Category: Xander

The boys and I went blueberry picking today at Valley Home Farm!!! That place just keeps getting better…not only do they have strawberries for picking but now they have blueberries AND blackberries. We met some dear friends there, that we have been fruit picking every spring and summer with since Roman was 2 months old…so precious. The boys all had homemade blueberry ice cream afterwards, and I had a homemade strawberry honey pop. Delicious. Kim and I sat on the shaded deck and got to visit a little bit while the kids ran around the farm. It was a good morning.

The boys had VBS at Holy Family this week and loved it!!!

The boys and I went downtown to the Cumberland Park Sprayground this morning. The coolest part by far was seeing the Blue Angels fly over the parking lot and hearing them break the sound barrier…I was jumping up and down and hooting and hollering…and the boys were super pumped about it too. We met one of our good neighbor friends at the sprayground, and the kids had a blast together. We picnicked and picked up an ice cream treat on our way out. I was smiley about a first for me…all three of the boys went into the boys bathroom with their dry clothes in hand and came out with their wet clothes in hand!!! It’s the little things. 🙂

Tom and the boys and I put out flags in our neighborhood (for the HOA) in honor of Memorial Day. I gave Tom a hard time about using a cordless drill to make the holes for the flags, but it TOTALLY worked and made things so much easier. The boys had a good time running all over the neighborhood and helping out.

I took the boys to gymnastics this morning. We met some moms and kids from our moms’ group, and if truth be told…I left crying. Ha! Funny now but not then. The boys were not listening and running around like wild banshees. I had to go and ask the gymnastics coach, as she was taking payments, what her rules were so that I could enforce them with my boys (because I knew they would push every boundary they could until they found out what they were). What made it a little more tough was that there were lots of little ones there who are used to having the gym all to themselves at that time. Suffice it to say that I will not be taking them back there this summer. They still had a good time, so I guess that counts for something.

We went to Percy Priest Lake this morning. I had never been there before, and I probably never would have braved going with the boys had it not been for my dear neighbor sending the moms’ club invite (and for Tom coming with us since it was his 41st birthday today!!!). It definitely gives you that feeling of being “somewhere else”…wading in the water, playing in the sand, etc. We enjoyed a picnic with friends in the shade afterwards and the kids had fun running around on the playground. We hope to go back soon.

The boys and I went to the zoo this afternoon. It was good times…even though we had tantrums over maps, potty emergencies, and three strong willed little boys running all over the place with selective hearing…we had a wait in a hot long line thwarted and handled with maturity by a 7 year old, a quiet 5 year old using his getting lost skills and approaching a zoo employee and giving her important information to locate his mommy (sitting 10 feet away), and big brothers giving little brothers piggy back rides. An overall success. 🙂

Story times and marionette shows at the Nashville Public Library downtown are such a treasure!!! We are so grateful for the wonderful cast of people who work so hard to bring joy to the lives of children and their parents in that children’s theater.

This morning, the boys and I got to the children’s library a little bit early to check out the play structure, climbing wall, puppet theater, and tinkering tables (although they all immediately got sucked in by the iBoard and iPad). Then, we met friends for a marionette show, “The Little Rabbit Who Wanted Red Wings”.

It was good times (except for Xander’s meltdown over sharing the iBoard that could be heard through the entire second floor of the library and Roman pushing some little girl trying to get her to “sit down” instead of reaching up for the smoke special effects even though he himself was standing up). Sigh…such are the ups and downs of experiencing life with children. Here’s to more of that this summer…

Jonas had a dentist appointment this morning, so I packed up our stale bread for feeding the ducks at a little pond close by on our way to the park.