Weekend Top Five 9/24/12

It was a cool weekend finally for the start of Autumn. We are fighting the urge to turn on the furnace and so far so good.

It was an okay weekend for the most part.  The weather was actually an interesting part of the weekend since it was so weird. It was bright blue skies and sunny at the exact same time as dark gray rain clouds, depending on which direction you were looking. We never knew when it was going to start raining or be sunny and hot, and it changed in the matter of seconds. Kind of spooky but cool at the same time :)





5. Gymboree Kids Day
I had to work an event Saturday morning that we do each year at my day job. We held a "Kids Day" to try to bring in more awareness of our classes and play facility. It was huge and we had over 200 kids in and out within the two and a half hour event. I was done by 1:00 and was even more happy to hear that the three "boys" (Daddy and boys) had gotten along fine while I was gone (which hasn't been the case much lately).

4. Football and a Bit of Maturity
I missed the deadline to be able to sign Aaron up for flag football this year but that hasn't stopped the interest. He has been trying so hard to kick and catch our football lately so when I got home, we headed over to a local park to play. It was a really fun time. I was proud of Aaron because not only is he trying very hard to kick the ball, he is trying very hard to catch them, even when they are super high and coming at him at pretty fast speeds. As a matter of fact, he got NAILED in the cheek while trying to catch one and after a small amount of whimpering, he got right back up and tried again, which is a HUGE improvement that we have seen in him since school started this year. Up until now, he has always just given up when things got discouraging. But since school started this year, Aaron seems to be more brave in giving things a second try. I am not sure why, but I know how much Noah improved in effort and positive attitude when he was in third grade with this teacher and I am wondering if that is the same thing with Aaron.  Whatever the reason, it is a fun change to watch in him.

3. Church
Noah was completely bummed that it wasn't his turn to run the soundboard at church this morning and then after church he said, "Mom, nobody ran the board today" so I encouraged him to ask next time if there is no one there and he was so excited at the idea that he could show some initiative on his own and is excited to ask next time. Aaron attended grown up church with us this week and did really well. Not sure which he will go to next week.

2. ArtPrize Round One
Grand Rapids has an annual event that completely takes over the city for about three weeks each Fall. Over 1500 works of art, both huge and small, of all various types are installed all over the city. So I took the boys downtown for a small viewing Sunday afternoon while Hubby was gone for a rehearsal. The weather kind of shortened things but we did see a few fun things that stood out. ArtPrize really is such a good thing for our city and I love just walking around downtown and being part of it. Both boys brought a small sketchpad to draw things they saw, which they do each time we go.







1. Sunday Night Stresses
School has been in session for a few weeks now and we are still trying to figure out the school routines and the changes it creates in family dynamics. Sunday night was a bit of a stress trying to figure out the week ahead and Noah had a rough time settling in for the week ahead. It was a first peek at the social stresses that we may be facing this year, which I was wondering when they would start. We'll keep working with him to help him the best we can and we also need to work better at hiding our own grown-up conflicts because I think it just exacerbates a difficult situation for him.

The Week Ahead:
We'll get through the week ahead, one day at a time, just like we work our way through every other week. I look forward to the day when we are actually "living" rather than "surviving" each day. There will be one fun day (hopefully) on Thursday when I go to the field trip with the classes to go see ArtPrize again.  Hopefully other happy moments will show their face as the week progresses as well. That would be a really nice thing.

Weekend Top Five September 19, 2012

So I've decided to try to bring the weekend top five back. I realized as I look back that I like having a kind of journal of our weekend activities through the years. There have been so many times that Steve and I have wondered "when was that?" and he is the one who usually says, "look back at your blog and check".

