Month: July 2013

Way back when we were working on Alex’s room (pretty much a year ago), Wade built and wired a lamp. He had an odd piece he had found at work and thought it looked cool. He added a round base, painted the top and bottom, and wired it. My job was finding a lampshade. We put it on Alex’s dresser and there it has sat. It turns out there are no outlets anywhere near the dresser. Last weekend was extremely cool (under 70 degrees) so Wade decided to run the electrical down from the attic and install an outlet. Now Alex can even turn on his really cool lamp!

In honor of Grant’s birthday (today is his “real” birthday), we joined the Strouds on a trip to Rachel’s bakery (she made Alex’s awesome pirate birthday cake) to decorate cupcakes! Everyone had a blast and Rachel was awesome with the kids. She pretty much let them do anything and everything to her bakery space – what a saint!

Every once in a while Alex will disappear under Wade’s desk in the kitchen to do a little reading.

Today was Grant’s birthday party and he celebrated with a bouncy house in the backyard!

And then cake and ice cream too!

Wade and I decided on a family outing to Port Washington. I’d never been and he thought it’d be fun. Alex was excited once fishing was mentioned and Teague always loves a trip in the car.

Alex’s awesome Granny made him more monster jeans and he was so excited to wear them today (and yes we are having that kind of weather in July!).

The boys and I were shopping at Target and stumbled upon the clearance section. Imagine my surprise at finding the “deluxe” model of the slip ‘n slide on sale for $.99 (down from $10). When Alex asked if we could buy it, I quickly agreed. With the cold weather we have been having and his age, I actually thought we would put it up for next year. Alex has been asking me about this daily. Finally today was slightly warmer than previous days so I agreed to get it out. I thought after his running and sliding in the pool with Phoenix he might get the idea of a slip n slide. He couldn’t quite get past sliding on his knees. It turns out I had to put on a swimsuit and show him how it is done. (There is actually a picture showing me doing this but I can’t quite bring myself to post it – sorry Amber.)

We’ve had quite a few games of hide ‘n seek at our house lately. Obviously Teague has been enjoying them (and paying attention to the rules) because tonight he walked up to Alex and asked “hide n seek?”. Alex quickly agreed. Teague walked over to the chair. Climbed up. Covered his eyes and counted, “Two, three, two.” The boys managed to play several rounds together – laughing the entire time.

Milwaukee has had some crazy weather this summer. It was really slow to get warm and then we had a really hot week. Then it cooled right back down. Amy and I decided to take the kids to the beach today (regardless of the temperature). They had a blast and didn’t seem to mind the cool breezes.

Alex has been working on his signature. Here he has signed Granny’s birthday card all by himself.

Alex and Abram requested the Lego police station and rock quarry. Teague wanted the Lego cars. Amazingly everyone played pretty well together all afternoon.

For the first time all summer, Alex is embracing the blow up pool in the backyard. And when he went for it, he really went for it. (Phoenix might have been a good influence here.)

And the entire thing in video form. (I’ll warn you to turn down your speakers. Alex is a screecher.)

For those of you wondering what Teague has been up to lately, he has been learning his colors. His standby is blue, but he has learned most of them (red, blue, green, orange, white, black, purple). Today he came up to me with a stack of lego blocks and started naming colors. I thought to video the exchange. After this video was taken we added more colors and he did really well -until we added yellow. That one threw him and he kept calling it purple (which he does know).

Alex has been picking me flowers for weeks now. Recently he has been asking to buy me flowers – sometimes randomly and sometimes when we are at the store. Today when we walked past them at the grocery store and he asked to buy me some, how could I say no?

Summer is officially here. It is hot outside! The boys were tired of the pool so I suggested the fountains at Hart park – instead they spent most of their time in the sand -silly boys.

Alex had swim lessons after nap today and did an awesome job. He loved when I came inside the pool area with my camera and would get the biggest smile on his face.

I was introduced to this snack mix by the Kubickis – yummy! It is basically sugary cereal goodness. The only downside is it makes a HGUE amount (meaning you have to find something big enough to mix and store it in). I started mixing it in the tupperware you see below and quickly ran out of room. I ended up filling this tupperware plus two other large ones.
Recipe:
1 box golden grahams cereal
1 box reeses peanut butter and chocolate cereal
1 box of fruit loops cereal
1 box alpha bits
1 bag teddy grahams
1 bag goldfish crackers
1 bag animal crackers
1 bag of pretzels
1 bag of M&M’s
1 bag jelly bellys (which I left out)
1 bag chocolate chips

Alex has been begging to “go down in the shop” and has also been asking for a critter catcher. Wade decided to take care of both wants this weekend.

Alex didn’t handle fireworks well last year and this year he watched 75% of them from inside on the 4th. My dad had bought some of his own and set them off in the backyard. Alex made it through part of those before going inside. Evidently snap pops are a different story…