Day at Amazement Square

Two weekends ago Jennifer and I met up in Lynchburg at Amazement Square for a cold weather playdate for the kids. Jennifer left Berkeley with her Mom but brought along her nephew Emerson. Then my sister turns up with her three as well. So all in all we had:
(Left to right excluding the gal in pink pants that doesn't belong to us....)
Cameron
Peyton
Emerson
Lincoln
Addison
Grayson
Luke
It took three moms and two grandparents to supervise this crew!

Mom and Kim making sure no one topples off the stools at the "boats"!

Luke picking some corn at the farm.

Luke carrying golf balls. This poor kid needs a man purse.

Luke learning about chariots. Apparently goats pulled chariots, too. Guess we all learned something.

Grayson could stay all day learning about boats and the lock system on the James River.

Luke just likes to have his hands in the water.

After the big day I decided I was too tired to drive home so I just stayed with Mom that night. Kids always enjoy sleeping at their Nana's house.

My Week With No Pictures

You'll thank me for no picture posts of the last week. Here's how things shaped up...

Saturday afternoon - Jennifer (HS friend), Erik (her husband), and their two kids Lincoln and Berkeley arrive for a weekend stay through the holiday on Monday. It's great to catch up with friends. Boys had lots of fun together. We play Wii into the wee (no pun intended) hours of the morning. Erik sustains a minor injury, alcohol may have been involved. I finally curl into bed approximately 3.5 hours before Grayson awakes.

Sunday - Leisurely morning then Jennifer and I take the boys to Romp and Roll. Then Ben and Jerry's. This nice outing concludes with an overtired Grayson throwing a major fit in the van and refusing to get out of the back seat. Parked in the garage, I cave and agree to serve him chicken nuggets while still in the van. Crying concludes, he eats two nuggets and then comes inside for a nap. Another nice evening, though this one with much less alcohol. I felt exhausted and went to bed at 10:30 with Grayson after he had been downstairs about six times.

Monday - Then comes 3:00AM and I knew it...I caught the stomach virus that had been going around town. 3:00 to 6:00 is a blur other than the fact that I remember waking up Steve and telling him he would need to take the kids to his parents house when he left for a board meeting at the Greenbrier at 6:30. I hear Steve going in to wake up Luke to get him ready to go and then realize that he must have found that Luke also had the stomach bug. Poor thing apparently threw up all over his crib and never even woke up. Steve had to deal with that because there was no way I could even stand up at this point. Then I hear it - Grayson gets sick in the hall. All the while our guests are having to hear this unfold until they can get their stuff packed up. Steve now has 3 sick people he's trying to take care of and figure out a way to still get to his board meeting. I call in for backup. Steve's Mom comes down so Steve can leave then my Mom arrives a bit later. Fortunately the kids never got sick again and Jolene and my Mom had all the laundry clean by the time I finally emerged from my bedroom around 3:00PM. Steve's out of town now. I need the state car from Motor Pool since I'm due at Danville Community College for on-site reviews at 9:00 the next morning. Mom manages to get me to Motor Pool to pick up the car and driving it home was my one big outing for the day.

Tuesday - 6:00AM comes much too early Tuesday. Mom stays with the kids while I go to Danville feeling like death warmed over. Steve's home now but has to leave a 5:30 the next morning.

Wednesday - Wednesday morning rolls around and now it's clear that Mom has the stomach bug. Kids get the OK to return to daycare while Mom stays home to recover. I'm off to Wytheville Community College for another on-site review. Wednesday afternoon Rich and Jolene get the boys from school because I have class until 7:00 after I get back from Wytheville.

Thursday - Thanks to my friend Jill in my office I got out of another onsite review on Thursday and was finally able to enjoy a "normal" day concluding with a very welcome yoga class that evening.

Friday - Steve leaves for his man trip to Snowshoe. The boys and I have a date night that included watching Lightning McQueen after school. This involved minimal effort and interaction from me which was exactly what I needed :-)

Saturday - I had been promising Grayson we would go to Amazement Square in Lynchburg and thought I didn't really feel like it, I kept my promise. We met Jennifer and her kids there and my Mom and sister and her kids also came. Grayson had a great time. I think Luke was old enough to enjoy it this time, too. I was afraid I'd fall asleep if I tried to drive back home so we stayed the night at Mom's in Amherst. Dinner and Winton plus a rare gift of Grayson sleeping in the next morning left me feeling much better.

Sunday - I didn't feel like myself again until Sunday. We drove back from Mom's early and Rich and Jolene took the boys while I took the afternoon to get caught up on things and take a nap. I'm going to hope the stomach bug doesn't revisit our house for quite some time and if it does I hope it picks a less eventful week to do so!

Master Painter

Grayson was so excited that I let him help paint the bathroom. Hey - I figure I can always go back over whatever mess he created. No harm done. He had fun, and with exactly one day of effort our half bath in the hallway now sports one orange and three maroon walls. Now I just have to hunt for a few Hokie accessories which I can't imagine being too difficult to find in this area!

Footnote: I kept getting after the boys for running around the paint and kept telling them not to step in it, etc. When the boys were down for a nap guess who stepped right squarely in the paint? I now have one less pair of socks.

Visit with the Walkers

Jennifer and I continued our annual tradition of getting together in Amherst after Christmas. Berkeley had just celebrated his first birthday a few days earlier! The little chunker weighs almost as much as Luke. Jennifer has some guns on her right arm now!

