QOTD

B: This one is my favorite cup!

A: MY favorite cup is mommy.

B: Mommy isn't a cup!

A: Yes she is. She's a buttercup!

QOTD

QOTD, courtesy of Preston as Archer is opening the car door for me:

"Archer will be able to find a woman to marry very easily. But then he's going to have to open doors for her for the rest of his life."

Almost Spring

We spent this past weekend camping at the ski mountain for the boys' ski race finals. 1 day of fun skiing in beautiful sunny weather + 2 days of racing in beautiful sunny weather = the boys are not ready for the season to end! They were starting to get a little burned out on skiing, but now they just aren't quite ready for it to be done. We have one more day...kind of a wrap up, fun day, and that's that. 

But don't worry. They won't be bored. Soccer practice started for Preston today, and the other 2 will start after Spring break. 

But back to finals. The boys did awesome. They had tons of fun and raced hard. Archer win a trophy for slalom which he was super excited about. The other 2 were crazy competitive with each other. Bryton beat Preston by a tiny bit in slalom the first day, which made Preston mad of course...but he came out the 2nd day determined to beat B in giant slalom and beat him he did! 

So proud of these boys of mine. Skiing wouldn't be my choice for them for competitive sports, but I love that they all love it and can do it together. I am also starting to appreciate the "togetherness" of the ski team families. It's a much different atmosphere than your standard team sports, and everyone helps each other out and pitches in for pretty much anything and everything. (Maybe because we spend so much time together!)

I have tons of clean-up to do from camping, plus lots of laundry and wet ski gear to deal with, but it was worth it to see my boys all so crazy excited about this weekend, and the big smiles each time they crossed the finish line. I need to remember that for next year when I am feeling DONE with skiing!

Preston

Bryton

Archer

The trophy winner! 

My little goofballs!

And my view right now: soccer practice!

Troublemakers

These chickens. Such troublemakers. They have been getting out of their run into our yard daily (really, multiple times daily!) and today they decided to check out our neighbor's yard. Little stinkers. But they are giving us eggs...lots of eggs! And I have gotten kinda attached.

This week I FINALLY got Archer's Cub Scout uniform ready. Only about 5 weeks late...but at least it's done, right?! He was pretty excited to wear it to the meeting this week.

He's seriously so handsome. And was so proud!

And just because we didn't have enough things going on this week with cub scouts, church, and soccer practice, we decided to fit in a little time for golf with the boys. Well, I observed, they golfed!

Birthday Celebration Weekend

Well...a little late (for B), and A LOT late (for Arch)...but we finally did birthday celebrations this weekend! I gave the boys the choice of either inviting 2 friends and going to Triple Play or doing a backyard birthday party with whoever they wanted to invite. True to form, they chose different things - probably just to complicate things for their mom!

So we started off with a Triple Play bowling celebration for Bryton with 2 of his buddies. It was such a fun, simple party! After bowling, we did pizza and cupcakes. Honestly I was really hoping Archer would want to do Triple Play too, but no such luck.

8! Still can't believe it. 

After soccer games today, we did Archer's pirate party in the backyard. Even though it was a lot more work, it was a lot of fun too. We did a treasure hunt where the kids had to do certain tasks first (walk the plank, pirate ship races, ring around the sword, piñata...) and then the treasure was hidden at the end. 

6 candles for this kid! 

I am SO GLAD that we have a few months until our next birthday! Doing both parties in one weekend, along with soccer, ski team sign-ups (eek! Already?!?!), and cub scouts...well, it's a bit much! But it was fun to celebrate these 2 crazy boys!

QOTD

A: "Jugs are bad, right Mom?"

Me: "ummm...what?"

B: "DRUGS. He means drugs!"

A: "oh yeah, drugs!"

Six.

My baby turned 6 today. 

We have been crazy busy with family visiting, but I can't resist a quick post about this! 

Archer, at 6:

Still loves police stuff - pretends to be a police officer often and loves driving his police car.

Is basically fearless when it comes to physical stuff. Bike jumps, riding dirt bikes, flipping on the trampoline, jumping off the diving board, etc. we went to Silverwood today and he went on every ride he was tall enough for. And loved them all!

LOVES his puppy, of course. 

LOVES his mommy, of course. :) He is still a major mommy's boy and will cuddle any chance he gets. He is very generous with hugs and kisses (to me anyway!).

Loves to swim.

