The Natural

Tyler is my little "Natural" at baseball. As you can see from the video, he also turns out to be quite a tattle-tale! By the way, those are real baseball he's hitting - no plastic ones.

As it turns out though, we must've missed one of the baseballs when we were cleaning up that day. I heard the neighbor lady mowing the next day, and she nailed one of the balls with the lawnmower. That was one of the worst noises I've heard in a LONG time! After about a half hour (and probably lots of cussing) her mower worked again - thankfully!

I can't believe I almost forgot to mention the outfit he has on in this video. It's his Halloween costume from last year. (A Hawkeye football player - imagine that!). He wears this outfit almost every night when he gets home!

They told me it'd be like this...

I remember when Tyler was about 11 months old, and was EVERYWHERE. He was at the age where you had to hover over him and chase him around - like you were chasing a chicken. Chase him out of the street, into the house, or out of the house. Into the bath, into bed, and just everywhere. Basically, up until just recently, I tried to keep my eye on him at all times, just because he'd been known to take off to just go exploring.

It's almost 8pm, and I'm sitting at the kitchen table. Tyler is playing with the neighbor boys outside. I can't see him, but I can hear him. He's having a blast. Connor is sleeping. This is nice.

People told me that it would get easier. I didn't believe them, because at that time, I couldn't see beyond the next day. Beyond getting up at 6am and chasing a toddler around to keep them from getting into trouble, or worse yet, hurting themselves.

Although I miss parts of the baby stage, I think this new found freedom for them, and for me, is something I could get used to!

The time of my life!

The sweet video of the White Sox Opener. It's an almost 5 minute video in all, but I taped the best part...a little bit of their history, then their road to being World Series Champions!

Saturday, I drove to the Quad Cities, picked up my dad, and we drove on to Chicago to meet my sister and go to a White Sox game. I think that day was one of the most fun days I've had in a LONG time! We ate, and drank, and laughed, and joked around, and were absolutely crazy. I won't say what we did in order to get 3 free t-shirt, 2 free blankets, and 2 free duffel bags, but it has something to do with MasterCard and a stand in the ball park. Enough said - and we're probably going to jail...

BUT, we had a blast! I was thinking to Saturday and what I ate that day - and it was:

1. McDonalds Breakfast: Egg & Cheese Sandwich, Hash Brown, Large Coffee
2. A large Casey's coffee for the way to Chicago
3. Dunkin Donuts Jelly Filled donut
4. A Kosher Hot Dog with onions at the ball park
5. A large piece of Connie's Cheese Pizza (shared with my sister)
6. A chocolate churro
7. Edy's dibs (shared by all)
8. Cotton candy (shared with my sister)
9. 1 $5 bottle of water (seriouly, it was $5 at the ballpark)
10. 5 beers (I think - I lost count)

Then my dad and I stopped on the way home and I got a Whopper Jr., fries and iced team. Then I got a Skor Bar when we stopped for gas.

Seriously, I'm about sick today, and put my body through "junk food detox" today, but we had so much fun. We decided that had to be an annual event. I swear my sister, dad and I were all made from the same mold - and we have such a blast when we're together!

My sister (my best friend), and I at the stadium

Dad, where are your eyes?

It rained in the 7th inning, but we still had fun!

Dad reading the paper in the backseat, as my sister drove his new Lincoln downtown! (She's a great driver, but fast - so he tried to distract himself with the news!)

Being a mom without being a mom

Today was one of those days. It was a fairly normal, but crazy (normal) workday. It felt productive, although I don't have much to show of it. I know I did a lot of "stuff" today, but can't exactly tell you what I accomplished. Yea, One of those days.

I left the house before 6am, and got home at 8:30pm. All work in between those hours. We had a dinner tonight which was a great networking opportunity. One of those that at the last minute I second guess, and try to talk myself out of. "I should really be at home", I tell myself. "The dinner will probably be boring".

It was a great dinner. I talked to people I hadn't talked to in years, met up with old bosses, and got to speak in front of the group of people. But I didn't see Connor today. I left the house before anyone was up, and got home after he went to bed.

On those days that I don't see him, it feels as though a part of my life is missing. I didn't get to see that goofy face. The crazy blond hair when he wakes up in the morning. The huge, bright smile, or the filthy, dirty boy that I pick up from daycare because he happily played in the dirt all day (although they try 10 times to remove him from the one dirt pile on the whole playground!).

I hate those days. Although I did get to do what I loved, and that is my job, I missed what I love most, and that is my family. I did get home soon enough to see Kyle and Tyler for about 45 minutes, but just had the opportunity to go into Connor's room and see him sleeping. Looking at his now, seemingly huge, although still-so-small body. See his crazy blond hair, and his fat little fingers.

I miss those smiles, those laughs, those giggles, and seeing what new things he attempts every night. It seems as though I'm a "mom", but not a mom. I hate those days.