I am working to figure out how to structure this blog going forward, knowing that I kept a private one this summer as well. I think that I will keep the private one for my biggest struggles (of which there seem to be quite a few at the moment) and keep this blog as my family journal of sorts. I imagine there will be some overlap at times but that is just because life is not easily separated into neat sections :)

5. Bike Ride with a Purpose
Aaron and I got some one on one time in a physical capacity Friday night. It was a very stressful week and I decided that I needed to get some exercise and I told Aaron to grab his bike. We took a ride together to a local video store. The ride had some challenges for Aaron but I just reminded him that the more he rode, the less difficult the ride would be next time. We didn't ride much this summer since Noah doesn't have a bike but I really DO enjoy that mode of exercise and I am committing to riding my back much more as I find time

4. Steve Back Discussion
Hubby stayed home all week due to a pinched nerve and caused much stress to the household. So after a bit of bickering and not so nice words, we got through it and he ended up cancelling the performance in which he supposed to attend Saturday night. As I was driving home late Saturday night (see below) I called him after the kids had fallen asleep in the car and we finally had a decent (and calm) discussion about the back situation and I think we've come up with a plan of attack for the week. At least, I hope.

3. Flea Bomb
This week, on top of all the other DRAMA in the house, I found  fleas on the dog. So, after a trip to the vet for flea treatments, we knew we needed to fix the house as well. In the past, I've always used the flea carpet spray but I really don't know how well it actually works so we broke out the big stuff this time. Since the boys and I were going to be gone for the day (see below) it seemed like the logical day for it. So after we left ( or got kicked out by hubby the Nervous Bomber) Steve set off the foggers and left for a few hours. After church Sunday was spent vacuuming every inch of the house and I was happily surprised that I found no fleas and a very small amount of "dust" on the dog when I checked her Sunday afternoon. As cute as Lily is, I will definitely NEVER have another dog and I would re home her in an instant if I could find the right family for her. She is alone all day every day and would be much happier with a family that could sit and snuggle/play with her much more.

2. Saturday Road Trip
We went to Illinois (with a spoken"S" when Aaron says it) for the day for my niece and nephew's birthday party. The kids had a blast playing with their cousins all day and the drive was somewhat uneventful both directions. One kind of cool thing was that as we were hitting the road to come home, a good Samaritan paid for my toll for me as I got onto the highway. That was kind of neat. I dealt with my bio mom without any difficulties and even came home with some glorious sparkly tattoos on my arm thanks to my seven year old niece.

1. Noah's New "job"
All of the fifth graders are expected to perform some sort of service at church and Noah had decided that he wanted to learn how to run the soundboard at church. Beforehand he had been quite nervous about it but we got there today and a nice man was there ready to help him out. Noah had a blast and is disappointed that he has to share the job with other kids :) He will "graduate" from this small board to one twice it's size next year in the middle school wing but the man helping them out said he did great and that all of the kids are ready for the bigger one by the time this year in the kids' church is over. I am just happy that maybe we found something that he will embrace and could do something with in the future. I guess we'll wait and see.

The Week Ahead:
School adjustments are definitely not smooth sailing yet so we'll hope for a better week in that front. I am working four out of five days at Gymbo this week as well as an extra event Saturday morning, which will most likely do me in. Hopefully Steve will be back to work by Tuesday so I can get my house back in working order, sans fleas finally.

Here's to a good week :)

Thursday Thirteen Summer 2012

I sit writing this on Monday night. Kids are in bed, backpacks are full of supplies, clothes are laid out, and two young boys are anticipating what 3rd and 5th grade will be like beginning tomorrow morning.

I have had a child in school of some sort for 7 years now (starting with Noah in preschool in 2006) and I think the first days are actually getting more difficult, rather than easier. Each new school year means one more year closer to the time when I am no longer an important part of their lives. And each year I cry as I send them off.

I had wanted this to be the "best summer ever" but due to financial constraints, I was unable to make it happen...AGAIN.

Although Noah spent much of the time this summer explaining just how awful his summer was, when we sat down this weekend and talked about what we DID do, he was the first one to say, "We really have fun this summer". I'm not sure if he was just trying to be nice or being honest, but it was still nice to hear.

So this summer was quite a bit different than summers in the past.  There were quite a few things that used to be part of our summers that really don't factor in anymore, mostly because the boys are just older now. We didn't spend every other day at a new park like in past years. As a matter of fact, I think we only actually WENT to a park maybe a half dozen times the entire summer. I think one factor of that was because it was just really really hot this summer. 

