May 6,7,8 - One Busy Weekend!

As most of you know, the beginning of May is an extremely busy time of year for our family (which is why my blog is super behind - I know, shocker! But, there's a reason this time!) - we had a weekend full of birthdays, the Duck Derby, and Mother's day. Good times!

First, both my wonderful babies were born on the 6th so it's a special day for us. This year is extra-special because Will is turning 5 - a real milestone, and the major reason why I gave in on having a huge to-do for him (more on that in another post).



Both kids agreed to a train theme for everyone this year. So, for our first party of the day, I made a James cupcake train. Will and his friends liked it - I know Fi did! Just look at that happy, messy face!

After school, I made my second cake of the day for Fi's party - a family one at home. She wanted a Rosie the train cake, and I decided the 3-D cake was just too cool to pass up. So, in the tradition of the women in my family, I gave it a shot. I think it turned out pretty good (and it was a good practice run for Will's party cake). We had a nice party that night with Barry, Cathy, Katherine, and her boyfriend, Casey.

We also had fun opening up presents from family - we've all chipped in and the kids are getting a monster playset for the backyard. We're all really excited and want to thank everyone for their generousity (and for resisting the urge to buy toys, as we have enough for a small store already).

Saturday, the 7th, was the annual Duck Derby downtown. Every year, they send rubber duckies down our falls to raise money for charity - this year their goal was 10,000 (and I think they made it). We didn't go last year, as it was a rainy day, but this year the weather was perfect.

We got downtown and bought our 2 ducks, and walked around - there were a ton of vendors and kids activities. We managed to avoid getting roped into balloon animal or painted faces (thank goodness) but had a good time watching the professional hula-hoopers (I found I'm only good if I'm Wii hula-hooping - can't do the real thing).

I wanted to make sure we had a good spot to watch the ducks come down the falls, so we headed down to the rocks where the kids and I usually feed the ducks. Brent and I staked out some for us and the Weavers (who found out we were there from Facebook - gotta love that!).

















While we waited for the ducks to come down the falls, the kids played in the dirt (although they really wanted to play iPhone) - yea, dirt! The closer the time got, the more crowded things were so I'm glad we got there when we did. The DJ announced the start of the race and was giving the ducks names like horses (think Kentucky Derby) - it was pretty funny. Then, they released them all - we couldn't see because we were at the bottom; aparently, some real ducks got in the way, which is pretty funny.

After what felt like forever, we finally saw some ducks come down the falls! Then, a lot more came and it was really cool. They were assigned "places" based on how they came through the tube at the end (see the picture?) - believe it or not, we actually won 28th place!!! It's a birthday party at a jump house, so we're pretty geeked about that. We finished the day off with some ice cream - and we can't wait to do it next year!

Finally, Sunday the 8th was Mother's Day. Normally, I buy a lot of cards for all the wonderful women in our lives - and don't send them because I'm so caught up in birthday madness. This year, I got them out in time, so score one for me! :)

Will made this beautiful picture of me - and no, I don't have 3 legs; I'm holding a vaccum. He says:
"I love when she shoo-shoos (our word for vaccum) my house. I love when she holds my cats and lets me pet them. I love when she helps me clean up when I make a big mess." Aww - he loves his personal maid Mommy. :) At least he told me that he loves it when I play trains with him.

He also made me a pot and put a flower in it at school. They both colored cards for me, and Brent got me an hour long hot stone massage and flowers. He also bought smoked salmon, cream cheese, and bagels for breakfast - yum! That afternoon (since I slept late - yea!), we all went to see Rio (so cute!) and had dinner downtown at Sticky Fingers bbq. I had a wonderful Mother's Day, and a wonderful, busy weekend - I hope you all did too!

Will & Reid Mud Pit Fun

This is just a little bit of fun the boys had in the mud at the Mud Run. If you'd like to see them do the entire course, check YouTube (it's 9 minutes long and I don't want to bore people on blogger, as cute as I think it is.)

Mud Run

Saturday our friends the Weavers (Jaime and Ross) participated in the 2011 St. Francis Mud Run (http://greenvillemudrun.org). This is a 3.5 mile Military style obstacle course with 30 various obstacles. Not something I have a desire to do, but Brent and I were more than happy to watch Reid and go support them.