Peyton joined us for the day as well and all the kids had fun feeding Nana's squirrels peanuts.

I thought it would be cute to get a picture of the 3 bigger boys (Berkeley got a pass this year).

But boys will be boys.

Mound of boys.

Well - I guess this is as good as I'm going to get. I should count myself lucky that all Luke, Lincoln, and Grayson were actually sitting on the sofa at the same time.Note: This is also the sofa that was, for years, "off limits" for food and roughhousing. I had to chuckle when I saw the sippy cup, cushions strewn everywhere, and 3 bouncing boys on it earlier that day. I suppose rules change for grandchildren.

Christmas Day - Santa Came!

Santa must have definitely had Grayson and Luke on the "nice" list this year! The boys were pretty overwhelmed (but very happy, I might add) with everything Santa left this year. At first I thought I might be a little mad at Santa for having splurged on the boys, but after I've seen how well they have been playing together and all the creative things they're doing with their new toys (a.k.a. many less requests for a show on TV) then I have to concede that Santa may have been onto something!

This year I was just as excited Christmas morning to see their reactions. They're at such a fun age and I can only imagine that the next few years are going to be sheer joy during the holidays!

This is what Santa left Grayson this year. While he didn't get the train he asked for (Santa must have known we already have two complete train sets and no more room!), he did get the MegaCrane he had had his eye on. He was absolutely thrilled with his 4 foot crane which is still currently housed in the middle of my family room.

Luke has asked for Nuks and May May (his girlfriend, Megan). In addition to Nuks and a photo album of his girlfriend, he also was pretty excited to see a Mickey Mouse Clubhouse!

Grayson learning to operate his crane.

Luke taking Mickey and Minnie for a ride in the Handy Helper Hot Air Balloon.

Luke with his Nuks (which Mom and Dad had taken away) and a little doll that looks like his blonde, pigtailed, adorable girlfriend Megan.A few more for the fleet which now includes a dumper, cranes (2), trash truck, transporters, etc... I'm thinking of opening something in nano-construction.

A little break with some new books.
Luke showing his Mimi his Megan doll and photo album of Megan. Megan's Mommy must have put together the album for Santa. Incidentally, I happen to know that Megan also got pictures of Luke from Santa on Christmas.
Whoops - we almost forgot the check stockings!A quick picture with Mommy and Nana!

Steve playing with one of his toys...the remote controlled helicopter in the middle of the picture!
Gabe isn't sure about this thing. Which is OK because it really doesn't work that well anyway.
Later that night we went to Rich and Jolene's for Christmas dinner. We did, in fact, enjoy a true white Christmas this year. Steve sporting his new Tilley hat out in the snow with a beer.And Grayson making a few tracks on his bike.
Steve and Rich enjoying some conversation after dinner.
Luke checking out his new scooter from Mimi and Poppaw!
Scooters and grabbers - I was figuring it wouldn't take them too long to come up with something like this...

All in all....what fun! Looking forward to next year already!

Christmas Eve 2010

We all enjoyed lunch at Rich and Jolene's on Christmas Eve, hoping the snow would hold off until later. It did!

The boys had their own little table!

Later that evening we got all dressed up for the Christmas Eve Children's Service at the church. This is about the closest thing I have to a picture of my two boys dressed up. They were excited to get to open a gift from Mimi and Poppaw on Christmas Eve.

A little Elf also left a few gifts on my doorstep while we were at church. Grayson loved his train calendar from last year (it's literally falling apart from all his use) and is now starting to memorize the pictures in his new one!

After church we enjoyed our traditional (OK, it's only like the third year but traditions have to start somewhere) seafood buffet. This year we had clam chowder again, grilled oysters and clams, chilled shrimp, and crab dip. Yummy! The boys got to wear their new Christmas Eve PJ's. I was determined to get a picture of the two of the together, but this was what I got instead...

Can you tell they were a little excited?

One more time, Mommy.

This looks way more fun than posing for another stupid picture.

But finally with a bribe of fruit snacks, I got something at least close to a picture of the two of them together...

Our tree! And presents which, by the way, about doubled after Steve determined that I hadn't originally bought the boys enough stuff. He said he wanted them to have the "wow factor" when they walked into the room Christmas morning.

And a little reminder of what it's all about. I love my nativity set - too bad I have to stash it away in the china cabinet since I don't trust my boys or my cats not to destroy it!

Family Brunch at Our House

This was my year to have Mom at my house for Christmas so on the 23rd, Mom arrived and Kim and her family came for the day so we could all have a little celebration together. Rich and Jolene joined us so I had my entire immediate family together. It was a great afternoon with good food and company. The kids enjoyed opening their gifts and then playing together.

All the grown-up girls.

A few arts and crafts, for about 3 minutes.
Mom teaching the two little ones how to play bowling on her new laptop from Kim.
Would have been a cute picture if Peyton hadn't been pissed about something. Maybe she's not happy with Luke's hand placement. I'll have to have a talk with him about that at some point I suppose.

Kim and Chris were thrilled with the afternoon. Riveted.
The three babies. Trouble.

Even more trouble.

Christmas Cantata at Mom's Church

The whole Addison side of the family met for church and lunch at Winton the weekend before Christmas. Would have been a cute picture if the 5th grandchild had been willing to stand with the rest of the kids!