Miss Madison

Madison has taken a liking to this babydoll. It started when we were at my parent's house. She now carries this particular doll everywhere and insists on sleeping with it. I'll post some pictures later of her sleeping with it. Sometimes, when she gets really mad because she is in her crib, she will toss the baby overboard and then that just makes her cry all the more. When I go to get her up from her nap or for the day she will hand me the doll first.

She loves all babydolls now. She can usually be seen carrying one in each arm around the house. When I picked her up from church this morning, she was carrying one around that she had found there.

A Day at the Park

I think I can catch this one!

Come back! Come back!

Carson and Harper

Our entourage.

I'm not scared of you.

A goose! Over there!

Carson, Harper, and Blake

We spent the month of July in Oklahoma and Texas. On this particular day, we went to a park near my hometown to feed the geese. I was so excited to take the kids to this park because I have fond memories of feeding the geese as a child. That and the fact that Madison LOVES ducks. The kids has the best time. I really thought that Carson would be afraid of the geese but he was not. There was one goose who tried to eat the bread out of Carson's hand and I just knew he would flip out but he didn't. He just laughed. I also thought that Madison would be afraid of the geese but she loved every minute of it. You can see in one picture above where she is nose to beak with one goose. After that she only wanted to catch one! She tried so hard!!

Madison walking

This is the best video we have of Madison walking so far. She practically runs now. She just woke up from her nap one day and decided she was going to start walking. And she hasn't looked back.

Soccer Camp

This is Carson and his soccer coach, Coach Ben.

The soccer sessions were one hour long but Carson generally only participated for the first 15-20 minutes. I don't know if he is ready to play soccer this fall or not. That is still up in the air. When he did actually participate, he had a blast! Every time we would drive by the soccer field during the day he would ask where Coach Ben was. Carson even tried to talk like Coach Ben one day. We were driving home and Carson said, "Mommy, I saw a trailer!" Then he said, "I saw a traywa." I must note here that Coach Ben is from England.

This next video is of one coach 'soccer surfing.' It is about a minute long but watch until the end to see Carson try it out.

Little climber

Madison's climbing adventures continue on a daily basis. Her latest feat is scaling the inside of the refridgerator. She can already climb up in Carson's full size bed. She tries her hardest but she just can't quite make it up onto the couch...yet.

Carson's Birthday

Even though Carson's birthday was almost a month ago, I still wanted to post some of his pictures. We took him to Toys R Us the night before so that we could spend his birthday money. He picked out a train set and a few trains. We were able to convince him that he could not open them that night. I still do not know how we did that! So after he went to bed, we wrapped everything and put it in his chair at the table so that he would find them for breakfast. Maybe that was not such a good idea since the ONLY way we could get him to eat his breakfast was by giving it to him as he sat in the middle of his new train set!

After breakfast we went to the local children's museum. They had a Clifford exhibit that the kids enjoyed. Then we went to the Rainforest Cafe at MGM Grand for a late lunch. Carson loved all of the animals in the restaurant as long as he did not get too close.

We had his birthday party the next night and we rented a bounce house which was a HUGE hit.

Adventures in Vegas

We had quite a morning today. Actually, it started late last night. President Obama was in town. My friend Carrie mentioned that she took her boys out in their pjs last night to see Air Force One which was parked on base. I debated whether or not to go since both of the kids were already in bed. Deciding that this could possibly be my one and only chance to ever see AF1 in person, I drug the kids to the other side to see the plane. It was after dark but the plane was lit up well. I was too chicken to get out to take a picture since it was dark and I was afraid Secret Service agents might come after me! I did have a security forces(AF police)car follow me after that! Maybe it was just coincidence... Carson cried the whole 5 minutes home because we did not get to ride HIS blue airplane!!

Then this morning I find out through tv and Facebook, that the President is scheduled to tour the solar farm down the road and conduct a 'town hall' meeting on the other side of base. So Carrie, her boys, the kids, and I trek to the general area where he will be touring the solar farm only to be told that no cars OR pedestrians would be allowed. What??? All we wanted to do was take a picture of the motorcade! We were not just random people off the street. We were on base, after all.

So, we were told that IF there was room at the meeting, we MIGHT be allowed in. And what do we do? We head to it, of course! All they can say is no. And they did. No kids allowed. *sigh* We then walked over to see AF1 and get pictures. Carrie talked to every SF person just to see if they would give us ANY indication of where we might be able to see the motorcade and get a picture. They did not. And would you believe that the motorcade drove down the flightline? It did not come anywhere near us! All I wanted was a picture...I think we would have had a better chance if we had stood on the side of the street off base! Go figure.