I brought my camera to another t-ball game, and therefore am going to torment you with more adorable photographs of the boys playing. For the last three games of the season, the coaches pitch the ball (unless the kid really just can’t manage to hit it, then they bring out the tee.) I am proud to say that in the two innings of the game (an inning = each kid up to bat once) each of my boys hit the ball that was pitched to him at least once. It almost seemed like it was easier for some of the kids to hit a moving target rather than the stationary tee. Who knows.

The light is so gorgeous at this time of evening, I can’t help but take a ton of pictures.

The trickiest part of taking pictures is that I have to shoot through the chain-link fence, and my lens likes to grab focus on the fence. Or else you get the weird chain linky haze. But I did my best. I used my 85mm for these, but I’d love to rent a nice 200mm or something fancy like that for one game.

Now I’ve got them eating fruit! Homemade cherry and blueberry popsicles.

Because I am now a parenting expert. I have figured out how to get the boys to try new things! Wait, I should probably not write this post now, because I know as soon as I do, they will stop trying new things. Maybe I should wait. Hmmm.

Let me just say that twice this week, I’ve tested out my new method, and twice, (most of) the boys have eaten new foods. After the salmon burgers Monday night, it was fried fish last night. Homemade fried fish. Even Miles tried it this time! Can’t blame them, it was delicious. Mostly because our oven seems to be broken, so instead of oven-fried fish like I was planning, they got real fried fish. Oh man, was it good.

Why is bowling so expensive? The boys want to go bowling, and so I did some research on local bowling alleys. Uh, $80 to go bowling with my family? I think I’ll just go buy one of these.

Yeesh.

What kind of chores can you make a 5 year old do to earn video game time? The boys have been playing wayyy too much Wii. In fact, the reason they want to go bowling is because they played it on the Wii. So I think it’s time we make them earn some time to play. I’m hesitant to put things like “get your own damn socks on” because that’s something they should be doing anyway, not just as a way to earn a reward. Maybe it should be stuff I wouldn’t otherwise expect them to do, like “clean up your pee puddles from the bathroom floor.”

What races should I do this year? I’m getting back into running, post-surgery, and I am starting to consider what races I want to do in the fall and winter. (I do not run outside in the summer as a rule.) I definitely want to do the Jazz Half Marathon that I PR’ed last year, and the Woman’s Half-Marathon in Baton Rouge. And then my sister was talking about maybe coming for the Louisiana (half) Marathon in January. But while I seem to do a lot of half-marathons, I really prefer doing shorter races. I’d love to get a new PR in the 5k. Maybe even, gasp, try to break the 30 minute barrier? My current PR is 32:xx, so that won’t be easy. But if I do lots of speed work on the treadmill over the summer, maybe in the fall I can do it. Hmm.

A friend of mine has been having a challenging time getting one of her twin daughters potty trained. I suggested that she try backing off any kind of pressure (or even any mention of potty training) to said daughter, but to keep her out of diapers and pull-ups and just go with the flow (HA HA HA). (Yeah, like I’m some kind of potty training expert. I failed once and then let daycare do it for me.) Anyway, it started me thinking about how potty training and eating are the two things you just can’t force kids to do (someone told me that once and MAN is it true) so I thought, I need to apply that to the boys’ pickiness.

So last night at dinner, I made salmon burgers for the first time. I gave the boys a hot dog, a piece of bread, milk and that’s it. And I put a salmon burger, cut into quarters (easier than thirds) in the middle of the table. George and I sat and ate our burgers with some brussels sprouts (I wasn’t even going to try to get them to eat those) and when the boys were done with their hot dogs, I told them they could have some of the salmon burger.

To my never ending surprise, Linus took a piece (sans bun) and ate it! The other two watched him intently and asked, “do you like it?” When he answered in the affirmative, Oliver took a piece. He nibbled a bit and looked unsure. He said, “I’m not sure if I like it.” I suggested he try another bite, after which he declared, “you know what? I do like it.” And he and Linus proceeded to finish the burger.

!!!!

I was stunned. And giddy. Miles wouldn’t taste it, and somehow he’s turned into the picky one, but whatever. I’m going to lay off the pressure. Not even talk about it. And wouldn’t you know, it worked. Time will tell, of course, if this is a one-off. Fingers crossed it’s not!

I’ve had two great weekends in the past few weeks. How lucky am I? And I still haven’t blogged about my 20 year reunion, which I really want to, if only for my memories.

This weekend was a trip to a house on a lake in Mississippi. I don’t know the story of this lake, I wonder if it’s manmade (at least partially) because, let’s face it, Mississippi isn’t known for its lakes or anything. I don’t think so. But my friend Heather found this house and suggested a getaway, so seven of us went for the weekend.

It was basically heavenly. We ate, drank, and soaked our way through the days.

My friend Teresa and I left after work on Friday. It was only a little over an hour away, which was nice. As soon as we got there, we changed into our bathing suits and hit the hot tub. Ahhhh, good stuff.

I didn’t take a ton of pics because most of the time I was in the hot tub, and I didn’t want to give my phone or camera a bath, but I took a few…

Heather and Teresa in the hot tub:

and in the lake (shudder)

I can’t say it was a particularly restful weekend, since we went to bed at 2am and were woken by the sun at 8:30 each morning. But it was relaxing.

Clouds rolling in before the storm!

Saturday was just spent hot-tub-side, and Heather and I went for a jaunt around the lake in the little pedal-boat thingy. It rained here and there, and the evening was spent largely playing Cards Against Humanity and laughing hysterically.

Good times!

Everything changed. I’ll never forget that crazy day! My OB told us to go have a drink after that appointment. Both of us. Seriously. Only in New Orleans.