The Obsession Continues

Kids day at Kinnick Stadium was yesterday. We all went. All 4 of us. After that experience, anyone that says those harnesses that people put their kids in at all mall, are inhumane, didn't watch me yesterday. Connor watched exactly 4.5 seconds of the football scrimmage, then I took him down the concourse to walk, er, dash around like a maniac. I was so sore when I woke up this morning, but he had a great time. One of the biggest hits was one of the golf carts at the stadium. While Tyler and Daddy watched the game, Mommy chased Connor like crazy!

We did have a great time, and since that time, Tyler wears his football helmet as much as he can, and wants to play "football team". He puts on his jersey, helmet and grabs his hawkeye football and wants you to cheer him on. It's hilarious! He's a lot more observant than we think - he wants to be interviewed like a football player, and even does the kneel down next to the helmet thing - like the guys on the sideline.

Football season should be interesting for all of us!

The best $1200 we ever spent!

Last fall, the water main in front of our house started leaking. This caused our front easement to turn to mush, and water to leak all over the street. The city was called - and by the time we got home from work that night, there were two tractors, one huge truck, and many guys digging in our front yard. You want to see heaven in some one's eyes - bring home a three year old to that!

The city did their work, which they charged us a mere $1200 for (we got a deal, because our neighbors down the street was fixed on the same day, so they basically cut the labor in half), digging up our front yard. They proceeded to leave it that way (dug up) all winter (not that we noticed with the 84 feet of snow we received), but as spring appeared, so did the dirt and mud.

As summer went on - Tyler started becoming more and more interested in the dirt. Now, it is the focus of our days. I've posted before about how they love to play in it - but that's nothing compared to now. Our lives revolve around this dirt - and it has provided hours and hours of entertainment for Tyler, and even Connor - although Connor's favorite thing to do is eat it.

Tyler is now playing baseball - in the dirt. He lays the baseball on the ground and basically golfs with it. It's awesome. I can sit here on the front step and blog - while he is totally entertained by dirt.

The city came last week and finally poured cement to fix the sidewalk they also had to dig up. They then smoothed out the dirt pile, but it is still very "playable". I'm dreading the day when they come to seed it. Then playtime is over. I'm seriously considering finding another "plot" in our yard to create a dirt pile. A sandbox will just attract cats, so dirt will be perfect!

If you would've asked me 4 years ago what I would be doing today - the LAST thing I would've answered is, watching my son play in the dirt - and be so perfectly happy with that!

Days Like These...

Make me wish summer would never, ever end!

Connor and Daddy in the Pool

Tyler and Chase (our neighbor) in the Pool

Connor enjoying ice cream that the ice cream truck brought!

Mommy, play with me

Tyler, Connor and I went to the store together today, and Tyler was such a great kid! Seriously, he listened, didn't run off once, and was great company. He spotted a semi truck that he just HAD to have, and since I was feeling weak over his acts of obedience, I caved.

He was playing with it on the living room floor tonight. Kyle was sitting on the couch reading a magazine, and I was catching up on reading some blogs (I have only been on the computer at home ONCE in the last week!). Tyler looked up at us and asked, "Mommy, will you play with me?"

Okay, how can you say no to that?

I get down on the floor, and so does Kyle. Tyler hands me one of the cars that came with his semi, and hands Kyle the other one. "Mommy, you play with the green one, Daddy gets the red one."

We proceed to push the cars on the floor, to which is quickly interrupted with a "No, no, no, no, no, not like that, like THIS!", Tyler announces, then demonstrates how to correctly play with a car.

We play along, and push them around in circles. "No, no, no, no, NO!", he says again, "you push them back and forth!".

We again, entertain him and push the cars back and forth. "Now SWITCH!", he tells us, demanding that Kyle and I switch cars.

This continued for a while, and we played along, just because it was fun to listen to him.

"He's about as bossy as both of us.", I laugh and tell Kyle.

"Correction,", Kyle says, "he's as bossy as YOU!"

Scary part is, he's right!

Lessons learned from this past weekend

After some reflection of past weekend, I have some very valuable lessons learned:

• When taking a picture of girls, especially when they are wearing skirts, make their they are sitting like ladies. (See Carley in picture below)
• Tyler has enormously large feet.
• Getting kids all look at the camera and smile is easy, when you have your sister dancing like a drunk ballerina, behind you.
• Having my kids take a one hour nap (on the way home in the car) is worse than taking no nap at all. I think they both had about a half hour meltdown after we got home, because the woke up so tired.
• Beer is very good when it is 100 degrees outside.
• I can take both boys to the grocery store by myself, but it will cost me on tractor, a barn for that tractor and two packs of gum. (That was two stores, and I got almost everything I needed.)
• You cannot keep a 1 year old up in hope that he sleeps in. All you will get is a crabby one year old in the morning, that needs a nap at 9am.

More very valuable lessons learned to come!

Happy Birthday Grandpa!

Emily (4), Carley (6), Connor (14 m) and Tyler (3)

My dad celebrated his birthday last Friday. My sister and I met up at my parents house on Saturday to celebrate and had a great time boating, eating, digging shells out of the water, and just having a great time!

We hope you had a great birthday Dad! We love you!

My sister, Beth, and her girls, Carley and Emily