Trip to the Zoo

We took a trip to the zoo with a bunch of friends from church. The boys don't use a stroller anymore. They are too "big." So they walked probably at least a mile around the zoo, but had a blast with their friends. Here they are inside and on top of some giant dinosaur eggs! And below is Cooper with his friends Logan and Kye.

A giant snake!

A dragon!

Safari kids

What a cutie!

Some kind of monkey/chimp

The Rainforest: Look at the curious faces!

The bridge inside the Indonesian Rainforest

A fun Tree House. The boys are doing spins on the floor.

Monkeys...

Huge Turtles

A train ride

A pretend play train: Here are your conductors!

What a fun day at the zoo! The boys were so exhausted when we left. They both conked out in the car, which they hardly ever do anymore. We had a great time! Next time we go to the zoo we will probably be taking a stroller and a sister with us!

Sunday Walk in the Park

On Sunday evening, we decided to check out the trails at Metea Park, a huge park 30 seconds from our house. I knew they had walking trails and hiking, but I had no idea how beautiful the trails were. It was around 6pm when we went and there was nobody there. We saw several deer, rabbits, and all the trees were multicolored for autumn. It was so peaceful and fun to walk through tunnels of trees. The boys loved it. We were all in mismatched jammies, with Cooper who picked out his swim suit to wear and Jaxton with a jammies shirt and Daddy with his church socks still on. It was an enjoyable evening!

This is the swimming beach we come to swim at during the summer. The boys love it because it is a sloped sandy beach so they can inch their way in the water and can touch the ground. The pool at the YMCA doesn't have a small shallow end so this is perfect for swimming for them!

A Date to the Prom...

I thought proms were long over with? Well, no. I got asked to prom yet again. This time by the most handsome, funny, and slick dude in town. Nate and I got all dressed up for this "Adult Prom" put on by a church member in the stake. Nate was so excited, that he went out and used it as an excuse to buy a brand new suit and a silver tie to coordinate with my dress! Doesn't he look good?! It was super fun! We had an italian dinner and then danced the night away. The boys stayed at Nate's parents house, so we didn't have to worry about being home to get them to bed. It was nice to just enjoy ourselves for the evening! When we first arrived, there was a random girl there who took one look at me and said, "Isn't that supposed to happen after prom?" (meaning my belly). I just laughed and said yes. It did feel a little strange getting all dressed up with a pregnant belly!!

Here is our group of friends we went with: Me & Nate, Jake & Jessica Newhard, Ron & Lisa Lewis, Blair & Summer Stump. We have some great friends in Fort Wayne!!

Nate was so fun to watch. Ron taught Nate some moves and he was loving dancing to some hip hop! It was funny to see all the hubbies dancing. Normally everyone is prim and proper at church. It was a change to see everyone let loose!

A fun night!

Chapter Books

We were at the library and Jaxton was gathering library books to take home. He had a stack of juniors chapter books like Goosebumps in his hands. He really wanted to read "big kid books." So I looked through all the juniors chapter books section to find a book that he may be able to follow and I found this one called "Stanley." It was pretty simple reading with black and white pictures on every other page. As we were checking out, the librarian asked, "Is that for him?" I said it was. She said, "Can he follow that type of book?" I responded, "We will find out!" She was impressed that he wanted to read a chapter book! Actually, I was too! So we began reading a couple chapters each day. It was a book about a boy named Stanley who was able to take his whole family in a spaceship to another planet. They met some aliens from the other planet who were tiny little people who lived in a tiny little city. They were having problems with food production on their planet and called earth for help. So Stanley decided to bring all the little people back to earth until their planet could produce food again. They built a tiny little city on earth to accomodate the little people. Well, Jaxton loved it. I had to tweak some sentences, but he did follow it. One day, I came up to get him from his quiet time after about an hour and this is what I found. He told me he had built the little people's city from his "Stanley" book. I was so impressed! Not only did he follow the book, he created his interpretation of their tiny village. My 3 almost 4 year old continues to amaze me!

Our Little Pianist

Jaxton loves to play the piano. He is very talented when it comes to music, songs, rhythm, his ABC's, and numbers. I really think he could pick up the piano pretty easily if he had lessons. He will play "pretty songs" for me and they are actually quite pretty! He also loves to put the piano on the drum setting and play the drums. He wants to be a drummer someday and is fascinated with drums and drummers in bands. So usually while Cooper is sleeping, I will let Jaxton have some piano time. He is our little musician!

Package Thief

We get packages all the time. Grandma Hutchinson sends the boys packages at least once or twice a month full of goodies and surprises. Nate gets packages full of Alarm equipment weekly. So Cooper has been super excited about all the packages lately, he decided he would just go ahead and open them up by himself. This one happens to be Nate's alarm equipment. He got a chair to get a fork out of the drawer and went to work. It took him quite a while, but he did open it. I made sure he didn't carry away any contents, but helped him take it to Daddy's office. He was so proud that he opened that package!! He has been opening lots of Daddy's packages lately. His curiousity is so cute just wondering what possibly could be inside!! Cute boy!

Happy Birthday Mommy!