We also spent fewer days at the beach this summer. We didn't even go to the tiny local beach a single time. We did get to Lake Michigan a handful of times this summer, but gas costs reduced our trips.  We also made it a new Lake Michigan beach (well, new to them, not to me) and it was our favorite beach day, despite the icky biting flies. We'll go back there next summer but earlier in the summer.  We also did not go to a couple of festivals that we have ALWAYS gone to in summers past, such as the Coast Guard Festival and Byron Days Festival. We also didn't spend a single night in a hotel this summer, which has always been a favorite of the boys in summers past.

Okay, so enough with the negativity. What DID we do this summer?

Well, after asking the boys what they will remember from this summer, and adding the things that I will remember the most, here is how the Summer of 2012 will be remembered:

13. DUNK TANK...Aaron's Dream Come True

I will never be able to explain why my youngest child has such an incredible OBSESSION with dunk tanks. I have no idea when it started or where it stems from, but it is real and it is here to stay. So when I found out that there was a fund raiser where kids got to be in a dunk tank, I would have paid an extraordinary amount of money for him to have the experience. Even better, it only cost a dollar and he spent an entire afternoon climbing into a very gross grass filled tank and getting dunked. His dream come true. Did it quash the obsession? Nope!

12. Birthday Parties...Noah's Dream Come True

Given a summer AND holiday birthday, a birthday party with school friends has never happened and he has always wanted one. So this summer was the year, in honor of entering Double Digits, we let Noah have a birthday party at a local game type place and also had a blast at a birthday party with all of his cousins at a local park. Definitely a memorable birthday for him. Even better, he got to spend fireworks with his gal pal as well, which he also talked about the rest of the summer.

11. Gymboree Summer/ McFlurries

One of the most obvious things of this summer was how much time the kids spent at work with me. As I was teaching 2-3 days a week, the boys spent a LOT of time in the little tiny office of our owner, with a minuscule DVD player and their handheld games in the dark. Real fun, right? Here's the funny thing...I figured it would be the WORST part of the summer. But not one single day did they complain about it the entire summer. To them, it meant a day of sitting watching TV and playing video games without mom regulating them. And even better, every Friday, since it was the longest day they had to be there (5-6 hours) we stopped for McFlurries on the way home. They thought it was the coolest thing ever. Who says you can't entertain children on a shoestring budget? :)

10. Camping, Cabin Style

Perhaps the best job I've ever done at planning ahead. Back in January when I got an email saying that you had to reserve (and pay for) summer camping sites for cabins at the campground we like in February. After some discussion, we took the small amount of money we got for tax refund and went ahead and scheduled our camping weekend. In hindsight, the best thing we've ever done since we would never have been able to do it otherwise. So even though we never took a "vacation" per say, we did get our weekend away and didn't have to "rough it" as much as in previous years since we rented a cabin at the campground. There were definitely ups and downs to our camping adventure this year, but it was a memorable weekend away as a family. Not sure if we'll do it again next year but we had an experience that hopefully the boys will remember fondly in years to come.

9. My Grandma

My grandma passed away in July, just four days shy of her 96th birthday. She was an extremely important part of my life and I am tearing up so this will be the most difficult paragraph to write. I wrote an entire tribute to  this woman on the private blog that I kept this summer so I won't elaborate here. In short, I was so grateful that I had some warning and was able to take the boys to Kalamazoo a few weeks before she passed so we had a short time with her to visit and say goodbye.  A couple weeks after her passing was a small gathering at the cemetery as her ashes were buried, followed by another gathering of family and friends the next day. The kids remember the weekend as time playing with their favorite cousins. I, however, had a very difficult weekend on so many levels and I am still hurting and very raw. So even though it's not a happy memory, it was a very huge part of my memories of the summer of 2012 and it needed to be part of this list.

8. The Grandmas, Grandpas, and Rebellion

My boys have the best grandma and grandpa ever in my parents. They will be the first to tell you that if you ask :) When asked, their first response is their favorite parts of the summer were the days they spent with the grandparents and cousins, playing in the forest, swimming at their aunt's pool and just being loved and doted upon. Every kid should be lucky enough to have these special people in their lives!

