Random Acts of Kidness

Here is a picture Zekie drew of himself as Hulk and a few items he and any other super techy 5 year would like. An iPad, Xbox, Ipod, bowl of candy ... and a pig!

People keep telling me I'm going to miss the days of small fingerprints around our home. I'm not convinced.

In an attempt to teach our boys some responsibilty we've been working on chores and allowance..complete with banks with dividers for "fun money" aka ice cream truck money, mission fund, and tithing. As you can see here, laundry is the clear favorite in the chore department.

Behold the side of our refridgerator, complete with super hero and candy chore charts, preschool calendars and the ever important Box Tops envelope. It's a boy, boy, boy, boy world!

Twins

 

My favorite story involving the twins lately goes a little something like this. Caleb wanted to know if he could go across the street to our neighbor "Sammy's" house. I said sure, but to make sure he looked BOTH ways before he crossed the street and that Isaac and I would be watching through the window to make sure he did. He said OK! and set off. Sure enough he approached the street and very deliberately looked left...then right...and then DOWN...and did his usual fist punching to the sky dance the rest of the way across the street. That kid's hilarious, but the best part of the story is that Isaac starting busting a gut saying "Did you see that?! Caleb looked DOWN. Like a car was going to come up through the road and hit him! Hahahahaha!" I love that Isaac thinks Caleb is as funny as I do :) Ahh, twins.

Caleb's first day of preschool!

 

Caleb is in preschool!!! He has been waiting his whole life for this moment. Literally. I had him on the waiting list for Ms. Holly when he was still in the womb. He has been watching and waiting anxiously as his older brother have gone and has been sooo excited to go!

 

This morning I was in the shower and Caleb surprised me when he threw back the curtain and shouted TODAY I GET TO GO TO PRESCHOOL! It was the first thing on his mind. Then of course we go to drop him off and the nervousness set in. He was not about to get out of the car. Only the promise that I would take him to his favorite place in the world (Maverick gas station) got him out.

 

One of the reasons Caleb was shy was because he saw this cute black boy and said he was nervous about his "fuzzy" hair. At the end of the day however I asked him who his favorite friend was and he said "I love the brown guy!" Glad he's decided diversity is awesome afterall :)

 

I love my funny Bebopalicious! Such a grown up boy who was sooo excited to have his very own glue and scissors. Score!

Isaac first day of Butterfly class

Isaac has been counting down the days to go back to Ms. Holly's preschool! Only this year he has graduated from the Catapillar class and has become a butterfly!

All of Isaac's best buds are in his class but Paigey (the cute girl on the far right) is his favorite! Isaac also adores his teacher Ms. Holly and we just had to go visit her on Labor day because he missed her too much.

Isaac had got his "camera smile" down...which means I need to tickle him during photoshoots to get his real Squeaks smile to come out. Such a handsome and smart boy.

Part of the reason Isaac's been counting down the days to preschool is because Zekie's been coming home from preschool with lots of treats. Unfortunately Zekie's not very generous and Isaac's been dying for treats of his own. I promised him that as soon as he got to preschool he would have a treat that Zekie wanted and would be able to have it alll to himself. When we went to go pick Isaac up from his first day back he came waltzing out with a great big cookie. Zekie saw it and said "Seriously? Can I have some?" There was a dramatic pause, Isaac held up his pointer finger, wagged it back and forth and proclaimed with a HUGE smile. "NO WAY." Sweet justice.

Mix it up!

 

Another incredible picture by Zekie! We have here Isaac's most approved food item of late...THE SMOOTHIE. The smoothie is really a magical thing. If you tried to give Isaac a handful of spinach...or even a bowl of watermelon for that matter, he literally may run to the garbage or sink to actually puke. He is picky with a capitol P. BUT do not lose hope. Isaac will eat almost any fruit or vegetable you can come up with IF it is blended into a purple smoothie. Color is important. If it's green...he won't touch it. However, if you throw some berries into a green smoothie, thus turning it purple...Game on!

 

Isaac found a frowny face in the smoothie that was about to be blended to his death.