Yesterday was the boys’ last day of preschool. Next year they’ll be in kindergarten. I’m not as emotional about it as I probably should be, because truthfully, for them, preschool has been so much like “real school” that the only difference next year will be no nap. Which is fine by me. Less stuff to wash and keep track of.

But I also love to reminisce, and love to compare pictures and see how they’ve grown, etc, etc, etc. (As I was rushing around school yesterday morning trying to get photos of the boys with each of their teachers and assistant teachers, another mom was watching me and we were laughing at the thought of me doing this is twelve years. But you know me. I surely will be.

So here are the boys outside the school, right before we went in. (I kind of wish they were wearing their uniforms here, just for consistency, but oh well.)

And in October…

Walking in…

And in August…

And with their teachers…
Miles

Oliver

Linus

After school, I took the boys to Sucre, a local dessert place, for cupcakes and/or ice cream. The resulting mess has me predicting we are now banned from the premises. And then we went to a playdate at a local park with Linus’s classmates. So fun, the boys didn’t want to leave!

I haven’t really blogged in a while, so I need to break this down into manageable chunks. This is gonna be all over the place.

1. We went to a birthday party at the Cool Zoo (the splash park at the Audubon Zoo) on Saturday morning. Last time I took the boys, they were kind of timid about it. (Shocking, I know.) I think that was two summers ago. This year, they (metaphorically) dove right in and had a blast. And therefore, so did I! So glad I wore my bathing suit. They even went down a couple of water slides! Color me shocked. I may actually shell out the dough to take them back later this summer.

At the bottom of the alligator slide.

On the way out, being all cute ‘n’ stuff in their towels.

2. My mom and I took them for haircuts Saturday afternoon, and due to Linus’s two crazy cowlicks (the other two only have one each), he got the bowl cut. Which looks so dorky it comes right back around to adorable. At least to his mommy.

Here he is with the fish he caught with Larry.

3. My high school reunion was over a week ago, and I haven’t written much about it. I really want to write a whole post about it so I don’t forget how great it was. Sigh…

4. This weekend, I’m going out of town with some girlfriends to a lake house. Okay, that makes it sound grander than it probably is, but I like to sound fancy. But there’s a hot tub that I’m going to park myself in for approximately 48 hours. I cannot wait.

5. School ends tomorrow. I’m glad (no more hour long commute!) but also sad. Hopefully we’ll be able to arrange some playdates with their friends over the summer. But camp starts Wednesday, and the boys are excited about that. I am too, except for the parts where I have to pack their lunch and wash bathing suits and towels constantly. But I’ll be able to go to the gym a little later in the morning (5:30 instead of 5) and I’ll actually get to work on time! I’m sure my boss is excited about that part too.

6. My friend Terry and her family moved away yesterday. I’m very sad about it. Her husband is in the Coast Guard, but they were hoping to get assigned to New Orleans again. Alas, they are going back to their hometown, which is good for them. I can only hope that in three years, they’ll be back again.

Terry and I have been friends since about 2002, I guess. She and Rob, her husband, lived across the street from the pub, so we saw them a lot. I have so many good memories with her, and it doesn’t take me long to compile a long list of reasons she’s such a great friend.

– When the boys were tiny and she and her family would come visit (they were stationed in Texas from 2006-2010 or so, I can’t remember exactly) she would always come help with them. I can remember sitting up late with her, feeding tiny babies in the wee hours of the night.
– She would take me shopping on the Navy base by our house. Or we’d go to the gym there. Or take the kids swimming.
– When I wanted to do something fun for my birthday, but everyone else on earth was watching some LSU football game, she came with me to the movies. Bonus: She taught me how good hot sauce on popcorn is.
– When her mom would come visit at Christmas, she’d always bring me a bag of homemade tamales. Except this year, they didn’t make them. I’m still bitter.
– She came over to help potty train the boys. Granted, we failed, but jeez, she gave up a Saturday to get peed on by three little boys!

Basically, she has always been there for me. And while writing this, I’ve started to realize how much better a friend she is to me than I have been to her. I could write a list a mile long, but I’ll just leave it at that.

Adios, ho!

No Uniforms!, a photo by pyjammy on Flickr.

For the last four days of school, the kids don’t have to wear uniforms. The boys jumped out of bed this morning, excited to pick out their clothes. (Linus has already informed me he wants to wear his shirt every day. I hope other parents are reading this so they’ll know I’m planning to wash it every night. I swear.)

But Millie wins with the best outfit. Sparkly headband? Check. Rainbow shirt? Check. Lace skirt over studded leggings with gladiator sandals? Check, check, and check.

This weekend was my 20th high school reunion, and it was so much fun. Thanks to my mad Photoshop skillz (don’t look too closely), I was able to get a picture with a bunch of us in it. Ain’t technology wonderful?

A much longer post is coming soon about the weekend…

The boys had their end of school picnic on Monday, and man was it cute. Lemme show you.

First, all the kids in their grade sang together. There’s Miles!

Oliver and one of his buddies held hands as they walked off. His mom and I were standing next to each other, dying over it.

And then Linus’s class performed. His teacher went all out for this. They were in costume, either Lions or Birds, and each group did a dance. It was pretty intricate, and I’m kicking myself for not having a video of it. (I chose to take photos instead. If only I could have done both.)

Here they were getting ready. Linus loved his wings. Who wouldn’t?

(I mean, really. The kid is just so freaking happy.)

Oliver loved his brother’s costume as well.

The performance:

He could never not watch me.

Taking a bow

After the performance, the boys and Millie sort of posed for a picture…

And Oliver got his face painted. That’s Spiderman. Kind of an abstract representation, you know.

Can’t believe another year is almost over!