Good Neighbor Days (aka Cherry Festival) 2015

We kicked off our start to Good Neighbor Days with the Saturday morning run.  My friend and I did the 5K and Brandon ran the 1 mile with Elizabeth and my friend's son.  It was very evident that next year we will be signing Grant up too!  He made me run with him afterwards to the pancake breakfast.  So we all headed to the high school for the pancake and sausage breakfast.

Very excited 1st time runners!

The before 

The after

The weather was pretty dreary and most were wet from running in a pretty good sprinkle.  We had wristbands for the kids for the carnival rides but it wasn't looking too promising.  Elizabeth's softball game had already been cancelled.  We got home and starting doing some housework and Brandon noticed that it had stopped raining so we quickly loaded the kids up and let them ride the carnival rides until the rain was just too much.  Luckily an hour and half of small town carnival rides was enough for them!  We had planned to watch fireworks with some friends but it got cancelled too.  There is a GND family bike ride that I am hoping we can do next year.  I think the kids would enjoy that.  Earlier in the week I had threatened that if they didn't shape up they could take their wristbands and hand them over to two children who weren't has fortunate as them.  Luckily we were all able to enjoy the festivities!

The carnie warned us that there was no override and once he started the ride he couldn't stop it for any crying kids! They were champs!

The Star Jumper that Daddy and EB now call the Star Drooper because it was so boring - EB almost fell asleep

Brandon was inspired by his carnival corn dog and made chocolate covered bacon for our evening festivities!

The end of GND - with great friends, no fireworks!

Ice Cream Truck

The kids have been working really hard at saving and earning their quarters for the ice cream truck.  On this cold (55 degrees) Sunday afternoon I am sitting at the kitchen table playing games with the kids and I hear the music. I stop. I tell the kids to listen and then all of a sudden they explode "IT'S THE ICE CREAM TRUCK!!"  Then panic sets in...Grant is in his underwear.  I have tried to have him put clothes on for the last 2 hours, he refused, I gave up. I mean really, we are at home, who cares! Elizabeth is clothed, but her clothing choice is pajamas!  I run outside to flag him down and he acknowledges that he will wait.  EB is out the door with her dish of quarters like lightening.  Poor Grant is in his bedroom closet in an absolute state of panic because he can't find clothes fast enough to put on.  I, of course, help him and he stops crying and runs out.  Now it is big decision time.  I don't really feel like I have the time to go through the life lesson of counting our money and reading the menu and explaining the math.  So I point to a few things that I know they can afford and ask them to choose.  They both want a character foam ice cream bar with the gum ball eyes.  But they are a little too rich for their blood at $3.00 a pop.  Grant settles for a Sour Power Bar at $1.00 and Elizabeth is happy with a cookies and cream bar at $2.00.  Now they are really anxious to empty the dishwasher and do chores because who doesn't want a frozen gum ball?!

Meet Megan Jo!!

We have a new family member!  My brother and his wife brought this precious little angel into the world on May 12th!  Which just happens to be the birthday of another little guy that we love to pieces, Briggs!  Auntie Alison made a special trip to Atlanta to meet Megan.  I had a wonderful time and got lots of cuddles.  David and Sara are natural parents and Megan is just as sweet as can be.  I think she looks a lot like Elizabeth's baby pictures.  Daddy did an awesome job holding down the fort at home (maybe a little too good...I think I can escape again without worry!) - he even cleaned! Major bonus points!  And in case you didn't know it before -- I think my brother and I may be the biggest game show junkies in history!  We actually watched an hour and a half show on how a contestant beat "Press Your Luck" and won over $110,000!! We laughed and giggled like we were 10 and 12! I also got to watch (ok maybe nap too) the Indy 500 with David's very special commentary to Megan about who we cheer for and why.  It was priceless!!

David and I took her on her first run

Auggie Love

To wear her out we borrow the neighbors labs and have them come over and play with her!

We hope to have a puppy class graduate in our midst next week! Here are a few snapshots of our little Auggie, who is really not so little anymore! But still just as soft and teddy bear like as can be!

Auggie loves tender little ears to nibble on!

Auggie loves her morning cuddles in bed with any of us!

The first time I let her ride shotgun.  Usually she sits between the kids in the back, but it was just us girls going to puppy class so I gave her an upgrade!

Elizabeth's Class Field Trip

Ranger EB!

I didn't get to ride/chaperone on the bus (darn!) but I did get to meet Elizabeth and her class out at Wildlife Prairie Park for the kindergarten class field trip.  She had so much fun we had to put it on our summer bucket list so the whole family can go back.  Here are some pictures from the day.

In the school house - what an expression!

Mrs.Evans with half of the class

The BIG slide 

End of the day, waiting for their ice cream

What would you do for a quarter?

We go back and forth about allowance and chores and should we pay the kids.  There are pros and cons to all of it.  Some very dear family member was paying our children to try new food.  Well our kids are pretty smart and Grant came in announced one morning that he had paid his sister to not tell what he had just done.  Wait, did I say they were smart? Well maybe manipulative is more accurate.  There is such a fine line between paying for a service (which is the way the real world does work) and doing things simply because you were asked and because you are part of this family.  Enter the genius mind of a mother.  I ask them to do a chore and they don't know until the job is done if they will get paid or not.  Brilliant, right?  Also allows for quality assurance at the same time, because let's be honest there is more than one way to pick up your bedroom.  The typical chore is unloading the dishwasher and they know the routine and are really good at it.  They are saving up their quarters for the ice cream truck this summer.  This week the maple seedlings are really bad so I had them pulling weeds and they had to collect them in a bag so I could count how many they pulled.  And because I am really serious about my weed pulling if there wasn't a root it didn't count.  I mean really, is there any thing worse than just pulling leaves?!  We will see what happens when the ice cream truck makes it first round :)

A Musical Shower

Since moving into this house the kids have typically showered in our bathroom.  I have recently decided that I am taking back our bathroom and they have been given notice that once school is over their bathroom will be the place that they shower.  Then something wonderful happened.  My parent's were gifted a bluetooth shower head.  Being the wonderful grandparents they are they re-gifted it to us.  Now, initially Brandon was a little intrigued when we discovered you could not only listen to tunes but also take phone calls.  I guess he had visions of early morning conference calls in the shower...but we decided that was not as practical as it seemed.  First problem solved - the kids now have a cool thing in their bathroom and so they want to take a shower in their bathroom.  Second problem solved - they take too long of showers.  Well we have a new time limit and it is how many songs you get during your shower.  They haven't figured out yet that some songs are longer than others and I don't have any 7 minutes songs downloaded.  Things were looking perfect.  Elizabeth was able to wash her body, shampoo and condition her hair all while belting out Taylor Swift's Shake it Off.  Awesome.  Next up was Grant, apparently Elizabeth hadn't quite had enough singing and was still hanging out in the bathroom while I stepped out to get someone a change of clothes and he didn't appreciate her singing (and maybe some dancing- who knows!) and he swung the shower door open and it came back and pinched his finger.  His singing in the shower debut was not quite as special.  But we are Paulis and we don't give up!  Mom only gives them one song, they can pick it, but ONE song. Last night daddy was in charge of showers and I am almost positive they each got FOUR songs.  He is so much nicer than me sometimes.  I just hope he doesn't really think that they got any cleaner because they had extra time!