Preschool Graduation 2014

Tamlin officially graduated from preschool this past week.  The YMCA had a little ceremony for his whole class...complete with songs, hats, rolled certificates, and handshakes. 
Oh my.  It was so damn CUTE!  Our muchkin was a ham, waving and smiling at everyone.  He knew most of the songs, but really he was great at dancing to the beat of the Elmo's ABC rap. 

 

We were able to snap a few shots before the ceremony.  Here's our happy family :-)

  

We are proud of both our boys.  Tamlin's excited about going to kindergarden in the fall.  Jude is doing great in the 3year old room; he just moved up a month ago.   Both boys still make us laugh and smile and just generally brighten the days...though they have rough moments too.

Here they are showing some brotherly love for the camera.  

I didn't get any shots with both boys smiling and not making silly faces.

 

And I learned cool new techniques in my photo editor.  The boys are holding their "first day" photos from last October, 2013.  My how much they have changed in a year!

May Showers Bring June Flowers

Tamlin drew us sunflowers :-)

Trip to the Cleveland Zoo

Thursday afternoon, Tamlin, Jude, and I headed over to the Cleveland Zoo. I went ahead and picked up the family pass, because the zoo is huge and I knew that we would be back multiple times this year.  We got there just as the kids on field trips were all leaving...so it was fairly empty :-)

The boys, of course, had to climb up on the baby elephant statue.



With our family pass, we get in free to the rain forest exhibit.  The botanical garden here reminded me of the Como Conservatory back in Minnesota...a little like coming home.  To get to the second floor, there was the option of stairs, elevator,... or climbing up a spiral staircase inside a tree!  They even have an area where it RAINS inside, complete with thunder and lightning.  There was even a huge ant colony of leaf cutter ants hard at work moving leaves through plastic tubing.  This fascinated both boys for quite a while as they "raced" ants.

It's hard to see, but there is a gar swimming on the top of the water.  Jude is looking underneath at the fish.

On the far photo, Tamlin is playing with a swimming turtle.  It was following him back and forth across the tank.

We rode the tram up to see the big cats.  Jude and Tam loved riding the tram...just look at this big smile.  We walked back down the wooden boardwalk...complete with races of ramps versus stairs.

Back on the main drag, we went in and fed the parakeets.  Both boys got a chance to hold the cup of nectar up to the thirsty birds.

Lots of giggles.

With it being much less crowded, I got to go in and see the uber cute little koala bears.

Awww...

And he was up there eating!

Awww...

We did catch a short show about birds...but the boys got squirrely after about 6 minutes, so we didn't watch the end.  However, we did catch the zoo "Pirate" show in its entirety. The premise was a pirate shipwrecked...and a scientist and her research assistant lost on an island.  (And it was a FEMALE scientist!).  They then had a parade of animals on the stage and talked about how they survive the heat and find water.  There were even trained rats running along the rigging of the ship...and a raven grabbing pirate coins (and a wallet) from their hands.  All the actors were good at working with the animals...even when they ignored them and pooped on the poop deck.  The highlight was when they asked for volunteers from our small (20ish people) audience.  Of course Tamlin had to go up there on stage!  Then they brought out the boa constrictor to drape across the volunteers...note how many little ones are up there trying to help hold up this heavy snake!  Very fun.

We ended the day walking from "Australia" to "Africa" to see the giraffes.  After 2.5 hours, the little boys were done...especially Jude and his little feet. (Must remember stroller or wagon next time).  When I asked them what was their favorite part of the day...
Tamlin "Touching the snake, sliding down the big slide, riding the tram"
Jude "Riding the tram"

Now the last time we were here was 2 summers ago.  Jude was Just a wee one in our arms barely 1 year old and Tamlin was only 3.5.  I scrounged up these old photos from that visit to compare with this one.  My how my babies have grown!

Here is Jude (3yrs) and Tamlin (3.5yrs) with their listening ears...

I love these two shots...
Summer, Brian, Jude, and Tamlin (and monkey) from 2012

And here is Me, Jude, and Tamlin from 2014.  We still have great smiles :-)
Next time we visit, we'll try to drag along my sister and family (or grandparents!)

Jude Sayings...

A few quips...

We were visiting our friends' Scott and Jennifer (and sons) at their house.  Brian and Scott, along with several other male friends, were outside putting a new roof on the garage.  The young boys were inside playing.  I ask Jude if he needs to go potty.  He says, very straight faced, "No.  There's no potty here."
What?
Yes, little dude.  They do have an indoor outhouse. :-)


As a family, we were at the local diner for brunch. After our orders were taken, we had some time to kill while we waited.  Our favorite time-waster game of late has been I Spy.  Tamlin has gotten pretty good at this.  He even informed me that he watches my eyes when I am "it" to see what I'm looking at so that he can guess that item.  (Smart little sneak).  Jude even tries to participate, to some success.
Me: "I spy with my little eye......something that is red".  Tamlin & Brian try to guess what I'm thinking of.  Jude answers with "Is it That?" while pointing to the ketchup bottle.  Good guess, right color, but not what I was seeing, which was a red jam package.
Jude: "I spy RED!"... "It's the KETCHUP!" 
Great job little man.
You'll get the hang of this game yet.


And of late, since it is warm and we are all outside more...
Jude" I fell down! I'm so Sad!  I need a kiss!  I need a Band-Aid!"
Oh the drama of the three-year-old life.
He is currently sporting at least 1 or 2 bandaids at all times, usually on some boo-boo that may or not be able to be seen with the naked eye :-)

Jude

Aviation Days

It was Memorial Weekend, and I cruised around the Internet trying to find a fireworks display to take the boys to now that they are a wee bit older.  I stumbled onto Aviation Days at the county airport with an evening air show. Planes and fireworks?!  No brainer!  I knew the boys would think this is wicked cool.

