Discovery Gateway

The kids and I went to Discovery Gateway with Jen and Boston Devlin today. The kids all had a blast. There are so many fun things there that we never even made it to the second level. Davis and Blair especially loved the grocery store. They loved taking turns being "the lady" and "the guy"- the checker at the store, while the other kid shopped. I love watching my kids have so much fun. We bought discount passes online, so we still have four more. It'll be fun to see them discover the things upstairs.

3 Year Olds and a Puppy

I thought it was time to update pictures since the kids turned three. Blair loves posing these days, so she was pretty good and loved hearing how cute she was. Davis, on the other hand, was a nightmare. I don't know what the issue was, but he didn't want to have his picture taken and he cried so hard that his face was blotchy and red. I didn't have many to choose from with him and it was hard to narrow down the pictures of Blair.

When we got back from taking pictures, I thought we'd take some with the puppy. Those three make quite a difficult group, but we ended up with a few cute ones.

"We turned into three!"

I can't believe my babies turned three. They are so big and so much fun right now. They think they can do everything on their own and they let me know it.

They had Joy School on the morning of their birthday and they were thrilled to take Cookie Monster cookies to school. They just knew their friends would love them. When they walked into school the teacher said, "Happy Birthday Davis and Blair" and Davis said, "Yeah, we turned into three." I died laughing. What a funny little boy.

My mom came to help me frost the cakes during the day and my dad watched the kids while we worked. Grandma & Grandpa Davis gave the kids the cutest airplane teeter totter, so they enjoyed playing on that all day.

That night we had Grandma & Grandpa Erickson, Grandma & Grandpa Davis, Uncle Morgan, Aunt Mandy, Sam, Alex, and Reese over for a little birthday party. Grandma & Grandpa Olsen couldn't make it, but we celebrated with them a week earlier.

Long before the party the kids had requested a Cinderella cake for Blair and a Lightning McQueen cake for Davis. They were thrilled when we actually got to have them and they loved the giant balloons. They're still a highlight a week later.

The kids got such great presents from everyone and they were super excited about them all. This year, Spence told me he'd be in charge of the kids gift (which he never is) and not to worry about a thing. He was super excited and I was super surprised. He has always vowed that we would never have a dog, but he gave the kids a puppy. I think the fenced in back yard and the fact that the kids have never ending fun with Grandma Erickson's dogs put him over the edge.

We got a yellow lab puppy that was eight weeks old and all the gear to go along with it. (Side note: After buying all this stuff myself I understand why my dad was always so ticked when we left our dog stuff on the ground. I think growing up I didn't think it was expensive.) The puppy's name is Sully and the kids couldn't have been happier. We had them open gifts that had a collar and a leash and dog bowls and a toy before Spence brought in the puppy. They knew the things were for dogs and they said, "Oh no; we don't have a dog." Were they ever excited when "Dad found one in the garage." (Funny story- The dog stuff that we wrapped for Davis was in a Simms box and when Davis opened it he said "fishing boots" and pushed it aside before opening the box. Dad was definitely more excited when he got the box.)

Sully is an outside dog all the way, but we let him in for the party. That night we talked about how Sully wasn't going to come in our house any more and we would play with him out back. The next morning I heard Davis coming upstairs from his room and the back door open. He went right out to play with Sully before anything else. (Anyone who knows him well knows that he must be pretty excited if he went to play with Sully before he ate breakfast. That kid loves breakfast.) After a couple of minutes I heard the back door open again and Davis say, "Come inside Sully; it's cold out there." I came down with some shoes and a jacket and took care of that. That morning the kids didn't come inside at all from 8 until 11:30.

Since then, they've had hours of fun outside in the sun, pouring rain, and snow. They love that dog and they're always reminding me that they need to go outside because "Sully loves us and wants to play."

Dad did a great job. I'm glad they had such a happy birthday. It was so fun this year.

Pumpkin Patch

Today we went on a field trip to the pumpkin patch with Joy School. We had planned to go before Halloween, but it was so super rainy that they closed the patch for a few days. The kids had a great time though. They took us on a wagon ride out to the pumpkins and the kids LOVED picking out their own pumpkins. After the wagon ride, we went over to the play area. They had a giant blow up bounce house shaped like a pumpkin, a train behind a four-wheeler, and a giant slide along with other things. The kids played in the bounce house and on the slide forever. They loved the slide once they figured out how to climb up the back of the straw- the steps were pretty big for little kids. We had a blast though and we will definitely go back next year.