Another month behind us...

Another month is gone! Is it me or does time just seem to be flying??? In less than 6 months the kids turn 3 years old...holy moly, where has that time gone?!?!? So how did September end for us...let me see.
After a second week of daycare twice a week, we decided to make a change...we added an hour and now taking them three times a week for 2 hours each time. They are showing improvements/progress, which is wonderful. Mommy is still trying to figure out how to maximize the time alone...so much to do! Alex is doing the best...once he settles (usually within 10 minutes) he will be fine for the rest of the time...Liz and Zach still have moments of tears during the time...if they hear the word mom, mommy, mother it will get them going or if they have a moment to think or ask where I am. Their teacher is very happy with their progress.
Auntie Jackie came home to visit on Saturday the 19th. We got together at the lake and had dinner together. The kids always love seeing her. We got a group shot of Jackie and the 4 monkeys. This was the best of the pictures as holding still and looking at the camera wee two things they did NOT want to do.
The kids have been very playful with daddy. They can be very goofy. These pictures were taken on Thursday the 24th after dinner. The kids got out the cowboy hats...Zach decided to wear it more as a top hat...

Liz put hers on and began hopping around like a frog, saying ribbit, ribbit. I got some great shots of her, but this has got to be the best/funniest.

He is just so handsome...not sure how well the girl headbands got with it, but he could be plannign to use them as weapons...lol.

Monkey pile on daddy...all three of them pile on top of him like he is a piece of furniture...sometimes I think he needs protective wear. When the kids were babies/early toddler stage Jeremy would lift them in the air while on his back or in the rocker...they kids loved it. Well they still want to do it but have gotten just a tad too big. Maybe Jeremy just needs longer arms.

Liz took her turn to stand on daddy.

The last weekend of the month mark the beginning of wood cutting for the winter heating season. The kids want to help SOOOOOO bad. I pretty much have to do things so they can either hear Jeremy or see him. Luckily Jeremy was working across the road, so Sunday I decided to feed lunch outside in the front yard. We normally have not spent a lot of time in the front yard but the kids are respecting the boundaries, so it is not so stressful being out there (for those that do not know, our house is very close to the road and it is a busy road). Here are a couple pictures from the lunch. They enjoyed being able to watch daddy work.

We try to settle the kids down before bedtime we try to have them get the books out to read. They are doing more of the reading themselves (not just reading but a lot of things they want to do themselves and are quite adamant about it). Here are the boys enjoying their books.

Liz chose to read to me...I love getting the one on one time and even better a picture of it...lol.

Zach has the love for the camera like I do. He grabs it whenever he can...most of the time taking pictures of...well, anything...walls, ceiling, floor, toys...you get the picture (no pun intended). While the kids were playing I let him take the shots. He got this one of Alex and Liz, not too bad.

Well that closes September for us. Looking forward to October.

Love, Jen

Tough week

After having a week with daddy, the kids had to adjust to him going back to work. This week he also had to travel so we went one day of him back to work and then the kids did not see him for almost three days. It is tough on them but I told them where he was and let them talk to him on the phone. On Wednesday morning Zach got done eating his breakfast and quicly headed to the breezeway. Soon he returned to the kitchen with one of the pictures...and pointed out daddy. Kinda breaks your heart, but it settled him to just see him.
The other tough part of this week was taking the kids to daycare for the first time. The first time non-family members to watch them. We are calling it school. Tuesday was the first time. Since the kids had never been there I decided to stay a bit to get them comfortable. Finally after 1 1/2 hrsI decided to leave. I snuck out as the kids were not to willing to have me leave. I was only gone for 45 minutes. As I left I could here the boys crying. I teared up as drove away but knew I'd be back soon and that this was a good ting to do. I did fine until I came back and walked in the room and was attacked by our kids all three at this point crying...it took all I had to put a brave face on. They did say they had fun and want to do it again. So I start to hype it up and tell them mommy will ALWAYS come back. Thursday morning came and we were all excited to go to school. I let them take their little backpacks with a favorite thing. We were great until we got to their classroom. This time the teacher took the kids and started working on redirecting them, so I left right away...I barely got to the truck before losing it. Bawled like a baby, felt like the worst mother in the world....of course called my mother to help me thru it. Even though I wanted to go back for them early, I waited out the full 2 1/2 hours...walked in to no crying and kids that had a great time. I guess mommy had a harder second day then they did, what was I so worried about. As I have been told, it will get easier for them and me...it is quite the change for us. I am hoping next week will continue to go smoothly. Here are the kids Tuesday morning before leaving for our first time at "school"...are they cute or what?!?!?

