A Little Miss-Timed Adventure

Ben has been in Maryland the last 2.5 days. In talking to the boys this afternoon, he mentioned going to 7-11. The forecasters are saying that tomorrow we are going to get thunderstorms and torrential rain, so I told Ben we should go today. But I wanted to walk, because gas is so expensive, I'm trying to only make worthwhile trips in the car. We have a 7-11 at the bottom of our neighborhood... but then you have to climb the hill to get back! And it is close to 2 miles each way. BUT there is a fire road out the back of the neighborhood, and .7 miles away is another 7-11! I can't believe that I hadn't thought of it before.

So, at 345, with bundled up in jackets and headed for 7-11. By time we got there, my hands were frozen. Fortunately, in the time that it took me to mix 3 suicide slurpees, my hands were properly thawed. Then it was back out into the cold, with less sun, and now icy drinks in hand. We made it home, pink noses and ears, with storm clouds circling above head. It was a fun Friday adventure, but I think next time, we'll shoot for a hot, sunny day!

Puppets!!

For Christmas, I got Aaron this adorable sock puppet kit. He liked it, I highly recommend it. There were only 3 socks, but lots of decorations. So today, on the first of 3 rainy days forcasted for our lovely week off of school, we made sock puppets out of real socks. Gasp! Real socks? Who would have thought it ;)

Where Did This Kid COME From?!?!?

Aaron is a real riot. He brings immense joy and almost as much pain to my life! He is happy and goofy, but stubborn and independant. Not the good independent, the kind where he wants to do everything himself... but can't. Oh, and he doesn't like me. And tells me whenever the opportunity presents itself. "No like mommy. Like daddy. And Isaac. And Roman." If daddy is home, mommy is chopped liver. Which sometimes works to my advantage. Like, Ben potty trained Aaron the week he had off between Christmas and New Years. No matter how many bathroom trips there were, Ben did them all.



Aaron loves to pick out his own clothes. He loves to put on his own underwear. Even if it ends up inside out and backwards. As long as he gets one leg in each hole and can pull it up over his chubby thighs and adorable bum, he considers it a success! He likes to accessorize. Like, say, with a pirate's eye patch as either a necklace or a headband :)


Aaron's favorite thing to do is cut. We have to hide all the scissors. He cut his blanket. His special can't-sleep-without-it blanket, which then proceded to unravel. We quickly scrambled to tie it off in various places and salvaged the already partial blanket.

I finally decided to give in and let him cut, under my supervision, and only paper. He has gotten quite good. He can cut in a fairly straight line, but he doesn't see the need to cut around things. He cuts straight down the paper, and likes to tell me when he is cutting the baby, or the flower, whatever junk mail I have given him to shred.



Another one of his favorite things is sock puppets. This picture of him, in the Mater underwear is classis Aaron. I think I was trying to find him for dinner. He was ignoring me, so I had to go find him. I was about to yell at him, when he pounces at me, his underwear on backwards, and a sock puppet on his hand. Sometimes, when he picks his clothes, he gets 3 or more socks out.

Aaron has finally decided he likes tv. Buzz Lightyear is his favorite character. On our last trip to Disneyland, he decided that he wanted to push Buzz Lightyear's button. We weren't sure if he would go through with it, he is terrified of Santa and most other things that are good in theory, scary when someone tries to plop you on their lap. He did push the button, but wouldn't pose for a picture. I'm glad I got this one. :)

Christmas 2010

Christmas has come and (long ago) gone. I feel guilty that I haven't posted ANYTHING. So here's a recap:

Joy came to visit, minus the girlies who were spending time with their dad this year. Bryce and Melanie and kids all came as well. It was so nice to have almost everyone together.

Christmas Eve, Dana, Joy, Brooke, mom and I all got pedicures. It was perfect; relaxing and fun. Then we all went our seperate ways to bake and prepare for the family dinner that night.

Grandma and granddad hosted a wonderful dinner for the 30 of us.
Too much good food was had by all :) We visited
and snapped a few shots of the whole group, and then it was time for everyone to head home and prepare for that jolly visitor.

Joy spent the night at our house, so I am pretty sure that she woke the kids up on Christmas morning.... Us Kerby's can't hide our excitement for a wild Christmas morning. These poor boys who keep marrying into the family are still adjusting to early rising and a full day of chaos.

The boys got spoiled, of course. Roman got a lot of science experiment stuff, and Isaac added to our heavily ladden lego collection. Aaron only really cared about the candy cane that he had been promised for the whole month of December!


After Christmas morning at home, we went to my parents, were we enjoyed a yummy breakfast and more spoiling. My parents got Ben and I a folding table and 4 chairs, in the hopes that we will stop stealing theirs ;) It's actually worked so far. We even used the table for 2 weeks until we got a real table of our own. (To replace the oober-tiny Ikea table that didn't even fit our family of 5).