We got there in time to watch them start and jump in a huge mud pit as the first obstacle. Then, they ran off into the course and we didn't see them till the finish - a little more than an hour and a half later.

Until then, there was the Kid's Mud Run - a mini-course for kids to have a blast in. It was a total riot (video in the next post)! Will and Reid did all the obstacles the first time around. Will was a little tentative about getting dirty - the first time through. He only waded through the mud pit at the end while Reid jumped in with reckless abandon. :)


Seeing that Reid survived (and that no one yelled at him), Will decided to go no-holds-barred and jumped and crawled in the mud. I lost count of how many times they did the course - at the end, they only did the small mud hill and mud pit, rolling around and splashing in the pit every time.

Meanwhile, Fi's checking all of this out. After watching, she decided to follow the boys their second time through. She was doing Ok (trying the obstacles at least) until she got to the mud hill and fell down. Then, it was ALL over - her hands and one knee was muddy and, boy, was she upset about it! You would have though we dunked her in the pit. After that, she hung out with Brent and the snacks while I tried to keep an eye on our mud boys.

Looking at the clock, we decided to get out of the mud and try to clean off so we could see Team Orange do the finish - a huge mud pit, followed by a wall (no rope or rocks to help climb it either), followed by a fireman carry to the finish. The boys attempted the cold water shower, but that barely got any mud off and just made them really cold. So, we took their muddy shirts off and wrapped them in towels.

We sat down in the sun with our snacks and watched different teams tackle the end. We saw our team and cheered for them as they tackled each obstacle.


They were total troopers and finished the whole thing - great job to everyone! And, if they decide to do it again next year, we'll be happy to watch the kids again. :)

Spring Break

I hope you all had a wonderful Easter and Spring Break - we did but, man, it was really hectic!

Brent got back from China Thursday night with a cold. We got up Friday to go to Will's Spring Sing (the video is on YouTube but I decided not to post it - not everyone wants to hear 5 minutes of Will's half-hearted singing) - poor Brent was still sick and spent most of the day in bed. I got everything and everyone ready to hit the road Saturday for Michigan. I drove all 12 hours Saturday but we made it there in one piece, with everyone still in a pretty good mood.

After a very short visit with the Maxwell's (where it actually snowed and Fi exclaimed, "It's Christmas!"), the kids and I left Sunday afternoon for my parent's house. Another short visit and then the kids, my mom, and I left for Pittsburgh to visit my grandparents. We actually stayed there until Thursday! :)

We had a really nice visit with G-Gpa - Fi remembered coloring eggs there last year and assumed that's what we'd do this year. She also remember my Uncle Mike being there and was very confused when he wasn't this time - she must have thought that he lived there. We had a nice visit with Great Grandma too - she remembered the kids and enjoyed seeing them at the barn. They helped feed the cows and horses, and there was a new batch of kittens that they enjoyed holding/tormenting - Fi couldn't understand why she couldn't hold one upside down. The Amish finished fixing our family barn in Sept and it looks really nice - I have a lot of special summer memories from the farm and I'm glad it's still there to show my children.

Thursday we headed back to MI and managed an all too brief pit-stop in Ann Arbor to give Kristi a box of hand-me-downs for Taye and give her a quick hug. When we got back to Grand Blanc, we got to be a family again - Brent met us there and we had a great night. Friday, Brent and I ran some errands for the Easter Bunny and were supposed to go to a Tiger's game. Brent really, really misses his live Tiger's games, so I didn't want to be a spoil-sport by complaining that it was too cold and rainy; and pointing out that we all still had colds . . . But, as luck would have it, Brent decided it would be better to skip the game. Yea! Instead, we had a nice dinner together at Mr. B's and went to see the remake of "Arthur" - it was quite good and had some really funny parts.

Saturday, we headed back over to Maxwell's. We had another really good visit and the Easter Bunny found us there Sunday morning. The kids had fun looking for their baskets and eggs - this was the first year Fi really got the idea and it was pretty funny.

Monday, we drove the 12 hours back. While we had great short visits, we were happy to leave the cold North behind and get back to the sunny South. After almost 2 years down here (I can't believe it!), it really feels like home. I think next year, we'll have Easter here and come up North in the summer, when we can spend more time with everyone and less time running around.