i'm an ogre!

when we were on vacation last week, we noticed a marble size lump on garrett's back. i took him to the dr tuesday and he recommended that we get it removed. so yesterday we met with the surgeon.

garrett is afraid of basically all medical personnel. so as soon as the nurse brought us into the room he started crying. she knew just what he needed. she brought him a shrek toy...the one that came in the mcdonalds happy meals. it's a big plastic shrek that burps and says "i'm an ogre!" well it worked perfectly and garrett was super happy.

the surgeon came in and started trying to talk to garrett. garrett just looked at him and kept pressing the buttons on shrek. so the only responses the surgeon got were burps and "i'm an ogre!" it was pretty funny. this continued the whole time he examined garrett.

the surgeon was quite a character, too. he said he'd seen a similar lump about 10 years ago, but he couldn't remember what it was called. then he proceed to tell us that he is suspended from the OR this week because he's behind on his dictation. ok, too much information buddy...you're supposed to make us feel confident in you!

well, our little ogre boy is scheduled for surgery next wednesday (provided all the dictation is done). so say a little prayer for garrett that all goes well and one for us cuz it's pretty scary to think about all the "what ifs."

ectothermic anyone??

monitor lizard (garrett actually touched one!)

the other night wendi & i took the kids to a reptile exhibit at the library. here is the description the library provided...

Walk, run, crawl, or slither your way here to spend some time with amazing reptiles.
Join Naturally Wild for an informative, hands-on experience! For all ages.

mmmmm...where to start. first, the room was packed with lots and lots of little kids. the oldest were maybe kindergarten. so you'd figure the speakers would tailor their talk to the audience. nope!

the hands-on experience consisted of a power-point presentation of reptiles. they showed 6 reptiles, only 2 could be touched. at one point when they were talking about reptiles being cold-blooded, they tried to get the audience to come up with the term ectothermic. yea, cuz that's what a lot of little preschoolers talk about.

i'm thinking they teachers need to watch a few diego episodes. that should give them a clue as to how to teach kids about animals!

p.s. here's the definition of ecothermic...teach it to your kids!
animals which must use heat acquired from the environment and behavioral adaptations to regulate body temperature

expensive pictures

sunscreen... $8
state park annual pass... $24
campsite... $30
beach umbrella... $40
great weekend with family... priceless

getting sand inside your camera... expensive

time to shop for a new camera shop...

chef garrett

tonight after we all finished supper, garrett got left alone at the table. he was supposed to finish up his ham. we checked on him after a few minutes and the ham was gone. good job, garrett. or so we thought...

as we cleaned up the table, tim cleared garrett's spot. empty plate & glass half full of chocolate milk. being a fan of chocolate milk, tim decided he'd finish up garrett's glass.

yup, you guessed it. tim got chocolate milk AND ham. yum yum!!

so a few lessons learned tonight...

• never eat garrett's leftovers
• if garrett ever opens his own restaurant...eat at your own risk!

camping...the list

once i find our camera, i'll post a few pictures. but i thought i'd list some of the highlights of our camping trip. they are in no particular order (but i will start with food first!)...

• s'mores
• tonka pies...yum yum!
  
• pushing our stroller to beach, only to find the last 1/4 mile of the path is deep sand
• walking down the beach with ryan in the bjorn (ahhhh, memories of disney world!)
• sitting around the campfire at night
• walking olivia back to the beach to see the sunset
• trail running with emily (no, we didn't get lost. we wanted to do a long run!)
• swimming in lake michigan (cold, but awesome)
• forgetting our pillows...who knew a sweatshirt could be so comfy
• showers!!! i love campgrounds with showers & clean bathrooms!!!
  

overall it was a good trip. i think we'll make it an annual tradition.

pictures to follow...

tan lines, splashing & guns

i think garrett is going to have the best tan lines this summer.

guess who loves to splash?

does olivia look a little too natural with a gun in her hand?

summer is here!

garrett new found love this summer is mint chip ice cream.
yum yum!

here's some summer math...
2 days at the cottage + lots of ice cream + lots of smores = one tired little boy
garrett slept for 4 hours yesterday...just another reason we love summer!

too busy

sometimes i feel like i get too busy for my kids. take this morning, for example. olivia was still asleep. garrett & ryan were watching cartoons. so i took advantage of the peace and quiet to work on the computer. next thing i know garrett was standing by me yelling something. i was kind of annoyed. he was supposed to be watching tv. giving me a few minutes of quiet. i was getting stuff done. i thought he was whining (what an annoying stage!!) that his show had ended. finally i looked down to see what he wanted.

poor guy. he didn't want anything. he was just so excited to show me that he'd gotten dressed all by himself. he was so proud!! and i felt terrible. sorry buddy!!

once i put his shorts on correctly, i found out that he'd put on new underwear, too. i'm discovering that there are endless combinations of how one can put 2 legs into a pair of underwear.

shoe lessons

you know when you see those women on tv or in magazines and they have on really cute shoes? i'm always wearing my tevas, so i figured i needed some cute shoes that were a little more dressy. well, i found these black shoes at target and i thought they'd look so good with my new red skirt. i actually bought them back in march in hopes of wearing them for easter. but i think we had a very cold easter, so i just pulled them out yesterday for church. when i left the house i was feeling pretty cute. fast forward to the car ride home...sore feet with lots of blisters.

as soon as i got home i threw my new shoes in the garage sale pile and grabbed my tevas. so the lesson for today is...don't mess with a good thing...and olowahu tevas are indeed a good thing!

my boys

it seems like lately all my post have been about olivia, so i thought i'd post a little about my boys...

ryan is our smilin' little guy. he just has 2 little bottom teeth, but loves to eat just about anything. yesterday he finally figured out how to drink from a bottle :) for the longest time it was just another chew toy to him.

ryan isn't crawling yet and doesn't really seem interested in trying. he gets pretty much everywhere by schooching, otherwise olivia & garrett bring him whatever he needs. it's a pretty good life.

now that it's turned warm, ryan has changed his hairstyle. his "old man fringe" along the back of his head has turned curly. so we'll postpone that first haircut for a while. it's just too cute to look at!

as for garrett...well his big interest these days is peeing standing up. he's been potty trained since january, but for the past 6 months i had him convinced that sitting down on the toliet was easier (and resulted in less mess for me to clean). well that era is over and our bathrooms are no longer clean. so proceed with caution if you come and visit!!