Missing...

Has anyone seen my baby?!? I took some pictures of him on the brown swing today and looking at them, he's becoming a big kid already! His words are coming and he's always up for having fun with the big kids. All 3 have been spending more and more time outside in the afternoons and evenings and I'm not complaining! The porch, the swings and the patio have been getting a workout.

Feed the Birds!

The birdseed box is still going! Our house may never recover but Lincoln is entertained over and over pretty much everyday for big chunks of time. While Lincoln loves filling bottles, hiding a golf ball then pushing it up so all the seeds spill out of the funnel and pouring seeds Otto loves to spread them everywhere and dumping them on the trampoline. Watching them have fun and all the learning is, thus far, making the mess worth it.

Progress!

So I've been mentioning Otto's daily swimming lessons for weeks. As is pretty much common knowledge, he LOVES to swim. What Otto doesn't love is to float. In order to save his life should he take a dive in a pool in same 2 seconds it takes him to do everything else he does around the house he needs to learn how to float on his own. This week he finally quit yelling at his teacher about it. He even flashed a smile!

After swimming we got home in time for our plants to be delivered and trees planted. We still have to figure out the exact layout and we have a couple more plants we want to get but we have the bed prepped and ready to go. I'm loving our new little Live Oak and Japanese Blueberry trees!!

Remember those library books the kids were excited about? Well, we've read them enough that today when Lincoln had story time with Grandma he did the reading! After a fun week, including a lunch date with Lincoln and Nora yesterday, this evening we drove Susan to the airport so she could head back to Ohio.

Tree Shopping

After shuttling Nora back and forth to and from Yoga, and Kyle got all three stumps out we were excited to move on to the next step in our developing landscape plan. I don't know if I should call it special time or just plain being a trooper...but Lincoln came along with us this afternoon to a tree nursery. Otto was napping and Nora asked to stay home with Grandma. I'm not sure what he might have been envisioning when he happily agreed to come but I'm pretty sure it didn't live up to his expectations. Kyle and I liked checking out trees and plants and coming up with a plan of what we want to add to the yard, Lincoln liked driving around in the golf cart! After we ordered 2 new trees, some bushes and grasses we headed home, but made a detour to Jeremiah's first! Lincoln's choice - red of course! We had dinner out on the patio tonight. It's been really hot during the day but it's starting to feel like it might break soon with breezy and slightly cooler evenings. Fall is in the air...almost!

Friday Fun!

After swim this morning we went made a special stop at the Glass Knife - AKA "Cake and Cafe" by the kids. The boys got to pick out donuts and drinks and we got extras to bring home. Lincoln did so well ordering and they were great while we sat and shared a monster donut. After our special snack we headed home to trim Cort's nails and head to his vet appointment.

All three boys were awesome at the vet and we were all happy to see Jessica for a few minutes when she popped in to say hi! Later this afternoon Susan came back and the kids were really excited to see her and share all their library books with her! Tonight we went out to eat at one of Nora's favorites, Shake Shack. Unfortunately we missed sunset but it was still a beautiful night out on their back patio on the lake. Pretty good start to the weekend!

Two a Days!

Just your average Thursday evening pool-side at the Y! Not pictured - Nora with her head underwater while the teacher gives instructions and Otto climbing the back of a lounge chair! At least the weather was beautiful!!

Library Day

While Hurricane Michael barrels ashore in the panhandle we're just getting some rain bands and tropical skies. This afternoon after picking Nora up from school we headed over to the library. The kids spent time playing and picking out some books to get while I went in search of some seasonal books and whatever else might jump out at me to mix up our reading list a little. I'm always nervous going straight from school to anywhere and today was no exception, but it went just fine and the kids were great! Otto made it clear when he was ready to go though. We're not expecting anything more in the way of weather from the giant storm but are thinking of everyone in it's path, this is not going to be good for anyone up there. There's been a request for a standby team for Child Life Disaster Relief and Children's Disaster Services but I feel like I'm still playing catch up from the last deployment a bit so as much as it tugs at me a bit to go, I'm going to sit this one out. Besides, Nora in her infinite wisdom told me that there are other helpers ready and waiting to go and it's my turn to rest this time.