Last Summer Blast

The weekend we went to have Radley blessed, we had a blast with the family too! The boys had so much fun with their cousins and took advantage of every second. They stayed up way too late and never went to bed before 10pm!  We went swimming, played outside, went to the lake, all the kids ran around screaming pretty much at all times, and we just had a good time!! 

This is me trying to get things packed and ready.  I would like to say this is unusual behavior for Damon, but it's not!  We take a monkey with us everywhere we go.

Damon's face cracks me up in this picture.  It also really makes me nervous because I have no idea what he will do once he knows how to drive a 4-wheeler.

Cousins!! Tyce, Kyler, Luke, Damon and Brek  They all played so well together.  Damon of course was the most possessive so sharing was difficult, but he still had fun!

 

When we went swimming, I told Kyler to blow some bubbles in the water, and this is what he did.  He blew on top of the water!  Not quite what I was thinking! 

Splish Splash! Kyler is not afraid of this pool any more!

Radley was happy to be there too!

Just too CUTE!

Damon got in the water to shoot baskets.

All of the cousins LOVED Radley.  They were all so good with him and gave him so much attention.  Damon was of course extremely possessive of Radley.  If anyone got too close to Radley and he happened to be paying attention, he would say, "My Radley, my Radley!"

This cutie just started cheezing away when I got the camera!

I'm telling you, they loved Radley.

Eww, sand

Kyler loves to splash his daddy!

These boys had so much fun together!

He always has to be throwing something.

Radley was not a fan of the wind, but he did really well considering.

Best Friends/Cousins

Damon got a pillow and blankets for himself and Radley.  He is very good about making sure Radley is not cold.

As usual the kids always wanted a movie on, but would only watch it for about 5 minutes before starting to play again then the rest of us watch the movie because, for some unknown reason, none of us turn it off!

Radley's Baby Blessing

We recently went to Childress to have our last bit of summer fun and to bless Radley.  Kenney's sister even made the trip from South Texas to be there with us.  It was a blast to have cousins to play with constantly!!  On Sunday at church Kenney was able to bless Radley.  I didn't get a picture of the blessing circle, but Kenney, Papa (Kenney's Dad), Kevin (Brother), Keyan (Brother), Papa Keys (Kenney's Gpa), Christopher (Cousin), and Pres Richardson made up the circle.

All dressed and ready to go!

Isn't our baby so adorable?!?

Just so happy!

Our Sweet Boy

Precious Smile

Daddy and his newest baby boy

We had some amazing photographers that even got Radley to smile

I have a feeling these boys are going to be trouble

Damon's 2

Our crazy little monkey turned 2 on the 12th.  We have been thinking he is 2 for a while now, so it's good he is officially 2.  We didn't do a whole lot for his birthday, but he seemed to have fun!!  He was able to go to the park, get a sucker, balloons, and stickers at the bank, eat lunch at this favorite place (Sam's Club, weird huh?!?), and he got ice cream.  He didn't want a cake this year either.  I am so glad!! Overall he had a pretty good day!!

Happy Birthday Damon!!

Opening presents was pretty funny this year.  Damon opened a Thomas the Train train track first, big mistake.  He didn't want anything to do with the other presents until he was able to open the train track.  Oops.  He did eventually open all of them and loved each one of course!

This is the last picture I got of present opening because I had to open the track!

He did really well blowing out the candles this year.  He has been singing the Happy Birthday Song for a few weeks now.  He will randomly start singing it in the bathtub or while he is playing!

We even splurged and got Blue Bell ice cream.  He loved it, almost as much as Kyler!!

While he was about to blowout his candles, he leaned down and singed his eyelashes.  This is me trying to get a picture, but you can't really see it.  It happened to his right eye; you can barely see it.  I guess that's what happens when you have such long thick eyelashes, I wouldn't know.  Mine are short and stubby!

If you watch close you can see him singe his eyelashes.  He was so excited to blow the candles out, we did it twice!!  One for each year right?!?

 I love the way he shows that he is 2.  He holds up one finger on each hand and says, "Two!"  It is towards the end of this clip, but I think it is so cute!!

Some of our favorite/memorable things about Damon:

• He has the biggest smile
• He loves to play
• He adores his brothers
• He can climb ANYTHING, seriously.  It is quite scary
• When he has 2 of something he doesn't say "I have two," he says, "Two ones."
• He likes to tell secrets
•  He laughs every time he toots and grabs his butt saying, "Fart."
• He is boy through and through

Staying Busy

I have been trying to keep these boys busy, hoping to avoid making messes and driving me crazy.  I am still wondering if going in pubic is a good idea, but we are making small efforts to get out.  It does give the boys a break from being at home and tends to break up the day, making it much more manageable til Daddy gets home.  Here are some of the things we have been up to!

The boys got some bubble guns when Radley was born.  Here they are trying to figure out how to work them.

Klyer got some bubbles to start blowing.

