Showing posts with label Uncle Jeff. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Uncle Jeff. Show all posts

Monday, August 12, 2013

Friday, August 9th

There were a lot of plans made for Friday, however the weather did not cooperate at all.  Fortunately everyone was able to go with the flow and so despite the changes, a good day was had by all!  A mix of around-the-house time with Uncle Jeff, a movie outing, some necessary party preparation (the next day was Victoria's 5th birthday party), and of course quality time with weapons :-)


Morning snuggles with Uncle Jeff.  Waverly seemed perplexed - it's like daddy but not daddy...? (can you tell there's no other men in her life??)


 Lincoln was showing off his mad game-playing skills on his Nook.


Scarlett made 12 pancakes like a pro!


 Then... the grand reveal!  Uncle Jeff had brought a belated birthday gift for Lincoln - an AR-15 style airsoft gun.  Because every 3-year-old needs assault weapons, right?


Learning the safety rules and proper handling procedures.


 Lincoln was quite impressed with it. He asked Uncle Jeff or Daddy to take him out to shoot some more roughly 4,395 times over the next two days.


Scarlett always surprises me - she meandered downstairs and discovered what the menfolk were up to and was eager to learn as well! 



Not only that - she was a total natural!  That's my girly-dress wearing, pancake-making, loves to sew, shooting girl, haha.


Per Victoria's explicit instructions, the theme of her birthday party was to be a Mexican Monkey Easter Egg Hunt.  I think we had something like 20 bags of a dozen eggs/each to stuff with candy.  Uncle Jeff helped establish the process.


Teamwork - they really cranked them out.  I think it only took about 15 to 20 minutes to get them almost nearly finished.


Grammie had taken Victoria to pick out her cake from Kroger.  Victoria had seen one there a week or two prior that she was sure she would love; they didn't have it this time but she chose another one that she felt would be just perfect.  I think it was the worst tasting cake of all time, lol.  She had made sure to tell us to save several eggs for her to fill as well. 


A whole buncha eggs!


 Time for the daily Uncle beating ;-)


 Jim and Jeff took the three big kids on a movie date to see "Turbo."  They all loved it, and especially since Uncle Jeff splurged and got them each their own kid's pack!


After the movie, Jim and Jeff headed out for the evening - when they returned all of the kids were fast asleep... except my sidekick, who likes to keep late hours and was in a sling helping me roll chicken enchiladas for the party :-)  Uncle Jeff was very accommodating and took over for a while so I could finish up.


 Hanging out while I wrapped presents.


I don't want anyone to feel intimidated by my *amazing* wrapping skills, but I wanted to show off this fine specimen ;-)







Thursday, August 8, 2013

Thursday, August 8th

Once again, our good friend Mrs. Lawson worked her magic and was able to get us into an amusement park at a deeply discounted price (free is pretty discounted, yes?).  The kids were SO geeked to head to White Water on Thursday - the weather had looked iffy but the forecast was showing little chance of rain until the afternoon, so we decided to go for it!  Things started out very smoothly and fun, but no sooner had we gotten settled when Lincoln took an epic spill, stopping his fall with his knees, forehead and chin :-(  He had been really excited to do some of the bigger kid slides at the water park, but after that happened he just wanted to stick close by me, so he, Victoria, Waverly and Julia were my crew while the other moms and kids (including Scarlett) went off to explore and ride some slides. 

Right before our two mini-groups joined back up, we had a nice little downpour.  However, the baby stayed dry and there was no thunder during the rain so the park remained open and we decided to break for lunch.  One of the great things about White Water is you can bring your own picnic lunch and eat outside of the park - it's very convenient and a huge money saver!  Unfortunately for us, there were some very interested yellow jackets hovering nearby and Victoria ended up with three stings!!  This made Day 2 of a kid getting stung... not a good trend.  Right after that drama was going down, it started thundering and with our firm departure time of 2:30 looming an hour away, I just had to call it a day.  It ended up being the absolute best choice, and the kids got giggly on the way home, making it a fun drive with everyone smiling :-)

The kids had baths (ew, the grody-ness of a water park majorly gags me, even though I am one of the least germaphobe people out there!), snacks and a rest, then it was time to get geared up for karate.  But best of all - Uncle Jeff made it to our house in time to go with them to karate class!  They were insanely thrilled to see him, and are looking forward to him being here over the next few days.


Knowing it would be hot and that we were, after all, going to a water park, I put Waverly in a cute little size 3 month swimsuit.  As I put it on her she made a little "uuhh!" noise, because WOW, that thing was tight!  It was like a baby spanx girdle! haha  I decided to take a picture of her with it on before peeling it off.


Victoria was adamant that she get to be the one to hold her for this photo :-p  Love my crew!


I hadn't packed the lunch the night before like usual, we had some time to spare, and the kids were running circles underfoot in sheer excitement... so I had the idea to let the girls make/pack our lunch. Genius!  They LOVED doing it and felt so big, and I did not have to make lunch.  A win-win :-)  Scarlett made all four sandwiches - 2 pb&js, 2 turkey & cheese - while Victoria washed and plucked grapes off the bunch and put them into a bag for us.  Linc helped momentarily by gathering some pretzels, but was soon off and running again.


Me: "Lincoln, I thought you were going to help the girls pack our lunch...?"
Lincoln: "I can't."
Me: "Why not, exactly?"
Lincoln: "There's a dinosaur eating my finger."
Me: "Oh."


Waiting for the rest of our group - love these goofballs!  Waverly could not fit into our group pic, taken as we huddled in the van :-)


Much smaller SASCH group this time, compared with Six Flags - only three families, plus a friend of Kimberly's and her son.


Running through the splash park area - can't imagine why he fell :-p


Scarlett - a wee bit excited to be here finally!


Mrs. Lawson is *always* - ALWAYS - prepared for everything.  Not only did she have a huge waterproof bandaid + neosporin for Lincoln's knee shred, but later she had sting-away wipes, motrin and benadryl for Victoria's stings! Thanks Mrs. Lawson :-)


Trying in vain to keep those pretty eyes open, but the warmth and sunshine just make it impossible - she was snoozing in no time.


I didn't get to see Scarlett go down any of the bigger slides while she was off with the other group, but she was really impressed with herself for doing them :-)


Julia and Lincoln, down a water slide.


Victoria was not so sure she wanted to go down this little slide, but eventually was peer-pressured into it.  Of course, once she'd done it she loved it and went back down twenty times.


Lincoln and Victoria!


The last thing my group did was the lazy river.  Julia took point and guided Victoria and Lincoln around in the inflatable.  When they made it back around, Victoria was not too pleased - she hadn't realized it would take so long and had gotten anxious.  She also said it was "way cold, like our pool at home." haha


After the picnic-lunch-gone-wrong (stings, thunder, lots and lots of loud sobbing and wailing), we packed up to head home.  Once we were in the car and suckers passed out, the kids rallied and even Victoria couldn't stay mad (doing her very best to show me a mad/sad face but failing miserably, lol).


Lincoln's version of a mad face :-)


While Jim and Jeff took the big kids to karate, Grammie and Waverly were talking about the day - big smiles :-)  Gram had asked Victoria if she cried more or less than Lincoln had the previous day (when he was stung by the wasp), and she responded, "I cried more, but three is a lot worse than one." True enough!


Gram made her awesome bbq ribs and fried potatoes for dinner - what an awesome treat!  Then the men spent twenty minutes throwing the kids around and/or being beaten up.  A good workout after all that delicious food :-)