Our Summer...... (Part 3 of 5)

JULY. 

Part three is all about July.  We had a pretty fun filled month and here are some photos..

1) Independence Day.  Here are Cooper, Katy and Kampbell in their red, white and blue.  Just love how precious these three are - so difficult to get them to smile at the same time though!  The Bram Fam came over and Andrew was home, so we had some food and celebrated.  Then, I took Cooper into downtown Indianapolis for the fireworks show that night.  We had a great day!

2) Katy climbing the dishwasher.  Not sure what it is about my kids loving the dishwasher, but they both have loved climbing in it.  Crazy kiddos.

3) Tim's surgery.  Tim had a short outpatient procedure to remove some weird tissue things he randomly gets.  This is him coming out of anesthesia.  He's always funny when he starts waking up.  He never remembers any of it later on though.  Wish I could have gotten some video.

4) KB's birthday!  Kampbell turned 2 on July 11th.  She's such a sweet grandbaby and I love her so much!!

5) Friday night sprinkler celebration - no real reason, he just wanted to have some sprinkler time, so we did it.

6) My Grandpa's birthday was July 13th and we went down on the 12th to celebrate with him.  Wish I had more pictures, but these will have to do.  Him with his cupcakes :)  

7)  The 13th we celebrated Kampbell's birthday at her house for a family party.  She was having a "bee" themed party, so I made her this cupcake cake.

Here are a few pictures of the pretty one on her birthday :)

8) Cooper had swim lessons for 2 weeks during the month of July, here are a few pictures from that:

I just love this one.  He's so handsome!!!

9) We took Kampbell, Cooper and Katy to a splash parkon the 22nd.  It really wasn't warm enough for them to be playing in the water, but hey, it was summertime, so we had to make the most of it.  Poor kiddos had blue lips when we were finished.

Again the smiling at the same time is rough.

10) July 28th we had the Sprinkle for Steph you can click to read more.

11) Another splash park visit with the Cooper and Kate after the sprinkle on the 28th.  They loved this one!

12)  Last, but not least, we bought ourselves a camper!!  Read about that here. 

Summer, Part three - OUT!  Stay Tuned, Part 4 coming right up....

Thankful in November - Day Thirty

Day thirty. Today, I am thankful a little boy who is as excited about the Christmas season as I am. Tonight, Tim put up our tree and Cooper got to put on the first ornament. He was so excited. Tomorrow, we will decorate the rest of the tree, house and make it feel like Christmas in our house. I cannot wait.

Doing these daily thankful posts has been a great reminder of the people and things I am thankful for day in and day out. Thanks to everyone for putting up with these posts!

 

Thankful in November - Day Twenty-Eight

Today, I am thankful for Thanksgiving. It's an opportunity to gather with loved ones, eat lots of delicious food, and be thankful to God for blessing us with WAY more than we deserve.

I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving!

 

Today, we will not dress up, we will not trick-or-treat.  Indianapolis has delayed trick-or-treating for the night.  And I’m excited about it!  Cooper will still get to trick-or-treat, albeit a day late, and we do not have to drag either kid out in the bad storms that are supposed to take place tonight.  I know that today is “Halloween,” and that if you are tied to a specific date, that this probably is breaking your heart.  But in my mind?  I’m A-OK with changing the date so that we are not stuck in the storms and in the rain. 

Cooper is going to dress up as a tiger, at least that is what he’s decided for this minute…..  The kid has so many costumes, he cold be a race car driver, a boxer, Mickey Mouse, a tiger, an umpire, a baseball player, football player, a transformer……  He loves playing dress-up. 

Katy will be a pumpkin.  We inherited the cutest pumpkin costume from my friend Shannon.  We did put it on her on Monday night just to see how cute she was going to be in it.  I’m so excited that both of my kids will be dressed up and will get to go out and enjoy this holiday. 

Since we haven’t dressed up yet, havent’ gotten candy yet, I thought I’d repost these pictures of my kiddos at the pumpkin patch this year.

  

When I was a kid, Halloween night trick-or-treating consisted of dressing up, going to a few neighbor’s houses and then to my grandparents’ houses.  There was no door-to-door tricks or treats for my brother or me.  And you know what?  That was GREAT!  We got to spend time with the relatives we loved the most.  I remember our cousins being at grandma’s house sometimes, so we got to see them in their costumes.  We always got PLENTY of candy, and I didn’t miss out on the door-to-door festivities in the least.

But now…. I’m excited that my little boy is going to participate in walking around the neighborhood and knocking on people’s doors – I hope I can teach him how to nicely and politely say trick-or-treat, and “Thank you” for the candy that he receives. 

We most likely will not let him eat any of the candy that he gets that night.  We’ll buy him some at the store and he’ll love it just as much.  Tim and I are crazy precautious of candy/food from people we don’t know.  But that’s okay.  Because what Cooper will experience this year, and what Kate will in future years is what it’s all about.  THE EXPERIENCE! 