The airport is small, but they had a good two dozen planes on the tarmac for people to get up close and look out.  Many of them were older planes, but there was one large modern Boeing to go into and check out. We even saw how planes from a kit were put together.


 

The boys had fun exploring the various planes...but it was hot... so we did spend a good chunk of time playing in the kiddie area.  Plane toss was a hit, as was the face painting.  Jude wanted starts and Tamlin picked out a rainbow star.  

 

 We went to a nearby park to eat a picnic supper and a romp on the jungle-gym while we waited for dusk.  Then, back to the airport for the night show.  We got out the lawn chairs, sat down with the crowd, and enjoyed a fresh fried elephant ear.  As the sun set, we listened to music and watched the planes line up for the show...well, I watched and my two boys ran around and circles / danced to the music.

The show was based on a trip through the heavens. The emcee talked about the different stars and constellations that are seen in the sky at this time of year.  The planes flights were also very cool.  We saw twin planes fly in a coordinated pattern with the smoke streams behind that were lit by the sunset.  Once darkness fell, the planes blazed through the sky like comets or fallen stars with pyrotechnics blazing out behind them.

 This was a glider that swooped and looped through the air in a graceful pattern.  I loved it :-)
The show ended with parachute jumpers falling down to our sight while shooting off fireworks and flares as they fell.  Awesome.  The kiddos fell asleep as soon as they were strapped into their carseats because it was way passed their bedtimes.

But...

The even more awesome thing is this...

Apparently, there were several local folk that saw strange lights in the sky twirling around and called the local news station reporting that there were UFOs around!
I guess not everyone knew an airshow was happening :-)

Adventure in urban gardening

 Guest blogger Brian Thomas :-)

March 18:  Experiments in Lakeside Suburban Farming phase 1: The Indoor starts.
Basil, purple basil, thyme, oregano, spearmint, rosemary, chives, various colored sweet peppers and various tomatoes varieties (cherry, yellow pear, plum, Roma, pink, orange and red).  Also started lavender and foxglove.  I predict rainbow salsa and spaghetti sauce in our future. More starts to come in the next few weeks :)

March 23:  Experiments in Suburban Lakeside Farming: phase 1.5; More indoor seeds planted.  Started several gifts seeds from Chef Brian (my boss) and have added the following heirloom tomotoes:  Cherokee purple, brandywine true black, black cherry and JL Blue.  We also got lemon cucumbers and jingle bell peppers (tiny sweet peppers) from Chef.  I also took the opportunity to start other seeds:  regular cucumbers, sugar baby watermeleons, lemon drop melons, cinnamon basil, lemon basil, and a bunch of marigolds. That makes 11 different tomatoes planted...

April 11:  The Suburban Lakeside Farming Experiment Phase 2:  Over the course of the last week Tamlin, Jude, and I have constructed 5 raised garden beds (8' by 8'), 2 rain collection barrels (32 gallon trash cans with a hose spigot mounted at the bottom, over flow holes near the top, leaf screening, and a drain pipe hole), a 32 gallon compost bin and 3 20gallon potato growing bins.  We've already got some fingering potatos from the store sprouting and I have "All blue" and "Purple Majesty" seedling potatos from Burpee's we're going to try out.  Now to find roughly 350 cubic feet of topsoil/compost...

The Suburban Lakeside Farming Experiment:  Phase 3:  The Planting (cue twilight zone music).  In the last 3 days me (mostly), Tamlin, and Jude and the neighbor boy Liam have planted a ton of seedlings including:  10 sweet basil, 10 purple basil, 6 lemon basil, 6 cinnamon basil, 6 spearmint, 10 thyme, 1 lemon thyme (donated), 10 oregano, 6 rosemary, 5 chive patches (donated and saved from lawn), 5 lavender and 3 sage.  Yay legal herbs :)  also planted sunflowers, cone flowers, gallardia, phlox and sedum. Vegetables to be planted soon...

May 15:  The Lakeside Suburban Farming Experiment continues:  more planting this week including 40 tomato plants (13 different varieties of mostly heirlooms), 12 peppers (bell peppers of various different colors and sizes), 3 cucumbers, 2 watermelons, 70 marigolds (take that rabbits and my allergy prone family), Asian lillies, day lillies, and 120 onion starts (red, white, and yellow).  Almost done :-)

May 20:  How much wood could a woodchuck chuck if a woodchuck could chuck wood?  I just saw one pick up a twig, gnaw it for a second, and then throw it down.  The answer is 1.

May 23:  The Lakeside Suburban Farming Experiment "The Planting" has come to an end over the last 2 days as Summer and the boys helped with 2 packets of carrots, 2 packets of radishes, 3 blueberry bushes, 3 more cucumbers, 2 more watermelons, 2 pumpkins, 3 spaghetti squash, 4 yellow squash, 4 zucchini, 12 green bush beans, 10 Italian rose beans, 6 snap peas and a bunch of flowers.  That is of course in addition to the 40 tomatoes, 3 potatos varietiees, dozen peppers, 100+ onions, 3 cucumbers, 2 watermelons, 100+ flowers and roughly 80 herb seedlings from the previous weeks.  Yes, we are possibly insane.  Let "The Watering" begin (recue twilight zone music).

Our flower gardens in the front of the house.  Mostly donated plants from the moms and some rescued from Michigan.

 Playset partially converted to hold inverted tomato plants. Brian removed a glider swing that the boys didn't use to make room for the buckets.  Some peppers and onions planted in the top with the tomatoes hanging down below.

Potato tubs...colorful ad practical.  As the plants grow, we add soil underneath.

If I get real ambitious, I'll get photos of each bed to show our baby plants :-)