Big Red Barn

Last year we found the Big Red Barn, and just loved it!  A nice long Hayride, out to the pumpkin patch, where we could pick out own pumpkins.  Once out there, you could spend as long as you wanted playing in the maze, the sandbox, and in the pumpkin patch.  We knew we wanted to make it a tradition.  This year, there were two big slides, and the maze was bigger.  They also had a bunch of wood cutouts for pictures.  Plus the good old John Deer that they boys feel it necessary to climb on.  As Wes said "It was even better then last year!"

 Riley's head poking up above the walls of the maze!

 Riley pretending to be "Farmer Joe"

 The boys went down the slide more times then I can count, but this was the craziest way they thought of to come down it!

 It was Phil's Idea for him to be the woman!

Headed back to the barn for some super yummy ice cream!!

Wesley is 7 years old!!!!

Wow, I can't believe that Wes is now so old.  7 years old and in 2nd grade. 

As usual we had a party with the Marsing side of the family on Sunday.  The cake Wes wanted for that was to look like it came out of his favorite book.  The secret zoo.  It was one of the easiest cakes I've ever had to decorate for my kids.  Lots of animals and some writing.  Easy Peasy!!  And he loved it.  So even better.

 With Angie and her family in town we got to have fun playing with each other.  And Wes of course enjoyed opening his presents.

 On Wednesday (Wesley's actual birthday) I took the day off of work, so we could do some fun things.  However, Phil had to work so Wes was a good sport and only opened one present in the morning and waited for the rest after Dad got home.

We gave him the present I've been planning, and working on for awhile. (With some help from my mom and dad and Riley.) 

Since Wes is really into soccer (the greatest sport, according to him.)  I made him some big old soccer goals, that can also be put together to form a fort.

 And boy did they go over well.  After a game of soccer at 8:00 in the morning.  Riley and Wes, turned it into a fort, and spent the rest of the day in there.  (I thought I was taking the day of to take the boys someplace fun, but they just wanted to stay in the fort, and I ended up cleaning the house.)

They ate both breakfast and lunch out there.  They also took out their beanbag chairs, and a bunch of games, and just spent the day hanging out.

After we took Wes to dinner, he finally got to play the same game as Riley did to get his presents.  Singing and Dancing and acting crazy, all just to open some presents.  He loved it.  It was a great day!!  We sure love you Wes!!



Riley's B-day!

Riley is 11 years old!!  Wow - that's crazy!!  Anyway, one of the things I love about being a Mom is being able to mess with my kids.  So I accidentally let Riley know what he was getting for his birthday - not to mention that he asked for it about 10 times a day for the month and a half before his birthday.  So on his birthday we decided to make him work for his presents.  The first present he opened was a game board - that Phil and I had concocted - a dice and three bags labeled "Gross", "Tasks" and "Embarrassing", with corresponding colors.  The game board was covered in squares of the same colors.  He had to finish the game to get his presents.  He would roll the dice and move that many spaces.  Whatever color he landed on he would pull out a piece of paper from the bag of the same color and have to do whatever it said.  Boy was this fun!!  For the rest of us anyway!!

Some of the things that he had to do included:

 Play Book of Mormon Stories on the Piano, Washing Mom's Feet,

 standing on his head while singing a song

 smelling Wesley's stinky feet,

doing a dance on the front porch,

do a dance to "Lady in Red",

Finding 5 different superheroes on the T.V.,

and many many more.

 He finally got his presents and to make it up to him a little I took them to Trafalga later that day.

I forgot to take pictures of the party we had with Phil's side of the family, which is too bad because it did involve a little bit of a spontaneous fire.  But I was the cause of that - so I'm glad there is no solid evidence.

But I remembered to take my camera to the party with my side of the Family.

Riley has a thing with Monkey's so here is his cake. (cupcake tree)

 It was super hot - but we had fun and family - and hopefully good food.

 Happy 11th Riley - we love you!!

