May 2013.

Other than our cruise and some visitors early in the month, we had a fairly laid back month.  

I sure took a lot of pictures of nothing then.  

But honestly, when you have subjects this cute, how can you not take photos of them?!

Brennan and Kiernan had a day of fun running through the sprinklers.  Mr Beckett wasn't a big fan of the sprinkler and had his own fun climbing and digging and eating gravel.  I didn't post any photos of Kiernan because he was naked the entire time.  Apparently he was in a nudie mood.  

Aunt Jen & Uncle Brian came to FL in early May.  Amid all of their visits to friends and family they stopped to say hello and took a trip to the park.  The boys enjoyed playing with Uncle Brian and had fun wading through the water with Aunt Jen and I when they got overly hot and sweaty.  Why their Daddy put the Brothers in long sleeve black shirts to go play at the park in the Florida sun (and why their Mommy didn't catch it before they walked out the door) remains to be seen.  

Early May weather is pretty awesome.  Hot, but not too hot, and the rainy season hasn't started to kick in too much yet.  Perfect weather for spending lots of time outside.  And so we did.  Baseball.  Sprinklers.  All of that good All-American stuff.  

We don't take advantage of living near the beach as much as we should.  Admittedly, it has been more of a production in the past.  But now that the boys are a bit older, stopping by to play in the sand or walk on the beach for a few minutes isn't too much trouble.  It's almost peaceful.  Almost.  

On Cinco de Mayo, we headed to Uncle Brian's Mom's house to spend the day with Jen & Brian while they were still in the state.  The boys loved running around the yard and playing all kinds of sports with Uncle Brian.  

They live on the water, so we were able to enjoy a semi-relaxing afternoon on the dock enjoying the scenery.  I mean, as relaxing as you can get while combining small children and a dock.  Brennan had a blast kayaking with Aunt Jen and Uncle Brian though!  We were sad to say goodbye to them, but they were heading to the Galapagos Islands.  Seriously.  They travel to the coolest places.  

Of course, the following weekend we headed out on our cruise.  We returned on Mother's Day and had a nice, laid back day.  Part of my Mother's Day gift was 3 picture frames with mats.  After I opened them, Brian explained that the boys were going to color them and then we'd take photos of their faces inside the mats to put inside the frames.  Super super super cute.  

Brian works on the weekends occasionally, and when he does, we sometimes go to visit him.  Actually, we often go to visit him during the week too.  His office is like little boy heaven ... cars everywhere.  One Sunday we went to visit and the guys were doing the majority of their work outside.  Brian's boss' fiance (my friend Meagan) had recently picked up their new puppy, so the boys got to run around in the trucks outside and play with the puppy.  It was like heaven on earth.  I love that my hubby's company is so family friendly.  

When Brian came home from work later that day, he and Brennan busted out their new Green Lantern kite.  Brennan was in heaven.  Life seems so wonderful and so .... simple when you see joy like this on a child's face.  And knowing that his Daddy made it happen melts my heart even more.  He may only want his Mommy to snuggle at bedtime, but his Daddy is a superhero in his eyes.  I love it.

This boy.  He is so full of excitement and love and happiness.  And my goodness, he is handsome.  I love him just a little bit.

And I love the Zilla too.  I sits quietly in the bushes, just making sure that everything is OK.  He's happiest when he's in the front yard with his Daddy.

Later that week, the boys decided to take the Camero for a drive.  Mr Beckett was elected the driver and holy bananas is he a natural.  He is a true car guy, cruising around the cul-de-sac with one hand on the wheel and big bro riding on the back.  Oh my heart.  I'm in trouble.  

Of course we do spend a little time indoors.  Brennan loves to paint, and the Brothers love to eat paint, so it works out.  Thank goodness for Crayola's non-toxic products.

Taking walks to the park near our house is always a fun thing for us to do.  It's good exercise for all of us and it sure does tire out the boys very well.  And now that they're getting older, it's not quite as stressful.  We can stand back a tiny bit and let them explore.  As always, Kiernan climbs everything in sight, Beckett sticks to the slides, and Brennan likes to try to play with the other kids.  

For the first time in a few months, Brian didn't have any business trips this month.  It was nice to have him home a little more.  The Brothers are starting to love to help him around the house as much as Brennan has loved it for awhile now, and being the super-dad that he is, Brian just takes it in stride.  He and Brennan camped out in their tent in our backyard for a night too.  We roasted marshmallows in our fire pit before bed and Brennan thought it was the coolest night ever.

