Monsters!

Jayden and Royal have this game they play. There are monsters hiding downstairs in the basement. According to Jayden, there is one in the bathroom (the monster lives in the bathtub), one in the guest room (under the bed), and one in the office. Often times in the morning if there is a toy downstairs and he wants to get it, after he begs me to go down and get it and I tell him he can go get it himself, he asks me, “There’s no monsters, right?” And I have to reassure him that they are either sleeping, at work, or have been kicked out of the house. And even then, most the time he wants me to stand at the top of the stairs and wait for him to come back. Imaginary or not, they kinda freak him out, yet he still goes down there. I think he’s going to like watching scary movies. Anyways, when Royal is home, Jayden is always begging Royal to “go downstairs and sneak”. They have to “sneak up on the monsters”. “Come on, Dad, it’s time to sneak. Let’s go”

It always starts out on the jumper - the upside down jumper. The jumper becomes a boat or an airplane (or sometimes a place to put dad in time out under it, but that’s a different game) that is the safe place from the monsters. Royal and Jayden huddle together and discuss if they have heard a monster and if they have, where it’s hiding.



Then they very quietly get off the jumper and “sneak” (Jayden will even whisper so that the monsters don’t hear him) towards the hiding place.



Tonight, they were hunting the monster hiding in the bathtub.



Once they take a quick look behind the shower curtain in the bathtub, the whispering stops and top-of-the-lung yelling ensues, as well as, bat-out-of-hell running. “AHHHHH! MONSTERS! RUN AWAY! RUN AWAY! HURRY DAD! MONSTERS! AHHHHHHHH!!!!!! QUICK, BACK TO THE JUMPER!”





Willow pretty much just chills and watches the madness.


I’m sure soon enough, she will be yelling at the top of her lungs too and running from the monsters. I’m sure Jayden will love having someone in the house who will play this game with him all day long, because he is always asking me when Royal will be home from work because he needs to sneak. What? You’re asking why I don’t play this game with him all day long? I’ll tell you. Because, as it turns out, Jayden has labeled me as the monster who hides in the kitchen. I get snuck up on and then once I turn around and see him, he runs screams bloody murder and sprints out of the kitchen. Awesome.

Putting Yourself to Bed

Thursday nights are Royal’s night to get the kids to bed all by himself, as Thursday’s are my day to be the workout queen - Power StrollerFit in the morning, Power Restore the Core in the evening, and now that I’m training for another half marathon, I cram in a run after the evening class. Anyways, if you remember, Thursday nights can sometimes be a challenge for Royal, like this poor night. I always call Royal before I head out for my run, one - so I can make sure he doesn’t need me to come home because the kids have gone postal on him, and two - so royal will know how far I’m running and know when to send out a search party if I don’t come home at a certain time. Well, when I called this time, he said, ‘Have fun on your run, but you have a surprise waiting for you when you get home’. I’m thinking, “Sweet! Maybe something to blog about. Joanna just called today for the sole purpose to telling me to get a new post up” There’s such pressure here in the bloggy world!

Well, I get home after my run and Royal tells me he was in rocking Willow trying to get her to sleep and while Jayden was dressed and ready for bed, he was in Willow’s room with him, which is not unusual for Jayden. He’s often in the room with me when I put Willow down, and has learned that he has to be quiet, but for some reason, he wouldn’t be quiet for Royal tonight. Royal tells him that he’s going to have to go play with some toys out in the other room until Willow goes to sleep. So, Jayden heads out. Once Willow’s down, Royal goes out to get Jayden and can’t find him anywhere. He walks around the house, calling his name. Jayden doesn’t answer. Finally, Royal goes into our room and finds him here, next to my side of the bed. (notice the bag of yarn, that’s Willow’s Christmas stocking that I have yet to redo)



What a good kid. Putting himself to bed. Royal didn’t have the heart to wake him up and move him to his room. So, we’ll just wait ’till we go to bed.



AND! Here’s some pictures of Willow because she’s just so darn cute! (and drooly)

Swings!

One of Royal’s directors at work offered to give us their swing set as long as Royal came and got it himself. I’m all about free stuff!!! Royal went and checked it out last week to make sure it wasn’t going to be too big or anything, since we don’t have a huge backyard, and to figure out how we could get it over here and put together. Turns out it is a really great size for us, and I was even more excited it didn’t have a little fort and roof and stuff because of what happened to our neighbors (being blown off by the wind and crashing into a house and all). So, while Willow and I got our 5 mile run in this morning (sooo much easier to run with 1 kid-and the little one at that- than 2!), the boys headed off to pick up our new toy. Royal recruited the help of a friend with another truck, so they could get everything in 1 trip (thanks Jeff!)