365 Blog!

A year or so ago, my two younger sisters made a goal to take a picture a day. Chelle did a picture a day for a month, and Angie then went on to do a whole year. 

Well, the other day my two younger sisters decided to issue a challenge (they start out saying it was only an invite to join in with them - but we knew it was a true challenge/dare) to my older sister and I, to also do a full 365 blog.  We both accepted the challenge.  I'm always up for a good challenge, and so three days in, I'm set up and ready to go.  So head on over to my new 365 blog ( Curiously Scrambled for 365 days! )  There is a link up in the upper left corner of this blog as well.  And see just how long I can last!!

Wesley the Klutz boy!!

First of all.  Wes is sitting right next to me while I'm posting this.  So he is complaining about the photos I chose.  But, too bad.  Secondly, this first picture isn't actally of him being a klutz.  But it did involve a little blood, so I figured it went well with the others. 

The first picture is an angry looking boy who just lost his first tooth. 

(Not sure why he's so angry about it though.)

(He just commented that he wasn't angry, he just was trying to look like a toothless vampire.)

 The second picture really does show off his super klutziness - is that really a word??  The giant goose egg on his head, is from walking.  You may think that maybe he was walking over something like rocks, and tripped.  Or maybe missed a step while climbing the stairs, or maybe even missed a curb, or hit a slick spot somewhere.  But NO he simply trpped over his own two liitle feet while at Walmart. 

(He again is commenting and saying how much he hates this pictue.  I say he needs to NOT use his left foot where his right foot already is.)

The third picture is of his lovely broken arm.  He was at school, and in the middle of the monkey bars, decided to let go, and didn't know that he wouldn't bounce of the hard ground underneath him.  Although he went the rest of the day at school, and the next as well, before we decided it might be broken.  So he may be a klutz, but he's a pretty tough one at that. (He wants me to make sure everyone knows that he DID NOT cry when this happened.)

 This fourth picture of Wes, he is sure isn't really him.  Maybe it's because he doesn't have his glasses on.  (It's actually quite funny how annoyed he is at the simple idea that I just might think this is really him, sometimes it's super fun to be a mom and just tease your kids like crazy!)

The Many Faces of Riley!!

I know that I've still got in my mind how shy and quiet Riley used to be.  So sometimes he still suprises me.  Let's just say that he is soooo not like that anymore.  He was Willy Wonka in his school play, and wasn't nervous or shy or anything but completely comfortable up there on stage.  He did a wonderful job, and we were so excited to watch him. (By the way - he picked the pink shirt himself, I didn't have anything to do with it.)  But that hasn't been the only alternate persona he has put on recently. 

 For the Wax Museum at school, he was Buffalo Bill Cody!!  This is his "I'm aiming for the giant buffalo." pose that he came up with.

 And this is his "hippie self" on 70's day!!  Wes was apart of this one as well, and both loved that I made them crazy (meaning super ugly) bell bottomed pants, and then let them draw peace signs on them as well.

Easter!

We decided that since we are always frustrated when we do Easter Eggs, because we can't get them to do anything more then turn a very light shade of whatever color we drop them into for a minute or too, we thought we would try something new.  I brought up all my acrylic paints and just do whatever we wanted to.  I found that if I got our green glass goblet and turned them upside down, they were the perfect egg easels.  So we all became egg artists, and quite enjoyed our new Easter Egg decorating tradition.  (And yes, they were all making stupid posses and facial expression on purpose, because they refused to just let me take normal pictures.)

 The Easter Bunny brought alot less candy this year, and a few more useful items, like clothes.  The boys were perfectly happy with it.

 Riley has started to come up with a new recipe once a week, that he makes all by himself.  (Okay I help when needed.)  But this is the one that he picked to do for Easter.  They were jello custard something or others.  (NOT very good, but also not his fault.  Phil liked them, but to me and Riley and Wes they simple tasted like mushy jello.)  The recipe he made the week after that - was soooooooooooo much better.  (Chocolate Chip Toffee Bars, but I don't have a picture of those, and they really don't have anything to do with Easter, anyway.)