Shooting one another

Radley hanging out with us.  He didn't last very long so the boys had to finish blowing the bubbles quickly.

Damon's first bloody nose.  I know there will be many more to follow.  I asked what happened, and Kyler said, "I threw a bowling ball pin at his face."  Yep, that will bloody a nose!!  Apparently breaking a window wasn't enough to learn a lesson about throwing things.  He had to try and break his brother's nose.  Thank goodness Damon is pretty tough.  He really didn't even cry.  I text Kenney to tell him and his reply was, "Haha, I shouldn't laugh."  I told him not to feel bad because I got the camera as soon as I realized he was ok!  We sound like great parents don't we?

The boys like to line up things.  They will do this with pretty much everything: books, canned food, blocks, cars, etc.  It does make cleaning up easier because they keep their lines very organized.

Damon likes to sleep in Kyler's bed now.  One night I went to go put Kyler in his bed and laid him on top of Damon.  I couldn't see him laying there because it was dark, and I just assumed he was in his own bed.  Oops.  Kenney still doesn't understand how I laid Kyler on top of Damon, but I really didn't see him sleeping there!

Damon smothers Radley quite often during the day.  Radley takes it pretty well, but Damon does not know what personal space is.  It annoys all of us!

Kyler's new thing is to pick out and change clothes multiple times a day.  He has definitely not caught on to the whole matching thing.  He doesn't care what his clothes look like.  I keep trying to tell him to stop getting out long sleeved shirts and pants because it is 100 degrees outside, but he does it anyway.  The other day he came out wearing his heavy winter coat.  Needless to say, that didn't last very long.  

Radley is making things more difficult too because he now rolls over really well.  He rolled over for the first time when he was 3 weeks old, but now it is a much more smooth motion.  I guess I can't leave him unattended now!  I was hoping he might be a little slower than his brothers and not be mobile quite so fast, but that doesn't seem to be happening!

This is the look I get when the flash goes off!

Just about to sneeze

Kyler can be found doing this quite frequently during the day.  He doesn't like Radley's crying!!

Damon decided to try and get some fruitsnacks off the top of the fridge.  He uses his bat to turn the light on and off in his room and to reach things that are too far for his hands.  Naturally, the bat would be his first thought to reach the top of the fridge.  Can you tell this is where I try and keep things out of reach?  There is a lot of junk up there!!

Surviving Hour by Hour

I have been asked a lot recently how things are going, and I have been saying, "We are taking it hour by hour."  And that is truly how I have been surviving.  Kenney is doing his clinical right now, and we both thought it would be easier in a lot of ways compared to school.  We were very wrong.  He has been gone for over 10hrs pretty much every day.  I was not prepared to handle these boys that much so soon.  It is nearly impossible to make dinner without someone to help with the kids!!

My new dilemma is between staying at home with the boys or getting out and doing things.  So far I don't have much positive to say either way.  We all go crazy staying inside all day (see broken window picture) because the boys need space to play, but if I take them in public one or more of them is crying at all times.  I had to pick up Radley's medicine the other day, and the three of us barely made it out alive.  All three of them were crying before we even got out of the car to walk into the hospital; We were all sweating because they didn't have the medicine ready until the hottest part of the day; Damon refused to walk in the hospital so I was pushing the stroller and carrying him; Kyler literally threw a fit the entire time (rolling around on the ground and everything), and to top it off they were handed suckers as we walked out the door to reward their 'good' behavior!!  I won't even mention our drama at storytime yesterday!!  So basically I am stuck between a rock and a hard place.  Any suggestions??  I really would like to enjoy this time with my boys, but it is proving rather difficult!

This picture is a little old, but I thought it was cute

Swimming with Daddy.  This is Kyler being 'brave'.  He is so scared of the water, and we don't know why.  It takes a lot of negotiation to get him to ride on Kenney's back.  He likes to go around and touch all the numbers.

Damon shooting Kyler and Daddy with the water gun.

Splash Splash Splash

Damon 'swimming' to the stairs.  Apparently, after I left Damon got really brave and started jumping in the water, but I didn't see any of it and therefore we have no pictures. 

Not the most flattering picture, but this is what I would prefer doing these days!

I know to most people this does not look like a chunky baby, but in our family, this is the chubbiest baby so far!

Radley has started smiling!!  I love it when they finally start acknowledging me. This is not the best picture, but it's hard to get them to smile at a camera.  The first time he smiled was a 3am.  It was an eventful feeding; he smiled, his cord finally fell off, he sprayed both of us with spit-up and filled his diaper!

Just an adorable little face!

Almost a full smile

It is nearly impossible to get a reasonable picture with these three

I know I will always have protection with 3 little Spidermen.

The broken window.  Apparently throwing cars is a bad idea.  I was feeding Radley, of course, while this happened, and after they had been told repeatedly not to throw cars .  It took nearly 30mins to clean it up.  Kyler and Damon had to sit on their beds and Radley screamed the entire time.  Needless to say, it took 7:00 a LONG time to roll around this day.