The flip side of this was the assertion of Noah's independence as he outright REFUSED to go for two overnights to my in-laws. It was a very difficult and awkward situation but we backed up Noah's decision and Aaron went to spend a couple of days alone with the in laws while Noah stayed home for some one-on-one time with us. Both boys had a fun time apart from each other. My MIL keeps asking about if Noah will come next summer. I know the answer but I will certainly not face that until it comes next summer. Anything can happen between now and then.

7. Reading, Writing, 'Rithmatic
Aaron is younger than everyone in his class by quite a lot, so with some encouragement from Aaron's teacher, it was very important to keep Aaron up to speed and even help him improve in some ways. So I did require the boys to keep up with reading , writing essays, and math worksheets this summer, including reading aloud to me.We also followed through on several local reading clubs, including the library one that treated us to a free trip to the local minor league baseball game. The game included a free kids meal and safety goggles night and was a lot of fun, even when it got rained out in the fifth inning and we went running for cover, soaked to the bone. I think (or at least hope) the work we did this summer paid off and I do feel like he is more prepared for third grade than he would have been otherwise. 

6. Michigan's Adventure

We had decided that there was no way we were going to be able to make our annual trip to the only amusement park here in Michigan. But after much discussion and a very honest and sad plea from our firstborn, we squeezed some blood from lemons and made it happen. Aaron got to go on his first corkscrew. The biggest part of this day however was Noah's experience. He was determined to ride the one ride I had denied him in previous years...despite me saying that I still didn't think he was ready yet. 

Sometimes it stinks to be right and this was one of those times. The poor kid got jolted and jostled around, scratching up the entire side of his temples, and then losing his glasses completely, never to be found again. He came away crying and wishing we had never come in the first place.

We salvaged the day for the most part, but after quite a few other icky mishaps, Michigan's Adventure will probably not be our summer destination again for a very long time. 

5. Day trip to Lansing

This was probably the best family day of the summer. We took one Sunday and headed to the state's capital. It was a great day and one of the very few activities I actually posted about this summer.

4. Summer Bowling

 A national website, Kids Bowl Free, sponsored 2 free games of bowling every day for kids all summer long. We have signed up for three summers in a row, but this was the first summer we really took advantage.  Our local bowling alley, in additional to participating in this promotion, also offered dollar shoes, dollar games, and dollar pop days on Mondays so with both the free bowling coupons and the specials, the boys and I went bowling almost every Monday all summer long for only $8 a day. Pretty good frugal planning if I do say so myself. Noah achieved his high score of 115 and Aaron's of 98. These of course were with bumpers but by the end of the summer, they were trying to do one game without bumpers and one with each time we went. Noah is even asking to be part of a bowling league this fall. We'll have to see about that.

3. Chili Dogs and Slurpee's

Perhaps again because of the extreme heat this summer, Slurpee's became a treat often this summer. For $1 I could get a 44 oz Slurpee, divide it between two cups and make two young lads super happy after a hot day playing outside. Not exactly nutritious but still fun for them to go make crazy concoctions. In addition, Noah was determined to try his first chili dog. He loved it and asked for them almost daily for the rest of the summer. And they were really yummy!


2. The Swing

Boys grow up and the day came when we realized that the small swing set we had for the little boys doesn't really cut it anymore when little boys become big boys. So after a sad farewell to the swing set (selling it to the people across the street) we needed an additional outlet for our active boys, besides the trampoline we had gotten them earlier in the year. I had actually begged Hubby to hang a swing from our tree out front for  several years and after quite a bit of nagging begging requesting, he obliged. The kids spent hours on the swing for the entire summer. Given the construction, it is amazing that there were as few injuries from it as there were, even though the most serious of them happened just a few days ago, with a head gash to Noah. But he recuperated and was back on it the next day as if nothing had happened. And yes, there are bets going around  the neighborhood about how long the limb will actually hold before falling. Hopefully it won't happen while one of them is airborne.

