A visit from MiMi and PawPaw

Time with MiMi and PawPaw

We got a little spoiled the month of September.  MiMi and PawPaw came up for Alex's Birthday over labor day weekend, than Mike's Dad came up the "bad Monday" when Mike had to go to the ER, Alex was sick, and my Uncle Mart died. He stayed the whole week to help out with the boys and for emotional support, than MiMi came up at the end of the week to stay another week! We enjoyed spending time with MiMi and PawPaw.  They also took the kids some days/nights so we enjoyed some one on one time with either Max and Alex and took them on fun Daddy, Mommy, and Me dates. Below are some pictures I took during their visits.

Alex climbing all over his PawPaw

Good picture of Alex in PawPaw's lap

Bekah takes Alex on a walk

talking a walk around the neighborhood

The 3 kids enjoyed spending some time together playing in the back yard.

While they were visiting Jennie and Todd graciously invited us over to their house to watch the HOGS game.  We don't have cable, so we took them up on the offer and brought the crew over to Centerton to watch the game.  Thank you Todd and Jennie for the invite, we enjoyed spending the afternoon at your house and eating the delicious snacks :)

Mabry enjoys visiting with Max and Alex's PawPaw

Alex on MiMi's lap

When PawPaw came the "bad Monday"  He actually even stayed the night at our house.  He helped us with bedtime and entertaining the boys, etc.  He did a lot of reading while he was here.

The last weekend they were here they came up for Max's soccer game.  It was Max's picture day so MiMi and PawPaw watched Alex and Bekah at the field while we took Max over to get some soccer pictures.

 

 

 

After the soccer game we all went out to eat at Genghis Grill (sp?)  It was delicious.  The kids loved it and so did the adults.

Me and Alex shared a bowl.  Dairy free of course

 

The kids enjoyed watching the cooks

 

Can you tell the kids are done and ready to go?

  After we ate, we let Mike and PawPaw finish up the Hog game, and we walked next door and got the kids some icecream.

Alex tried the Dairy free sorbet.  It was delicious!

 

Group picture!!

While MiMi and PawPw were here they took turns taking the grandkids out to their land to spend some time with them.  Max went first with Bekah so we got to spend some alone time with Alex.  We spoiled him rotten of course.

nap in the movie room with mommy

naps next to mommy

special dinner outside

Next up was Alex's turn to go to the land.  He was so excited.  Below are some pictures of him enjoying his time with MiMi and PawPaw

 

 

 

That means we only had Max now!  We decided to go see Despicable Me 2.  Me and Mike actually had wanted to see it for a while so we were looking forward to taking Max.  It was a good time since Alex wasn't going to be with us.  Alex has gone to several movies, but it isn't always easy :) By the way, I loved the movie, I would definitely recommend.  It was pretty funny, both kid humor and grown up humor.

 

 

relaxing outside after the movie letting Max play near the fountains

Took Max to fresh market and he got a free chicken wing! haha

We bought him lego candy

Monday morning I fixed Max a special breakfast. EGGS and Bacon.  Neither of the two he gets very often.  Bacon takes longer and smells up the house, and eggs, well Alex can't have or get near so we stay clear :)

Max enjoys every bite of breakfast in the movie room!

Monday night Alex was still at the land so Mike took Max to Buffalo Wild Wings to Watch the Steelers Game.  He had a $10 giftcard so they had some wings and fries, yum

The boys are used to spending time together.  Since Max was at the Land Friday night, Saturday, and Sunday....and Sunday we made the switch, got Max and gave them Alex, the poor guys hadn't seen each other in a while!  Tuesday morning when Alex got home, Max was still at school.  Alex asked for Max the second he got into the house.  Well, Alex refused to nap, he was too excited and kept asking about Max.  We finally had to go pick up Max an hour early from school just so they could spend time together.  It was so cute how excited they were to see each other and play together.  I think they ignored me for a good 30 minutes when we first got home :)

Alex was literally attached to Max when we got home, it was so cute.

Finally Tuesday night Mike got off work and we were a family of 4 again!!!

Had fun visits with MiMi and PawPaw over the month of September. Glad they got to come up for Alex's Birthday, Glad David was able to come up when we needed his help, and glad MiMi was able to come up and spend some time with the boys as well. Looking forward to a trip to Delight in October or November for Deer Season to spend time with them again!!!

We love you MiMi and PawPaw!!

20,000+ views!

Me and Mike started our Blog in 2009.  We started it because we were just about to start a family - Max was on his way ETA February 2009, and we wanted a way to keep up with some stories about Max and our experiences as a life as a family of 3. We had several family members and friends that were across the US and didn't "do facebook", so we figured this would be a good way to keep up with us too.  We had Mike's family in Southern Arkansas, my family in Russellville/Little Rock, my sister at the time lived in Charlotte, NC, my aunt Phyllis lives in Colorado, and I have extended family in IOWA.  We thought the blog would be a fun way to share stories and updates with them as well as be a fun reminder for us to look back at over the years. It's literally been like a digital scrapbook.

Well 4 years and almost 900 posts later,

This month we hit 20,000 views!!! (21,143 to be exact)

We are excited we've kept up the blog for this long and want to continue to update it with stories, our travels, pictures, funny moments, or just updates with our lives.

We love the name of our blog.

Can'tsilencetheselambs

Isn't that the truth?!

The first 4 years of the blog have been fun.  Blogging about life as a family of 2, 3, than 4!  Don't worry - we've hit our Max, there will not be any blogging about a family of 5 :)  But we do look forward to sharing stories of the boys as they grow up and life in our new house and new town of Bentonville, AR.

