Monday, August 27, 2012

Kindergarten Here We Come!

We have a kindergartener in the house!  

Noah was so excited to finally have his first day of school today.  He's been eagerly anticipating it all summer.  He woke up at 5:55am this morning, ready to take on the day!

We've reached the magic age where it's increasingly difficult to get a serious photo, so here's a few of Noah's favorites


Noah's new school backpack truly reflects his interests!

Here's he is at his table, working on his first assignment to cut pictures of things he likes out of magazines.

He got right to work, I gave him a kiss and said I was leaving, and he said, "Ok Mommy, see you at 2:30"

No tears, just lots of work to do.

Friday, August 24, 2012

Family Movies

Oh, we are so excited!

Matt is overhauling our family's technology, and we are able to watch our family movies on our TV!  
Whoo hoo!

Noah and Isaac were captivated by watching our videos from Christmas 2009, when Isaac was a tiny baby, and Noah was 2.5 years old.  They wanted to watch the videos again and again and again!

Family movies...it's the best thing on TV.

Triathlete Noah

Noah participated in his first triathlon!  

It was a pre-school triathlon for kids ages 3 to 5, and it was the prefect distance for each event.
Here's Noah getting his bike and equipment ready.

Then, it was time to go!  
Noah swam 25 meters, biked about 50 yards, then ran about 50 yards.

Noah got his very first athletic medal, and he is so proud of it!

Who knows, maybe triathlons will be a life-long sport for Noah!

Trolley Bus Adventure

One of our favorite summer adventures it to take the Gold Rush trolley bus to uptown Charlotte.  It's a regular bus, but it looks like a trolley, so it's special to the boys.  Even better, it's a free ride!  We were able to meet up with Noah's friend from preschool who he always has a fun time with.

Once we were uptown, there was construction everywhere!  Charlotte is hard at work getting ready for the DNC convention.  

Watching the construction was just as fun as riding on the trolley bus

Once we were uptown, we had lunch at Moe's, which is the favorite restaurant of all the boys

Thanks for the fun day, trolley bus!

Thursday, August 23, 2012

Strawberries

 
Isaac has a great time cutting the tops off his strawberries.  He is perfectly capable of biting into a whole strawberry and avoiding the stem, but cutting them is so much more fun!

Isaac

I just wanted to share a couple of sweet pictures of Isaac...


Ok, Mom, that's enough!


Friday, August 17, 2012

Preparing for Winter

Isaac likes to be bundled up when he sleeps.  Even when it's 105 degrees outside, he still likes to sleep under 3 or 4 blankets.  He prefers to lounge around the house in his winter pajamas when he can find them (shh...don't tell him I hid them!!)
So, when Isaac just happened to find his mittens on a hot summer day, he was so happy!  He insisted that he must wear them while he napped.

He woke up with very hot and sweaty hands that day!

When I took pictures of him, he covered his eyes because of the bright flash and said "I need my sunglasses!"

Silly boy!

Our Art Gallery

Our playroom is bursting at the seams with art!  I didn't have a plan of what to do with all of Noah's preschool art, so when he brought it home, I would just tape it to the wall.  As the year progressed, the wall grew into an art gallery!
This wall is Noah's preschool art, with a few pieces from Isaac mixed in too.

This wall is Isaac's art and paintings that were made at home.

Now that we're getting ready for a new school year to start, we've taken all the art off the wall.  The playroom is currently strangely empty without all the wonderful colors!  Noah is so excited to fill up the room again with is Kindergarten art.

We took pictures of the art so that we can play an artwork slide show on TV.  We chose our favorite pieces (which was very challenging!) to keep, and I bought a storage box for each boy to keep in his closet.

Thursday, August 16, 2012

Swimming Lessons

Noah has finished his summer swimming lessons at the YMCA, and he made huge progress in his swimming this summer!  He started the summer wanting to use his "floatie" all the time and not having much confidence about his swimming abilities.  

After 8 lessons, he ended the summer being able to swim at least 15 feet by himself, float on his stomach for about 20 seconds, and jump in and swim without a floatie.  More importantly, he learned to have fun in the pool and just goof around without the floatie and enjoy being in the water.
Noah and his swimming teacher, Christine, are in the front of this picture.  There's a water exercise class going on behind them.

Noah is swimming from Christine to the ladder

Noah swam back to Christine from the ladder

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Hello, New Camera!

Hello, Sony NEX-5N!  Welcome to our family! 

After 6 years of happily using a Cannon Rebel, we were ready to upgrade to a DSLR camera that is capable of taking higher resolution pictures and has the added benefit of taking high-resolution video.  

This new camera is the perfect combination!  I love being able to take a snapshot and then instantly begin taking video.  I have captured so many moments that I would have otherwise missed while juggling between two devices.

Here's two of the first pictures I took with the camera:


Wednesday, August 8, 2012

Sparklers and Fireworks

We had an All-American Fourth of July: boating with friends, hamburgers and hot dogs, sparklers and fireworks.  It was perfect.
Of course, Isaac insisted on holding his sparklers by himself.  He did a great job holding them carefully.

After hearing our standard lecture on how to hold sparklers, Noah decided they were too dangerous and would only hold them if Matt was right there to help.  But, we insisted that he be brave, and he also did a great job holding them.

Happy Birthday, America!

Matt and Noah met up with friends to watch the fireworks in Charlotte.  Here's Addie, Noah and CJ.  The shirts were not planned ahead, but how cool is that?


Ahh, the sign of a great day...asleep in your car seat with a glow-in-the dark necklace on, holding a book that was a gift.

A Summer Highlight

A highlight of every summer is boating with friends on Lake Norman.  It's something we always look forward to!


We all loved watching CJ ski.  He's only 5 years old, and there he is, skiing!  It was incredible!



Noah, Addie, Matt and Isaac

Matt had a chance to wakeboard and he did a great job!

Noah and I went tubing, and the look on Noah's face shows how much he enjoyed it!

Tuesday, August 7, 2012

Cooling Off

Is anything more fun on a hot summer day than playing in a sprinkler?


Well, sitting on the sprinker might be even more fun than running through it...




Monday, August 6, 2012

Reason #216

Reason #216 it's wonderful to have a handy husband....

...when your car's radio stops working.


When the radio stopped working, Matt thought that the fuse might have blown, so he replaced it.  The new fuses didn't work either, so he Binged (we don't Google anymore) the problem to see what the solution might be.  He read that the problem is most likely that there are coins inside the tape player, and the coins are causing the whole unit to malfunction.

So, he looked in the tape player with a flashlight and saw coins...lots of coins...and some paper money too.

Hmm, how could that have possibly gotten in there?

Instead of taking the radio in to the dealership and paying some huge amount of money, Matt decided this is a perfectly good do-it-yourself project.  So, out came the radio, and he spent at least an hour shaking it upside down and using different instruments to try to get all the money out.  

It turns out that the paper money was a $10 and a $20 bill.  I always have the feeling like I can't keep track of my money in the car, so now I know why!

When all the money was out, Matt put everything back together and it works as good as new!

Noah later told me that he and Isaac had been playing "toll booth" in the car, and they needed a place to put the money when a car went through the toll booth, so they put it in the tape player slot.  

Needless to say, I'll be supervising them more when they play in the car, and I'm not leaving any loose change in there either!

Saturday, August 4, 2012

Playset Fun

I had fun snapping pictures of the boys one day while they were swinging on the playset and playing in the mulch.  The playset is in the shade in the afternoons, and when the weather is nice, it's a great place to be!