Boyd Orchard Field Trip

This past Wednesday, Jacob's 1st grade class took a trip to Boyd Orchard  (in Versailles, KY -- and yes, you should pronounce that "ver-SAILS" because we ARE in Kentucky, after all...)

 Jeremiah & I got to go along... (Daddy was working, of course, but remember last year when Rich & I both got to go?  Might have been the one single solitary benefit of working  midnights/weekends!). 

Besides being FRIGID, it was a very pretty day.  But I have to admit, keeping up with Jeremiah made it very hard to get good pictures.  :)  But here are a few anyway...

At the petting zoo, Jacob fed the goats...

And the whatever-this-animal-is... a turkey maybe?

Jeremiah played in the sand...

 

...while Jacob went on the BIG slide!

(Look for him at the top of the slide, on the left... and notice the 

"absolutely no adults" sign at the bottom...not fair, if you ask me!)

Fall Break

Fall Break. What is it really? Well, for us it was supposed to be a weekend with Nana & Papa for the boys, and a little camping getaway for Rich & me. But Papa's back muscles (poor Papa!) and Rich's new manager (phooey) had other plans.  

So, today instead of meeting Nana & Papa halfway to Atlanta & ditching the kids with them ;), we are at home. AND, as if that weren't enough disappointment to fend off, it's RAINING!  (Of course stupid Kentucky would choose today of all days to rain...  grrrrr...) We really had to pray last night at bedtime about "choosing to not be disappointed" and that was even before we knew about the rain.  :)

Anyway, we are making the most of it. This morning we had breakfast in front of the TV... Then we had some special coloring activity sheets of "Super Why" that I printed off of PBSkids.org. (Super Why is Jeremiah's new favorite show.) Then we moved on to hand stamps, which is quite a step forward for Jeremiah...

After storytime at the library, Miss Katy gives all the kids a little stamp on their hand. Well, Jeremiah not-so-much. Over the last several weeks he has progressed from absolutely refusing to acknowledge that it's happening, to very suspicously peering over the shoulders of the kid in front of him to check out the process, to walking up with me & watching me get my hand stamped. It's been very funny to watch!  And finally, today, Jeremiah got a lovely blue caterpillar stamped on his hand. TWICE! Good times.

After that, we did some more coloring & Jeremiah did some sticker-ing in a little farm activity book that he has. Lately he likes to play at guessing all the wrong answers first & then finally coming to the right one. A little tiresome for me...but at least it took up plenty of time in this long rainy day.

When Jeremiah went down for his nap, Jacob & I started in on a great project that has been waiting for us for months and months:  the "My Little Blue Robot" book that Grampy got for Jacob who-knows-how-long ago. It was a very neat process...I wish I had taken pictures along the way, but alas, I didn't. Here is the end product though.  :)

 

 

Oh, No!

Now, multiply that by about 3 hours...

Bi-Water Farm

This past Saturday morning we took a quick trip to a pumpking farm in Georgetown (about a 1/2 hour north of Lexington).  Mostly I needed to scout it out for a Life Group fun night ;) but we figured it would be a fun trip for the boys too.  We couldn't stay long, because there was a wedding we needed to be at that afternoon, but we did do a little browsing, a little chicken-chasing, and got a few good pictures.  

I think we'll probably go back sometime when we can stay a couple hours & do the hay-ride and corn maze (and something called bunnyville which may or may not involve baby chicks going down a baby-chick-sized water slide...?).  I'm sure that trip will warrant another post!

All the boys next to a really cool old chevy truck 

that was filled with pumpkins in the back...

And the little boys chasing after the chicken 

that was wandering around.

And, sadly, we never could get this one quite right, but we sure tried:

  

Catching Up Chapter 3: Jacob turns Six!

Jacob's 6th birthday was June 21st... We seems to be on an every-other-year pattern for parties... Last year was the great Bliss Water Park party, with pool & sprinkler & slip-n-slide, so this year was a "just family" year. It also turned out to be a "one-present" year, because it was such a BIG present! :) We sent him on a scavenger hunt...

and the clues eventually took him to the present...

After some more practice rides, we let Jacob choose where to go for supper, and he picked Gattitown. I was so glad he picked it -- I was wishing I had gone there for MY birthday, but didn't get to! :) Both the boys rode the (lovely pink) car... love those faces!

And Jacob took a ride on the bumper cars:

He also did great at the skee-ball & the whack-a-mole games. It was very fun for everyone!

(And that concludes our catching up adventure! I think we're up-to-date. :))

Catching Up Chapter 2: Fun Moments

Here are a few fun moments from January of this year:

Ring-around-the-rosie:

Jeremiah playing along to Rowlf the Dog's "Halfway Down the Stairs"...Listen for Jeremiah's enthusiastic "hallelujah!" part-way through. heehee.

And, one rare quiet moment that I caught. Check out those faces! (Jacob's eyebrows, especially!! Yikes!)

Catching Up Chapter 1: Jeremiah Turns Two!

Jeremiah's 2nd birthday was April 1st... He opened some presents:

And played:

He did great at blowing out the candles:

And eating cake:

The present that Jacob picked out for Jeremiah (with Nana's help) was this microphone... which Jacob also enjoyed a lot:

I remember thinking "I can't believe he's TWO!?!?!" ...and now I'm still thinking, "I can't believe he's TWO & a HALF!!" :) Arrrrgh...

Playing at the Park

Jacob has some kickin' new monkey skills:

And Jeremiah was learning about his shadow:

All very fun. :)

snow day!

Wednesday was Jacob's very first snow day! It was supposed to be his first day back to school after the winter break, but it snowed Tuesday evening, sending most of Kentucky into a tizzy.

To be fair, most of the tizzying was warranted. :) Richie & I were out to dinner for our anniversary, and on the way home we did a slow 180 as we tried to brake down a slight hill. Since we ended up exactly backwards from where we started, we decided to just go with it and go home a different way. Yikes! I was glad I wasn't driving...

Anyway, our day off was a lot of fun! (We're all SO glad that it happened on a day that Richie was off too.) There was pancakes for breakfast, and playing in the snow:


and warming up:


and plenty of fun inside (Jeremiah's very into music these days):


The best moment may have been when Richie brought Jacob & Jeremiah into our bedroom at 7:something am & told Jacob there was no school... I wish I had a sound clip of Jacob's reaction. It was a very excited, yet calm & collected, "yeeeeaaaaahhh!" :)

christmas picture attempts

The progression of funny pictures from the "boys-in-front-of-the-christmas-tree" photo shoot... These guys are so fun: