Popsicles with Jackie

Saturday afternoon, we headed over to the Wiseman residence for a barbeque and some fun with friends.  After playing in the pool and the water slide, the boys had a nice dinner with Jack.  John ate all his food while Nicholas enjoyed his french fries.  Jack ate much like Nicholas as well, so it's not just Nicholas.  In any event.  They all enjoyed popsicles after dinner.  John specifically chose to take over some "firecracker" pops.  Back in the day, we called them BOMB POPS!!  As you can see, Nicholas chose to eat a Big Stick.  I'll give you one guess why he chose the Big Stick.  Yes, it's orange.

Gueritos

Saturday morning, we headed out to Northgate Market to pick up some tortillas since John liked the tortillas from there (he had them at a friends house).  As we get there, they notice that everyone is speaking in Spanish, so John starts whining about not liking it there because everyone was speaking Spanish.  As we move deeper into the store toward the hot foods, both he and Nicholas start to complain about the smell.  They are quite delicate like that.  Anywho, it just continued to go downhill from there and Maureen was mortified by their behavior.

On the plus side, they noticed that there is a better selection of flavored Danimals products there, so they want to go back for that.  We told them they asked us never to bring the Gueritos back to the store because they swere so disruptive.  Maureen and I gave them a stern talking to about their behavior and attitude.  John said that he'd behave.  Nicholas said that he'd behave the same way.  Oh well, I suppose we should just take them there every week until they get used to it.

They also like the fresh assortment of pan dulce that the bakery had and the Bimbo muffins that I gave them.

Pescaditos

Many years ago when I was about their age, we took a trip to Cancun.  Neither my brother, Robert, or I could swim, so we just stayed on the steps of the pool and clung to the side.  On a lark, I decided to take the plunge and try to swim.  I looked much like these two little scamps as the scissor kick in the water.  Nicholas took to it immediately, but it took John a little time to warm up to it.

Star Spangled Wake Up

John decided to give us his rendition of the Star Spangled Banner this morning as he woke up.  There's no video, but there is great sound.

Fun at the Turtle Pond Park

After running some errands today, we decided that it would be a good day to go to the Turtle Pond Park on 8th Street.  It's a hidden gem of a tiny park because it always seems to be empty.  It has two see saws, a slide, and three swings.  The boys love going there because they like the older seventies-style apparati.  In particular, they love the slide because we'll let them walk up the slide if no one else is around.  Why do they like this?  Well, at school, you are not allowed to walk up the slide.  Sometimes, these boys take a bit of slide down the slide as they try to walk up.  They sometimes forget about the force of gravity like some cartoon characters.

John asked if we could have a picnic at this park, but we decided against it today.  Normally, there aren't too many kids in the park, but for some reason, it was packed today.  Nicholas had a little trouble sharing his sand toys with some of the other little boys that wanted to play and a nice boy named Shlomo was more than happy to pal around with John on the see saw and the swings.  Thankfully, all went well and the boys had a great time.  They actually even listened to us when it was time to go.  I was quite pleased with that!

Playing with Marv

The boys were downstairs playing with their water guns earlier this week when a neighbor came down withher dog Marvin aka Marv.  Sure enough, Marv was a pleasant little dog.  He ran up to me and started to lick my hand.  As always with dogs, the boys were scared at first, but they warmed up pretty quickly to Marv.  He started chasing them and then when he was tired they'd chase him.  It was a fun 10-minutes while Marv stretched his legs and went to the bathroom.

John Always Wants to Help

As we left the restaurant after breakfast with Mami and Papi, I jokingly told John to push Papi's wheel chair. Wouldn't you know it?  He did it all the way from the restaurant to the car.  That boy has a good heart.  Strangers have told us that and this just proves it even more!

Breakfast with Mami and Papi

On Mother's Day, we woke up bright and early to go have breakfast with Mami and Papi.  The boys were quite excited to go to breakfast.  We learned that if you go at 8 AM there are no crowds, so we went super early to avoid the rush.  As usual, the boys ate their usual.  John had pancakes and eggs.  Nicholas had bacon.  I offered him some toast, but he just wanted bacon.  I guess they didn't break the mold when they made me because he's got the same palate as I.  Anyway, John was kind enough to pose for a photo with Mami and Papi, but our friend Nicholas was just too cool for school and stayed in his chair.  Don't worry.  He did give Mami a hug and a kiss a little later.

