Front Yard Play - Engineer Style

The boys, engineering their wagon/tricycle mobile command center. Ben had a wagon, a tricycle and two bungee cords. He devised a system to hook the wagon to the tricycle and pull the wagon. I didn't get a picture/video of it, but when one of the other kids was having trouble peddling the trike to pull the wagon so Ben went over to have a look-see. He first observed and corrected the wagon wheels. He straightened them so they they were in the correct forward motion position. He then adjust the bungee's a bit so they were level between the trike and wagon. He then told Nick to move to the back seat, further away from the trike because he couldn't pull him if he were in the front seat. He then hopped on the trike and away he want, no problem, pulling his brother in the wagon. I was very impressed by the wheel assessment/straightening and the weight distribution logic.  

Two forces of equal and opposite magnitude...can't end well. 

First Football Game

We took the boys to the UT home opener football game. It was their first live-action football game. I got us seats 3 rows up from the field in hopes it would hold their attention better. We started off with a few tailgates, including the UT Alumni pavilion for hot dogs and then catching up with Cameryn and a big gang. 

We stayed for the first half. The boys did great. they were slightly more interested in Rocky and Rocksy the mascots, but they did watch the football game. Nick sat in my lap and Ben stayed close to Adam. I took Nick down to the wall at the field for a bit so he could see from a different angle and give Rocky the Rocket a high five. Ben was pretty upset when we left before the game was over, but they were so tired, they were asleep before we left the parking lot!

Nick got a little toy football at the Alumni pavilion and he was not seen without it the rest of the evening. He was throwing it to people and running with it. He could not be separated from his football!

Go Rockets!

An Evening By the Fire

A beautiful fall evening by the fire. Nick displayed some of this amazing acrobatics in this attempt to get into the gravity chair while in a recline position. 

Obviously, we are all sitting in the chairs wrong and Nick is doing it right. 

Don't ask questions when someday you see my children sans eyebrows. 

Some Morning Play Time

A little morning play time including an elaborate fort/bridge/car launcher thing. 

A view of the toy room. Do you see any carpet?? Yeah, neither did I until I spent 4 hours cleaning. 

Anniversary

Last weekend was our 6th anniversary. We got a sitter and squealed the tires as we pealed out of the driveway! I wanted to take some pictures for our anniversary since we somehow did not take any on vacation. And I can fit in my wedding dress (the short one) again, so I wanted to wear it ;) It is so nice and peaceful taking pictures without children. After pictures, we went to dinner at my most favorite new place, Social. It is a gastropub across from Levis and has the best food around! It has been open for less than a month, I have been there 3 times, and each time the food has been fantastic!

My favorite!

Firetrucks

Friday evening we headed downtown for the last First Friday hosted by the Downtown Perrysburg Inc. group. We tried to go in August but it got rained out. This time, it was a beautiful night. The fire department had two big fire trucks parked for hands on experience. Nick loved the fire trucks! Ben was on the tired side after a long week of school so he stayed in the stroller. Nick was up and down and in every open door he could find on the fire trucks. He needed to buckle himself into the front seat and drive the fire truck. 

The First Day of Preschool!

Tuesday, September 3rd was Ben's first day of preschool! He was not aware of where he was going when I took these pictures. And there were gummy bear treat bribes involved. Tuesday and Wednesday were rough drop off days. Tuesday, Ben didn't figure out what was going on until we pulled into the park lot of school. He just kept saying, 'No, mommy, you are just dropping off paperwork!' (which we had done the previous Friday). Ben was very sad when I left in the mornings. But Wednesday afternoon I had to wait for him to finish playing at the workbench before we could leave. Thursday morning, Ben was tear free! Nick however, threw a fit when we left school because he wanted to stay and play trains with Ben...Just can't win sometimes. Friday was 100% tear free and daddy got to pick Ben up at school and everyone was happy! 

Tuesday, after such a good school day and because Adam was out of town, I took the boys to McDonald's for dinner. I was trying to make the whole school transition thing as big of a deal as possible in order to get positive buy-in from Ben. After dinner we went to Target to get a school pillow for nap time. Ben picked out a panda pillow pet and is very excited about it. 

Neighborhood Birthday Party!

Last Saturday we helped Little Ben celebrate this 3rd birthday. The kids played and played and played! They had fun swinging at the pinata and later swimming in the pool and hot tub. The dads all got in the pool and played volleyball while the kids hung out in the hot tub. It was a great cul de sac party, as always!