Thursday, April 24, 2014

A Road Trip to Tuscaloosa!

We had a fall break in October, so I decided that I would take the boys to Tuscaloosa for the week!  We left VERY early when it was still dark and we got to watch the sun rise as we were on the road.


I know my grandparents really enjoyed seeing the boys for a few days because they can't really get out here to see us.


I always travel with my bouncy house because it's instant fun when there's not a lot of toys around!


I was very excited that I got to go to my favorite restaurant, Taco Casa!  I dream of taco burgers and the only place I can get them is here, about 2 times a year!




My next favorite restaurant of all time is City Cafe!  It's tiny and you have to wait in the longest line imaginable, but it is so worth it.  It was one of our favorite college places to eat lunch!


We spent some fun time just hanging out with my grandparents.


Then I decided we should go to an Alabama game.  That was a little bit hard with all 3 boys, but they were thrilled!


Luckily, Dad helped me wrangle the boys and we went to the A Club room to eat lunch before the game.


Judd and Jennie came to meet us at the A Club room as well and we all enjoyed a great meal!


We literally watched the team run in and play 1 play and then ALL the boys were just done.  It was naptime and it was a long day for them, so we decided to go ahead and leave.  I was sad, but it is what it is with tired kiddos.  


At least we had fun for the time that we were there!


On the way out of the stadium we decided to stop off at the newly built Alpha Gamma Delta house.  I had not been to Tuscaloosa in a long time, so I was shocked to see the beautiful new house.  It really was amazing!  I tried so hard to wrangle the boys so they wouldn't break anything or make college girls decide they didn't want to have kids one day!  The new house mom invited the boys into her apartment and gave them food, candy, and let them play with her little dog!  She was so kind to them.  It really was so sweet of her to acknowledge that they were kids and they were going to bang on the nice piano!


I mean, what can you say?  The University of Alabama does sorority houses right!  It was beautiful!  I'm so glad I got to run in and look around while everyone else was at the game!


Later that evening Noah just wasn't acting right and he just laid in the floor screaming and wouldn't get up and he just cried and cried.  I got a little worried and decided I may need to take him to get seen somewhere and then it dawned on us that the ballgame was getting out and 80,000 fans would soon be flooding the roads of Tuscaloosa.  As a last resort, we took the back roads to DCH Northport so that we could avoid most of the traffic heading to the highway.  He threw up while we were at the ER and we got an X-ray of his belly just to make sure.  He ended up being ok and we were back for bedtime.  Poor guy!


It was a long week but a good week.  As you can see, the boys passed out on my grandmother's couch one night!


Pretty soon, it was time to hit the road again.  Since I was alone I had to make sure I did this trip as quickly as possible.  I learned that if I packed our breakfast and lunch and then just handed it back to them, then it could save us up to 2 hours on the road and money as well.  So that's what I did and it as worked out so great doing it this way.  I pack everything the night before and just toss it back with some fruit and a juice box!  Genius!


Arkansas bound!  It was a fun fall break trip!




Tuesday, April 22, 2014

October Fun!

Back in October we had some really fun things to do!  We were excited that fall was coming!  We took a picnic to a park....


and visited a nearby pumpkin patch for a picnic another day.





We did not do a good job at the grass maze, thus we will not be doing a real corn maze!

Life with boys...finding a toy snake in the wash!


Sometimes it's nice to just stop and read a book when they want you to.  They're only little once!


I took these 2 yahoos with me on a Walmart trip and they insisted on carrying the Bible in with them.  How could I say no?!


I braved the area craft fairs and took them all by myself one afternoon.  It went better than I expected!  They did pretty well.


They even got to ride the cow train all by themselves!  They are growing up so fast and getting so big!


Monday, April 21, 2014

September Wrap Up

So I'm trying to get caught up on the blog month by month, so I'm just picking a few of the highlights from each month!  

We began to find a groove in how to homeschool on our at-home days.  I'm probably still not perfect at this (with 2 other littles at home) but I feel like it's an ever-evolving thing and we'll just go with the flow and live and learn!  I have been so proud of all the things John Michael is learning!



Just a snapshot of life at our house!


I found this picture of when the boys tried to "help" me clean the hardwood floors.  Nice.


We saw "Planes" at a drive-in theater!  It was so much fun!


I quietly and sadly realized our once three-crib house had slowly dwindling down to ONE crib and soon, NO cribs.  


We bought a set of bunk beds from a friend for the boys' room and they were so thrilled!  It was almost time to start the transition of Noah into their room in a few weeks.


I found this cute picture of Matthew being my biscuit cutter-outer helper!  I think he likes to help cut the biscuits out so he can sneak pieces of dough!


I love catching quiet, still moments like these when they have no idea you see them.


We had one last batch of tomatoes from the garden and they were so yummy!


And we reveled in something new to us: a child that can read!  I have NO idea why it's been so amazing to watch this year, but I've just been amazed that within only 3 weeks of school starting, JM was learning to read small things like the "Dick and Jane" books.  We were so proud and he was so embarrassed that we were so proud!


September is always a strange month.  You can't quite kiss summer goodbye because it's still so hot, but football season has begun, school has begun, church activities have picked back up, and fall feels like it's just waiting to burst forth with that first early morning cold snap.  September was a good, slow month of getting back into the swing of real life after the break of summer!


Preschool Time!

Next up, it was Matthew's turn to start preschool.  He was doing 2 days a week this year and I would pick him up before lunch.
He was really excited to start school and get to see some of his old friends and teachers from last year.

Look at that sweet smile!


With both brothers at school, Noah and I had a little bit of free time to just play!


We had a bit of park fun......



and then picked Matthew up from school.  We had some yummy lunch and then everyone passed out from having such a busy day!


I think Matthew had a great first day back to preschool!

Sunday, April 20, 2014

First Day of Kindergarten


Continuing my trend of catching up the blog from a few months ago, I can't forget to blog about John Michael's first day of school!  We have the unique opportunity to do a classical education Christian school model in our area.  We have prayed about this for a few years and just really felt that this was the place for our kids.  Because it's a mix of home school/regular school, I really wasn't all that sad about John Michael heading to kindergarten.  If he was leaving me for 5 full days a week, I probably would have been a basket case!  I was really excited for him to begin this awesome new journey!

The morning-of we woke up super early and had breakfast as a family and then headed to school so that we could drop him off and say goodbye!


Be still, my heart!


He looks a little dazed?!  We said our goodbyes, I reluctantly left the room, took one last look back, and left.  I think I did pretty well!  I still can't believe all those hard years of raising little ones just passed so quickly and now it's time for school.


After we dropped brother at school, Matthew went to meet his preschool teacher and see his room that he would be in for 3 year old preschool.  He knew Mrs. Brooke very well, so he was happy to go see her and check out his room!



For a fun treat, we went to Waffle House for lunch, because....well, life is short and sometimes you just need to say YES to waffles for lunch!

It was a long day waiting for brother to get out of his first day of school.  I learned a little about navigating the school pick up line too!


For an after school treat we stopped by our favorite cupcake shop to celebrate our first day of school!  John Michael had a great first day!  Now that the school year is almost over, I cannot say enough great things about his kindergarten year.  I have loved his precious teacher, the school, the sweet days we get to spend together as a family doing home school work, and the sheer amount of amazing things that he is doing now! It has been a great fit for our family! I can't believe his first year of school is almost over!