Apr 23, 2010

Recycled Stampers



In honor of Earth Day, we dug into our recycling bin for this fast and easy kids craft. First we collected a bunch of lids from plastic containers (Gatorade and Snapple lids worked great because they were larger). Then we chose our favorite foam stickers, applied, and voila - easy peasy stamps!




We even found a use for some of Daddy's empty little 5-Hour-Energy bottles - roller stamps!


This project was incredibly easy, but it kept Sawyer entertained for almost an hour!

He spent the rest of his Earth Day getting up close and personal with the Earth, er, pavement...


Skateboarding road rash :(

Apr 21, 2010

Happy 3rd Birthday Sutton!



Our "little guy" is THREE - yay! We're throwing him a pirate themed birthday party this coming Sunday, so we celebrated his real birthday in rather low-key fashion. We let him open his family presents on Monday night since we knew our Tuesday night was going to be busy with his sports class and then out to special birthday dinner.


Opening his present from his brother, complete with a specially made collage b-day card


"Here Sutton, let me help you...it's a Mater the Greater jumps through fire car!"


Testing it out - HUGE hit!


Mommy & Daddy got Sutton a pop-up Cars themed sports tent - it has spots for golf, basketball, skeeball, soccer, ball toss (through colored rings), and velcro "dart" balls


Tuesday morning we took Sawyer to school, and Ms. Robyn told us that Tim the Piano Man was coming to perform at the school at 10:15 if we wanted to join them - of course! I've heard a lot about him because he performs at various events around town, and people seem to adore him, but I've never actually seen him perform. Contrary to his name, Tim the Piano Man actually performed for the class with his guitar and not a piano. From the minute we arrived he treated Sutton like a special birthday star - singing special birthday songs to him and giving him a special instrument to play during one of the songs. He was awesome, and I can see why everyone loves him so much! We ended up buying two of his CDs because after the performance Sutton told him "I want your music on my iPod" and made everyone crack up laughing.

We spent the rest of the day hanging out at home, and Sutton got to talk on the phone to a couple of his friends and relatives who called to wish him a happy birthday. You could tell that he really felt special, and he was soaking up all the attention! After Sawyer & Daddy got home it was time to go to Sutton's sports class.


Coach Celeste explaining the nights activities to the kiddos - basketball and t-ball. The class is for 3.5-4.5 year olds, but they let Sutton join in anyway since he is definitely ready. He's actually one of the biggest kids in the class even though he's the youngest!



Getting ready for t-ball...this kid can SLAM a ball! He's equally as good batting right or left handed, and his form is pretty amazing for a three year old - everyone seems impressed with his skills! Sawyer helped out by fetching and returning all of the balls that Sutton hit off the tee.


Next it was time for basketball - nice shot!

Dinner time! We took the boys to Red Robin to celebrate - they had fun, but they were both exhausted from a long day with no naps.






Sutton was thrilled when they brought him his birthday sundae and balloons! He was so excited that they were singing for him, but they were SO loud! :)

Apr 19, 2010

Slippin'-N-Slidin'

Yesterday was a sunny and gorgeous 77 degree day, and the boys were jumping around begging us to turn on the sprinklers for them to play in. Daddy decided that it was time for the Slip N' Slide to retire from its winter hibernation, and it turned out to be the best decision! Sutton sounded like a broken record, repeating over and over, "I want to do some slippin' and slidin'!" and soon Sawyer joined him in his chant. "Slippin' and slidin', slippin' and slidin', yeah!"


Sutton examining the set up and getting ready to test the water


Daddy decided to show Sutton how it's done: "Hold your arms out like Superman!"


Wheeeeeee!


Ladies and Gentlemen, we now have ourselves a true Slip N' Slide addict! He loved it! I wasn't sure it was possible, but I think he might love water play even more than he did last year!


Sawyer was still much more cautious, and he preferred to run back and forth across it instead of sliding on his tummy.


He was still having TONS of fun though!


Sutton demonstrating what happens when you run across a slippery surface! Whoops! ;)


Eventually Sawyer got comfortable enough to take a turn at being Superman too


"That was AWESOME! I want to do it again!"

We had the best day playing outside in the sunshine with each other! The boys played so hard and for so long that they skipped their naps. Eventually they both fell asleep on the couches - Sutton at 6:45 and Sawyer at 7:45 - I actually had to go wake up Sawyer for school at 8:00 this morning because he was still sleeping so soundly!

I ♥ My Family! How'd I get so lucky? I can't wait to see how much more fun it will be with THREE boys running around!

Apr 17, 2010

It's A...

BOY!!!


The very first look that we got at the little guy was the money shot! There's no denying that this is boy #3!


He was squirming around like CRAZY in there!



Look at those hands and long legs kick, kick, kickin' his Mommy already! The tech even mentioned how long he is already - looks like another tall Kundin boy!


After awhile he finally started to curl up and go to sleep. He really seems to like having his hands up around his face ♥

We're both really excited to be having another boy. I thought I'd be disappointed if it wasn't a girl, just because I really wanted to balance out some of this testosterone around here, but I'm actually not that bummed at all. I can't wait to meet this little guy, and I'm determined to give him a name this time around before he's a day and a half old!