I really enjoyed May.  Of course, I had the normal challenges of dealing with a 3 year old, getting the Brothers transitioned out of their cribs, and trying to keep up around the house with ... barnacles on my back.  But it was a pretty refreshing month.  I took a painting class that my friend Lisa teaches and found it incredibly relaxing and fulfilling.  I'd love for it to be something that I can do more of!  And Bri and I were able to enjoy a date night while Jen & Brian were in town.  That was the first night that Kiernan actually climbed out of his crib and poor Jen just took it in stride all night until she got him to go to sleep and stay asleep so that Bri and I could enjoy a nice evening together.  It was refreshing to spend some time together outside of the house without kids!  

April 2013.

Ahhhhh.  April.  It feels good to be catching up a little.  

Brian turned 30 on the 4th.  His birthday present to himself was knee surgery.  Poor guy.  My parents just so happened to have already planned to come to Florida for his birthday, so we were lucky to have them around during the process.  The surgery went beautifully.  The surgeon was able to remove the extra piece of bone in his kneecap and fix the tear in his tendon.  We were in and out of the hospital in no time, of course the process may or may not have been sped up because of Brian's sarcasm with the nurses.  

That evening we celebrated Brian's birthday with a delicious German chocolate cake that Brennan & Grammy made for him.  They also decorated the house while we were at the hospital.  (And did a million loads of laundry as you can see in the pictures.  Aren't Moms the best?!)

Perspective.

To say that the last few weeks have been overwhelming would be an understatement.  

Brian has been travelling for essentially a solid 3 weeks and I've been holding down the fort at home.  It's not easy for either of us and I think we're both desperate for a little normalcy.

Last weekend my car decided to take a poop, and it's been in the shop since then.

Brian came home from Michigan last week limping around because his knee hurt.  Apparently he just woke up one night and it was throbbing.  At first I thought he was being dramatic, but after seeing him wince and hearing him cry out with the slightest graze to his knee, I knew it was serious.  This was not simply a man-injury that would blow over at the first chance to go do something fun and physical.

OK, that's not entirely true.  He did make one attempt to run through the sprinkler with Brennan on Saturday.  I caught it on camera, Brennan had a blast, and Brian hobbled back to the chair seriously regretting his decision.  Yep, not just a man-injury.

Love grows.

I was just sitting here, missing my hubby, and got the urge to look back at honeymoon pictures.  

 

 

We were so young and carefree and in love.

Not so young anymore.  Definitely not as carefree.  But even more in love than we were then.  

Happy Valentine's Day my love.

If you don't like seeing pictures of my boys, you should probably just move on.

I feel it's only fair to warn you that you are in for a major photo bomb!

The best is yet to come.

As I wrote yesterday, it was our 6th wedding anniversary.  

We didn't have any fancy plans, but we both knew that we wanted to do 2 things - celebrate with our kids and then celebrate without them.  

The zoo seemed like a perfect place to celebrate with them, so after breakfast we started to get ready to head out the door.  In the midst of my preparations, I walked past a box on the counter that was covered up by a towel.  

"What's this?" I asked as I whipped the towel off of it.

6 years.

6 years ago I put on a white dress.

I walked down the aisle of the church I'd walked down for my first communion.  

I smiled, arm in arm with my parents, looking at all of the people who were looking back at me.

And then I caught a glimpse of the man that I was going to spend the rest of my life with. 

My eyes met his and I saw his tears and mine began to fall.

We spoke words of love and commitment to one another and exchanged rings and kisses.  

We celebrated with our family and friends til the wee hours of the morning.

And we've never looked back.  

6 years later, I can honestly say that I love him more than I ever have.  

Beach babies.

The weather has been a bit cooler lately.  Cooler, meaning I can go outside and not immediately break out into a sweat.  The AC is off and the windows are wide open and we can enjoy the nice breeze blowing through the house.  I live for this time of year in FL.  

Today we decided to head to the beach, just for a little walk.  At first, Brian pulled the brothers in the wagon while I made sure Brennan didn't try to go swim with the fishes.  

a plague on our house.

Can someone please tell me why the HELL we cannot seem to stay healthy in this house?

It's driving me bat.shit.crazy.  I feel like in the past 6 months, we've had a total of maybe 3 weeks when we've all been healthy.  Not fun.

Sunday morning I went in to get the brothers from their beds and was hit by a wall of vomit-smell when I opened the door.  Kiernan and his bed were covered in puke.  Lovely.  He acted perfectly fine though, so we just assumed he ate too much or hiccuped or who knows what and we moved on with life.

Monday morning the boys and I met some friends at the zoo.  I started feeling a little queasy but chalked it up to my lack of breakfast that morning, threw back a handful of trail mix, and went about my business.  Then we got home and as I fixed the boys their lunch I got more and more nauseous.  The little boys went down for their nap and I curled up on the couch with Brennan while he watched some cartoons.

