Andrew's New Room

Well, yesterday we finally got Andrew the big boy bed he's been wanting. They were able to deliver the same day, so I made a mad dash home to try and break down the toddler bed and convert it into the full-size version. I also needed to wash and dry his new sheets and clear out a place in his room for the new bed. All this needed to happen before:

(a) they delivered the mattress set between 6:00 and 9:00 pm; and,
(b) Andrew's bedtime (8-ish?).

The good news was they delivered the mattress set around 7:00 p.m. The bad news was, I was only about half-way through the process of getting the bed frame set up. The boys helped me break down the toddler bed and were thrilled about that process. They played really sweetly as I cleaned the room and even helped a little. But as I was scratching my head while reading directions about how to put the full-size frame together, time ticked by way too fast. Turned out, my confusion was because a key part that I needed (the footboard) was in another closet in another room, but about the time I found that...the doorbell rang and it was the mattress guys.

Oh well, we just scooted everything out of the way and had them put it straight on the floor. After I finally got the boys some dinner, I started making up the bed with his sheets and bedspread. When Andrew came in to see his new bed (sort of) all set up, this was his reaction:















He kept throwing his hands in the air, jumping around, and yelling "YEA! MY NEW BED!!!"
Sweet Davis was just as excited and so supportive that his little brother finally had a big bed, too. They played like crazy, running all over the place and jumping around...on the bed, of course.









































They decided sword fighting was the appropriate way to break it in, so out came the pirate gear. I got them to stop long enough for a couple of quick pictures.





























When Daddy got home, the boys were still up ("reasonable bedtime" had gone out the window long before this point) and they let him know that scurvy pirates had to walk the plank. Aaaarrrr!!!

Who knows what time they finally got to sleep...I think it was way after 10:00, but they had a fantastic time. We'll make up for it today...and Daddy can finish putting the bed together this weekend! My work here is done!

Naptime

Davis and Andrew have been wanting to sleep in the same bed for a little while now, but can't seem to get to sleep if they try it. Lots of playing and giggling goes on, but not much sleeping. But today, we pretended we were camping and told 'scary' stories under the covers with a flashlight, then I stayed in there with them until they both fell asleep. Then I just had to sneak back in for a picture...how peaceful!

Our fun morning

Davis has swim lessons at 8:00 a.m. three mornings a week for a little while, so we are getting a much earlier start to our days than usual. It's good, though, because it's getting us out of the house. I have a tendency to stick around the house and just piddle with this and that. Davis and Andrew love to play at home and don't seem to mind, but I think having this as a change of pace will be good for us all for a while.

This is Davis learning to float on his back with Ms. Amy, his swim teacher. She is awesome...so patient and sweet. We're hoping he'll get the floating down by next Monday.

In the meantime, Andrew is staying busy during Davis' swim lesson by playing in the pool's spray area - don't know what these are actually called...maybe a splash pad? Whatever it's called, they love it. Andrew quickly learned how to turn it on...

Checking out the temperature...

Wow, look at that!

And every now and then he heads for the baby pool just to keep it real. He has a new "Thomas" boat to play with in the water, so he's pretty happy with this whole swim lesson situation.

We can't stay at the pool after the lesson, because it doesn't open until 10:00 am. Luckily, there is a cool playground right next door that we can go to in order to take away some of the disappointment about not swimming longer.

Here's Davis doing the monkey bars. He's just recently gotten to the point where he can go all the way across without help and it's so awesome to see him do it!




Andrew at the bottom of the slide.

Davis checking out the rock climbing wall. He is definitely my climber. He prefers to climb up the outside of slide than to go down the inside.

Hey mom, look at us! (I love this picture!)

So, by around 9:30, the boys have had quite a busy morning! Davis was ready to go home by 10:00, but mommy still had to go to the gym and the grocery store. By the time we got home, naptime was long and relaxed! Hence, having the time to upload pictures for the blog. : )

Independence Day Cupcakes

We decided to make cupcakes for the upcoming July 4th holiday. My favorite mix to use is 'funfetti' because you get all the candy bits to sprinkle in the mix and on the icing. Davis and Andrew LOVE sprinkles! So does mommy, but they are the important ones here.



So, here they are on their chairs - lined up to do some serious baking.



Davis is very careful with the mixer. You can see he's taking it quite seriously.

Wouldn't you know that Andrew is just posing with a big grin for this? I think he's saying "stinky feet!" (instead of "cheese") I love little boys!

All right, the cupcake batter is in the muffin tin, ready to go. It is so hard to watch a 2 year old and a 4 year old try to fill muffin tins with cupcake batter without stopping to clean up every 2 seconds! I'm working on letting it go!

After the first batch had finished baking, they each picked out a spreader and set out to decorate their cupcakes. There was a lot of licking the spreader going on, so we just ate those right away.

They are so proud!

Check out their creativity - I let them go with the icing writers, and tried to help out a little, too. Needless to say, I am not good with icing writers...

Well, I tried for the first time to pipe on icing with a star tip. It takes a lot more than I expected, so next time I'll definitely get more icing. I still have a lot of practicing to do!