Christmas was good. I loved having the family together. And I loved seeing the excitment in my boys eyes as they opened the presents that had been taunting them under the tree for weeks :)


The lovely sweater was from an ugly sweater party that we had. Actually, it was supposed to be an ugly sweater contest, but everyone else kind of forgot about that part.... I made my sweater, and was quite impressed with the end result. I guilted a few of my good friends into coming up with SOMETHING, and the Catlett's actually did give me a real run for my money. Next year for sure, everyone wants to do the ugly sweater thing, so I'll have to step up my game even more :)

A Stroke of Genius

Dana brought over 3-ring binders for the boys a few weeks ago. They are smaller than normal 8.5 x 11. so I had to cut down paper and change the setting on the whole punch... but the end result were research binders, complete with their names on them. The boys loved them.

The last weekend in January, we went to Cabrillo National Monument, and the boys took their binders. It was a beautiful day, and the boys were so good. Roman sketched a big navy ship, a prowler jet, and the lighthouse. Isaac counted the ships that he could see in the harbor below, and Aaron scribbled furiously in his book.


I was pretty proud of my good parenting idea, I feel like they are few and far between, but this was a hit. And the key was to let them take their time whenever they decided that they wanted to write something. Also not a forte of mine, waiting, I usually rush from one thing to the next. But being patient and letting the boys direct the day really made for a good time for all of us.


After the lighthouse, we headed down to the tidepools. They aren't the most exciting tidepools, but they are very accesible, and the shoreline is really pretty.
We saw a lot of mussels, hermit crabs, sea snails, limpits, and 2 sand crabs. As we were leaving, one of the volunteers pointed out a brittle star. It was pretty cool, and we never would have found it on our own!

Blue Zoo

The boys have this week off, for President's week... but then we don't get President's Day off, don't ask me!!! Monday morning, we went to the Zoo, just mama and her boys. All 3 agreed to start at the Koala's. A great idea, because the keepers were feeding them, so they were actually awake and active! So cute.
From the Koala's, we charted our course to hit the animals down the middle of the park, and end up on the opposite end, to catch the Skyfari back. It is exhausting, and maybe impossible, to try to see ALL the animals in one day.




The boys were very good, and took turns in the single stroller. The older 2 were good about holding Aaron's hand when someone else was in the stroller. The only problem was that when Isaac tripped, he took Aaron with him!



After the zoo, we picked Ben up from work to have lunch with us. We just had Weinerschnitzel, I was hoping that Aaron would eat a corndog... but instead, he slept through the whole thing, out in the car. Don't worry, we sat right outside the car, scarfing on corndogs and chilli cheese fries next to the a-frame on the side of the road. What a romantic Valentine's day!!

We took Ben back to work, and the boys and I headed home. Aaron continued to sleep in the car, and Isaac was also asleep by time we got home. Isaac woke up crying, and I moved him to his bed, where he slept another hour. I told Roman to just read or lay down, so he came into my bed, where I was reading, and he ended up falling asleep for 15 mins or so. It was pretty nice to have a napping house again... it had been far too long!

Oh, and the blue tint.... My point and shoot camera has been taking blue tinted pics for the last few months. Ben finally looked on the internet, and saw that someone (probably the person formally known as The Baby) had changed the settings on the camera!! So, Ben found how to change it, and viola, we shall have normally colored pics in the future!

Waterfalls in PQ?!?

We have just booked some campsites outside Yellowstone for this summer, so in preparation for the funtimes we have ahead, we thought we should start hiking. It works out so nicely that Ben is camping and hiking all over San Diego County (and beyond!) with the 12 year old scouts, so he knew of waterfalls in PQ!




We each grabbed a drink and hat and I packed a few (horrible, not trail friendly) snacks, and we were off... The trail was an old maintenance road, with grass and shrubs on either side. Not too scenic, but it was pretty flat and easy for the boys (and me!).







We tried to look for wildlife, and actually ended up finding more than 11 caterpillars! (11 alive, a handful more dead) 10 fuzzy orange and black ones, and 1 green one. It was funny, because they were scurrying right down the middle of the dirt trail, in plain view. We moved the first 2 into the grass on the sides, but then thought there must have been a reason that they were all in the dirt.

Roman and Isaac were both very good hikers, I was pleasantly surprised. They liked having their own backpacks and walked the whole way without any complaints! We think it was probably just over a mile each way.

The waterfalls were kind of hard to see from the side that we hiked in from. Ben had to get out on a ledge, and then I would slide one boy at a time down to him. I missed a really cute pic of them all out over the waterfalls... My camera acted up, possibly due to a slight bounce it took on one rock.


On the way back to the car, Ben found us a nice spot in the shade for a break. I am so glad that the boys enjoyed it, and I look forward to many more hikes with my boys!