Merry Christmas

I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas day!  We had a wonderful time with our family and later I might add some pictures of our day.  

Terwilliger Elementary School took a field trip to Macy's to write letters to Santa Clause.  Each letter written donated a dollar to the Make a Wish Foundation.  I have included the TV20 video of the event since Nathan got to be in it (probably because his answers were so silly).

Cane Days at Dudley Farms

Well I always seem to have problems getting these pictures in the right order.  Our pictures from Cane Days at Dudley Farms are actually in the opposite order that they were taken.  We went to visit a beautiful working farm that was actually built in the 1800s.  Jonathan's mom used to volunteer some of her time here so we like to visit when they have big events like Cane Days.  This is a state park that is currently in danger of having to close down so the boys and I were glad that we got to visit it with the Peine family.

This first picture is a of Nathan who found a tree to climb on the property.  He is growing up so fast.  I couldn't have imagined that he would be old enough to make his way into a tree already, but here he is.

Here is a picture of Gavin doing a spoon race with another visitor at Cane Days.  There was a lovely section open to show the kids the types of games that children used to play before they had things like video games or television.  They also had sack races and some small wooden toys to play with.

Here is a picture of Rosemary watching a young lady make corn husk dolls.  It seemed to take a long time, but it was neat to see how the parts of the corn that we would normally throw away be used to make a toy.  "Waste not, want not," is the appropriate statement for this scenario.

Here is a picture of Gavin grinding corn which will eventually turn into either corn meal or grits.  Even though Gavin is allergic to corn, he still enjoyed "playing" with the grinder.  It is funny that if we asked them to do this kind of thing at the house they would complain about it, but in this setting I had to practically drag them away.

Cane Days would not be complete without the boys having tasted some of the cane juice which was made shortly before we walked up to the table.  Yum!

Family Vacation- Zion National Park

After a sweltering night in Phoenix we went to pick up the RV.  It took us a while to get out of town and it was really late and dark by the time we finally got into Zion National Park.  

When we finally woke up in the morning this is some of the awesome scenery that we woke up to.  There are big mountains totally surrounding our site.  Even though there are some plants around it is really hot and somewhat barren out here.  It is awesome to visit, but I would not want to live out here.  

This rock is called "Red Arch" because of the arch made in the rock from erosion.  We saw this site on a Ranger guided shuttle tour through the park.  The tour was awesome and we learned so much about the park.

This is a picture of the boys with the park rangers that gave us our tour.  They were very friendly with us because Nathan was able to answer a lot of their questions they asked and because we happened to be sitting right next to them.  More proof that the GATOR NATION IS EVERYWHERE!!!  The ranger on the right, Adrienne, was a geology graduate of the University of Florida.  

Here are the boys playing in the Virgin River at the end of an easy mile long hike at Zion.  At this point the trail goes on into the narrows which is a hike you have to take through the river.  We stopped here so the kids could play in the water and rocks.  Gavin being as clumsy as he is, fell into the river twice.  He dried off quick in the heat of Utah.

Family Vacation- The Beginning

On July 24th we drove from Gainesville to Tampa to start our family vacation for the summer.  My father has graciously decided to take us all on a trip to visit some of the National Parks in Utah and Arizona.  We had a flight from Tampa to Phoenix, which was a little bit bumpy, but it was still a lot of fun.

Here is a picture of the boys on the plane.  They have both been on airplanes before, but they don't really remember it.

We stayed at the Embassy Suites which was a lot of fun but the temperature in Phoenix was 108 degrees even at 9:00 at night.  Even in a dry heat 108 is really hot!  The Embassy Suites had an awesome breakfast and the people who drove us around in the shuttle were really nice.

Nathan and Gavin were really excited about sleeping on a pull out bed at the hotel.  I guess we will see if they still enjoy that by the end of the trip.

4th Cousins' Day at Build-A-Bear Workshop

July 22nd was the last Tuesday that our family would be in town before mom had to get back to work.  Since this would be our last Cousins' Day of the summer we decided to do something extra special and we took a trip to the Build-A-Bear Workshop.  When we got there the kids almost instantly knew which animal they wanted to take home as their own.  Alec immediately picked out an Alaskan Husky dog which he later named "D" because dog starts with "D".  Annamae picked out a pink bear covered in white hearts which we named Princess although later she thought Bear would be a better name.  Nathan and Gavin both picked out Tyrannasaurus Rex animals.  Nathan named his T-Rex after his favorite "frenemy" Ron, and Gavin just wanted his to be named T-Rex.

Here are the kids at the fluffing station.  I think this is the part they liked to most where the got to brush their new friends and fluff the fur with an air blast.

Oh what a face!  This is the cheesy smile that Gavin picked up from his big brother.

After we finished all of our animals the nice lady at Build-A-Bear agreed to take our picture.  We were a very happy group.

Here are Nathan and Annamae playing at the mall playground.  We are having a "beary" busy day at the mall.  They played so hard that they were sweaty by the end.  Ewww!

Here is Alec!  What a handsome guy.

After we made our "bears" and played at the playground we had a yummy lunch at Chic-Fil-A.  It has been a big day for the group and after lunch we were ready to go home.  We were so glad to have time to play with our cousins this summer.

3rd Cousins' Day at the Library

On July 15th we had our third cousins' day where we met our cousins at the library.  Before we left Lola was barking like crazy outside of the house.  We went out to investigate what the problem was and we discovered that an armadillo was hiding from Lola by the big magnolia tree.  I didn't like the idea of the armadillo digging up the roots to our beautiful tree so I tried poking it with a stick so it would run away.  Apparently whatever was in the ground by the tree was more enticing than the fear of being poked with a stick and he just buried himself deeper in the ground.  Here is our Armadillo!

