All Good Things Must Come to an End

As a gift to my dad for Father's Day I took my kids back after their two week and one day vacation in Georgia. Let me know when you start having withdrawals and I'm sure I'll be able to arrange another extended stay, Paw-Paw!

Our two week break from the kids was enjoyable and we got a lot done, but Steve and I were definitely ready to for them to come home. I forgot how funny they were. But I also forgot how mischievous Kathryn is. The drive home wasn't the greatest, but when is a drive ever great with Kathryn in the car? Nathan was yelling at her every time she whined or cried. My favorite time was when she started yelling and getting mad and Nathan told her, "Baby Sister stop being bad. I'm always a good boy so you need to be a good girl..... You better recognize." I have no idea where he heard that. Maybe overheard someone say that while he was out, or maybe he picked it up from Paw-Paw and Lady.

Paw-Paw and Lady took the kids to the playground almost every night. Being back at home is going to suck for the kids.
Mace likes to be included in everything.


Mace got to be very protective over the children while they were at the playground. He stood and waited for them to come down the tunnel slide every time, or when he wasn't busy sliding himself.

Poor Mace. He would go under the table to try to make Kathryn forget about him. As you can see, his plan didn't go as expected most of the time.

Look at Mace in this picture.

Nathan got a giant cookie with lime green frosting.

Kathryn is such a girly-girl. She loves flowers.

At the beginning of their stay Lily hated Kathryn. She would take off running and hide under something every time Kathryn came looking for her. Unfortunately, that was quite often. I don't know how Paw-Paw and Lady didn't go crazy just off of hearing Kathryn demand "kee-kee-kee" (kitty) and "Lilla-Lilla-Lilla." I couldn't believe that by the end of their stay Kathryn was petting Lily on the head.

More flower sniffing.

Nathan and Lady took trips to library. Nathan came home with books and a Dr. Seuss movie that he liked to watch on the portable DVD player.

Always being funny.

When I saw Nathan I told him how much I missed him. He then told me how much he didn't miss me. I asked him why and he said, "Because I had fun with Paw-Paw and Lady."

Before the Sick Days

Not only did Nathan get sick, but so did Kathryn then Paw-Paw then Lady. It's been a pretty rough situation over there in Georgia. Steve and I refuse to take the kids back until we are certain all those germs are out of everyone's systems. Just kidding. We would love to have them back once we get our whole house situation worked out.

Before everyone got sick we took a trip around our neighborhood's big loop. It's about two miles around, but Nathan said he really wanted to ride his bike around and stop at each workout station along the way. His intrigue has been growing for almost a year now.These kids had quite the workout, especially Nathan.
Kathryn had fun working out too.
At least she got a break between stations riding in her hand-me-down blue car.
No worries. No children were harmed by the reported alligator. Someone reported that they saw an alligator in our neighborhood. Even if there are alligators living in the neighborhood, that should be least of everyone's worries living in Montgomery.

Nathan almost made the full loop, but his little butt started hurting towards the end. That worked out just fine because Kathryn started getting tired and kept trying to climb out of her car. I ran home with Kathryn to get the car to go back out to pick up Nathan and Steve sitting on the curb along the loop.

I'll share these pictures too. One of Kathryn's greatest pleasures is pulling Daddy's socks out of the drawer. She took it one step further and started piling socks up on Daddy's head, right after she put his hat on him.
Talking on the phone. It must be a business call because she looks so serious.

Packing Up

In case anyone is wondering why I haven't done any posts lately, this is why.
Imagine that mess in every room of the house. We are packing up the house and getting it ready for the movers to come. I love moving. It's an opportunity to get rid of random junk every couple of years that we normally would just put in a box and forget about for the rest of our lives.

Thank you Paw-Paw and Lady for taking our mean little munchkins this week so that we can get stuff done.