1. Weekends together

Another thing that was different this summer was Daddy being home. He did work a few Saturdays in order to try to beef up his paycheck since things were really really horrible this summer, but at least he had the CHOICE for the first time, which meant many more weekend sleeping in together than ever before. Another nice change was that our church holds Sunday morning service "encores" on Monday nights during the summer for all the many Michiganders who are out on the water on the weekends. We attended many of  those Monday night services instead of Sunday morning and I liked the change. It made the week shorter as well :)

So, I guess we did make the best of our summer. The one biggest thing I learned this summer was that I don't ever ever ever want to have another summer where I feel like a complete loser as a mom again. The only way to change this is for me to make money....REAL MONEY. So for that reason, the decision was made this summer for me to head back to school come January.  I feel that this decision came directly as a result of truly feeling the poor factor this summer and I had to stoop lower than ever before to even try to keep food on my children's plates.  I hope the struggle this summer will pay off and after I am done with classes in a couple of years, then my summer post will have a very different feel to it. I don't necessarily want to be able to say yes to everything the kids ask for, but I never want another summer when the answer is always no.

I am so lucky to have had yet another summer with the boys, despite the circumstances. I have limited time left when the boys want anything to do with their mom so I will take each day as it comes and work to be grateful for each and every moment.

Finally...A Fun Family Day

Yes, this summer that was supposed to be "the best summer ever" has turned into merely disappointing. I am hoping that some changes I am planning to make in the near future will make future summers less depressing, but for now we just have to take joy in a random fun day here and there if they come.

Luckily, this past Sunday was one of those days.

We had planned to take a day trip to Chicago yesterday (Monday) but after yet another bout of number crunching, it was clear that it couldn't happen. But since Hubby had gotten the day off from work, we tried to figure out a fun activity as a family on a smaller scale.

We came up with a trip to our state's capital, Lansing. It is about exactly an hour away and we have only been there once as a family.

We had seen two ideas that I wanted to try with the kids.

Hubby and I had to teach Sunday School Sunday morning so we hit the road shortly after church.

It ended up being a very fun day. Our first stop was a children's garden we had seen advertised on numerous mom websites around Grand Rapids. Yes, we are a Michigan Family (Go Blue!) but could we help it that the fun looking garden was on MSU's campus?

This garden was amazing! For starters, it was free, unlike Meijer Gardens here in GR, which is way out of our Poor Person's price range. The boys got out and started walking toward the gardens and I was afraid that the boyish "this is boring" would start. But it didn't. It was a beautiful sunny day and the boys were quite enthusiastic. There were so many little areas with different themes, including one made of all the plants to make a pizza, a spice garden that I couldn't stop leaning over to smell each and every plant, and even an edible garden, where Noah actually tried some of the leaves (YUCK!). I loved rubbing the leaves of the chocolate mint plants in my hands and smelling them afterward.  There was a huge snakelike topiary that the kids could run through and also a topiary maze. There was a small pond with a ceramic frog that "spit" water at you when you turned a lever and also a fountain. It was just really neat little spot and I definitely want to go back and take a lot more pictures of the flora if I get a chance again this summer.

After about an hour, we started getting sweaty and thirsty. So after a quick snack and drink, we were back into the car for our second adventure of the day. We went to the Impression 5 Science Msueum. Since this is basically a children's museum I wondered if the boys would be too old for it but I figured since it was new we would still have a good time.

Although smaller than we expected, there was a lot to do. Noah's favorites were the trebochet launch and the electricrty exhibits. Aaron loved building blocks. I made a huge tower all around him taller than him and he was actually patient enough as I was building to wait before breaking out. After about an hour or so, an announcement came on that we could pay a small fee to maker slime in the science lab. Oh, yeah, we're there! So the boys each got a bag full of liquid plastic, food coloring, and water and borax and made slime.  Needless to say, the slime has been a most played with toy every day since then. As a family, the four of us also had a blast making silly shadow pictures in the shadow wall.  The last time we had played with one of these was our trip to St. Louis when the boys were really little so it was fun to do it while they were old enough to understand how it worked this time.