Here is the woman at the library who reads to us at story time.  She has a puppet called Candy Man and the kids love to sing the song for the puppet.  By our third time at the library the kids are familiar with the puppet and they are begging for him to be brought out.  

Here are Annamae, Alec, Malachi, and Aunt Laurel listening raptly to the story this week.  

I am not sure what is happening here, but I think it has to do with the fact that I asked Nathan to stop squirming around the room.  His personal protest to good behavior is to lie down on the ground and pout today.

Trip to Granny's House Day 4

On our last day at Granny's house we went to Josiah's 6th birthday party.  It was a skating birthday party and my kids are not really familiar with roller skating.  Gavin refused to even try to skate, but Nathan made a valiant attempt at it. 

Gavin and Cee Cee had lots of fun playing with the bubble machine that was set up.

Luckily my boys were not interested in getting their hair spray painted different colors!

For lunch at the party the kids got popcorn, pizza, and a rare treat: Sprite.

At the end of the party Nathan and Gavin got pretend swords which they still are using at home.  Unfortunately the drive home was longer than we expected even though we started the trip about thirty miles north of where we normally start.  We were so glad to finally be home with Daddy!  It was great to be home again, even though the trip was fun.

Trip to Granny's House Day 3

On day three of our trip to Granny's house we went with Josiah, Ceecee, Jeremiah, and Angie to swim at Grampa Art's house.  Later on I found out that some people complained that there was such a "baby of diaper age" in the pool so unfortunately Grampa Art was fined and we won't be able to swim there any more.  Oh well... it was fun while it lasted.

Trip to Granny's House Day 2

Today Nathan, Gavin and I got to visit a really fun place called Bounce-U.  It is a place full of different bounce house types of games.  There was a giant slide, boxing ring, obstacle course, baseball, basketball, and did I mention the giant slide?  (The slide was my personal favorite.)  Josiah, Cee Cee, Jeremiah, and Angie went with us and it was a lot of fun.  Unfortunately we were going so fast on the big slide that I couldn't get a picture that wasn't blurry.  Oh well... here are some other pictures of our day.

This is Nathan is some strange sort of web tube.  He crawled up to the top web level even though it took him a lot of time.  Once the Bounce-U employee taught him how to climb up he was really good at it.

This is Gavin playing baseball.  The ball stayed suspended in the air so just had to swing.

Home run!!!

After all of the bouncing the kids got to have a snack.

After the trip to Bounce-U we had lunch at Panera and then we stopped by the orange grove store to get some yummy orange ice cream.  We went back to Josiah, Cee Cee and Jeremiah's house to play a little bit.  Nathan was invited to spend the night and Gavin had a "Special Night" at Granny's house with Granny and Mommy.  We went to have dinner and then Gavin got to pick a movie, had popcorn and drew pictures.  He got to do just about anything he wanted to for his "Special Night."  Of course Gavin loves his big brother so much that he didn't choose to do anything that he thought Nathan would really miss out on.

Meanwhile, Nathan got to stay with Josiah for a big boy's sleep over.  Nathan was excited to borrow some of Josiah's pajamas.  He picked the Spider Man outfit, but I think he got the wrong shorts.  Oh well... he enjoyed himself.

The evening wasn't quite as fun for Granny and me.  I spent a lot of time trying to fix the air conditioner in the Infiniti, and Granny was stressing out about her brand new washing machine which was leaking all over the laundry room.  That part of the night wasn't quite as fun as the rest of the day, but even with those mishaps it was overall another great day!

Summer Trip To Granny's House Day 1

We love to come and visit Granny Frannie.  Even though she is at work this week, we are still blessed to spend time with our oldest friends Josiah, Cici and Jeremiah!  Here are some pictures of the time we spent together on Day 1.

Gavin is picking out a water gun.  For the most part the 

Dollar Tree water guns were no match for the kids.  Most

of the guns were destroyed by the end of the morning!

Nathan and Josiah battling with their floats.

Josiah, Nathan, and Cici making human bridges.  The theory

was that by standing on top of the ridges there would be more water.

Nathan and Cici waiting in line to go down the big water slide.

Nathan went down the big slide, but held on so he didn't have

to go under the water.  It is still a little scary for him.

Jeremiah isn't big enough to hang with the older kids,

but he still had a lot of fun.

Nathan, Josiah, and Gavin in the water.

What cute smiles!

The crew at the end of the night.  What a ton of fun.

Cousin Trip to Poe Springs

We are lucky enough to have some time to spend with our cousins this summer.  We have been meeting at the library for story time on Tuesdays.  On this particular Tuesday, Grandma Lisa took time off and we all went to swim and picnic at Poe Springs after story time.

Annamae and Gavin sitting next to each other during the picnic.  Yummy yogurt!

Alec and Nathan at the picnic having some yogurt 

and a special picnic drink made by Grandma Lisa.

Gavin on the lobster float.  Nathan is practicing snorkeling in the back.

The water camera got fuzzy so this is the only picture of Nathan

that came out at all.  He was real excited that he could 

see under the water with his new goggles!

After the cool swim we had a sweet watermelon snack.  

What a fun day.

My First Attempt At Blogging

This is a totally lame attempt at my first blog.  It is a decision based on mommy guilt.  After seeing how cute the Peine family blog is I felt like I should do a better job of letting my friends and family know what my kids were up to, so here it goes. 

This is a picture that Jonathan took of the boys in our dogwood tree as it was blooming earlier this spring.  You can't really see how pretty the dogwood is, but you can see the boys!

This is a picture of the boys making a homemade drum set out of the objects in the recycling bin.  Nathan loves to reuse things around the house.  It is part of his passion to be environmentally friendly.  He also refuses to use paper towels and likes to lecture me about how I should car pool more often.