Kallen Starts Preschool

Kallen actually started preschool way back in September, but I still wanted to post pictures of his first day for myself. They are not great pictures, but I took them super fast as we were on our way out the door.

Kallen was pretty excited, but a little nervous to start school. He was excited to go because Tyson told him that when he was a little boy he went to school too. Since Kallen loves being like Daddy, that helped him want to go, but it was still a little scary for him. It took him about a week to get in the groove, but now he loves it. His teacher is wonderful and Kallen has learned so much! We are so proud of him.

I let him choose his own backpack for school, and he chose this cute bumble bee bag. It is a bit cheesy, but I thought it was pretty cute, so I got it.

Little Hooligans

If you are like me, you can usually tell when your kids are up to no good. If not, you might be wondering how I can tell. Well, normally, my boys are loud, running around and giggling when they are playing. There is also the occasional screaming and yelling when they fight over toys...okay, it isn't that occasional, it happens a lot. However, even when my boys argue, they are loud and making noise. On the other hand, when they are doing things together that they shouldn't be, sneaky things, everything suddenly gets very quiet around here. The silence is what tips me off that they are up to something.

The other day, they were playing upstairs normally, so I wasn't worried about them. I heard them playing with their legos, with their trains and other toys. After a little while though, they got very quiet. I told myself that I should check on them, but I didn't think there was anything up there that they could get into. Boy was I wrong. Soon I heard them decending the stairs and this is what they looked like.

Here is a close-up.

They had gotten into my food storage and pulled out a big bag of flour. It was everywhere. I couldn't help but laugh at them. They were so cute covered in flour. It took me over an hour to clean up the mess, but hey, it was worth it for the memory. What little hooligans.

PS: Did I mention that we are going to have another little hooligan on our hands very soon? Yep, another boy is on the way. Can you imagine the trouble all three of them will get into? :)

Kallen Turns 4!

I still can't believe that Kallen is 4! He is getting so big, which is kind of sad for me, because I wonder where my little baby boy went. But it is also lots of fun to see him grow and I love how he makes me laugh all the time because of the things he says.

We had a small family birthday party, which I think Kallen loved. Grandma and Grandpa Hill came over and we spent the day at the water park and playing with all of his new toys. He wanted a "green" birthday, so he had green balloons and streamers. He also wanted a chocolate cake, which I tried so hard to make pretty, but it just didn't turn out. I'm just not a baker, what can I say. At least it tasted good.

Kallen's favorite gift by far was his train car wash, but he loved all his gifts. He is still obsessed with car washes, so it didn't surprise me that he really liked that gift. Weston's favorite was the car mat. I don't know why he likes it, because he doesn't use cars on it, but he loves walking all over it.

Brothers

I keep forgetting that I haven't posted anything in months, so I figured it was about time to put something new on the blog. Here are just some cute pictures of the boys together these past few months.

These boys love bugging and annoying each other, but they also love to play and laugh together. They make me smile everyday, and I am so happy they are part of our family.

We Love To Read

There is nothing better than a good book to read. Kallen and Weston couldn't agree more. Both boys love to have us read to them.

Some of Kallen's Favorites are: Big Red Barn, I Love You Forever, Pingo, Don't Let The Pigeon Stay Up Late, and Dr Suess. Here he is with Grandma and Sharlie reading the Big Book of Things to Spot.

For the past few months, Weston has been a huge book lover. He will have us read books to him over and over and over again. His current favorites are: Itsy Bitsy Spider, The Best Mouse Cookie, Goodnight Goon, Nursery Rhymes, and Miss Spiders Tea Party.

A Swing Set!

Meet the newest addtion to our family. Our Swing Set!!!

I have been saving for over a year...yes, over a year...to buy my kids an awesome swingset. And after all that time, we finally got one. Hurray! The boys absolutely love it!!

I wanted to give the boys the swing set for Easter, but it just didn't work out that way, so they got it a week later. You see, I decided to buy the set from Costco, however, there isn't a Costco around here, so Grandma and Grandpa Sutherland were nice enough to buy it for us over in Bellevue, and then drive it over here in their truck.

The whole week before they arrived, Kallen would talk about his Swing Set non-stop and mentioned he couldn't wait for Grandma and Grandpa to bring it. It was pretty cute. And when they arrived, Kallen was sooo excited. He couldn't wait for us to put it up for him. The set came in 6 boxes and took a very long time to assemble. My Dad was such a trooper and spent his entire weekend putting the thing up with Tyson and I. We really do owe him a lot! How long do you think it took us to put this sucker up? 5 hours? 8 hours? 10 hours? Nope. It took us over 16 hours! Can you believe it? It was crazy, but it really wasn't that bad. Plus, all that work was worth it to see the smiles on my little boy's faces.

