When it rains....

Well we live in Utah, which I'm told is a dessert. So when it rains we go out to play!

My favorite thing about this was when I posted this photo and my next door neighbor's adult son (expecting his first baby! a girl!) Kade commented saying that he played in this exact same pool when he was this age. Something about this "pool" caused by the horrible sidewalks of Pleasant Grove city has been here for 20 years and being enjoyed for that long makes me so so happy.

John couldn't stand to be inside, but cried every time he got wet. So I stuck him in the stroller to keep his feet dry and handed the kid an umbrella.

.....which quickly became the coolest toy in the yard.

And with no umbrella to play with, Little John discovered the joy of the pool.

In truth this storm was CRAZY. Crazy crazy. Lightening, thunder, floods all over the neighborhood, trees torn out of the ground. It was nuts. But once it calmed down a bit we went out to enjoy. 

The next day (Sunday) I went into the massage room so I could grab something out of the storage closet in there, and found this

Turns out while I was feeling bad for all the people affected by the storm, our basement was flooded and mudded. This is nearly 24 hours later. Josh and I mopped up the mud and water and moved on - reminding ourselves again how glad we are to be renting here. 

Preschool

Tommy started preschool this year. He really really loves it. He learns new songs and games and loves to show me what he did today. 

Plus I love the walk to school in the morning - his school is just shy of a mile away and it's a nice little walk for the boys. Tommy knows the way (a straight shot North of here) and Little John knows when he's allowed to get out and walk too.

We usually get there a bit early and the boys sit on the sidewalk playing together until it's time to go in.

Last week I drove Tommy and John was heartbroken when he realized that he didn't get to play. Poor thing. 

I wondered about putting Tommy in school - he has 2 years until Kindergarten, but decided last minute to put him in and I'm (currently) so so glad I did. We were lucky to find great teachers who he loves. 

Producing Produce

Last Saturday I helped my mom can her beans in exchange for a few bottles.

OK a few means like 9 million....

I got there AFTER the picking (bless her heart) and we washed and snapped and boiled and bottled and pressure cooked 58 pints of beans. That's right, FIFTY-EIGHT.

I really love doing stuff like this - as long as the kids aren't mad at me for abandoning them. Mom and I sat on the sofa snapping beans and talking for like 4 hours and it was lovely. Plus I came home with 36 pints of those beans, then went out to pick my own garden and found these.

And two days later, I was lucky enough to be given raspberries to feed my freezer jam addiction.

Obviously raspberries are the very best produce anybody has ever shared with anybody - but the beans are a close 2nd. My boys are in heaven. John downs them like he does most things. I swear he'd eat anything.

Love. True Love.

Tommy and John tend to make each other crazy. One has the thing the other wants and the other snatches is the one screams and the other gets mad about the screaming and screams back and then they start pushing and wrestling and if I'm lucky I get there before the kicking and hitting starts.

But during the last week or so, Tommy has become Little John's best friend and greatest ally. They've joined forces and I'm here to tell you that together they are unstoppable.

The other day we were waiting at the park for Josh to get off work so we could pick them up, and these boys had a blast playing with each other.

When Little John got to the top of the slide he was too scared to go down, so Tommy gladly jumped in and "trained" down with him. These two cheered each other on and helped each other up and loved each other the whole time. Tommy would say "you can do it Little John! I KNOW ya can!" and Little John would giggle and laugh and clap. It was a thing of beauty.

Meanwhile our bedtime ritual has started to include The Snuggle Bed. Because it just feels mean to leave Little John in his crib while Tommy and I snuggle. So, we all snuggle for a while together. And the boys love this. They laugh and giggle and tickle each other. They sing and play and have fun. They are simply adorable. 

There is nothing like watching these two enjoy each other. They are beautiful, lovely, kind and thoughtful children and it is a joy to be their mother.

This phase has lasted almost a week. They've stopped trying to kill each other and started to be best buds. And although I know it's just a phase and they'll likely start snatching things and picking on each other again soon, I'm soaking up every second of their goodness.

Garden

So we're growing a garden, and for some reason (I can't tell you what it is) it is going CRAZY.

Which is why we eat things like noodleless lasagna and zucchini bread and just plain tomatoes with nothing to even hide them.

But my favorite thing is when the boys follow me out and eat the teeny tiny tomatoes right off the plant. They devour them. None of those poor itty bitty tomatoes have ever even been inside our house. Or past the edge of the garden really.

That's how I know that Little John loves tomatoes. Also because he growls at them - as he does everything he loves.

But today after picking the garden I was up in a tree cutting down dead branches and being all kinds of proud of my kids for getting "out from under me RIGHT! NOW!!! or else you're gonna have a tree land on you and it will hurt."

When I got to the back porch where they were dutifully sitting quietly, I saw what was keeping them quiet.

One bite of each of my tomatoes. Just one.

Lousy vampire children sucked all the juicy seedy goodness out of the tomatoes.

They're lucky they're cute.

Lazy Man

Lindon City had a Lazy Ironman this year and on a whim I thought it sounded like fun. You do an Ironman....over the course of 2 months.

Only I didn't hear about it until halfway though.

So I signed up and asked Josh to be on my team. We'd share a shirt.

And what do you know - we actually finished it!

As far as a physical challenge a lazy man isn't really something to brag about. And splitting one with your spouse really isn't something to brag about. But I'm doing it anyway because GO US!

Plus there's something about meeting a common goal and working together for something...more reasons I'm glad we did it.