The Beach

One thing I REALLY miss about Oregon is the beach.  Having lived within easy driving distance of the beach for the first 26 years of my life, it has been kind of sad for me.  I know some (my husband included) would argue that we have plenty of beaches, but LAKE beaches just aren't the same as OCEAN beaches. 

We usually make a day trip out to the coast when we are down in Oregon, but this time we spent a couple of nights at a house there with my parents and my grandmother's.  The weather wasn't spectacular, but we had one really nice day + a day of perfect kite-flying weather, plus there were plenty of people to keep the boys entertained at the house.

Get ready for pic overload!

B throwing rocks - a favorite activity of course.

B & his pinwheel

This must have been on the "perfect kite-flying" day.  He's going for the wind-blown look!

I'm pretty sure this was the first time Archer was really old enough to enjoy the beach.  He LOVED the waves!

Kite Flying!

Hot tub in the rain.  P&B LOVED it...Arch...not so much.

P & Poppa playing Jenga

Serious concentration

Game time!  (So glad there was an abundance of adults there since I really don't like games.)

Archer & Momma (my mom)

Cute little boy

QOTD

Conversation of the day, actually:
Me: Boys, you need to clean up your playroom.
B: But we want you to heeeelp us.  (let me add, this was VERY whiny!)
Me: I didn't make this mess, so why would I clean it up?  You boys need to take responsibility for your actions.  Do you know what that means?
P: No...
Me: It means that when you do something, you need to take care of it.  So when you make a mess in the playroom, you need to clean it up. 
P: But when Daddy makes a mess, you just go right after him and clean it up.  Why is that?  Why do you clean up Daddy's messes but not ours?

And right then, I had to turn away and do a little silent laugh.  Oh these boys crack me up.

20.5 months

And he pooped on the toilet!

I know, who gets excited about these things except mom's, right? 

He's young, but Bryton showed interest at about that age as well...I discouraged him due to my gigantic pregnancy belly and lack of energy, and he ended up potty-training himself when I finally "allowed" him to.  I decided that I would not discourage any attempts by Archer to use the toilet, and it's resulted in quite a few potty successes (with this being the first poop success).

HOWEVER, bragging on my little boy isn't really the point of this post.  The point of it is to warn on the dangers of the "little potty."  Archer was pretty proud of his success and stood up.  I picked him up to get him cleaned up and left the bathroom for about 10 seconds.  I came back to clean up the little potty...and the poop was mostly gone.  Jasper slunk guiltily away from the bathroom.  And now she is banished outside.

Was that TMI?  When I say she'll eat anything, I mean it!

The Farm

We just got back late last night from a trip down to Oregon.  It seemed like we were going to have a nice long time to spend down there since we were there for just over a week, but it went by SO FAST and of course we didn't get to do everything that we had hoped.  Oh well.  We had fun anyway, and the boys enjoyed spending time with their grandparents, great-grandma's, aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.  Preston has now decided that he wants chickens and cows.  I'm not exactly sure where he is planning to put a cow on our little lot, but he seems pretty determined!

*These pictures are courtesy of my sister-in-law, Erin, who followed the kids around outside and took lots of pictures!  I was inside, keeping warm and dry with my little Archie boy who was a sick, teething mess most of the week.

Trekking through the woods at the farm

B hitching a ride with Poppa, as usual

Cows!

The boys had so much fun mucking around outside.  I was glad we decided to throw in their boots at the last minute!

Hunting the eggs

Found one!

Cute Mr. B.

John's Birthday, Attempt #2

Okay, for some reason the pictures didn't show up in my last attempt, so here's try #2.  We've been down in Oregon visiting family & friends, so I have lots of pictures from our time on the farm and at the coast, but they will have to wait for another day.

The Big 3-0 was a success...and here are a couple of belated pictures!

Birthday Dinner with Friends...love the hat!

P&B helping Daddy blow out the candles

QOTD

"Shake it like you might break it!" - Preston