Evening Pets

The house is quiet.  The kids are in bed.  And the pets are chilling.

 

 Little Moozie didn't want to sit still for the camera.

Until she was much closer to me.

Happy New Year - 2012

Today was a lazy day.  We had a late breakfast.  We got off to a late start leaving for the dog park.  Ruby got escorted back inside and into her crate after being naughty in the car before we got out of the driveway.  Dylan loves going to the dog park, but he gets so excited he drools all over the place.  Blech.  He's also sneering a little bit (silly boy, his upper lip gets stuck on his teeth sometimes and it looks like he's sneering at us).

Chloe had fun wandering around the dog park petting the other dogs, as well as bossing Dylan around.

After 30 minutes at the dog park, it started raining and we drove home.  Another hour of rain helped us find fairly permanent spots on the sofa relaxing for the remainder of the afternoon.  The sun came back, but we stayed inside until 4:30pm.

Chloe spent this time looking through her school yearbook from last year.

At 4:30pm, we headed out and bought a bed frame for the girl child's bed (her mattress and box springs have been on the floor since day 1) and a new bed skirt.  Then we came home and chilled out some more before having dinner and chatting with Minnesota grandparents before bedtime.

One more day left of vacation and enjoying each others' company before starting back into our normal routine on Tuesday.  This past week at home with just us and occasionally hanging out with friends has been a much needed break from the busy-ness of reality.  The downtime and no schedule or responsibilities of having to be somewhere has been appreciated to the max!

Twas the Night Before Christmas

The Grandmas came over early afternoon and joined us for a candle light service at church.

I think the kids' favorite part of the service is holding their candles up while singing Christmas carols.

We drove home and had a few moments to relax before making a lasagna for dinner.  So we got a few photos on the stairs while there was still some good light coming in from over the front door.

Loved that the kids were sweet and cooperative!

Until they had to irritate each other.  :)  Because that's always fun to hear your sibling squeal!

We had the typical stragglers at the dinner table.

Although, both kids were excited to be allowed to open one Christmas present after dinner.  

Even if it was one that Mommy picked out.

Can you tell by the look on his face he thought the one present he would be opening was expected to be more exciting than new pajamas?

The Beanarina was slightly more excited.

Although her pajamas were a bit long and wide.  Skinny kids have such problems fitting into normal clothes for their ages!

Once the kids were in their new pajamas, we took off for an hour drive looking at Christmas lights with the Grandmas.  When we got home, it was late and the kids didn't get into bed until close to 9pm.  Two parents stayed up late to wrap all the kids' presents before relaxing on the sofa for awhile.

Little Moozie stopped in to clean Little Horse's face.

And then he was left in peace and quiet to enjoy the Christmas spirit and flashing lights.

Then we had a trouble maker in the house (it wasn't Chloe, she was already fast asleep!) shaking the tree.  Can you see her?

Jezzie climbed up the inside of the tree almost to the top.  She was eye level with me when I snapped this photo.

And before we knew it, Norad said Santa had arrived in Atlanta a few minutes prior.  We didn't want to chance Santa not coming because we were still awake, so we closed our laptops and hurried upstairs.  It wasn't long before we were under the covers, closing our eyes and we heard prancing on the roof.

Our Dylan Boy

For the second day in a row, we took him back to the dog park.  The girl child collected sloppy tennis balls in her shirt. 

Daddy and Owen hung out on a bench, discussing baseball positions and world peace.

Dylan mostly laid around and watched the other dogs until I called him and then he came running.

He's a sweet boy.

And after a year and a half, he's a pretty good boy, too.  He is most certainly a daddy's boy.

After we left the park, we headed to a local pet store that has a DIY dog bath.  I couldn't lead him up the ramp into the sink.  Todd had to lift up all 76 pounds of him into the sink.  After that, he sat still while I washed him good with shampoo and conditioner.  He looked most pitiful.  But afterwards, he was the cleanest smelling dog and only for nine bucks.  Woo hoo for a clean boy!

Little Horse

Oh sad dog, it's really not that bad.

It's only taken two months for most of his Easter purple to grow out.

Saturday Morning Soccer

We were out bright and early at the soccer fields this morning.

It was chilly and windy, which made us dress a little crazy.  ;)

Soccer players don't need jackets or long sleeves because they are tough.

Dylan was happy to come along with us and even happier to get extra attention from the kids walking around since he was Easter Egg Purple.

Chloe stayed busy during Owen's game by running around, playing with other kids, showing off Dylan and picking flowers for her Momma.

Taking Little Horse for a Walk

Snow was projected to come this evening and I thought it would be way too cold to walk Little Horse.  So the kids accompanied Dylan and me on a walk in the afternoon before the temperature dropped too much and it started snowing.  They had fun running ahead of us.

They also stuck close to take turns crowding petting Dylan while we walked.

They found some rocks to stand on.

Owen is now spending more time popping his eyes out at us and making silly faces.

Half way through our walk, the kids needed to rest.  Owen just chilled.

Chloe pretended to make snow angels.

Day After Christmas Fun

The day after Christmas was a relaxed day.  The kids played with their new toys.  We played Parcheesi together for the first time.

Chloe liked Parcheesi better than her brother, who abandoned us half way through and then came back to tell us how we should each be moving our pieces to block the others.  :)

Later, we took Dylan on a walk up to the tennis courts to run around.

We stopped at the bottom of our street so the kids could climb up on top of a ginormous snow ball people had made the day before.

The kids were excited to get up to the courts as small snow flurries fell on us.

Owen is all about cartwheels lately.

I had so much fun taking pictures of Todd and the kids running with Dylan.  So many big smiles.

I think even Dylan was smiling.

The guys took a break to sit down and rest.

Chloe loved on Dylan.

Owen danced around like a siller.

And as it started to snow harder, Chloe tried to catch snowflakes on her tongue.

Even Dylan got worn out and needed to take a rest.  He didn't get much of a rest as the snow fell harder and harder, which helped us decide that it might be time to go back home.

Someone was friendly and left a message on the hill below the tennis courts for us.  :)

I liked watching Chloe holding her Daddy's hand as we walked home.