New family photos...

While Marmee was out taking photos with Auntie Mick and her family this weekend, we asked her to return the favor. She graciously stepped into photographer mode and took some wonderful new family portraits for us to treasure. Here's some of Auntie Mick's awesome shots (thanks Michelle- I couldn't have gotten these without you!):

Then because a few photos never seem to be enough for me, I grabbed the camera back and took even more photos of my adorable boys!

The Little Misters LOVE their Daddy and their Daddy puts up with my incessant need to take pictures of him! Hooray for Daddy.

Loving these! They're already off to the photo printer so we can get them framed and hung on our walls.

Lucius & crying...

True story:
My three (almost four) year old has a bit of a crying/ fussing/whining problem.
This weekend I was flipping channels and Tom Hanks starts yelling a classic movie line. Interesting, I could use this... Seriously: two days later and we haven't heard one inkling of crabbiness. Why?!?
Cause this Marmee says to him the moment he might usually get upset "there's no crying in baseball! There's no CRYING in baseball!"

Yup, true story.

Highland water tower...

My Aunt Melanie called me on Saturday to tell me about a fun adventure she knew we'd like. I love these kind of phone calls, not only do I get to catch up with my aunt but we usually end up adventuring. She let us know about the Highland Water Tower which is only open two weekends a year for visitors. Sunday (yesterday) we canceled our original plans and headed out. Auntie Mick & family came along on the climb.

 

 
We climbed the 151 stairs (thanks Melanie for counting them cause we forgot to count) to the observation deck. It was fun to see both Downtowns, Minneapolis and St. Paul, AND the airport. We watched planes come in and land and take off. WE also had to check out the views from each and every window.

downtown Minneapolis

 

downtown Saint Paul

What a fun adventure. I know the boys have been missing climbing towers since coming home from Italy- so it was extra special to show them one here in our "own back yard". 

A Cave Adventure...

Oma and Auntie Dana met us at the house last Saturday morning. The boys loaded into Oma's car to talk someone else's ear off, while Marmee and Daddy enjoyed a little silence in our own car. Oma followed behind us on a short hour long road trip to Wisconsin to see the Crystal Cave.

Oliver loved the last cave we saw in southern Mn. Since Lucius wasn't able to join us last time, we figured it would be fun to try a new cave. It was a pretty fun cave, complete with small bats hanging from the ceiling. There were quite a few large "rooms" in the cave that we stopped to admire.

 

A fun adventure made more exciting sharing it with Oma and Auntie Dana.

Quoteable: Hideous...

Lucius has rediscovered play dough at ECFE. He's a huge fan. We were playing with it at home the other night and Lucius held up his play dough creation and said to daddy:

"look... I made a hideous creature"

Okay, where did that sentence come from?

Tree Swing...

I tied a rope to the tree in the front yard. The boys tried swinging on it and were injured one too many times.

So I decided to look for a piece of wood to tie to the rope. I found an old stool top and drilled a hole in the middle of it. The boys were super excited to have a swing in our front yard. Lucius likes having the new tree swing all to himself in the mornings while Oliver's learning at school.

Lucius, one on one...

Lucius and I have a bunch of one on one time together while Oliver's at school. The last few days it's been glorious out so we've walked Oliver to school. It's about a twenty minute walk from our house to his school and we're usually early, which means we get to spend a few minutes on the school playground. When the bell rings, we let Oliver get into his classroom and we head back home. Usually we walk to another playground on the way home to play, but there hasn't been any other kids to play with. So he plays alone.

Occasionally we go home and all he wants to do is play "the hippo game" as he calls it.

He's very in love with the one on one time and all the extra attention he gets. There's also a lot of time he gets a quiet house to play whatever he wants without having to fight to take turns with his brother. Lucius enjoys the solitude and can very easily entertain himself for quite a long time.