Apple Picking

For labor day, Ms. Juliet and I found both our husbands working on this holiay. We decided to take the kids apple picking. We went to Bryson's in Mountain Rest. It took like an hour to get there, but it was a nice drive.

Here are the kids gearing up (ie putting on hats). My kids only wore their hat for this picture.



They gave us big buckets and a very vague description of what we were suppose to do. With the kids, it probably wouldn't have mattered. They were going to do whatever they wanted to anyway:







Turns out, apple picking is not like blueberry picking. Apple picking is like shooting fish in a barrel for these kids. Our buckets were full in about 15 minutes. Now what?

We spent most of our time at the outhouse. You know about these boys...



And James liked to put rocks on his head:



We will probably go back later in the season!

It's game day!

The football games early in the season are not always the best to go to. It's hot, the time usually is inconvienent, and the game isn't always interesting. I think Clemson, knowing this and knowing that their first game was going to be on TV, wanted to make sure the stands were filled. They offered really cheap tickets. Cheap like $16 for adults and $10 for the kids. For our family of four it would cost only slightly more that for one adult to go to a different game. Since this is probably the one and only time we will ever go together, we decided to give it a try. James had been to a game last year, but he was still excited. Andy had never been and to be honest, I still do consider him to be too young, but again, cheap tickets.

We left our house about an hour and a half before kickoff. We still go primo spots by the P&A. We still bribed the kids into the stroller with a pop pop.



We kicked the stroller outside of Bracket and walked the rest of the way. Andy. Andy who does not sleep in the car. Andy who we would not have taken last year cause he needed the nap, but could do without it this year...fell asleep while we were walking up to the stadium, stayed asleep all the way to our seats, and dozed until pregame. Unbelievable.



I walked up this carrying a 34 pound dead weight two year old:



Good view once we got to the top. We were about 5 rows down.



It was hot, we did try to stay hydrated.





James kicked over 3 drinks in the stands. Two of them were ours.

They liked the band, they liked the clapping, Andy was a little horrified they just let all those balloons go, but before long, it was just hot. I took them to the top to walk around a bit. There was a breaze there.



We left not long after this picture was taken.

It was fun, but I am glad we didn't pay full price. We left the stands right after the first quarter. Oh well. There is always next year!

Bagels!

Beth, Jenny, and I used to regularly run together and then afterwards we would go get bagels. Now, bagels do just about completely defeat the purpose of running, but it is still fun. It was nice girl time without the kids. When school ended, we weren't able to run together as much, but we still met for bagels. I know....even worse than bagels after running! And, and, AND we would bring our kids. This really defeats the purpose of bagel girl time, but again, it still was fun. Sort of. Today we met with my two kids and Beth's sweet little girl. Jenny left Mattie at home. Good thing I brought a spare!

We always sit outside. We figure we disrupt the regular customes less that way.



I send my boys running to keep them occupied. It took Elaina and Mattie awhile to catch on.



We bring toys! Today it was cars. Again, Elaina was such a trooper.



Jenny was late (as usual). Here she is with her iced coffee. They make the BEST iced coffee (with half and half and splenda).

Summer Fun

Oh my gosh, I really got behind this past week. We had a impromtu swim afternoon at in the kiddie pool last week. It was really cute so I took pictures:



One of my water toy investments for this year is squirt bottles. They hold more water than waterguns!





We had a passive observer. Good thing!



Baby Christopher wasn't really into it. Neither was Mr. Tony.



Eventually, everyone took a break to water the plants and play in the sand:







And then, there was wrasseling:



When everyone is "done" and getting cranky. We tell them to get back in the pool and take their suits off. We generally get another 5 minutes of play this way. John and James put their suits on their head because they thought they looked like pirates! Please note that this picture is only from the waist up. ;)

Bubble snob

I have said this before, I will say it again, this blog is the only place where I write things down to remember things. For next year: gazillion bubbles - good, miracle bubbles - CRAP!. You can only get gazillion bubbles (this year) at Target.

Earlier this year, for a gift exchange, we went to Target and picked out a $10 present...a pooh giant bubble maker. Wouldn't you know, we took it to the birthday party to exchange and James picked this present knowing what it was and was so happy to unwrap it. We are now the proud owners of a pooh giant bubble maker. I have to say, this is a pretty cool thing and we have used it a lot. Most recently, we brought it out in the carport during a rainstorm. Kept the kids entertained for about half an hour.

Just thought this was a cute picture:



I think Andy would fit into this bubble:



There is goes!





Even Andy can do it!





Setting it free so James can't pop it:

Whose line is it anyways?

We have had a few post about James. Time to even the score. There are a couple of phrases Andy is known for. Here they are now:

"Dinner's ready!"

"Wake up Mommy!"

Vive Le Tour

So, sometimes I do things just because I think it will be a good blog post.

Some background info. This is about the Tour de France. We were living in Dallas during Lance Armstrong's run. We are sports fans and we would follow it. Maybe have the replay on at night while reading the paper. After Lance retired the first time, we would forget about it, but remember sometime in the last week and again, have it on to see who ended up winning. Forward to 2008. Andy was born on June 10th, so that means at the beginning of July he enter his super cranky baby phase. In the evenings there were hours of crying which mean we spend hours walking and bouncing and nursing and rocking until he finally went to sleep. Thank God for the tour. We caught it at the beginning for the first time and had it on during the walking and bouncing and nursing and rocking and somehow it made it bearable. Instead of completely dreading the "witching hour" it was our excuse to watch the tour.

I think Carlos Sastre won that year, but I could be wrong. For the longest time, I didn't really get it. I liked watching it for the scenery and the exciting finishes (watching Mark Cavendish getting ready to bring in another one now). I did try to figure out what was going on and would read about it on the internet, but this year is the first year I think I really understood why this were happening. It has been very exciting. We had it on in the afternoon and James was entranced by the bike race. And of course he wanted to have a bike race. So then I had an idea.

Here is coverage of the first annual Tour de La France held at La France Elementary School this morning. Of course, this was like the hottest day of July, but it is suppose to be the most epic race ever. Any ride on toy was allowed:



Here is Andy trying one out. I have never scene a superman cap on a rider in the real tour. I have seen them on the spectators, so I allowed it:



Mattie liked to push instead of ride:



Here are James and John warming up:



We had encourageing/heckling messages on the course:



GC hopeful Henry had the biggest bike (16 inch tires!)



Mattie and Andy both had their eyes on the white jersey, oh, I mean ribbon:



We had several races (stages). Sometimes they all went in the same direction, sometimes not:



We had 2 popsicle breaks between stages:



Poor Becky was a trooper! She made it through the whole race.



Juliet was so smart and brought a spray bottle to keep cool!



They were racing for ribbon: yellow, white, green, and poka dot. The poka dot was in the most demand. These ribbons were tied to the bikes:



See you next year!