Apr 11, 2010

Easter, Part 2

Since Easter was rainy and cold here, we rescheduled our family Easter BBQ until this weekend. Unfortunately, it still wasn't sunny and warm, but at least it didn't rain this time! Only about half the family that was originally going to attend was able to come this weekend, which was actually kind of nice since it was less crowded and less overwhelming for the kiddos. Sawyer, Sutton and Stella ended up being the only kids there, so they all were able to find FULL baskets of goodie-filled plastic eggs during the egg hunt. They also got big baskets of stuff from their Gigi, Aunt Debby and Grandma Ardy: stuffed animals (and singing & dancing stuffed animals too!), cars, frisbees, little nerf footballs, games and more sweets. Thanks everyone! We had a nice BBQ lunch and then played the usual outdoor fun and games - basketball, badminton, pseudo-t-ball, and bikes. It was a really nice day, the food was great, and everyone had a lot of fun!


Stella, Sawyer, Sutton & Grandpa Gene

Hunting Eggs!

Sutton finally got the hang of egg hunting this time around - I was surprised! Usually he finds an egg, opens it, eats all the candy out of it, closes it back up, puts it into his basket and then goes to look for another one. This time he gathered lots of eggs and waited until the very end to start opening them up.

Sawyer has gotten really good (and fast!) at finding eggs - he managed to fill his entire basket before Stella and Sutton were even halfway done with theirs. Fortunately he hasn't quite mastered the concept of "look high and low and all around," so he left quite a few behind for the little guys to find :)

Sutton & Mitch taking a cruise on the pirate ship

Sawyer & Aunt Kari petting Joel & Andrea's brand new puppy, Mia, a Jack Russel and Chihuahua mix. She loved Sawyer and kept crawling up into his lap to go to sleep.

Apr 5, 2010

Best Laid Dinner Plans...



Last week I made a menu plan to answer "what's for dinner?" for the next couple of weeks. It's been a little while since I actually made a meal list, and I'm remembering how much I love knowing the answer to that daily question before 6:00 rolls around. So, I had big plans for dinner tonight. Plans that involved marinade, au gratin and loads of beautifully chopped vegetables (not to mention loads of time in the kitchen). But...all it took was one wistful and enticing "Come outside with me just for one minute, Mom" and the menu plan went out the window.


How could I say "No" to these lovable little guys? I'm never too busy for some sidewalk chalk art!


See how cute they are? Besides, look at all that beautiful golden sunshine - such a contrast from the wet and stormy weekend!


It was far too lovely of an evening to be stuck indoors cooking.


Plus, staying outdoors and in close proximity probably saved us from having to spend the evening in the emergency room from one of these cool bicycle stunts. ;) Sometimes the perfect dinner plan is simply throwing some hotdogs on the grill while you soak up the sunshine ♥

Apr 4, 2010

Happy Easter!



Late last night while everyone was sleeping, the Easter Bunny brought these fun filled baskets of goodies for Sawyer & Sutton. Mommy & Daddy were excited to see the looks on the boys' faces when they awoke this morning, but (amazingly!) Sawyer slept in this morning until almost 9:30! When he remembered that the bunny was supposed to have paid him a visit, Sawyer ran down the stairs clapping and cheering all the way...




The baskets were filled with LOTS of goodies (all purchased last year at the after-Easter clearance sales or recently from the Dollar Tree and Goodwill. Did you know that Goodwill sells NEW items too? I snagged these great still-in-packaging Mini Etch-a-Sketches there for $.75 each!). Sutton immediately picked up his Etch-a-Sketch to show Daddy that he already knew how to turn the knobs to draw a picture and shake it to make the picture go away (he actually was the one who discovered them at Goodwill - it kept him occupied for an entire half an hour while Mommy looked at old books!)



The most expensive items that I bought this year were the baskets themselves - $9 each after my 40% Joann's coupons. They're deep and sturdy though, so I think we'll get several years of use out of them. In previous years I've bought large plastic sand pails to put their goodies in, but they inevitably get broken after a few weeks, so I decided to go with a traditional basket this year, and I'm glad I did. The boys loved them!

The Easter Bunny also hid 30 plastic eggs throughout our downstairs, so after they raided their baskets they were off on an egg hunt. It was SO much fun! This is the first time that I've ever had a morning at-home egg hunt (even growing up we always just did a large family egg hunt outdoors in the afternoon), and it was a blast! It only took Sawyer about 3 minutes to find most of the eggs - he was literally jumping up and down and SO excited about it! Sutton was more into opening each one as he found it, so he only ended up finding about 1/3 of the eggs.





They each got three large eggs that were filled with candy and a Hot Wheels car too!


Since all the eggs were filled with candy, we had them dump it all into one container to share (which made it much more fair too since Sutton only had about eight eggs!).

After we hunted eggs we had a huge brunch of scrambled eggs, toast, bacon and sausage. We normally would have headed over to my parents' house this afternoon to BBQ and hunt more eggs, but since it was cold and rainy today we're going to reschedule our "Spring BBQ Picnic" until next weekend. Since we were stuck indoors in the cold, we decided to dye some real Easter Eggs the traditional way. I totally forgot to take any pictures of it though! We mostly used crayons to make wax resist drawings on the eggs before dying them in food coloring. They look great, and it was a fun activity to actually do on Easter day since I've previously always done them several days in advance. Mitch took some video on his phone of the boys hunting eggs, so if I can figure out how to upload it I will...it's probably a lot better than the few mediocre photos I was able to take this morning!

Apr 3, 2010

Yay!

Our marbled Easter Egg post was featured yesterday on The Crafty Crow - yay!!! Their blog is one of my most favorite places to find craft ideas - both for the kids and myself - so being featured on there is quite an honor! I hope our Springtime idea inspires someone else (it's SO much fun!), and I hope that this is just the first of many creative posts that make their way over to their wonderful site! :)