Memorial Weekend

Memorial weekend means Camping Season has officially commenced!!  3 days of "roughing it" at a campground that has everything imaginable to keep kids entertained.  Plus we had great weather, it was a little chilly but that didn't stop the kids from swimming for hours.

Another year of catching gigantic fish in Yogi's pond.

Kade and Charlie

Mason and Harper inspecting the caught fish.

Kade, JB and Charlotte

Mason trying his luck (he didn't have any).

Erik took Mason and Harper for a walk and discovered a dance party going on with Yogi, Cindy and Boo Boo!  Here they are patiently waiting for the giant bears to turn around.

Erik decided to put a rubber mouse on the end of Mason's pole.  Every time he cast his line he would yell, "Look!  I caught a mouse!!  Take a picture!!"

These two...inseparable.

The big kids discovered a bridge down the road from our sites and spent hours pretending they were trolls under the bridge.

Tucker and Kade

Charlie, Kade and Tucker.

Soon to be FIRST GRADERS!

These two...again.

Can't get enough of their friendship!  

I think Kade and Charlie were meant to meet in order for Mason and Harper to become friends.  

Cindy getting some loving from the littles.

I noticed Kade's line was tangled and the pole was laying in the grass.  It had probably been there for hours.  As I was reeling it in/untangling the line, I discovered a fish was caught on the hook!  My first catch of the season!!

Mason and Charlotte

JB's got the right idea, sit in the middle and let the kids do all the work!  

Unfortunately it got a little hectic at the end and we forgot to take a group picture.  It was a great time, the kids had fun and the parents even got to relax by the fire every night because the kids wore themselves out all day!  Can't wait to go again soon!

Yesterday I joined Kade and his class for their field trip.  It was the one beautiful day in the last 2 weeks, I swear!  We went to Quarry Hill to learn about all things nature, then on to Chester Woods for a picnic and a couple hours of play.  It was a great day, Kade and I were exhausted after all that walking, playing and fresh air!!

Big day for the big boy, it was his day to be Line Leader and he definitely had a big role to fill!  Lots of lines formed for all of the different nature walks!

Waiting for the puppet show to begin.

It was a great day to be Line Leader...guess whose hand is in that bat.

Yep!  It's Kade!  

You can sort of see his face in the crack on the left.

Taking their bow after their fantastic puppet show.

First stop on the tour was the Butterfly Garden.

Here they are acting like butterflies.

Kade and his buddy Tyeson.

Next stop on the tour was the insect garden.

Biggest, juiciest worm of the day!

Boys and their bugs.  

Disgusting.

I didn't take any pictures of the Chester Woods portion.  I was in charge of Kade and 2 of his classmates so I was too busy chasing them down to have to time to whip out my camera.

I did manage to take a few pictures of Kade's class when they are all FINALLY sitting down!

Whoops, forgot to include the teacher!

That's better.

Gotta do a funny face!

Can't forget to include the little man Mason!

He's turned a major corner in swimming lessons.  He's finally warmed up to the teacher and now he can't get enough of the water!!  So proud of the brave boy!!

He jumped in 3 times!  On the 3rd time he jumped in from the standing position and went completely under water.  The only kid in the class to do that!!

Before Kade started school, I had 2 days off a week.  We'd spend 1 day cleaning, running errands, etc. and the 2nd day we'd do something fun.  Once he started school we had to change our schedules to accommodate the bus schedule so now I get just 1 day off a week.  Unfortunately that means most of the time Mason spends his day off with me doing chores.  Last week we took a break from jobs and spent the day at the National Eagle Center.  We called up G&G C and took a mini-road trip!

Trying to see what an eagle sees.

Eagle Eye Mason!

This was so cool!  

The eagles were so close we could touch them!  Not that we would because, holy cow, they're huge!  And those talons could do some damage!!

Remember what I said about those talons?  Yikes!

Afterwards we went out to eat the restaurant featured in the movie "Grumpy Old Men"!

Can't leave the big boy out of this week's post!

Mason is still securely in his "Daddy Only" phase, especially at bedtime.  We all gather in Mason's room for bedtime prayer then, without fail, Mason will say, "My want Daddy to lay with me".  It's just not worth the battle to try to take a turn myself.  I kiss his delicious cheeks, then Kade and I head downstairs to his room.  I'm not going to lie, I don't mind this phase of Mason's because that means I get Kade all to myself!  And that's a rare occurrence these days!

I tuck him in under all of his blankets, lay down next to him and proceed to ask him about his day.  Instead of just saying, "how was your day", I ask him 3 questions:

1.  What was your best part of the day?
2.  What was your worst part of the day?
3.  What was the funniest part of the day?

He's usually prepared right away for the best part.  It's almost always about phy-ed or recess and how his team won whatever game they were playing.  He goes into great detail about how he made the winning score (I have no idea if he's feeding me full of lies--no doubt there's a great deal of exaggeration--but I appreciate his enthusiasm for his greatness!).

His worst part is usually about how some kid was naughty at school or said something mean to him.  Every once in awhile he'll admit that his bad behavior was the worst part of his day.  We try not to dwell on the worst part, but it gives me good insight to how he's being treated at school by his peers.  So far, so good on that end!

He can never think of a funniest part.  I'll ask him if he ever laughed during the day and he can never remember what it was about.  However, judging by the conversations I've heard him have with his friends, and with Mason, I'm guessing everything funny had to do with the words butt, fart or poop.  Seriously, what is it with boys and those words?!?

I love this time of day with Kade.  He talks freely, tells me everything on his mind and he's always happy at this time of night.  If it wasn't awkward or weird, I'd do tuck-ins with him every night for the rest of his life :-)

A couple weeks ago the boys started swimming lessons.  I figured Mason was ready.  He's got no fear of the water--every time we've gone swimming he jumps in without anyone catching him, he goes under no problem and he swims away from us all the time.

I assumed he'd be even better at swimming lessons than Kade was when he was 3 years old because he's never been shy like Kade.  Turns out I was WAY way wrong.  Kade's always been shy, the kind of shy that used to cry when a stranger talked to him.  Mason is the kind of shy that just shuts down.  If he doesn't look at the person, make any facial expression, or any movement at all he assumes the stranger will go away.  That kind of shy is not conducive to the swim instructor taking Mason in the water for one-on-one time.

The first week he just cried the whole time, never going near the water.  At the end, I just put him the pool with the instructor where he screamed at the top of his lungs the entire time. The second lesson he still wouldn't get in the pool without me putting him in there, however he only screamed half the time.  Tonight is lesson 3.  He's already informed me he's not getting in but I'm hoping that when I put him in there will be no more crying.  Fingers crossed!!

Kade, on the other hand, is doing great!  He's swimming the full length of the pool, doing 6 laps at a time for all of the different strokes.  The instructor works them hard and by the end the kids are exhausted.  But he's got a smile on his face the whole time.  Hopefully next year Mason will be over his shyness because I think he'll be a great swimmer as well.

I don't have any pictures of swimming lessons because I spend the entire 30 minutes of Mason's lesson trying to coax him in the water.  And the entire 30 minutes of Kade's lesson making sure Mason doesn't disappear!

I do, however, have this super cute picture of Mason taking his favorite lady on a cruise...on a lawn mower....with his dad driving.  

Ladies Man.

Kade's music teacher had a mini recital last week of the songs they've been singing all year.

Kade, of course, was too shy to really let loose.  He looks like the kid who's too cool to perform.  I assure you, at home, he is not too cool!