That's when it hit me.  That lovely warm-watery-mouth-I'm-gonna-blow-chunks feeling.  I ran to the bathroom and hurled my lunch while Brennan stood above me saying "Mommy, you puked!" and "Excuse you Mommy!"  Vomiting with an audience is over-rated.

A Not-So-Normal Day in the Life.

So this morning I decided to do an Instagram "Day in the Life" series.  Except that I also discovered that we were completely out of dog food and therefore needed to make a Target run.  Usually I either plan outings the day before or we go after naptime, but I didn't feel like starving my dogs all day long, so I kicked it into high gear.

8:00am - The Brothers wake up and are ready to cause some trouble.  I get green smoothies made and pop some Eggos in the toaster for breakfast.  Talk about a mix of healthy and not-so-healthy.

September 2012.

Sooooo I should probably write a September recap post before it's time to write one for October, huh?

Clearly, life has been BUSY. 

We had Beckett & Kiernan's birthday party on September 1st.  I had so much fun planning it and the day turned out beautifully.  A few days later, I headed to Michigan for class while Brian stayed home and had a blast with the boys. My heart was broken when I found out that my first day ofclass was on the twins' first birthday.  That morning was pretty rough for me, but the day shaped up pretty well.  I was able to Skype with them and then celebrated "Happy-one-year-of-not-being-pregnant-to-ME!" with my fam and my BFF.  Carrot cake, wine, and great company.  Delightful. 

We took Beckett and Kiernan for their first haircuts on September 9.  They both did AMAZINGLY well.  We were worried about Kiernan sitting still and warned the stylist about it.  But of course he made a liar out of me by behaving like a perfect angel.  All 3 boys looked so handsome with their new do's.

No but really, what DID I do with my time before I had kids?

It was 8:00 p.m. on a Tuesday night.  Brennan was in Michigan with my parents and Beckett & Kiernan had been tucked into bed for an hour.  The dishes were done, the house was picked up, and Brian had just returned from a run with the dogs. 

As he sat there and stretched, he turned to me and asked “What do people without kids do?” 

I stopped.  After thinking for a moment I replied, “ Honestly, I don’t remember.” 

I remember thinking I was busy before I had kids.  I remember feeling stress over not having enough hours in the day to accomplish everything that needed to be done.  My nursing job allowed me to work (full time) 3 nights per week.  My house was messy.  I wasn’t in school.  And yet I still felt terribly busy.  I knew life would get busier once we had kids, but it wasn’t easy to wrap my brain around just how busy it would be. 

Nothing turns me on like a man who knows every word to a Disney song.

source

Remember these?  If not (and you were raised in the 80s/90s) you lived a deprived childhood.  Go tell your parents they ruined your life.

While eating dinner the other day, Brian and I somehow got on the subject of the Disney Sing Along Songs VHS tapes we had as kids.  He busted out into "Friend Like Me" while I promptly jumped on YouTube to see if I could find it.  It wasn't hard to find and when the music started, Brennan snatched the phone from my hands and stared at it for the entire 11 minutes and 44 seconds it took to get through "Friend Like Me", "When You're The Best of Friends" from Fox and the Hound, and "Something There That Wasn't There Before" from Beauty and the Beast.  His eyes literally did not move from the screen the entire time, despite his crazy parents dancing around and belting out every word of "Friend Like Me", even the banter before the song starts, without needing to even glance at the screen.

Wordless Wednesday {7.4.12}.

Kiernan, Brian, Brennan, & Beckett.  7.1.12.

Does life get any better?  I submit that it does not!

Run drunky, run!

I know the saying: What happens in Vegas, stays in Vegas.  But honestly?  This story is too good not to tell.  And it doesn't involve anyone but my darling husband (who doesn't read this blog) so I'm telling it anyway.

Brian left for Las Vegas early Friday morning.  As the best man in his best friend's wedding, he planned a weekend bachelor party in Sin City and had been looking forward to it for months.  They partied hard and probably had a steady buzz all weekend long.

My hubby is a pretty avid runner and has been on a "OMG I'm getting old and fat I must run every day" kick lately which apparently is not exclusive to sobriety.  So after a long night of drinking, instead of passing out like a normal person, Brian decided to go for a run.

Daddy's Birthday {clinging to the 20s}.

My smart, handsome, amazing, wonderful husband turns 29 today.  He thinks he's old and fat and gray.  No matter how hard I look I can't see any of the things he sees.  I still find him to be insanely hot and incredibly smart and extremely kind and amazingly impressive.  

June 2005 - Red Rock Canyon, Las Vegas