The End

The end of our wonderful week ended with a little couple time. After Dozer Day we took the kids to my parents for an overnight visit while we headed out of town on the motorcycle. One of the great perks Jeremy gets with working at Harley is to borrow bikes to test drive...so we used that bike rather than ours. Our destination was Hazelhurst where my uncle Jim and aunt Deb live. We specifically went there to use a gift certificate to a local pond place that is only open seasonally. We took a scenic route which ended up take a longer than we anticipated, but we made it there before dark. It is so beautiful up north. It is the one place we would move to or would consider moving to. My uncle was still out of town, so it was just Deb and us. We went to dinner then chatted. The great thing about being up north, we sleep great...this time until 9am....oh it felt great! Unfortunately our stay was very short and we were back on the road by noon. It was a nice way to end Jeremy's vacation time. We had beautiful weather! We had Deb take a quick picture of us prior to leaving this morning.So that is the end of our "stay"cation. In the end we spent less than $250 which is less than the cost for one plane ticket to go to Florida/Disney World. I so enjoyed having Jeremy home and doing all the special things with the kids. There are so many things to do locally that may be overlooked and I am glad that we were able to enjoy some of them and look forward to doing it again. I hope you all have enjoy the pictures and stories.
Love, Jen

Dozer Day

Thanks to a couple billboards that Jeremy passes everyday, we found our final activity for the week...Dozer Day. A quarry in Sussex opens it up to the public for the kids to learn and explore. They get to get up close to the large equipment as well as ride on some. It was our first time so we did not know what to expect...we know now what to expect for next year. After waiting in a very slow moving line of traffic for a half hour we finally got parked and headed in. The kids had a blast as did we. It is pretty much a day thing or as long as the kids will last...there is just that much to do. The kids did not ride in any equipment and we did not take any tours of the quarry, but hope to do so next year. The kids did get a rock collection and played on a giant sand hill. Here are the pictures from the morning.
Hot spot for a photo you do it quickly as there is a TON of people waiting...
Liz and Zach checking out a dozer...

The equipment is just enormous and you really don't know enormous until you put your child in the inner parts of a tire...

or stop for a quick photo in the "scoop" of an earth mover...

Alex was very interested in the equipment and wanting to see in, since they were not going to ride were looked at the ones without lines waiting to see in...

We will take one scoop of a Liz, a scoop of a Zach...

Liz watching Backhoe Alley...next year we will ride one...

Daddy watching the backhoes with the boys...

The thirde level of the quarry where they do tours with school buses and earth movers...another thing to do next year...

The giant sand hill...

It is a race to the top...

I giant tire as a sandbox...we love it!

Do we have to leave...ever???

One last giant machine before we leave...

A small portion of the quarry...

Shalom Wildlife Sanctuary

This afternoon we went to the Shalom Wildlife Sanctuary. It is pretty much right down the road from us, but we have never been there. It was a self guided tour, which was great to be able to go at our own pace. We will definitely be going back as we ran out of time to do a second lap like it was suggested to do. We will be going on the wagon ride that they have in winter. The kids had fun seeing all the animals. What a great thing to have pratically in our backyard. Here are the pictures from the trip.
A beautiful setting...

Kids watching the horse approach us...

After the horse and Dall sheep was this beautiful Bobcat...

then there was the fawns...we saw an albino one as well as this one...

The Elk were huge...

we stopped the visit the porcupine...

he was sitting on top of his water pail...

Then we stopped at the 3 silver fox...

There are a total of 40 Whitetail Bucks...the racks on them were amazing!

There was also albino deer...

and Bison...

Not only were there animals but trees and plants labeled as well as indian artifact and such...here is a directional tree...the indians would bend a branch in the direction that they were travelling and as the tree grew it would stay like that...cool, eh?

Little house that contains Indian history and things...the kids liked the drum...go figure!

Not only are the whitetail deer and albino deer but pie bald deer too...

Kids made friends with a squirrel inside...I think the squirrel is trying to convince them to let him out...

Then we visited the donkeys, goats and chickens...here Zach is meeting the goat...

and Alex and Liz meeting the donkeys...

and as we left the donkeys said good-bye...hee haw, hee haw...it kinda scared the kids but it was funny too.