Pool Take Two

Finally it has warmed up, so today we filled the pool to let the water warm up. While Ephraim was taking a nap this afternoon I told Jacob to "go outside and check the temperature of the water in the pool". I wanted him to tell me if he thought the water was getting warmer.

After a few minutes Jacob came downstairs with our digital thermometer (dripping wet) in his hand to show me what the pool's "temperature" was! It cracked me up that he took me so literally!

What a funny boy.

After Ephraim woke up the boys got to play in the pool. They had so much fun!

Jacob and Ephraim were chasing each other around, growling like monsters. Occasionally Ephraim could come up to the side of the pool where I was watching and yell, "Rrraaahhhhrrrr!

I love this picture where I caught him in mid-roar. It makes me smile.

Jacob and Ephraim both splashed an had a great time. Jacob loves to splash, but is not so sure about getting his face wet!

The big hit of the evening was definitely the watering can. They thought it was great fun to dunk it under the water, fill it up, and then pour the water back out.

I had to make sure that they both got a turn to play with it. It was funny to watch Ephraim because he would fill it up until it was almost too full for him to lift! This picture makes me laugh because he is pouring the water into a cup that has holes in the bottom!

The boys did a great job at sharing and playing together in the pool. I can tell we are going to have a lot of fun with it this summer!

I'll have to remember to get out our slip-n-slide and waterball too. Between the pool and sprinkler toys we should have a ton of fun getting wet this summer.

Tower of Chores

One of the boys favorite things to help me with is drying the dishes. So on Sunday after church Jacob asked if he could help me clean up. I am always willing to let them help me out!

I think Jacob likes to help dry the dishes partially to see how high he can stack the dry dishes! Just check out the tower he made of all the cups and bowls.

Wow, huh? He is always disappointed when I go over and "steal" dishes from his stack to put them away. So far we haven't ever had a dish tower topple over on us. I don't know if that is Jacob's good engineering, or my quick reflexes!

One of my favorite things to do is hang clothes out to dry. I find it to be strangely relaxing. The boys can play in the sand while I can be productive. Plus I usually fold the clothes while I take them down, so it seems to get the laundry done faster

Can you tell what kind of load I was doing today?

Is it just me, or is laundry on the line pretty to look at too?

Cooler Overhaul

Joe has been working hard on getting our cooler all cleaned up and ready to go. He got a cool new tool that he has been using to get the scale and other mineral deposits off the bottom of the cooler.

The boys think the tool is fun, but they also think it is noisy.

Here is Jacob wearing some earplugs while watching Daddy work. I thought he looked pretty cute.

Joe got to the point where he was spraying the bottom of the cooler with new paint because he got it all cleaned up. Jacob was telling me how stinky he thought the paint was.

If you look closely, you can even see Joe in the background with the spray paint!

Hopefully our cooler will hold up well for a few more years, until we have saved up enough to get air conditioning! Thanks honey for working so hard on the cooler and getting it working!

June 10- A Marked Day

Tuesdays and Thursdays are my aerobics days. We go to the church building at 9 a.m. and I work out while the boys play. Then usually when we get home I am all sweaty, so I need to take a shower.

Lately I have been letting the boys watch a half hour of t.v. while I shower. That way they are occupied and I can get dressed without fear they are going to do something they shouldn't.

Apparently on this particular day the t.v. show that the boys were watching was not entertaining enough for Ephraim. When I went downstairs to check on the boys I found that Ephraim had gotten into Jacob's markers and started on a little body art.

He colored all over his hands, and even got his face pretty colored up.

Nice goatee, Ephraim!

I don't know what possessed him to do this! He knows that we only color on paper. Maybe he just couldn't find any!

So I took him upstairs to wash up. Check out just how colored his hands were!

All I have to say is thank heaven for washable markers!

First Pool Day

Since Joe mowed the lawn last night, that meant we could set up the swimming pool! The boys were so excited! I think they almost had as much fun filling the pool as they did playing in it later in the day.

Before you ask, yes I did have to change them both out of their wet clothes after filling it up! But I didn't really mind.

Later in the evening after the water had a chance to warm up a little I put the boys in their suits and sent them out the pool. They were literally dancing with joy.

They ran around in the pool, played ring around the rosies, and had a great time splashing around. I thought the water was a little bit chilly, but they had a blast and didn't seem to mind the water temperature!

Ephraim was especially excited to play in the pool. I was excited because he can finally get in by himself without dumping out half of the water!

I think we will be playing in the pool quite a bit this summer because the boys loved it.

Unfortunately we only got to play in the pool on Wednesday and the water actually never got a chance to get warm because it was cold and it rained ...and rained... and RAINED! We were so bummed out! Saturday I emptied the pool and told the boys we would try again next week.

Two Boys at Work and Play

Now that the weather has warmed up a bit, the boys finally get to play outside. Hooray!

When it's hot the boys beg me for Otter Pops, and I am happy to give in to that request. We are still working on last year's box, but I have a feeling we are going to have to restock soon. Good thing they are inexpensive. Yesterday I gave the boys their pops and found them a few minutes later eating them together on the porch swing. So cute!

My boys love to play, but they also really like to work too! They are always asking me if they can help me do things around the house. You have seen how they like to help me dry the dishes. They also love to help me oil the piano.

Believe it or not, they actually ask me over and over if they can clean the piano! How cute is that?

What great helpers! They do a pretty great job too.

Little Red Riding Hood 2010

What an awesome weekend!

I successfully finished my first century (100 mile) bike ride of the summer! Wahoo! Now I have finished four centuries in the past year.

