Grandview Drive 2008, Part Two

Here are the pictures from our second day up at Grandview Drive.

Holiday Weekend Review

It was definitely a busy one this past weekend.

It all started with a little league game. Ryan waits for his chance at first base.

Next on the weekend agenda, were the July 4th fireworks downtown. It's said that Peoria/East Peoria's combined display were expected to be in the top 3 percent of the nation's best fireworks.

Look closely to see what had us laughing. Can you guess?
Ashley waits for the fireworks to start with her friends.
Bret and Ryan wait, too.
It was the best show yet.
The two cities spent $77,000 on the display.
Yesterday we spent time with family. We met up with Bret's brother's family over at his dad's house for lunch. The kids tested out the in ground sprinkler system for Grandpa.
When did this kid grow up? And who the heck said that she could?
Thinking about it...
And we have lift off...

Chilling out.

We followed up the afternoon over at Bret's brother's house where the kids swam...
...and the mom's hung out.

How was your holiday weekend?

(Sunday's pictures courtesy of my brother in law.)

Pool Day

While Ashley has been to the pool numerous times with her friends, this was the first trip to the pool this summer for Ryan and myself. After swim lessons, we drove over and pulled my niece Brooke out of day care and took her with us to the pool with my friend Teri and her daughter, Skyler. It didn't get very hot outside today, so Teri and I never quite made it into the pool, but the kids didn't seem to mind and had a great time.

Ashley figured out that the secret to staying warm is to stay covered in the water.


Ryan has no fear this summer. His swim lessons are paying off and he's got a lot of confidence in the water now.

Ryan and his cousin, Brooke.

Ryan on one of his many trips up to the water slide.

Now we're off to Ryan's baseball game...

Back From The Brink

(I have no idea what is up with Blogger and their line spacing problem these days!)

I'm back. Did anyone miss me? Does anyone still come here? It feels like forever since I've posted.

I'm still not smoking. How, through out all of this stress I've been under the past week or two, I've managed not to smoke is beyond me but I'm still going strong at 10 weeks and 3 days. I had an appointment for my annual physical on Friday with the doctor that prescribed my Chantix. She was proud of me, which in turn made me proud of myself. I told her that I've been weening off of the Chantix and even then am still not remembering to take it. She told me that she recommends patients to take the Chantix for 2-4 months longer than the recommended 12 weeks to keep them on track and to keep them quit. I've got a prescription to extend it, but am not sure what I should do. I do still get the tuggings, and while I get through those tuggings just fine, I am wondering if I should stay on the Chantix. The only reason I had stopped taking it was because I couldn't remember to take it routinely, so the nausea had been a real problem. We'll see.

In less than a week, the school carnival will be here. Friday the craziness will truely start and by Saturday evening it'll be all over with. I pray that it's a big success. As long as it makes as much money as it's made in the past and the kids have a great time, I'll be able to sleep at night again.

Below is our baby. My co-chair's husband made this Plinko board for the carnival. The kids have all complained that there weren't enough games in the past, so we've loaded them up with lots of choices, but this here below is our baby. I've put many, many coats of paint on it and am ready to add the letters and numbers to it now. (My house looks like a mini carnival with a Plinko board in the living room and a bozo type bucket game in the hallway.)

Along with planning the school carnival, Ashley has thrown a birthday sleepover party in the mix for the following weekend. She decided that she wanted Dance Dance Revolution for the game system downstairs to use during her party, so my mom and brother went in on it for her birthday. Bret has it playing through his stereo system and she's been practicing all day. I tried it - it wasn't pretty. LoL. But with that and Karaoke, I think she'll be set for her party now.

Ryan's Blue & Gold Banquet for Cub Scouts was tonight. His Den made a dragon costume to go with the whole theme they had going on. It was way to cute to see them trying to keep up with each other while they walked around the room.

Ryan earned his Tiger patch and 5 belt loops. (Guess I have to go buy the belt now.)

As soon as the banquet was over, we headed over to catch the rest of our Niece's birthday party.

Where they had trick candles. I love those things.

It's been a long day and I'm ready for bed. Last night we had friends over for dinner and drinks and I'm really dragging now. I'll try not to be such a stranger, but it may be difficult until after next weekend.

Happy Birthday, Little Man

Happy 3rd Birthday to our nephew, Mitchell.

Weekend Update

With the Christmas season getting close, I did a little furniture rearranging to make room for the Christmas tree in our family room. This meant moving our oversized chair into our bedroom, which meant moving Daisy's bed to a different spot. I'm guessing she's not too happy about it since she decided to bunk with Ashley.

Ashley finally got to change her earings, but it took us an hour to get the original stud back into the hole last night, so I think it may be awhile before we try again. She's pretty bummed.

I am officially old and do not understand the new style of dressing that is going through the Middle School. Can someone please explain to me why girls are wearing a t-shirt, knotted in the back, over a cami? Maybe if I try out this look myself, Ashley and her friends will be horrified and it'll end the craze so they can move onto something else?

Last night we watched Brooke & Mitchell for awhile. The kids were excited to see them. Mitchell is following in Ryan's footsteps and discovering the world of Star Wars.

Our niece and nephew seem to like us a whole lot more when their parents aren't around. Maybe it has something to do with the bowl of candy sitting between Brooke and Ryan? At 8pm at night? He He.

This morning, Bret took Ryan to his Cub Scout field trip to the Greater Peoria Regional Airport to tour one of the Caterpillar Company Jets.

Ryan got a turn to sit in the cockpit.

Sitting in comfort.

The whole Den thanking the pilot for showing them his plane.

Best Buds

It has definately been a busy day today with the boys. Ryan has been loving being the "big brother" for a change and Mitchell has said over and over again today that Ryan is his buddy. I think he's really loving the fact that he's got Ryan all to himself. They're gotten along extremely well today and have both been so well behaved.

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After lunch, Bret and I took the boys to the park down the street.

We really wore Mitchell out on our walk through the woods surrounding the park area. He was walking pretty slow by the time we were back in sight of the parking lot.

It's been Ryan's mission to turn Mitchell into a fellow Jedi. Must also be Bret's intention since he went out and bought Mitchell his own light sabre while he was napping.

After dinner we took a walk around the neighborhood and found that our neightbors were having a bon fire in their backyard. It seems there were backyard parties everywhere throughout the neighborhood tonight - a definate sign that the weather has gotten nice again. The boys had a blast having light sabre fights in the dark and sitting around the camp fire. The funny thing is that Mitchell is with us because his parents and sister went camping for the weekend, and here we are kind of doing the same thing.



Ashley comes home tomorrow afternoon and can you believe that she hasn't called home once yet? It must be a sign that she's having a blast and hasn't missed us. I can't wait to hear all about her trip. I'll have to post some of the pictures from her disposable camera after I get them developed.
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Tomorrow we're going to take the boys to the zoo. If they're as good as they were today we won't have to leave them behind with the monkeys.