cousin ingrid was there to supervise :)

i’m five!

oreos, licorice, gumdrops…

pretzels and nana’s special cake and frosting.

ta da!!!

Supposedly the studio will be ready July 1st.  Hmm…we’ll see about that.

Stay tuned!!!

Love the 70 degree days we’ve been having, my flowers blooming, I even love the occasional booming thunderstorms.  Good for snuggling.

Driving with the roof open and the windows down…

Going to the zoo.  Love the Vilas zoo!

***

(Or my mom.  You’re it)!

Our 17-hour car ride to Florida took 19 with the kids.  Not bad, I guess.  However, the first two hours really made us sweat. 

We weren’t even to Rockford, and Charlie was non-stop. 

“Where are we?”  “What city are we in?”  “What city is next?”  “What city is after that?”  “I’m hungry.”   “I need a snack.”  “I want something healthy and crunchy.”  “Can I use your iPhone?”  “I dropped my dog”.  ”MOM!  get my dog!”  “I’m calling dad.”  “Where’s dad?”  “How long ’til we get there?”  “What city is next?”  ”When are we going to be in Florida?”  “I dropped my frog”.  “MOM!  Get my frog!”  “Where’s my ditty bag.”  “Mom, mom, mom, MOM!…WHERE is is Harold and the Purple Crayon?”  “And where’s my pillow?”  Where’s my blankie?”  “I need to get cozy.”  “I’m so cold!!!”  “Ugh!  Now I’m sooooo hot.”  “Mom, I need to roll down the window.”  “Can we watch a movie?”  “It’s mmyyyyyy turn to pick the movie!”  “Where are we?”  “I have to pee.” 

STOP.

[2 miles later]

“I have to poop.”

STOP.

[2 miles later] Grayson:  “I have to poop.”

STOP.

[5 miles later] Charlie:  “I’m hungry.  I want something  just crunchy.”  And so on, and so on.  After about 3 hours, they were great.  But whoa, for a while,

WHOA.

**********

**********

This is how Mrs. Popo came about:

Driving down I-57 south, somewhere in Illinois I think, Charlie asked where we were.  I replied, “Paw Paw”. 

Grayson:  Hee-haw!!!  

“Paw Paw!, Poo-Poo!, Popo!  Hahahahahahahaha.  Mommy, you’re a Popo!”

Hee-haw!!!

And somehow, everything became all about Popo. 

For the next 10 days. 

We came to realize that Popo actually really = butt.  And there was a lot of butt talk. 

***

And unfortunately, there still is!

***

It truly, was like re-living my tweenage years with Mikey (aka. Grayson). 

Laughing at his own jokes, everything is a butt, a butt-face, a poop-face, do you want to smell my butt?  etc., etc.

Seriously?  I do not know where they learn this stuff.  It must be an innate boy-thing.

I think for the next 15 hours down to Florida, my mom and I entertained ourselves with, [and where] …Mrs. Popo could really go…

{Mrs. Popo goes to Washington; Mrs. Popo goes insane;  you get it}.  Funny only if you were there, I guess.

**********************

I think I need another vacation.

 simply put, they are amazing.  i’ve seen them three times now, and it never gets dull!

This is inside a very large cargo plane of some sort.

Practicing his hand signals?   Do you like his outfit?

Pitting the plane.

Really old fighter helicopters.

Fascination with the helicopters, that’s for sure!

I’m not sure who was more fascinated though.  Can you imagine?

We learned a lot from Grandpa!!

Interesting old engines…

Lots of fighter planes…

I loved that Grayson was the only one to figure out that this sea-plane had *eyes*.

At the controls.

 I bet inside the naval museum there were 300 different kinds of airplanes and helicopters for the kids to sit in.

Dad-o reminded me that my Grandpa Thayer had flown a 132 in WWII.  It was pretty cool to see that plane hanging from the ceiling.  Of course, I didn’t get a picture of it.  Grrr…

My monkeys could have gone from plane to plane all day!!!  Mom intervened…back to the beach kids!

I cannot wait to take them back when they are about 8 or 9 years old.  The space stuff was amazing, as were the IMAX movies and simulators.  Pretty cool stuff for little boys!

Honestly?  The only memorable thing that happened today, was when the boys and I were grocery shopping, and Charlie asked me what Grayson was *eating*.  Sure enough, Grayson was in his *car* grocery cart (kinda like driving a dog-sled, if you ask me), and he is munching on a rather large fig newton of some sort.  He found it on the floor of his *car*, he said.

Seriously?  I almost threw-up in aisle 4.

We’ll see what kind of strange disease he gets this week.

******************************

BTW, adorable letterpress notecard in picture is from sycamore street press.  They have really cute things! 

IMHO.

bill + the kids and i  spent saturday morning with them.  it was AWESOME. 

To add to the mix, was their little diva cousin, born just three days after these little guys.  So 4 babies, born 3 days apart, together for a picture.  I think I lost 5 lbs. just sweating through the morning, stressing about getting…anything!  It’s hard enough trying to capture one baby, let alone four!

Can’t forget about big brother Sam, Grayson’s little buddy.  Such a dear and totally adorable!!  Until next time kids!

We now own every single die-cast car from Cars, but it was well worth it.

We had them all lined up on our mantel, and every time he pooped in the potty, Grayson got to pick one out and bring down to play.  Seriously?  One day, he literally pooped six times (each the size of a tootsie roll) just so he could get them all down. 

He’s no dummy!