After about three hours, the kids were starting to wind down but enjoying themselves and Hubby and I decided that we would rather leave while the boys were still having fun rather than getting bored so we headed out. Originally we had planned to take a short walk over to the capital building but by the time we got to the car, everyone decided that we were too thirsty and ready to head home.

After a quick run through a drive through for beverages and ice cream,we were on the road.  We were home by dinner time and all we could all say was, "What a great day!" Noah declared it the best day of the summer, which is high praise from a ten year old who has become extremely surly lately.

We are not able to provide big experiences (or even medium ones) for the boys this summer and I have had to say NO way more than YES this year, which has brought disappointment to everyone. But I am so happy that we had one fun day away that we can store in our memories of family time this summer.

If you are in the area, I highly recommend these places as fun family inexpensive entertainment.





PS. This is not a sponsored post in any way. I was not paid to explore these places, nor did I receive anything for free. I just wanted to share a fun family day we had.

Noah's Birthday and a GIVEAWAY

My "baby" is ten. The big double digits!

Because his birthday was a big one, we finally let Noah have a "friend" party at a local entertainment venue.  Being that the birthday was on the 4th of July, only two of his friends could come but they had a fun time.

This, however was not his only birthday celebration this year. As a matter of fact, by the time the week was over, we were COMPLETELY birthday'd out. But it was so fun that we are definitely glad we lived it up for him.

I was very excited to get an email from a representative at The Party Works  asking if I would be interested in blogging about their website, which I am thrilled to do. Throughout this post, I will be showing some of the fun ways that I made use of the package I received :)

I started a tradition a few years ago of decorating the boys' rooms for their birthday after they fell asleep.  Noah's room is by far easier, simply because a loft makes it easy to decorate. Last year I covered his loft with balloons. This year, I got a little more creative. Armed with the balloons and streamers from the gift pack, I patiently waited for Noah to fall asleep and went to work. He LOVED it! It is now a week later and only one out of five streamers is starting to fall but he is determined that they stay up as long as possible. I am curious to see who long they last :)

Another tradition we have is having a birthday breakfast followed by presents from us being opened first thing in the morning. This was because we were always out for fireworks at night. Noah picked out the Mario and Friends party pack so that is what I used to decorate his birthday table.







His present from us was a skateboard and helmet that he had been asking for for a long time. Just for fun, I also picked up a couple of throw away cameras as well. He used his camera to take a picture of everything the rest of the day.  Once again, the silly little afterthought present ended up being the favorite present of the day :)






After awhile, we headed out to the second birthday party of the day.  We lasted three hours and still came away with token cards for another visit. I am sure we will be back there again before school starts.








But the birthday celebrations were not yet over.  Due to a blended family, my boys are blessed to have a huge number of cousins to play with. So this past Sunday we had a simple cousin party for Noah in a local park with a splash pad. It was a very fun day. We set up a table and chairs under a tree and added a small scavenger hunt through the woods as well.  We went simple with food, but we still needed utensils with which to eat so I brought the remaining items from the gift pack.










So here are a few things I learned about the gift pack I received...
In the past, I have always hit the dollar store to get party supplies for all of our parties. I did indeed do that to make sure there was enough. But the interesting thing was that when I was putting the dollar store utensils in with the stuff from The Party Works, there was a definitely difference in sturdiness and the dollar store ones did break while the Party Works ones did not. Also, we noticed that the tablecloth from Party Works  was thicker than the dollar store one as well. The boys loved going to the website to look at all of the party themes and I was amazed at the variety. Actually, I was a little bummed since there was an Angry Birds theme and I looked everywhere for that last year at Aaron's birthday and couldn't find one. I will definitely remember this site for next time.


Would YOU like to try out one of these party packs for yourself? I am lucky enough to be able to offer a party pack of your choice to one lucky reader.  I know everyone else's giveaways have all those bells and whistles and hoops to go through.  But NOT this one. Just leave a comment below on what the next celebration in your family will be and which party pack from the Party Works site you would want.  I will draw a name on my father's birthday, July 21 (keeping with the birthday theme) to see who will win.


