Better late than never

I'm a horrible mother, but what's new? Rocket turned 3 last month (my baby!) and in the midst of life forgot to put up the pictures. He had a great little party and got lots of fun goodies. I'm still having a hard time comprehending that my little one is 3. He's so much fun at this age and has such a quirky little personality. He has a very funny smirk that he does sometimes that is totally identical to the one my dad does when he thinks he's being clever or witty. He always uses proper English when speaking, which I find funny because you don't expect a kid that small to say "I do not want to do that", instead of "I don't wanna". He still such a happy kid, in general, though his feisty little temper is emerging more and more. He tries so hard to keep up with his big brothers, and also likes to torment them, too. He will still let me snuggle him, loves to give me hugs and kisses, though he doesn't like to hold my hand very often. I'm so lucky to have him as my own! I love that kid!

Gambit was never far away, just in case his help in opening gifts was needed.

He got a balance bike from us. He loves it (those things are amazing in teaching kids how to ride a bike) and zooms all over the sidewalks.

This was Gambit's very sweet birthday card he made for Rocket all on his own.

 

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Look who's 32!

He's got a little more gray hair in the beard, and a little less hair on top overall, but still cuter than ever. Happy birthday Antonio!

 

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Ape Caves

Mammie wanted to do something together as a family on Memorial Day, but the weather wasn't expected to be very good. We all decided to go to the Ape Caves, which are lava tubes near Mt. St. Helens. It was wet, and a little cold, but it was really neat to climb through the caves. I definitely want to take the boys again, but not when it's so wet and soggy. We were all soaked through by the end and the boys rode home in their underwear because all their clothes were sopping.

Cousin Dee had the best ride.

 

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Happy Mothers Day to....me?

Antonio has been wanting (begging) to get some quads for the family. After months of research and his relentless need to bring up the topic every 1.7 seconds, he finally got his beloved quad on Mother's Day. I got breakfast in bed (which was delightful). He got a quad. Hmmmm. That one quad morphed into four within 10 days. One for me, and two small ones for each of the big boys. I stopped asking what the financial hit was eventually. I figured in this case, ignorance really is bliss. Despite my jesting, we have had so much fun out riding together.

Mouse (Athena and Falsh's daughter) drove Gambit around for a long time. They had fun.

 

Athena and Falsh have been kind enough to let us keep and ride the quads out on their property for now. We don't have the storage space or a trailer big enough to haul them all yet. It's been fun weekends of getting dirty, BBQs, friends, and happy memories.

This is the view from Athena's front yard. Gorgeous, isn't it?

Falsh even let me do a bit of target practice. Don't worry, the kids were in the house far away and not playing on the play structure :-)

This is how the kids wind down after a long day of riding. Poor Rocket was getting bounced all over. Again with the amazing view. I'd love to look out at that every morning!

 

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Nine weeks

Athena gave me this gorgeous orchid (that had nine blossoms) in celebration of us reaching nine weeks of pregnancy! She's actually given me a cute gift each week, but I only now remembered to take a picture.

Little gummy bear is doing great and growing well. We had another ultrasound on Monday morning and it was so neat to see him actually moving his arms and legs! So amazing! In general, I'm still feeling pretty good. My pants are getting snug, and I want to eat everything in sight, but I don't feel sick very often. And when I do it's very brief. He is being quite the gentleman so far.

 

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Boys will be boys

Athena and Falsh have a lot of beautiful land and live about 15 mins from us. Falsh also is working on building a monster truck (a real one!) and Antonio had been having fun going up there to help. Though I'm not actually how much help he really is. He was also able to reach a dream of his and got an ATV to enjoy this summer. Antonio took Ninja and Gambit up there while we had some great weather for hiking and being boys.

 

Monster truck frame! The name of the truck is "Stripling Warrior".

 

Antonio's new toy

 

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Family nights

We've had lots of fun family dates the last few weeks. I took the boys downtown one evening so we could meet up with Antonio after work and have dinner. We took them to a delicious Lebanese restaurant that Antonio and I both love. The boys ordered pizza (of course), but we still had a lot of fun.

 

We took the boys bowling one morning and that was so funny. Rocket kept throwing the ball and then it would roll really slowly down the alley. At one point it even stopped before it got to the pins. There's a fun arcade in our bowling alley and they love getting tickets to get prizes.

 

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