Willow’s pretty pumped about it. We just need to get a baby swing to put on for her!





Jayden was so excited, he was jumping on the swings before Royal had the whole thing put together (notice the slide on the ground)





We are going to have so much fun back here! It’ll be nice to have some swings for Jayden to play on, especially when Willow is sleeping, since the park is a good 1/2 mile walk away!

Painting

Nothing spectacular has been going on over here. Just the same ole, same ole, everyday grind. We have managed to make it to the pool a couple of times, but it’s hard to hold Willow, keep my eye on Jayden, cool myself off in the pool, AND take pictures at the same time. I’m thinking of investing in a disposable waterproof camera, just so I can have it dangling in the water with us and take pictures of Jayden swimming in the deep end (with a floaty of course) and dunking his head in the water. He’s pretty darn proud of himself. Although with those darn disposable cameras, it always takes me forever to get them developed and by the time they actually made it to my blog, it’d be Christmas.

Anyways, here’s some new pictures of the kiddos. Jayden needed to get some painting time in, and while I tried to convince him that we should do it outside, since it was so nice. He said it was too windy and he didn’t want his paper blowing away. So, inside it is! Willow just chilled on the floor and spent some time chewing on toys. It’s one of her favorite things to do.

Package in the Mail

Today Jayden and Willow got a package in the mail from Papa and Nana. It was full of paintings that Nana has done, pinwheels to spin in the wind, a little raft for Jayden for the swimming pool, gum, sand molds for the sandbox, a cute dress Nana made for Willow, and this hat.






The hat even came with a matching doll!




Thanks Papa and Nana!

Kid Quote :: 1

I have really bad allergies during the spring and summer. I have for as long as I can remember and usually I get some good medicine from the drs that nip it in the butt right off the bat. However, now that I am nursing Willow, I am not taking anything because who knows how much she would get, and I’m not really willing to risk it. So, I heard that if you eat honey that is made within 30 miles of where you live, it can totally help. At this point I’m willing to try anything, because if I’m outside for like 5 minutes, I suffer for a couple hours afterwards. I am constantly washing my face and hands and pulling my hair out of my face to keep the pollen as far away from my eyes and nose as I can. I figure even if the honey doesn’t help my allergies it always helps a sore throat and boy is my throat sore from how much my nose is running. So, at the farmers market this weekend, I found someone who makes honey right in Wichita and when I asked them where the honey was made, they said, “Right over there. Why? Do you have allergies?” Sweet! So maybe it will work! So for the past couple of days, I’ve been taking a couple tablespoons of honey in the morning and evening. This morning as I was dosing myself with honey, Jayden came up to me and said, “Hey mom. I need some honey. My allergies are KILLING me” Guess I’ve been complaining a lot or something…. ;)

A Special Zoo

Today it got up to 98 degrees. And because I have so much McComb genes running through my veins, well actually Einarsson - from my mom’s side - it seemed like a good idea to go and do something outside. Something that didn’t involve large pools of water or shade or anything like that, ya know, things that would be really good for a hot day. Instead, we met up with Tonya and her husband, Justin, and daughter, Skylyn, and went to Tanganyika Wildlife Park. It’s a park that takes care of and breeds rare and endangered types of animals and tries to create for them habitats that are as close to their natural habitats as you can get here in Kansas. The animals that don’t need to be caged in, don’t have big fences around them, so you can get really close to giraffes and hold birds and pet lemurs. It’s pretty sweet. But thankfully, the rhinos and tigers and stuff were off limits to touching.

See how close the giraffes are back there??





Anybody see those 2 teeth that Willow has? She popped those babies through last weekend!





Indian Rhino



We walked around inside the Lorikeet exhibit and I got a couple birds to sit on my finger. Sadly, I was the one holding the camera, so there’s no photo. But one little birdie got annoyed at me and bit into me real good and made my finger bleed. It was traumatizing for Jayden a bit, even though I didn’t scream or anything, and we had to leave that exhibit right away. Jayden has always had this fear of birds dive-bombing him and pecking his head and stuff.





Cute little kookaburras





Clouded Leopards



Here’s the kangaroos. You got to walk around inside their exhibit too and if they came up to you, we were told we could pet them on their back. Sadly, it was too freaking hot for the kangaroos to get up out of the shade and come over to us. They just laid in the shade and stared at us like we were crazing walking around in the sun and stuff. I tried to call to them, but I guess I don’t know kangaroo very well, because they didn’t do what I asked.
This kangaroo has a little joey in it’s pouch! I’ve never seen one of those upclose!





Here’s Tonya and Skylyn petting the donkeys and miniature horses and goats.



Hello Goat!