The paint face chronicals

So we know that Lily LOVES to get a paint face and got one on Sat. at the school party. Matt had gotten out his kit and painted a few faces there. Lily keeps asking him to paint her up at home. Here are some of the results. 

Icy princess? 

Truck clown?

This one is, by far, Matt's best work. Lily really wanted this. She was a very serious wicked witch and insisted that the hat needed to go with the ensemble. She was pretty spooky for a while........

......until most of it ended up on the couch and she ended up looking like Eddie Munster. 

Shades

Ben picked these out for his sister. She is a star. 

Seriously, is he the coolest guy on the planet?!

Something about sunglasses, especially star shaped ones, they just give you street cred. 

Summer Celebration

Lily's end of the year party was quite an event. A good time was had by all, especially Benjamin. There were 2 bounce houses, face painting, tattoos (we were in charge of tattoos, go figure), tye dying t-shirts, and lots and lots of sugar. 

Cotton Candy!!!!!!!!!!

Ben had some but crack issues, as usual. 

Somebody put some pants on that kid! Look at Lil inside. Pure joy....or sugar buzz. 

Paints!!!!!!! I love to paint!!!!! I love to eat paint!!! "BBBWWWWUUUUUU"!!!!!!!!

This was actually a really cool painting. I wonder if they kept it at school. 

Banana Pancakes

Most weekends, Matt makes banana pancakes with chocolate chips and whipped cream. (He makes mine w/o gross hot bananas). We LOVE them! (and him)

More Matt smiles

Another flashback educing evening with the kids. Matt and Jimmy used to do this all the time. They used to rig up anything they could to pull each other around and basically do anything super fast and super dangerous.

At least they have helmets on.

Bubba Chubba

Ben and I were at the grocery store and the BIG ladder truck was stopped in the parking lot for lunch. Had to check it out and grunt a lot. 

I eat Apple Jacks every night when the kids are in bed. I know it's terrible, but so so yummy. This was a prize in the box. SWEET!

Work Days

I worked 2 days at Lily's school last week. It was my last days of the year and they were awesome! We had a lot of fun and got really messy. 

Here's Emma, Vivien and Lily helping out. 

 

Mondays

On any given Monday, you can find Ben and Gracie perched at their post, watching the garbage trucks. We have 3 different cans, so they get to see 6 trucks. (3 on each side of the street) Very exciting stuff. 

TRUCK

fun in the car

Matt just thought this was the cutest thing ever. He and Jimmy used to do stuff like this all the time. This was a noisemakers from Nikki's birthday dinner. The kids loved them, not too sure about the other people at the restaurant. We ask Lily every night what her favorite part of the day was. For a solid 5 days, it was "Nikki's birthday." 

Oh Bubba

Ben had a fight with a brick wall and he lost. The cut was deep, but not bleeding too bad. It wasn't deep enough for a stitch and thankfully, Erik had a steri strip and closed it up. Sadly, I feel this may be a regular occurrence for us. 

Ziggy Marley

The obsession continues.....Our kids LOVE Ziggy Marley! Matt bought me the new Ziggy album, Family Time for Mother's Day. We went to see him play on Sat. and the opening band was Rhythm Child! (They play at Lily's school fundraiser each year). The kids were singing along and dancing up a storm. (Their favorite song is Cry, Cry, Cry. Ben sings: Ky Ky Ky, bee dzee zeeba bee) Ziggy also played Jammin', Lily's previous favorite song, but she informed us that it is no more. Cry Cry has replaced it. Sorry Bob. Ben passed out midway, but rallied for the last few songs. Ziggy's kids were on stage, singing and playing drums the whole time (they're 3&1). Just a wonderful way to spend a Saturday morning! 

Baby feet with tatts! I love it! 

The Washman

Soooooo, there's this strange noise going on when our 3 month old washer is on it's super fast spin cycle. The sound is like scraping metal or a nickel rattling around. Turns out that there was, in fact, a nickel rattling around in there. Matt got it out, but the noise continued. We call the Whirlpool people. A man comes out, takes out the soap dispenser and immediately finds a few princess magnets and a big red pair of play-doh scissors. The man then laughs because he's a grandpa and he can. The sound is still there, so he tells us it's too big of a job to do alone and he'll be back tomorrow. Three days and a whole run around later, we call another service. The guy and Matt take the washer apart for 2 hours, find a blasted magnet and fix it! Yeah! One week, 2 hours, 2 decent gashes on Matt's fingers, 2 repair services, the amusement of one fixit grandpa= a good chunk of money. Being able to do 6 loads of laundry in one afternoon= priceless. 

Attack of the Stink Eye!

Lily, the stink eye force is strong within you. 

They felt they needed these super hero boots (slippers) on to give them extra power. Lily was naming off all the tools she has on her super hero belt. They included something to make you invisible and a hammer. 

Monkeys

The tent is working out wonderfully! The first morning, at 5, Ben was pissed!! He yelled and screamed for a few minutes, but then gave up and went back to sleep. I put a few trucks in the bed with him, so he's happy. :) 

The Wonder Of Boys

The Wonder of Boys is actually the title of a book that was recommended to me by the director of Lily's school. It seems that boys are very different than girls and sometimes mommies and daddies have to adjust to the rigors of boydom. Having been through the 2's with a girl apparently doesn't prepare you for the same with the male persuasion. Oh Benjamin. When Matt was in Florida for a conference, Ben decided to start climbing out of his crib. He'd show up in my room at random hours of the night saying, "HI!!!" or "MAMA!!!" I was too out of it to check the clock. I was so exhausted every day, with Matt helpless in Disneyworld listening to constant Disney theme music and my crying. Ben also decided to start cleaning the refrigerator out for me. He can't really read dates on labels, so there was no way to know that those 15 eggs he smashed on the floor were perfectly good. The grapes which no doubt rolled under my appliances were fresh. When Matt got home, I picked him up from the airport, drove straight to LMU and he dropped me off for class and took Lily to ballet. What a dad, huh?! That was the night that Lily passed out at 8 with a 103 fever and woke up puking. That was also the night that Ben decided to show Matt his climbing and cleaning skills. At 3am, Ben decided that our 2 brand new cans of coffee were just taking up space in the fridge and dumped them all over the kitchen floor. Then Matt found him on the couch eating a burrito. Dude was hungry. Cleaning out the fridge is hard! Erin noted that Ben is like a college student with his 3am burrito breaks. We never thought we'd be these parents, but we purchased a net (or SUPER COOL TENT FOR REALLY SMART BOYS) for over Ben's bed. (Thank you Caroline for the stories of that boy you watched during our years together at Northwestern's Career Services or I would not know these devices existed). We have been feverishly checking Amazon and clicking the "Where's My Stuff" button, cursing UPS and praying for a box to be on our doorstep. Well, my friends, today is the day. I got that super cool tent ghetto rigged onto Ben's bed immediately because Matt is the smart one and he is not here tonight, but SWEET MOTHER OF ABRAHAM LINCOLN, I am tired.