Yes, we had a blast celebrating Noah's birthday. The best part is asking him about his birthday and hearing how happy he is. Now we just have to get on him to finish those thank you cards.

So, refer a friend over for this giveaway if you can. I'd love to see some new names.

Wordless Wednesday Tree Trimming

Independence Day 2012

I have always struggled doing a 4th of July post. Not because of the day itself, which I always enjoy. But because my firstborn shares a birthday with this all important patriotic day and I have always tried to figure out how to separate the two. Strangely enough, this year it was easier than most because we celebrated his birthday on the actual day with a party, which I will post about later after his final birthday festivities tomorrow.

Which frees me up to post about festivities for Independence Day.

In the past we have had Noah open his birthday presents in the morning of the fourth but generally not done much else for his birthday on the actual day, other than bringing a birthday treat with us to the fireworks with friends.

This year, since we planned to have a party on the day, we decided to forgo fireworks at the park altogether, instead deciding to purchase some small driveway variety, figuring we'd be too tired to go to the park and watch the big display after a day of partying.

But plans changed, and as I have been learning over the years, when plans are changed and we go with the flow, we usually have a lot of fun.

As Noah's birthday party was coming to a close, a friend mentioned that they were meeting some others and asked if we be joining them. Although we were tired, it was so nice to hear that they had been planning on us joining them all along and all four of the kids (Noah and Aaron and K and her sister) started begging so that we couldn't possibly say no.

So, after almost four hours at a local party place, we packed up the party stuff, ran home to PEEL our hot sticky sweaty clothes off, packed up our fireworks (which we thought we would have time to do before walking over to the park), grabbed drinks, and headed out to K's house. Yes, this is the same girl "K" whom Noah has been close friends with since they were five. We got there and reintroduced ourselves to some others there whom we had met a couple of years ago. Steve and Aaron made the mistake of settling into the couch for a few minutes and I had to take a picture of how incredibly whipped they both looked. Due to Aaron's nagging begging  polite requests, we did pull out a small variety of fireworks in their driveway before walking over to the park.

Some things never change. As the first big boom sounded, Aaron assumed his annual position of ears covered and slumped down in his chair, hiding from the noise. Steve settled into his chair and promptly FELL ASLEEP until the fireworks started. Actually, I think he probably slept through some of the actual show as well.





And Noah settled onto a blanket, next to his friend. I hope these two will always stay friends, even with all the crazy social pressures that they face in the coming years. This would be a good friendship to get them through the tough teenage years ahead. I hope they never give in to the comments of others and try to turn their friendship into anything more than what they are comfortable with. I wish everyone else would leave them be and let them enjoy each other without trying to "label" it. This is my hope.

It was very late but fun night after a very long day.

So the next day, we still had a pile of fireworks to light on our driveway. Being that we were all still pretty tired from the day before and neither boy had the patience to await until dark this time, we lit the fireworks up pretty early.


A few interesting things came out of our Day 2 celebrations in our yard.

Number One: Noah is still as much of a pyromaniac as ever. He even managed to figure out how to light his sparklers in the middle and make two sparks go out in either direction. He BEGGED us to let him light the bigger ones this year since "Now I'm TEN" but we told him that was a milestone for when he turns 13.

Number Two: Aaron actually held a sparkler this year. I couldn't believe it!











Number Three: Aaron learned that if you touch a burned out sparkler before it is cool, you will sustain burns that blister on three different fingers within a minute and need to spend the next hour with your hand in a bowl of cold water.

Number Four: We can figure out way for Aaron to NOT hide from night two of fireworks. After finding him hiding inside the house watching from the window, I convinced him to cover his ears with a pillow and then he could join us. He was thrilled with the idea and even made a game of it. I wonder how old he will be when the sound doesn't cause drama for him anymore.




So here we are...another 4th of July has come and gone. We are learning that sometimes a change in plans can be the best plan of all.

Tradition is a wonderful thing.

So is trying something new :)