getting into trouble, but we love him so much!! His laugh is so cute. He absolutely adores his sister and brothers. They can all make him laugh when he's upset!

The other day he fed himself yogurt, which is what some of the pictures above are!!

Art is almost done with the house....how long have I been saying that?

Tomorrow we're headed to the Chatham Fair! One last day of fun before school!!!

We had a visitor!

We saw this snapping turtle in our backyard on Thursday. It was quite big! The kids were amazed. We of course ran out to see it up close, and our neighbor Mr. Dave helped us "catch" her and put her into a bucket so that we could show her to Daddy. Neat.

I let Owen play with the cars on Thursday, and now he loves them! It's funny to watch him. He doesn't quite get how to play in them. He climbs in and climbs out, and most often makes the car fall over. But he has fun!

One more week of summer vacation! Wow! Last night we went to the mall and bought new shoes and some clothes for Sam. When did Sam start "needing" so many clothes??

Art is still working on the house...but he says he can see the light at the end of the tunnel!!

Happy Saturday!

Join the party-- win some prizes!

Who doesn't love free stuff? Three Boys and a Dog is having a Back 2 School Blog Bash 2009! She is giving away something every day!! Check it out here http://momof3boys3702.blogspot.com/2009/07/back-2-school-blog-bash-2009-month-of.html

Monday!!

It's Monday!
And oh what a day today has been!! I started watching a little girl named Ilana today, and her sister too, but her sister will only be here for 2 weeks. Ilana got along very well with Owen, which makes me very happy. They played nicely with little people and blocks. Had crackers on the deck. Played outside on the little castle and little trampoline. It's been a great day.
Samantha and Sarah were here... and then their friend Michelle came over, who is spending the night. And then Tommy came over to swim and "hang out".
Will is here. Jordan and Lucas and Aldin have been here too. Swimming and playing.
Colby went to Cameron's for the afternoon!!
The boys were supposed to go to tae kwon do tonight, but they asked to stay home because Jordan is available to play tonight. Since there is only 2 weeks left of summer vacation, and it's a nice night, and they already have lots of stripes, we're letting them stay home and play.

The kids had a great time camping with Grammy. Jenn was there so Sam was happy!!
It was so so quiet without them here. But, it's even better to have them home, chaos and everything!!!

Happy Monday!

It's Sunday!!!

It's Sunday. Owen had me up at 5:30 this morning. I tried and tried to get him to go back to sleep but he wouldn't. So I got up. Didn't want to, but I had. Now it's 8 am and guess who is napping? Yes, Owen fell asleep around 7:30. I figure I will update the blog and then shower in peace.

Last week Samantha went up to Lake George for a week with her friend Alexis. She ended up coming home on Thursday because she was sick and throwing up. We first thought it was a reaction to the meds, but seeing as she had been on them for a week at that point, the dr. didn't think so. Sam wasn't 100%, but she was "good enough" to go to camp with my mom on Friday for the weekend. Actually, all 3 older kids went.

Last week, without Sam, I took the boys to a splash pad I found in Rensselaer. It is really cool! I couldn't get many pictures because, well, there is water spraying everywhere!! But I was able to get some. The boys had fun. But Owen LOVED it. Loved it!! He just walked around to all the different fountains. He doesn't like getting water in his face, but after a while he was okay with that too. There were a few beach balls there and he really liked them. I need to get him one. It was a great day and it was fun. We only stayed an hour because Owen got tired and the boys were hungry. It's closed now, but next year we'll go back!

This was a hot week so he were in the water whenever we could. The hot weather made the pool turn a little green, so Art had to shock it and fix it. There were a couple of days when Owen and I went in the pool every couple of hours! It's just so refreshing when you're dripping with sweat. (eww)

Colby caught a frog. He tried to keep it in the little plastic container, but the frog was smarter than that. Not only did it get on the edge *where Art took a picture*, but when I went to go outside, it hopped after me. So we let him loose.

Art and I went to a barbecue with Owen yesterday. It was fun! Everyone loved Owen. Art's friend made him a little sandbox, that was very cute because Owen's never played in sand before. He kept grabbing it with his little hands and then letting it seep out through his fingers. It was cute. But then it rained. We stayed in the garage, but Owen wanted to be out in the rain. We let him and he got soaked. But he had a blast! We were there for 6 hours-- and as SOON AS we put Owen in his carseat, he fell asleep!

Have a happy Sunday!