It was a beautiful day for a ride. It was sunny with some scattered clouds, but it wasn't too windy and I didn't get rained on like last year. There were 3000 ladies registered for this women-only ride in Logan, Utah. It was fun to be on the road with so many ladies! There was never really a point where I could not see other riders on the road with me.

Joe was my personal photographer again this year, and I have to say  he did a great job! He didn't catch up to me until just before lunchtime because he ended up being asked to help direct traffic at the starting line. Three thousand ladies, cars and bikes is a lot to get organized!

Of course there were also event photographers on hand to take pictures of all the ladies. Before Joe caught up with me they got a couple of nice pictures in the morning. Here is one that my parents were kind enough to purchase for me after the event. Thanks Mom and Dad!

It was nice to get to the lunch stop and find Joe there waiting for me. The food was really good, and I even shared a little bit with Joe. I figured that was o.k. since he actually turned into a volunteer for the ride that day!

This year Joe left the boys at Jeanette's house, which I am sure they enjoyed more than following Mommy around. I missed seeing them, but I know they had more fun. Here is a picture Joe took of me with my bike that I think is nice. This is when I was leaving lunch, so I had gone 50 miles at this point.

I have to say that the organizers of this ride did an awesome job! I heard parking was a bit of a challenge for some ladies, but everything else was wonderful! The rest stops had plenty of water, great food and great volunteers. There were SAG cars ready to give assistance to anyone who broke down. Even more importantly, there were plenty of bathrooms!

The entire ride I didn't end up waiting in line to use the bathroom, which was phenomenal. :o) Another thing that was great was the lunch. The food was fantastic and it was at a nice park. Check out all these ladies and their bikes!

Even though I was doing the ride by myself, I met plenty of people and rode with different groups here and there. One leg of my journey I caught the wheel of a team that was keeping their speed up around 20 mph. I managed to hang in with them, and it was so fun!

I even caught up with some of the ladies from our local Trek bike store. I didn't get to ride with them very long though because they were doing a shorter distance than I was. But Joe did manage to get my picture with them!

After lunch Joe got some pretty awesome shots of me. I had a hard time choosing the best ones, but here are my favorites.

The course was mostly flat, but of course there are always hills. Here is a picture of me going up a hill right before my first rest stop after lunch. I am standing up and pushing hard.

Here is a nice photos of me passing another cyclist up the hill. Go me!

I love this next picture too.  It was fun to know that occasionally I would see my husband a little further up the road, waiting to take my picture.

I was also proud of my mom, who finished 35 miles. Way to go mom!

I am proud to say that I finished my 100 miles in 5 hours and 45 minutes of ride time. With breaks I was on my bike from about 7:45 in the morning until around 2:30 p.m. or so in the afternoon. My average speed was about 17 miles per hour, which is 1 mph faster than I did last year!

My family was there to meet me at the finish, so I got to see the boys. They had been having a great time at the Kirkham's and hardly even missed me! Joe had to talk them into coming with him to see mommy, but I'm glad they did.

I love Little Red Riding Hood! It was a great experience and I had so much fun. I definitely want to keep on doing this ride.

Fire Station Party

Friday (June 4) was a busy day for us. We had to get ready and pack up our stuff to drive to Logan so I could ride in Little Red Riding Hood and complete my first century of the year. Joe even took the day of. He ended up working on the swamp cooler while the boys and I were gone in the morning.

Where did we go? Jacob had a birthday party to go to! Jacob's friend Scott invited him to come to a tour of the fire station. Jacob was so excited! We drove to the fire station and all the boys got a fireman hat.

Then we got to take a tour of the fire station. They showed us where they lived, relaxed and trained. The boys were all fascinated by the CPR dummy, and they all had to touch him. It was so funny!

Then we got to see the fire engines. They opened up all the side compartments and showed us some of the cool stuff they have in there! They have all kinds of saws, axes and tools.

Ephraim thought it was pretty cool when they opened up the compartments and showed us all the tools. They even pulled out the jaws of life and showed it to us. It was pretty noisy, but the boys thought it was cool.

I thought it was fun to see the firefighters and all the equipment that they have to use to do their job. Check out how packed their lockers are!

We got to check out an ambulance as well as a fire engine. Ephraim was all over the ambulance, even before they showed it to us. Let's hope he never has to ride in one!

The boys all got to climb through the fire truck and the ambulance. I was pretty jealous because I have never been in either one... but I guess I'm o.k. with that!

The boys did a pretty good job of listening to the firemen. I think parts of it were more interesting to the parents, but the boys really did have a good time. The firemen were really great with the kids and made it fun for them.

Since I was right there, I had to take a second to put my boys up on the fire truck and take a quick picture. Check out all the dials and gauges.

Here is Jacob. He is a little bit better at smiling quickly on command.

While we were there the firemen almost got called away on a medical emergency. Another fire station stepped in and took the call since we were there. Since one of the firemen was already getting geared up, he finished putting on his gear and let us take some pictures. How fun. Here is Jacob and Ephraim with the fireman:

I think it's funny that the only person smiling in this picture is the fireman. Silly boys!

What a fun birthday party for a bunch of boys! Afterward we went to a nearby park and had pizza, cupcakes and ice cream. The boys had a ton of fun.

Then we waited until Daddy found a stopping point in his work on the cooler and we drove to Logan.  I wish we had more time to spend with Jeanette and my mom, but it was a very busy day! Plus when I went to put the boys to bed I ended up falling asleep with them. Guess I was tired after my busy day.