Foul Ball!

We enjoyed a major-league ballgame on May 17th. It was John's favorite team - the Los Angeles Angels vs. the Texas Rangers. The boys had a blast and the weather was perfect. We had perfect seats for foul-ball catching and our luck paid off!

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A foul ball landed just a few rows back & bounced off of a man's hand and came down and bounced off of Dylan's eyebrow. It fell to the ground and Jake and his friend were both handling it trying to decide who should keep it. I suggested that since Dylan got hit in the head....maybe he should have it. The staff at the stadium rushed right over to make sure Dylan was okay. He asked for an ice pack for a few minutes, but was totally fine.

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What a great night!

A New Tradition

We have a room in our home that sits empty about 355 days a year…it's our dining room. It is typically only used for birthdays, holidays and an occasional dinner guest. A favorite past use when our kids were little is being demonstrated here, climbing on the table and destroying the centerpiece (isn't baby Ryan cute??).

So we decide to start a new tradition, which will allow us to use this room an additional 52 times per year. We are now having Sunday dinners in here each week. We have the kids all help to set the table, we make them eat with napkins on their laps and use the proper "please" and "thank you's". We've been doing this new tradition for a few weeks and are really enjoying it. Hopefully our children will develop enough manners to attract future wives someday ;-).

A Lovely Day

Mother's Day last week was a lovely day. In the morning I was greeted with two "breakfasts in bed" from Dylan and Ryan. I was served mashed up bananas and lettuce wraps (lunchmeat wrapped around a piece of lettuce. I was also given a homemade card from each of the boys.

Ryan gave me a hand-painted butterfly card & hand-painted ocean bookmark.

Dylan gave me this card & some bath salts.

Jake gave me this poem which he wrote and typed himself. John made me a fabulous "real" breakfast of French toast and chicken apple sausage. He joined the family at church. Then grilled up my favorite dinner Lemon-Dill Salmon. We finished it off with orange-peel-coconut rice and steamed vegetables. I must say….it was a great day!

Balancing Boy

I left town a few weekends ago for a seminar in Austin. My husband and father-in-law held down the fort while I was gone. I received a phone message Saturday afternoon that Ryan (4 years old) was riding his bike without training wheels. I was surprised as up until a short time before that he was riding a big wheel around and had never been on a big bike. He had only been riding a bike with training wheels for about 6 weeks!

The training wheels on his bike kept shifting out of position (after having "trained" 3 little boys). So Jake had shifted them up & out of the way and Ryan rode the bike just fine with out them. So Jake asked Grandpa O. to remove the training wheels. Bystander reports indicate that he picked it up very easily.

About an hour later they decided to go to the local skatepark (which allows bikes, scooters, rollerblades & skateboards). Ryan took his bike and rode all over the ramps at the skate park.

When I saw him riding without training wheels the following day it looked like he had been doing it for about a year. As seen in the pictures above he darts in and out, makes sharp turns and even stands up while peddling. Now two weeks later he's trying to master a trick by pulling up the handlebars and lifting the front wheel off the ground while he's riding (see bottom left picture above). This child never ceases to amaze us. His newest nickname is "Super Balancing Boy"!

Piano Concert

We had a piano concert at our house when our latest guest-of-honor visited ~ Grandpa O. ~. The concert featured the talents of one of our own. We were fortunate to have a very polite Usher, Ryan, who graciously showed all of us to our seats. Our Master of Ceromonies for the evening, Dylan, gave a grand announcement for our featured pianist. We all enjoyed the musical talents of Jake. We had a surprise soloist for one of the pieces when Ryan stood up and sang the words!It was truly a great evening. We topped it off with a yummy coconut milk ice cream dessert!