Memorial Day weekend

Over Memorial Day weekend we went to Kyle's Aunt Sam's house in Galveston. She lives on Offatt's Bayou, near Moody Gardens and the airport. Her house is at the end of a small road, and she has a neighbor on only one side. The other side of her house (the end of the road) is a local spot for fishing, kayaking, etc. We attempted to find hermit crabs, but didn't have much luck.
Here is Kyle's mom and the boys--check out Grandma's muscles! She helped the boys look for hermit crabs. We didn't find any, but Aunt Sam did. She kept claiming that she was an expert, and she was right! She found the biggest hermit crab I've ever seen. We watched it walk around for awhile, then let it go back into the water.
This is Sam's neighbor's pier. Kyle is fishing at the end of the pier, and Braden is walking (very, very carefully) out to Daddy.
Perhaps the boys' favorite part of the visit was playing with all of Sam's animals. She has two dogs, a few cats (two are just visiting), a parrot, and fish. Garrett loved the dogs while Braden was most impressed by the parrot, especially when Sam took him out of his cage to sit on her shoulder. I tried to get a picture of Garrett, Sam, and the dogs, but none of them would cooperate. This is the best I could get!
Moody Gardens has recently leased the Galveston Municipal Golf Course, and they have totally redone it. A new fancy housing development has gone in by the golf course--about a half mile down from Sam. The neighborhood park is pretty cool--it is a "real" pirate ship (according to Braden). He and Grandma had lots of fun sliding down the fireman pole.

Ahhhh, the first day of summer!

I've deemed today the first "official" day of summer for the boys and me. We slept in (well, until 7:45 when Tiffany called on her way to teach summer school), we watched morning cartoons, I straightened up the house, then took a shower. It was nice and relaxing. It's weird, though, knowing that I have absolutely nothing else to do...no papers to grade, no emails to respond to, no lessons to plan, nothing at all. Sweet!

Braden had his first swim lesson this morning with Rachel, the sister of one of my students. She and a friend teach private lessons in the summer in the friend's pool at her house in the historic Southgate part of College Station. I figured Braden would do better for Rachel if I wasn't there, so I packed the jogging stroller in the car and Garrett and I took a 30 minute walk while Braden swam. We got back in time to see Rachel trying to get Braden to put his face in the water--it didn't work, not even after I tried to bribe him with a snow-cone. Maybe tomorrow. She said he swam the length of the pool with her hand under his belly barely supporting him.

After swim lessons, we went to HEB. Funny, all of the "race-car" carts were gone. Turns out that Monday morning is when all of the stay-at-home moms and home-for-the-summer moms go shopping. There were kids everywhere! They also had lots of samples out--more than they have in the evenings and on the weekends when I usually shop. We munched our way through the store.

The boys are eating grapes right now--Garrett keeps calling them "stwawbewies" and making Braden mad. I think he's doing on purpose just to get a reaction out of his brother. He's kinda clever like that. In just a minute I'm going to put Garrett down for a nap, put Braden in his room for "quiet time" and begin my quest to catch up on my scrapbooking.

My first parent/teacher conference!

I had end-of-the-year conferences today about Braden and Garrett. My kids are, of course, very smart, well adjusted, emotionally well developed, and have excellent fine and gross motor skills!

Braden's teacher, Salina, said that when she was testing him on counting, she asked him to count from 1 to 50. He was at about 15 when he stopped, looked at her quizzically, and said, "Salina, do you know how to count to 50?"

She said, "yes, Braden, I do."

He asked, "then why do you need me to do it for you?"

Clever little sucker, huh?

She noted on his number chart that he asked why he had to stop at 50 when they always count to 200.

Salina wrote on his report that "Braden is such a sweet boy! I love having him in my classroom! He is such a great helper; he is always willing to help other children with their lessons." Perhaps we have another teacher on our hands!

Here is a scan of his shape worksheet:

Garrett's teacher was out today (her daughter is graduating from high school tonight!), so I met with one of the daycare directors. He "always" meets all of the developmental skills, such as "match sounds to animal" and "sing some words to songs." The report also says that he always "can copy housework." Hmmm...now that I know that, I need to put the kid to work!

Here is a scan of some bugs made with Garrett's fingerprints:

Change Places!

Can it be? 74 degrees outside on May 27 in College Station, Texas?? A very windy but precipitation-free cold front moved in this afternoon, and it feels fantastic outside!

After a yummy dinner of Little Caesar's Hot-n-Ready pizza (they've gone up to $5.99!) and a round or two of Dora, we moved the Stutts Tuesday night party outside onto the deck. Braden decided to play imaginary baseball. He stood in one corner of the deck, swung his "bat" and hit the "ball" with all of his might, and then yelled, "CHANGE PLACES!" at the top of his lungs and ran his stubby little legs to the opposite corner of the deck.

Apparently he doesn't understand how baseball works.

His yelling did get the neighborhood dogs to barking, though.

Garrett picked up on things (he does and says everything that big brother does), and he was soon yelling "tange paces" and running around the deck, too. Kyle and I just laughed and pretty soon we were pitching and batting, too!

"Dress like your favorite community helper"

Yesterday Braden's daycare class celebrated the end of their lessons on community helpers by having a dress-up day.

We borrowed the mailman outfit from the Corleys--Parker wore it for Halloween. Braden was SO excited and got lots of compliments about how handsome he was!

Splishing and Splashing with good friends

Last night we went over to the Corley's house to just hang out and relax after a very long week. Parker is an expert at the Slip 'n Slide, but Braden caught on pretty quickly. Tyler and Garrett had a great time splashing in the water spray.

We all reminisced about the Slip 'n Slides of our childhood, and agreed that they sure have come a long way since we were kids when they were just a flat piece of yellow plastic, and you had to use your own sprinkler!

The boys capped off the evening with ice-cream sandwiches and bike/trike riding on the patio. Garrett sure made a mess of his sandwich!

Linsey's graduation!

A few weekends ago, Linsey graduated from the University of Houston-Clear Lake with her master's degree in instructional technology. We had a very nice, relaxing weekend with lots of family fun.

Our little family drove down to Houston on Saturday morning and went to brunch with Linsey, Mom, and Tom. Linsey chose a yummy Mexican restaurant near her apartment in the River Oaks area. The restaurant reminded me of the fancier restaurants found in Mexican border towns (If you've never been to one, I guess that doesn't make much sense, but trust me; this place was great!). Linsey, post the name of it in the comments section!

After we stuffed ourselves, we went back to Linsey's apartment and took pictures of Linsey. Isn't she pretty!

We skipped the graduation ceremony itself so that the boys could take naps and Kyle and I could attempt to catch up on schoolwork. That evening, my Dad and Janet came over and cooked a delicious dinner of grilled shrimp, chicken, and veggie kabobs. We swam in Linsey's pool, and the boys opened birthday presents from Linsey, Dad, and Janet. They're in a diaper/underwear in the pictures because we had been swimming, then came inside to eat, and I didn't see the point in getting them entirely dressed when we were just going to head back out to the pool.

Braden loves Linsey's apartment, especially because of the pool. He swam with the safety lifesaver around him. It had a long rope attached, which made for lots of fun when we pulled him across the pool really fast!