Kallen was so excited to be the first one down the slide.

Weston loves his swing and pretty much everything else on the swing set. In fact, this surprised me, because I didn't think he would be able to do much else but swing. However, he can get up and down the ladder to the fort area all by himself and will even go down the slide sometimes. This use to be a scary thing for me, but he has gotten pretty good at it, so it doesn't scare me as much anymore.

We actually have had both of our families visit us since we got the set. All the cousins loved it.

Can't you tell from the smiles?

I am so glad we got our kids a swing set. It has been wonderful. They play outside on it every day and it is so much fun to spend time with them playing up in the fort or going down the slide with them. Sometimes it gets a little old pushing them over and over on the swing, but it is worth it to hear their laughter and see their bright smiles.

Easter...It's About Time

I know, I know...Easter was over 2 months ago, but I'm finally posting some pictures. Maybe if I'm really on fire this week, I'll make two posts and not just one...but if I were you, I wouldn't keep my figures crossed.

We had a lot of fun this Easter. Kallen loved painting his Easter Eggs and probably could have dyed tons more, but I limited him to a dozen.

Waiting patiently for the eggs to dye.

Let me introduce you to Kallen's cheesy smile. It has been appearing in our pictures for the past few months and just won't go away. Oh well, at least Kallen will let me take his picture now. A few months ago, he wouldn't even let me do that. So I guess I'll take the cheesy smile over no smile at all. :)

The proud kid with his finished product.

Here is the loot. The Easter bunny was sure nice this year. Kallen got a lawn mower, which he absolutely LOVES! Weston got a swing...which he couldn't care less about. At least one kid was happy right? Speaking of that swing, I wonder what it goes to? You'll find out later.

Weston wasn't that into the loot, however he thought the Easter basket grass was the coolest thing ever.

Like I said, Kallen loved his lawn mower. As soon as he saw that the Easter Bunny had brought him one, he ignored everything else and mowed our entire house. It took some serious convincing on my part to get him to look at the other things in his basket and to start the Easter Egg hunt...Reeses Peanut Putter Cups helped get him focussed a little. However, his heart just wasn't into it and he soon was back mowing everything on site in no time.

Notice the cheesy smile again.

Grant County Spring Fair

For Easter, we were originally planning on visiting my parents in Bellevue. However, the day before we were suppose to leave, they all ended up getting really bad colds. Since my kids had been cold-free for about a month, I did not want to have them around a bunch of sickies, so we decided to stay home. As luck would have it, Weston ended up with a horrible cold regardless...should have known it was inevitable. Anyway, I think our decision to stay home ended up being a good one. My parents and sister's family didn't have to worry about us while they were sick, and since we didn't go we were able to go to the Grant County Spring Fair. It was so much fun! The best part about it was seeing how much fun Kallen had on all the rides. Plus, the other great thing about this fair was that it was crowd-free. We never had to wait in line once! This was probably due to the cold weather and winds, but hey, it was totally worth it.

Kallen loved the "horsey ride" and probably went on it 10 times. He actually went on most rides about 10 times, so we got our money's worth. I love his happy little face in this picture.

Kallen was also super brave and went on some bigger kid rides like the roller coaster and a ride called the Octopus. I must admit, I was fine going on every ride with him except for the Octopus. It freaked me out, but Kallen absolutely loved it! In fact, as soon as our little cart started spinning and going up and down, he started screaming with joy at the top of his lungs. The ride operator actually stopped the ride half-way through to see if he was okay and I assured him that he was fine and loving every moment of it. Kallen wanted to go back on it again later that day, but I quickly turned him down. He might have loved it but I on the other hand did not, so we did not go back for a second time.

Kallen's favorite ride by far was the giant slide. He thought it was the greatest and the lady who operated it always laughed at how many times the little guy went up and down on it.

Kallen loved everything about the fair and still talks about it. Can you tell from all the big smiles in these pictures?

Weston was such a little trouper while we were there. He had a cold and was probably not feeling good, but he was happy the whole time. Next year, it will be fun to take him on some of the rides too.

Oh, I almost forgot. The fair also had some animals there. Kallen loved the pigs the most, but we also got to see some cows and sheep. The fair was so much fun and I'm glad we got to go. They have another one here in August, so I'm sure we will definitely be going back for it. Kallen is already counting down the days.