Because Isaac is such a smoothie lover, we make them at our house pretty much daily. Unfortunately we have not been please with our blenders of the past. They have jammed up and leaked under the daily abuse. Sooo, we broke down and spent some of Rob's bonus money on The illustriou BLENDTEC. For some reason we can justify large sums of money if it is going to Costco. We have fallen under their spell with the rest of America. Oh well. Isaac's health is at stake here and it will definitely get all sorts of use so here we go.

 

For our very first Blendtec smoothie we decided to all out on the ingredients. This smoothie had the following: Milk, yogurt, a slice of tomato, cherries, spinach, carrots, berries, honey and a banana...and they drank every single drop!  Sweet Smoothie Success!

My friend Anne posted this on her blog and it's hilarious! I thought it went well with my smoothie blog so here you go. Enjoy!

Real Fun with REAL Salt Lake Soccer

We decided to be ambitious and attempt going to a Salt Lake Real Soccer game with these three crazies. We scored discounted tickets when we signed up Zekie and Isaac for soccer this year so we decided we were "game" to go to a game. The boys loved all the music, drumming, cheers and confetti and streamers for the first goal of the night. But mostly the treats. It's always about the treats.

This guy made our first soccer experience bonafide. He stood most of the game, yelled all sorts of randomness at the refs and players, tied a streamer around his head, and waved his flag with pride. He was a real REAL fan I'm telling you. Sorry. I definitely admit I did more people watching that soccer watching myself.

Zekie our budding photographer keeps asking me why people pay me to take their picture and not him? I think he's got some pretty good skills as you can see from this fabulous picture he took. Now I just need to teach him Photoshop...

Caleb at one point hit the wall (it was waaay past his bedtime afterall) and neeeeeeeded to have some of the cotton candy the vendors kept taunting him with. Not having any cash with me, me, Zekes, and Baby head off in search of an ATM. We found one, which of course charged us $3.50 to get out money...on top of the cotton candy that cost $5.00. $8.50 was way more than I wanted to spend, but at least it was a 3pack of cotton candy in one bag. THEN Caleb three himself on the ground and demanded that he get the entire bag to himself! Oh, the joy of mothering an exhausted 3 year old. But that was one heck of a sunset :) Rob and Isaac had a wonderful time and we are now checking going to a REAL soccer game off the list. Check!

 

Day Out with Thomas 2011!

This marks our 3rd Annual Day Out with Thomas tradition and Rob and I thoroughly agreed it was our best experience yet.  Although it got off to a rough start with Rob being stuck at work in the morning and us rushing to the office to pick him up, ultimately we made it on to the train and had a splendid time. Many things played into it being the best time ever:

1.) We knew exactly what to expect.  We knew right where to wait for the train.  We knew the line was more of a free for all herding and that all the seats were going to be more or less the same.  We knew the train ride was going to go forwards for 15 minutes and then backwards for another 15 minutes and that it was more about hyping up that we were ON the actual Thomas train vs. going somewhere exciting. Total “joy in the journey” deal.  We jammed to the Thomas songs.  Oohed and Aahhed over the springtime scenery of Heber mountains, grassy meadows, farmland, and creek.  Waved to every passing neighbor that looked our way… and generally soaked in the special family occasion of it all.

2.) The weather was pretty darn good.  Last year it was soo hot.  We were sweaty and uncomfortable and so were the kids.  This year it was sunny, but much cooler.  Towards the end the wind kicked up a little and Rob was too chilly in the shade because he forgot his jacket… but all in all, it was definitely an improvement.

3.)  It really was not too crowed.  It runs Thursday through Monday and we went Friday.  Don’t get me wrong.  There was a solid crowd, but it really was manageable.

4.) We knew what to hit and what to avoid.  We enjoyed mini golf, avoided the tent of kids playing with trains, skipped the line waiting for an employee to put on tatoos and put on our own, blew off the mega line waiting to take a pic with Thomas but instead got cotton candy for the boys to eat while we waited in the short line for a pic with Sir Topham Hat.