Sick Days

Thursday night Nathan came down with something that completely took him by storm. I slept with him and woke up to find him leaning over my head with a sick look on his face. I moved just in time. Steve and Baby Sister fled the scene and headed to Georgia. Steve met up with some friends who were passing through and Baby Sister kept Paw-Paw and Lady company until Nathan got well.I got out Steve's old DVD player so Nathan could lay in bed and watch a movie. I could tell he was getting bored and wanting to get up even though he wasn't feeling well enough. He asked if that DVD player used to be Daddy's when he was a little boy. It's old, but not that old.Then he ventured out of bed to put his states puzzle together.Then we got some packing done. I packed the boxes and he labeled them. Notice the box labeled "TOYZ." In Montgomery the schools just go ahead a teach kids to end anything plural with a "z" instead of an "s." I'm just kidding. He just took his "s" the wrong way.Nathan got better and we took a trip to Paw-Paw and Lady's house to meet up with Baby Sister. Look for lots and lots of exciting pictures from their fun in Georgia.

4 Year Check-Up

After all the excitement of turning four years old wore off, Nathan had to go to the doctor for his four year check-up. It turns out he is doing just as great as we all expected. He's a little on the little side measuring in the 22nd percentile for weight and 28th percentile for height. Luckily, they don't do head measurements anymore so we can stop making fun of him and his outrageous melon. As we were waiting for the doctor to come in I couldn't resist taking a picture of him in his little gown.

There is never a dull moment when Nathan is around. When the doctor asked him to hop up and down on one foot he decided he would rather show her some of his breakdancing moves he learned at Marietta Square with Paw-Paw and Lady. After showing off his moves he finally decided to show her that he could easily hop on one foot.

It wasn't a good day for poor little Nathan, though. After the check-up we headed over to immunizations for his four year shots. He took two shots in each leg like a champ. He didn't cry, but he mentioned that he didn't like that as he walked out. To make things even worse (and he never even complained or acted scared), he had to do blood work for his physical form for pre-k. He gave a vial of blood through his arm and cooperated the entire time. He did mention that he didn't want to do that again. Wait, there's more. He had to pee in a cup too. As we walked back out to the waiting area he said, for everyone's amusement, "Are all these guys going to pee in a cup too?"

He was such a good boy after all that so we stopped at McDonald's for lunch. Baby Sister prefers fried chicken over McDonald's so we stopped at Church's for her.

Making Memorial Day Memories

If there is one thing that became expected from our house over the past 11 months, its been backyard cookouts. We borrowed Paw-Paw and Lady's smoker for the Memorial Day celebration. Steve's food was good, but people are still raving about my ribs. I'm just saying...

We've had numerous cookouts bringing in people from all over the world. Seriously. All over the world. This Memorial Day was no different. We had our regulars plus a few more including our friends from Serbia. This little girl is six years old. I don't remember her name, but she sure loved Kathryn. Kathryn loved her at first too... until she started picking her up all the time and carrying her around.
This is Nathan's new friend from Serbia. She couldn't resist Nathan and she scooped him up and carried him around and fed him. Now I see where her daughter gets it from. Oh well, Nathan ate a plateful of food that he normally wouldn't even think of eating.
We had BBQ ribs, smoked pork, brisket, chicken kabobs, and Serbian-style chicken. A meat extravaganza especially for Steve.

Mr. Norm and Zoran playing cornhole.

Steve tried out the new cornhole boards he built. Now we can continue the fun down in Florida. Watch out Joe and Lexi. We're going to be practicing daily!
Baby Ray-Ray soaking up the sun.
This seems like the perfect way to spend the day.

Reagan isn't going to know what to do without her friends Nate and Kate. They're like her brother and sister.

Except Nathan didn't ever beat up on her like he does Kathryn.
Mr. Norm and Ms. Shelly lived in Germany before this assignment. They brought over 600 bottles of wine back to the States with them. Really good wine. They always showed up with wine, but Lady always declined their wine and brought her own communion wine. Oh well, whatever gets the job done.
Relaxing after the Memorial Day meat extravaganza.

Nathan enjoyed having his buddy Mr. Norm around for one last hurrah. It's funny to think that Nathan wouldn't even talk to Mr. Norm 10 months ago. All it took was Mr. Norm showing up with gifts for the first couple of weeks to win him over.

Now here he is trying to feed him bugs.
When Paw-Paw and Lady left the next day they had to do what they've been dreading... telling Mr. Norm, Ms. Shelly and Reagan good-bye. They are moving to Italy in a week. Shelly said that one day when Reagan is older she's going to ask her parents, "What ever happened to Paw-Paw and Lady?" I think Paw-Paw and Lady looked forward to seeing the Normans just as much as they looked forward to seeing the Meissners on their visits here.

I have to include a picture of the guest of honor.