The Fair

These are a little out of order, but oh well. Wednesday we went to the fair and actually let Evan ride some of the rides. I think we have a ride addict on our hands now. He loved it.

Brandon, Bryce, Evan and I did the bumper cars. The ride broke down a few times before we got on, but we had a pretty good run. Everybody in our group managed to steer okay so we didn't just have to sit in the middle the whole time.

My mom sacrificed her turn on the bumper cars so we could go, and amazingly she managed to get Kyle to fall asleep. He normally won't do that for anybody, but she said the creaking of the ferris wheel and all those fun carnival ride songs lulled him to sleep.

Evan liked the ferris wheel, but he kept wanting to stand up to look over the edge. Luckily my dad kept a good hold on him.

Here we are when we first arrived at the fair checking out the exotic animals. This was a zedonk, also called a zonkey (whichever you prefer).

Bryce took Evan in to pet the animals. He is getting so much braver. Before he wouldn't get real close, but this time he was walking right up to stuff by himself and petting them.
Evan got to ride his first roller coaster, and he did it all by himself. I was amazed that he walked up, handed the guy his ticket, and went and sat down. He is getting so grown up braving this stuff by himself (he even walked all the way to the top of the big slide thing and went down it by himself). It makes me happy to see him being brave and independent, but sad my baby is no longer a baby. I am definitely not ready for him to start school, so I guess I'm glad he misses the deadline and has another two years. Maybe I'll be ready for preschool next year....maybe.

Kyle got to do his first fair ride. He loved riding next to Evan once he realized that it was okay that the horses were going up and down.

Kyle trying to bolt before the exhaustion took over and he fell asleep.

Happy Belated Birthday

I know I'm a few days late on the post, but I wanted to put up a Happy 50th Birthday post to the best dad in the world. We've had so much fun together over the years, and it has been such a blast living close the past 5 years so that I could see him a lot.

It also means my kids get to see Pimpa a lot, and I get the joy of seeing him as a grandpa.
My boys adore him and I get the impression the feeling is mutual.
They always seem to have fun together.

Thanks for everything Dad, I love you!

For my Dad's birthday (and Bryce and Camille's 2nd anniversary!) we ventured up to the zoo. The weather wasn't the greatest, we did get a little wet, but we had fun. You'd think we wouldn't have to wear long pants and sweatshirts the end of July, but whatever. Evan loved the new spider web in the kid section.

The petting zoo was fun for some...Kyle was just trying to keep an eye on his bottle because a few of the goats looked like they were after it.

The highlight of the day...or one of them, the sharks. I'm so excited that this camera took some decent pictures of them. Here is Dad explaining some crazy shark fact I'm sure.

Evan posing with "the hugest shark in the world."

"Hiking"

We went "hiking" today with the boys. It was about a 1.5 mile loop all on a boardwalk with railings which was great. Evan walked most of it, and Kyle walked some. We were able to take a stroller for Kyle which worked out pretty well. They loved checking out the signs telling us what birds to look for. Evan needed to know the names of them all and also asked the names of all kinds of plants (luckily we were familiar with most of them). All in all it went well, so we may just brave another "hike" some time soon.

Soccer Stud

Evan has been doing pretty well at soccer practice the last few weeks. He loves having Camryn on the same team and they are both getting the hang of the game now which is fun. We have our first games this week, so stay tuned for updates.

Here they are trying to learn some aggressive behaviors to try to steal the ball from someone. Previously if someone had the ball the others would politely let them through.This is the coach giving Evan and Camryn some pointers I guess. They both look like they are listening intently (thanks for the photo Jamie).

This was a little before practice snack yesterday. The ice cream man came by and if one gets ice cream they both do. They both picked out the Spiderman ice cream and the report was that it was delicious. They had it everywhere by the time they were done, and Evan's face was still stained when he got to practice a few hours later. Oh well.

We're Still Here

I know we have been a little slow at posting lately. My excuse...we've been sick. Last week we added pink eye to the mix, so really we haven't been doing anything. We are on the mend though, and last night we ventured out to the fireworks at the capital. I had the boys in pajamas so they could go to sleep in the car on the way home and be put right in their beds. That worked quite well. I didn't plan on it, but they were dressed as twins, so we took some pictures. This is the best we could get because Kyle kept chasing the camera. I love that they both have juice boxes in hand too. We have some fun plans for later in the week, and if any of it materializes we will be sure to post some new pics.

Long Time No Post

Okay, I know it has been forever. Here is a quick update on what we've been up to. In the things we don't have pictures of category. We have had 4 infected ears (two for Evan, two for Kyle) and one case of tonsilitis (Kyle scored that one). Evan's ears and Kyle's throat were first, then a brief break for Mom and Dad to get sick , probably because we weren't sleeping, then Kyle decided to cut his fourth molar, which was followed promptly by the ear infection for him. Such a party. At this point we are almost completely healed.....I hope. In things we do have pictures of....Evan started soccer. Here he is in his outfit before the first practice. You can't see, but he has on Spongebob shin guards underneath the soccer socks. As of last night, it has been determined that his team name is the Fireworks. We'll see how things go once the games start, but so far it is very entertaining, and he is having a good time.

My great-aunt Juneal passed away the end of June. The boys and I went with my mom to the funeral and I got to sing and play. My mom showed me up and got to sing, and be a pallbearer. Not something girls get to do very often, so we took pictures to prove it. The funeral was good and it was fun to see some family from out of town.

The 3rd of July we went to the beach for one of my dad's science lessons. I swear he knows every animal you can find on the beach, and all about them. We used to go all the time when I was little for our oceanography lessons, and it has been fun to take Evan a couple of times now. He was brave this time and held a starfish and a little crab.

For the 4th (Brandon's b-day) we had our annual kayak races. Evan didn't participate, but he did get in some kayaking with "Pimpa" and cousin Isaac. Well, this one is out of order, but the night of the 3rd there is a local fireworks show that we always go to. This year all the cousins dyed their hair to look more patriotic. The fireworks were fun, but the singing and dancing before hand were great.

While watching fireworks on the 4th we had smores by the lake. Very fun and delicious. Here is Evan's prized creation. He was talking about making it all day long, and I think it lived up to the hype.Here we are watching fireworks (I just wanted evidence that I was there).

Headphones are great for fireworks. Kyle didn't need them because it didn't scare him, but Evan enjoyed using them again. We enjoyed putting them on Kyle, and he enjoyed taking them off.