Is such a kind-hearted boy - he is very sensitive to how other people feel and is very empathetic. 

Still our little spitfire for sure! This kid keeps us hoppin'! There is never a dull moment with Archer around!

Happy birthday Archer! (More pics to come of his bday celebration.)

Graduation

My baby graduated from kindergarten! So crazy that he is this old already. How did this happen??? 

His class put on an adorable program with lots of songs that he has been practicing A LOT. I could tell he was so excited that the day was finally here!

Dancing in the "Penguin Polka" song

Shaking hands with the principal

Getting his diploma :)

Throwing their caps

I've said it before, and I'll say it again...but I LOVE their school. All of the teachers are amazing, and despite being a public school, it has a "small school" atmosphere. I really wasn't sure how Archer would do at the beginning of the school year. He's a young kindergartener (birthday in July), and definitely a Mama's boy, but he has done awesome, and he's excited for first grade (except that he'll have to be gone full days...he's not sure about that yet!).

QOTD

"Mom, you know why I don't like winter? Because it's cold and it snows. If it wasn't cold I would love winter! Like, if it was warm and sunny, and there was Christmas." -Archer (a child after my own heart!)

Snow and Spring

2 days ago, it snowed. Again. Today: 65 and sunny. Welcome to N. Idaho!

Some pics from today...

My sweet littlest boy paused from riding his bike to pick a flower. He said "I love girls, and sometimes I give them flowers!" He bikes over to me, gave me the flower, and said "Pretty girl, I love you!"

And then he got tired (after spending the afternoon at the park with friends, and riding bike) and cuddled up on my lap. As much as he could anyway!

Evening bike ride! So excited that these days are back!

Interval training!

QOTD

"I wish I was Indiana Jones...but I'm a ninja instead." -Archer

QOTD

"Did you know that Martin Luther King Jr. wasn't ACTUALLY a King?! That was his NAME!" -Archer

1 year

I intended to post this about a month ago, but apparently all my Disneyland posts took priority and I don't think I ever posted it!

It's amazing the difference a year can make! These two have grown so much in a year!

QOTD

A little sweetness from Archer:

I was vacuuming the stairs this afternoon when Archer came tromping up the stairs with a piece of paper in his hand. He told me it was his treasure map (he had drawn a map and crumpled it up to make it look "old"), then he said "And YOU are the greatest treasure of all!" He told me that his treasure map had led him to me.

Awwww! This kid is seriously the sweetest 5-year-old ever!

QOTD

Archer and I put together a world map puzzle today after school. I asked him where we live...he spent a long time studying the map, and then says to me: "I'm looking for 'C' (our last name). It's supposed to say C!"

QOTD

"It's raining snow!" - Archer

QOTD

While cuddling with Archer this morning...

A: Mom, what if you had never gotten married?

Me: well, then I wouldn't have you and that would be sad!

A: Oh, right, because Dad needs to be there to catch the babies.

QOTD

"I think his brain works like a squirrel's...he just sees a car and runs straight towards it!" - Preston, referring to Archer's bike riding (I got a flat tire on the Yuba on the way home from kindergarten today, so the boys all had to ride their own bikes this afternoon. SO thankful for the Yuba after that experience!)

Fall is Here

I'm still picking tomatoes and spaghetti squash (how I will eat all the squash by myself, I do not know! We discovered this year that John's pumpkin allergy does extend to spaghetti squash as well.), but Fall has arrived. Our morning ride to school is chilly, and the evenings are cold. It's been raining (mostly at night, thankfully!), and the sunny days are less and less. 

I'm not a "sweater weather" person, but I did enjoy my bike ride home from school with a pumpkin in the basket! We only ended up with 2 pumpkins in our garden, so thankfully a friend had extras and gave us one. No fights over pumpkins in our house!

In other news, Bryton started Cub Scouts! He's so adorable in his way-too-big-but-hopefully-will-last-a-few-more-years uniform. 

And then, there's this:

We got another freezer because we have 1/4 of a cow and 1/2 a pig waiting for us. And John is still hopeful that he will bag an elk this year. Archer has been asking (and asking...and asking...) for a playhouse, so he snagged the freezer box and decorated it for his playhouse. He told me the drawing means "Mom's Allowed!" Unfortunately, his playhouse wasn't looking so great after the Cub Scout meeting at our house, so I made him a little teepee out of fabric and PVC pipes. It isn't perfect, but it seems to be holding up okay for the time being. 

Selfies with Archer