I am 27! It sounds old!! I had a wonderful birthday. Some kind friends took me out to lunch. Then, Bill & Linda watched the kiddos so Nate and I could go to dinner. We did some shopping and got a new camera!! Yay!!! So now I have quality pictures again! Thank you Nate! My mom gave me an early birthday present which I have used very often, a KitchenAid mixer. Oh how easy it is to make pizza, bread, rolls, cookies, anything!! To make bread or pizza dough used to be an all morning ordeal. Now I can make dough while we eat breakfast in the morning and let it rise till nap time without getting one bit of flour on my hands!! Thanks mom! On Sunday we had dinner at Bill & Linda's and a birthday celebration there. The boys absolutely love birthdays and cannot wait for their own. So it was fun to have party hats, cake and ice cream, and presents!! Cooper was helping to set the table, and Jaxton was just too interested in the chocolates all wrapped up from his Great Grandma Routsong and the miniture gift bag containing $$$ to target from his Grandma. I had a wonderful time with the most wonderful people in my life! Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!

A Shining Sunbeam

Jaxton is a Sunbeam in Primary. He has learned a lot over the year about how to be reverent and how to act at church. He has learned that it is very different from school or play. He has wonderful teachers who have worked with his very large rambunctious class of 3 and 4 year olds. The past few weeks they have told me how wonderful he has been. He has been the example to the rest of his class, a wonderful listener and that he sings the songs during singing time. His teachers have come up with a system to reward the sunbeams for being reverent in Primary. Jax got to pick out these funky glasses which he has loved! Jaxton had to give his first talk in Primary this week. His topic was "I can show love to Jesus by keeping the commandments." He used several pictures of different commandments and shared with Primary some of the commandments he knows and that by doing them, he is showing love to Jesus. He did a wondeful job! He then presented his talk in our own Family Home Evening on our fireplace "stage" and he did it with no help at all for our family. What an awesome kid! We love you, Sunbeam!

"SPACE" by Jaxton

Jaxton had a dream one day, he said, about space. He was telling me all about it. He had characters, plot, and drama! It was a great story. So I helped him put it into a book. This was his first book he has ever created, storyline and illustrations, and it is pretty darn amazing for a 3 year old!! On the cover, he drew lots of black stars to represent outer space. On each page, he drew "what happened next" in his story and then he told me what to write.

"The yellow spaceship is for the heros, with lots of windows. The purple spaceship is for the bad guys with only 1 window and it is called A-G-T-U-P-O-J-O." You can see the fire coming out the back end of his yellow spaceship. He got carried away on this page writing letters, so the name of the bad guys' spaceship got extra long.

"This is the world. The brown and green spaceship is for the heros and the bad guys."

Here, he drew the earth. Pretty good, wouldn't you say!!

"This is all the space. The stars are black and green. The spaceships fly in space."

Here is Jaxton's interpretation of outer space. Again, he represents it well. The black and green are stars in a blue sky.

"These are all the bad guys. They have red swords. The king bad guy has lots of arms all the way down to his feet. They put holes in the heros' spaceship, but the heros won and the bad guys floated up."

His story ended with the bad guys. This is actually the illustration he chose to draw first. He was very excited about the bad guys and the heros fighting with swords and the heros winning the battle. He knew that you "float" in space, so he imagined the bad guys floating away once they lost their battle.

The End

Slimy Slime

Cornstarch & Water is an amazing thing! Mix it together to make some weird, slimy stuff! We added food coloring to make it green slime and the kiddos loved it. I almost did it outside to minimize the mess in case they got too excited, but they were so intrigued with the consistency of the stuff that there was not tons of mess. Adrian, the little boy I watch, he was so fascinated with it, but would not touch it with his hands. And the mess cleans up just like flour. It was great fun!!

Swimming Lessons

Jaxton & Cooper were in swimming lessons at the YMCA this summer. They have truly learned so much!! Jaxton was in a class with 3 and 4 year olds, without me, and he was pretty nervous at first. But his best friend Kye was in class with him, so that helped. It is hard for me to take the kids swimming ever because neither can swim, so from knowing nothing about swimming, to the end of the swimming session, Jaxton has done so very well!! The teacher will stand back a yard or two and give them a shove and make them kick/swim to grab the wall. She will take each one out one at a time and work on skills. Jaxton now will dunk his head on his own, which has always been scary for him. And he feels so much more comfortable in the water and less afraid. He has done so well, that I signed both kids up for another swimming session in fall.

Jaxton's Report Card

Cooper also has excelled!! He and I were in a class together, Mom & Me. Cooper is different from Jaxton in that he is fearless and daring. When the teacher had us submerge our child under the water for the first time, most kids, frieked out and cried upon coming up out of the water. Cooper smiled so big and said "Again!" He loved it! I think he figured out on his own that he can't breath under water. So I put him under again and again. When he jumps from the wall he tells me to go to the other side of the pool (which i don't) because he thinks he can jump far and swim to me. So he jumps and under he goes before I catch him. And he loves it. He wants to do it again and again. I can give him a shove to the wall and he will kick his little feet so hard to reach the wall. Both boys are excelling, so I am excited to see what this next session will do for them!!

Jaxton's City

Here is the city that Jaxton built one day during his quiet time. He put water all the way around the city and then a bridge to get across the water. Super detailed and creative. Way to go!

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom

Chicka Chicka Boom Boom...Will there be enough room?

Here come Jax & Coop up the coconut tree!

Dirt, Mud, and More Dirt

Who needs grass when dirt is so entertaining? Our whole yard is dirt, and boys find so much to do in it! They go rock collecting, bug searching, and dig for pennies in it. They mix it with water to create mud and "go to work" out there. This particular day, our sand box (which is empty- why buy sand when you have acres of dirt?) filled up with water overnight. The boys began using cups to get out water and dump it places. Then they began dumping it on each other and themselves, till they were muddy messes!! But oh so much fun!! They were laughing and playing, that I decided to let them enjoy themselves; they needed a bath anyways.

Here is Jaxton drenched in muddy water

Muddy Boys!