This next year will be the last year the boys and I are at home.  Max will start school next August, I will mostly likely go back to work (eek) and Alex will start preschool.

We hope you will continue to keep reading our blog and enjoy the pictures and stories we share. We are so thankful to have a way to share our journey : )

The Lambs
Mike, Ashley
Max (4.5) & Alex (2)

I guess its that time again

Max started potty training a little before he was 2 and a half.  I remember this because Max was 2 years, 5 months and 2 weeks when Alex was born and we started trying to potty train him by the time Alex arrived on September 3, 2011.  Well little did we know that 

A. Max wasn't really ready

B.  It takes longer than a day to potty train your kid (that's an exaggeration but I really don't think we knew what we were getting ourselves into trying to potty train our first kid)

C.  We were first time parents - I'm pretty sure we didn't know a lot :)

Max was in pull ups for about a month or two mainly at night.  November 1st, when he was 2 years, 7 months, 2 weeks, we sent him to Mother's Day out.  They told us he had to be in underwear in order to move up tot he next class. That's when we kicked potty training into high gear.  Max was a big kid and he towered over the other kids in his class.  He also seemed a little bored and hated the mandatory naps in the "baby class".  I told him if he could get to where he could wear underwear and not have accidents we could move him up to the next class. It took about a month but before we knew it, Max was potty trained.  He moved up classes at school, rarely had accidents during the day - a few at night but by his 3rd Birthday I'd say he pretty much had the hang of it.

Alex just turned 2, and he is way excited about this potty thing.  He has started way before Max and really wanting to go. I've let him practice and get the hang of it, but soon it will be time for him to really learn.  I am thinking in a few weeks when the weather gets cooler and the boys play outside more I'll just let him play outside in underwear and try to learn that way. I think its more convincing me - the parent - to fully commit to this potty training thing again. It's not any easy thing to do for anyone that has not accomplished this feat before. It completely consumes your life for literally 24 hours a day and introduces you to all types of challenges and experience one has a hard time preparing them-self for.  I feel like it's something that could go on my resume! haha twice! lol  Well we'll see.  Below are some pictures of the last few weeks as we familiarize Alex with the basics and getting him ready to potty train soon. 

we got him a potty seat from Rhea Lana's for $4.  He was really excited about it and has made things so much easier. 

I love this one.  Max and Alex both got out of the bath and Alex yelled he had to go potty.  He ran to the potty and max was right behind him.  He picked up his brother and put him on the potty and cheered him on. So sweet Max is trying to help him learn.

sometimes he will stand to go potty, but this is rare.  I think because he's so tiny he thinks he might fall in?

sometimes I catch Alex running around with a wet diaper and his pants.  He doesn't like it when his diaper is too wet so he will just take it off, bring it to me, and tell me he needs a new one.

Over the summer we let them play in the water a lot. Don't worry, I promise they wear swim suits when they are playing. BUT I always take their swim suits off right before we head to the bath so they don't drip all over the house.  Before I knew it, I turn around and see this.  This was too cute not to take a picture of. So funny

Alex is getting big enough that he will put the seat on and get on the potty all by himself.  It takes him a while, but he'll do it.

after he goes potty he gets a prize.  Normally 5 skittles.  He sure knows where to go to get his prize.  I keep them on top of the refrigerator.

I try to always have him go potty before bedtime. 

Lately he has been asking for a book to read while he is on the potty.  So funny.

Marker

Alex loves the word Marker. Anything he sees that resembles a marker, he points, says marker, than wants to color. Last Thursday we went to the doctor and they had the "safe bucket" where they put all of the needles hanging on the wall, Alex points and says markers. I laughed and explained to him that those were shots! He didn't want them anymore after that ; )

Well last week he found an actual marker, got the lid off, and I guess couldn't find paper because he decided to use his legs. He was so proud he ran up to me, pointed at his legs and said, marker rara (what he calls me) I color with marker.

After I snapped a quick picture, straight to the bath he went. This kid can accomplish almost anything in 30 seconds....lesson learned. Although I still have no idea where he found the marker all by himself.





- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Mike's Fall Carnival

Mike's Fall Carnival was Friday. It had been the longest week for our family and mike was still on the road to recovery, but the fall carnival is a fun tradition so we decided to take the boys for just an hour. We got there right when it opened and there wasn't much of a crowd at all so we actually got to pack a lot in, in the hour we were there. We took the kids to make balloon animals first, the lady made the boys swords. After that we headed to play some carnival games and the boys won some little prizes. One game Max even got the ring around the coke bottle, the kid working said max was the first one all day to do it. Skill or luck, we were all impressed. Next we headed to the food and drinks! We got each of the boys a slushy, popcorn, cotton candy, lemonade, me a funnel cake, than we headed to the "pools" to pick out a drink. After we ate and drank til our hearts were content it was time to head to the bouncy houses. There were 14 bouncy houses, yes, 14. I could not believe they had that many. No lines or short lines, it was great. Both boys enjoyed them and had fun bouncing around. Before we knew it the hour was up, the sun was shining brighter, it started to get crowded, and we decided it was time to head home.
I'm do glad we were able to go. We are so lucky Mikey's work puts this on every year. Did I mention it was all free? Games, food, drinks, bounce houses? We always look forward to going, always have a lot of fun, and are looking forward to going every year.
Below are a few pictures I snapped while I was there