Meme and Papa Visit!

Toward the end of September, Meme and Papa came to Texas to visit us!!! Papa was only able to stay for a long weekend, but Meme remained another week after that! We had so much fun, and the boys just adore their time with them! Here's a snapshot of some of the fun things we did...

we spent some time at the park near our house--Lucas loves the swings

I love Anthony's sweet smile






playing "drums" by banging sticks on the railing of the pavillion

and on the table :)

yes--as I was discussing with a sweet friend just today--it IS asking too much to get the boys to look at the camera when taking a picture! But they sure do love their grandparents!

me and my sweet dad

goofballs

Meme and Papa brought a special surprise from Memphis--garbage trucks!!! Wow! Who knew garbage trucks could be so much fun??? Here we are six weeks later, and they still get played with every single day! Of course, every Wednesday, the highlight of the day around here is watching the recycling and garbage trucks collect our waste! Anthony begs me every week to go sit behind our garage outside so we can watch them up close!

Lucas loves books lately!

I love that I had reinforcements to do some extra reading with him!

We ventured out to downtown McKinney...

We decided to take a little horse-drawn wagon ride!

the boys thought it was pretty cool

Lucas sat in the barber shop and watched Papa get a haricut

we stopped for pizza before heading home

Lucas wearing Papa's hat and playing on his leapfrog phone

oh! here we are with the new garbage trucks again! Lucas definitely keeps up with Anthony--they push these babies all over the house--FAST!

picking up acorn "trash"

Meme brought a special treat--Bugles! I didn't even know they made those still! Why is it that you don't have to teach a kid to put bugles on their fingers?!? They somehow know it's what you're supposed to do! ;)

monkey see, monkey do!

Lucas has to try it too!

Anthony and Lucas gave us a musical concert--they play these instruments every day too!

jamming out

we went to the Plano balloon festival one day

They loved these dogs that were waiting for adoption.

Anthony got to sit in a real police car! The policeman even let him hold the handcuffs!

picking lollipops off the lollipop tree at one of the booths

Lucas loved his beads

they had so much fun in the bounce houses

they didn't want to get out!

silly Anthony!

Lucas doing some reading again

Lucas' favorite book right now is "Roly Poly Pangolin" by Anna Dewdney

Anthony loves propping them up and flipping through them

the more books the better, i say...

but i'm starting to run out of space!!!

My mom scoped out Founder's Plaza--a lookout point near DFW airport where you can watch the planes come and go. We grabbed some ChickFilA and had a picnic while we watched.

I think Lucas was having fun

both boys loved it! we watched plane after plane after plane

It was fun to see them get so excited over something so simple (and free!)

American Airlines--our airline of choice!

Anthony especially liked the UPS delivery airplanes

we tried to take a picture, but someone was uncooperative :)
(hint--it wasn't the one on the right!)

Thanks, Meme and Papa, for making the trip down here. Can you come back soon??? We miss you! We love having you on our "turf"!!!

September At Our House

Maybe you have noticed--maybe not...For the past few months I've been trying to capture some of the "ordinary" that goes on in our home. It might not look like anything special when I post the pictures, but these are the day-in and day-out moments I don't ever want to forget. Being silly, laughing, horsing around in the backyard, enjoying special treats...yeah, these are the little things that make my life with these kids and my husband truly happy every single day. I know I've got a long way to go, but I want to relax and take pleasure in the simple things in life...

enjoying some "daddy time"

friends caleb and joshua came over for the afternoon--we went to get a snow cone treat
anthony and caleb rode the wagon


joshua didn't have any treats, but he still enjoyed the ride in the stroller
wait a minute--is that a bit of a smile i see? from a kim kid???
(what you don't see is the picture i snapped before this one was super serious!)





lucas loved it! he rode mario's back in his backpack. i know it's a little ghetto, but we had to take lucas and caleb's shirts off because we were afraid the spilled snow cone might stain!

anthony's dark blue shirt didn't matter

LOVE those grins--they are definitely having a ball!

some batting practice in the backyard

he really puts some muscle into that swing

love how happy he looks

baseball season is daddy's favorite time of the year!

tickle time!

watching big brother

Lucas loves playing ball

close up

can't get enough of this sweet baby

anthony is the king of the fort

love the dirty face--he's been playing hard

handsome boy

you can tell by his face that he really enjoys life to the fullest

close up

my babies--getting too big too fast

horseplay with daddy

it sure is non-stop energy around here--but that's the way we like it!

on a trip to the mckinney farmer's market, we stopped to listen to the live music. one of the musicians let anthony hold his bass guitar.

(this was after the man saw anthony start to cry when we told him it was time to go home)

anthony and lucas play doctor

epidural, maybe?

might i add, Lucas is an EXCELLENT patient!

i know before too long i'll miss the days of little handprints on our grill and scribbles on our brick walls

one of the highlights of the month was when the city of mckinney decided to repair the sidewalk almost right in front of our house! wow! we spent several afternoons outside watching the men work instead of taking naps!

anthony was so excited to see both a backhoe loader and a cement mixer right on our very street! he loved watching the trucks and how they work!

more horsey riding on dada...we'll miss this too before too long!

LOVE that mario plays with them so much!
these boys sure do love their daddy

Bedtime At Our House

So, these clips are some typical scenes from bedtime around here. The energy doesn't stop at bedtime! They will go, and go, and go, and finally just conk out!

This is their favorite bedtime song "Who's the King of the Jungle?" Mario and I first learned it while we were working for Fellowship of Christian Cheerleaders. If you can't tell what they're singing, the lyrics are "Who's the King of jungle? Who's the King of the sea? Who's the King of the universe? And Who's the King of me? JESUS!" I certainly hope and pray these boys make Jesus the King of their hearts very soon.

The boys love doing seat drops (or "secrets") on the bed. Of course, they love anything that involves flinging their bodies in the air. They look pretty sleepy, don't they??? ;)

Our Little Drummer Boy

Here's what Anthony is really into lately--drumming! (Oh, don't worry--he still loves his trucks most of all). I love his creativity in this first video clip...He's never even seen a real drum set here, yet somehow makes a very realistic setup. Too cute how he changes keys in the middle, and my favorite part is the way he ends it!

So, in light of his new found passion, we decided to make a trip to Guitar Center to let Anthony play on the child size drum sets they have there. Well, as you can imagine, he loved it and didn't want to leave. We have some ex-drummers on both sides of the family, so we'll see if this lasts. Notice the end of his segment is similar to the one in the movie above. Love it.

Highchair Entertainment

Mealtime always seems to be a prime opportunity to capture the funny little things the kids say or do--most likely because they are confined to their chairs and can't run away!

This first one is Lucas' "no means yes" phase. Anthony goes around saying, "Lucas says no to everything." We're still working on manners, but it sure is kinda cute when he turns down ice cream then reaches for it!

The second clip is Anthony's imitation of a storm. I'm not sure where he got the "lightning" thing with his eyes, but I love his innocence! Don't ask me why he's wearing underwear on his head again--they are his favorite pair, I guess. Notice Lucas' chubby little finger at the end pointing to the "puppies" on Anthony's head!

Barbarians Eating Watermelon

the title says it all....

so if you step on something sticky on my kitchen floor, please kindly ignore it! ;)

Some August Love

sending some August love your way...

classic Lucas expression

homemade finger paints--pretty colors!

a little dab at first

now they're getting it

the finished product

ummmmm, what happened to the colors??? ;)

Lucas' cutie patootie in his "jeans" diaper

enjoying one of our summertime favorite fruits--watermelon

stay tuned for some video clips