It was quite a nice surprise to see the Lowther's join us at breakfast.  We actually drove by their car and thought, "Wouldn't it be nice if they were to join us?  Sure enough, they did.  The boys were ever so happy to see Aunt China and Uncle Mike.  Of course, Aunt China did her best to get the boys all riled up.  She's very good at that and quite loud.

All in all, the boys did very well at breakfast and then we headed home to prepare for the fun that was to await us at Grammy's house.  John kept asking, "When are we going to Grammy's house?"

Splashtastic Fun at Grammy

Grammy bought the boys an inflatable pool with a giant slide.  We went over to Grammy's for a barbeque on Mother's Day afternoon.  Let's just say that we felt it was in the best interest of safety that we remove the slide.  The boys were sliding off it and it had bad news written all over it.  Still, they really did enjoy themselves quite well.  They had so much fun that Nicholas wound up running naked around the backyard.

Trouble with a Capital "T"

Maureen asked me to go in and see how Nicholas was sleeping.  I was a little shocked to see the placement of his hand over his crotch.  Then, I looked over to John and noticed his hand was in a similar spot.  What are the odds that the two of them would have their hands in the same position over their crotches?

Someone Is Growing Up

After removing John's bed rail to create pillow world, we decided to try something new.  We didn't put the rail back on his bed to see if he could make it through the night without rolling onto the floor.  Sure enough, our Little Man came through with flying colors.  He slept the entire night and didn't thrash about.  Nicholas wants us to do it to his bed, but we told him he's still too young.  He said, "When I'm four years old, we can take the fence off, ok?"  He wants to be just like John.

Don't worry, we put pillws on the floor next to his bed should he roll around.  He's as safe as can be.

Lazy Sunday Morning

Today, we were invited to Cousin Adriana's First Communion at Cathedral Chapel, but we decided that it would be most prudent to keep the boys at home and go to the party after the ceremony.  Maureen attended and I got to spend some time on Pillow World with the boys.  For the most part, they paid attention and did as they were told.  Once in a while, they'd start tunneling through the pillows and I'd have to threaten taking away their stickers if they didn't stop.  John is better at listening.  Nicholas was a bit of a pill, but that's nothing new.

So, we headed over to the party at Grammy's house and the boys were quite shy as they always are.  We headed inside until they decided they were ready to go out into the backyard.  After 15 minutes, John kept on asking to head over to Uncle Rick's Garage Bar, so we made our way over there.  He was itching to dance.  He wanted to dance under the disco lights.  Thankfully, Uncle Rick was kind enough to put the lights and music on for the boys.  While they were waiting, they decided to sit on the stools and hang out at the bar.  They look a little too comfortable sitting an those bar stools.  God help us when they are older!

We had to leave before the cake, but we were able to stick around for ice cream.  Both boys opted for Rainbow shebet over Neopolitan ice cream.  They also had a bit of whipped cream on their iced treat.  Thankfully, it wasn't too messy although Nicholas was quite sticky after eating it.  Then again, that boy is always sticky, so I don't know if that ice cream is to blame or if his normal secretions were the cause.  I vote for the latter.

Golfing at PLB

One of the hidden treasures at the PLB are the parks around the property.  Each has different activities for kids.  The "Cookie Fountain" Park, so called because the boys sometimes get cookies by the park at the coffee station, has a small putting green.  Every so often, one of the boy decides that it's time to go golfing.  Last weekend, John was disappointed because we couldn't make it to the putting green.  Instead, Maureen offered to take him to the park the next day and have a picnic.  After the picnic, they were going to have some fun on the links.  The boys did enjoy themselves.  They even met up with the Korean grandmas and one of their little Korean friends.  The little girl didn't speak a word of English, but Nicholas kept on talking to her as if she did.

Sunny California

Earlier this week, I was in Arkansas for a business meeting.  It was 70 degrees when I landed on Wednesday night.  By Friday morning, it had dropped to 30 degrees and it snowed over night.  Back at home, it was nice and hot.  It was so hot that Maureen took the boys to the beach!  Sure enough, it's cloudy and rainy now.  I'm sorry I brought the gloomy weather back from Arkansas with me.