5.) We did NOT buy our tickets online, instead we bought them from our local Smith Tix so we could pay less processing fees (I’ll take what I can get)  and even got a ticket free by going to the second to last train time, that apparently they were pushing in a big way.  I think I’ll consider Rob the free person/ticket in this scenario .

A couple kid moments included when one of the engineers helped Caleb up the steps to the train, he proclaimed “I like you!”  Also, I put Rob in charge of taking Caleb to the bathroom in the portapotty.  Caleb utterly refused and I can hardly blame him.  Being the brilliant mother that I am, I was able to convince him to pee in the handy little urinal section inside of it.  Much better.  Isaac was also quite hesitant to go and asked if the portapotty was for “Mamas or cats?”  I told him it was for everybody.  He repeated “and cats?” “No Isaac, it’s not for cats.”  Only then would he pee in it.The cotton candy was 2 tickets.  I asked the guy if he would give me a “boy” size for 1 ticket so they could each have their VERY own and he agreed.  Score! Nothing better than a cotton candy goatee.If you look at their incredible expressions you can see why waiting in the line for a picture with Thomas was NOT worth it. Even Topham Hat is struggling.Here is our “no line” version of a picture with Thomas. I think this is the happiest Rob’s ever been to pose for a picture. Three boys in da hood. Happy happiness, riding Thomas and their very own sugar high… and then sugar crash, the climax being Zekie yelling “I’m hungry for… BLOOD!!”  Rob and I just looked at each other like, did that really just happen!?  Apparently he saw some super hero cartoon with a vampire bad guy.  Looks like it’s time to go back to watching Thomas the Tank Engine!

The rhythm is gonna get you!

And for the grand finale, Zekie and Caleb (briefly) busting out their best Thomas moves!  Later though, when all the kids (maybe 30) had a dance/drum off Isaac was the grand prize winner of the coveted neon green and pink train whistle.  Woot woot!!

Caleb’s 3rd Birthday

Our baby is tha-wee!  He’s such a big boy that we clearly needed to have a BIG party.  He picked out the dinosaur decorations at Walmart himself and with the balloons, streamers, and happy birthday banner we were ready to go! I asked Caleb what kind of birthday cake he wanted… maybe Ironman…or Umizoomi? No, he wanted it to be BLUE.  Just blue. Nothing else.  It’s like he knows I don’t have any cake skillz and didn’t want me to hurt myself trying.  I conveniently had some dinosaur sprinkles, so we spiced it up a bit… nothing too fancy. And let’s be honest…it’s all about the frosting anyway.  I could have just bought a tub of frosting, stirred in some blue food coloring and handed it to him and he would have been just as happy. The Bachman brothers… and best friend Nate the neighbor, who virtually lives at our house.  It’s a good thing.  He’s like our Urkel, Kimmy Gibler or Cody from ‘Step By Step’ … but cooler clearly. Caleb got lots of love and attention from his family and friends! Caleb’s ultimate favorite present.. a Bop Bag tiger that you can punch and it will pop back up… until it get a hole within 24 hours and takes up space in your toy box.  It was GLORIOUS for a day though, and he did the best happy dance when he got it. Caleb questioning, is this entire bag of jellybeans all for me? Nick and Erica really hooked Caleb up… he was the happiest of nephews.  Candy and a ball?  The perfect 3 year old gift. You can see Zekie was more anxious for Caleb to open his presents than he was. All Bachman functions must have a full body tackle at some point in the program. The bop bag didn’t stand a chance with this group about to pounce. Here is Nick trying to resurrect my attempt at the actual cake portion of Caleb’s birthday.  I of course didn’t let the cake cool down properly before I put the frosting on and it melted in a disgusting blob around the outside.  I tried to recruit Nick to help me and he was entirely reluctant until he saw there was no chance of survival with me at the wheel and finally took over. Erica may think twice before she buys a present for my children that could possibly be used as a weapon.  A pretty convincing cower I may add. Ta dah!  A beautiful blue cake for Caleb’s birthday.  Nice work Nick and lovely assistant Zekie… and by assistant I mean assist in eating it.