Tonight, I think we’ll sit at home and watch Charlie Brown and the Great Pumpkin! J

So for all of you out there that will be out tonight – have fun!  That’s what it’s all about! 

Randoms & The Easter Bunny Visit

It has been a rough morning and I see it being a long day.  Hoping it gets better, if I can stay awake that is…….

1)  My day started around 3:30 this morning.  Cooper woke up and was yelling “Mommy” over and over again.  So I race in his room to find out what’s wrong.  He had lost his teddy bear and couldn’t find it.  It was right next to his pillow, so I’m betting he was just asleep and didn’t really search very hard for it.  I’m just glad he hadn’t peed the bed.  I made him to potty and found his teddy bear and he went right back to sleep.  Mama however, did not.  I think I snoozed some in the 4am hour, but it wasn’t long – cause I am a clock watcher and kept checking it.  Not smart.

 

2)  Cooper was a complete stinker this morning.  He’s obsessed with playing hockey.  He plays with some plastic golf clubs and usually a foam baseball as his puck, and a bicycle helmet as his hockey helmet.  Well, each morning he wants to play, but we generally do not let him until he’s gotten his 4 morning items complete. (1) bathroom 2) brushing teeth 3) changing clothes 4) eating breakfast)  Once he’s got those items finished, he’s allowed to play whatever he wants until it’s time for us to go.  The problem is, that Cooper spends all of his playtime playing with his food and not eating, so he generally misses out on his hockey time.  Today, it really bothered him.  How do you explain to a 3 year old, the faster you get your 4 things done, the more you get to play?  I’ve tried explaining several different ways, and so far, nothing has worked.  I guess he’ll eventually learn.

3)  Tonight I have to boil eggs.  I need to get them ready for tomorrow’s Easter Egg dying session with Stephanie, Ryan, Kampbell, Andrew and Cooper.  I’m looking forward to it.  Should be fun.  We’ll dye them with Kool-Aid again this year, since they turned out so great last year.

4)  A couple of days ago, I cleaned out Cooper’s closet.  It was time.  I hadn’t done it in a long time.  I have an entire new wardrobe to fill up that closet now, lots of spring and summer clothes, so it was time to do a major purge.  He had clothes in there that were still 18 months size.  CRAZY.  They were all things that really shouldn’t have been 18 months – in fact, some of them he wore through the summer last year.  But still, I should have gone through them before now.  Oh well, such is life.  I finally did it – and now it’s just time to get the new clothes in there.  I’m thankful that we have someone to hand the clothes down to, so that they can be used again and I don’t have to mark them to sell at a consignment place! J  Win/win for me!

  

5)  We need to do our taxes – I dread them, and we just need to sit down, bit the bullet and get them over with.  This is the latest I’ve EVER waited to do them, and the more time that goes by, the less I want to even touch them.  But, time is creeping up on us and April 15^th will be here before we know it.  Time to get them done.  Especially before the madness of baseball season starts.

 6)  I have a love/hate relationship with Flex Spending Accounts.  We use Flex Spending for our dependent care, and while it saves us all kinds of money in taxes, it causes me extra work, and I don’t like that part.  I have to remind myself that the tax savings is worth it.  And it is, I know it is, I just despise extra work. 

 7)  After work yesterday, we took Cooper to visit the Easter Bunny.  Like every year prior, he was scared to death.  Daddy always comes to his rescue and sits with him in the picture.  This year, he actually smiled!  I was shocked!  Then he gave the Bunny a high five, I’m telling you, it was a miracle. 

 Complete Randomness today, at least there were a few pictures, right?  Have a great Thursday everyone!

Happy New Year

Well, after a looooong break, I’m blogging!  Happy New Year everyone!

We’ve had an eventful 12 days.  I was off work from 1pm December 21 to today.  I cannot explain to you how wonderful and much needed that break was.  I was burnt out, and I really wanted some time to rest, relax and unwind.  I’ve got about 5 months of nonstop work without a day off coming up and I really wanted to enjoy this last Christmas with Cooper before his brother or sister comes.

Speaking of brother or sister….. My anatomy scan is scheduled for January 14 so we are hoping to find out the baby’s gender that day.  Yippee!  Only 12 days away.  Back to our break….

We got to visit lots of family, the weekend before Christmas we visited Tim’s family in Ohio….

All of the cousins

The Johnson Siblings

Then, on Christmas day, we open presents at our house, then we visited with my dad at his house, then my mom at her house.  My brother and his family visit with us at dad’s then mom’s also.

Christmas morning at our house

At Dad’s house Christmas day

At Mom’s house Christmas evening

Our Christmas was wonderful, we are truly blessed.  Time with family was the most precious, and Santa went above and beyond, as usual.

After Christmas, we spent the rest of the week hanging out around the house.  We had about 7-8” of snow on Christmas night, so Tim and Andrew spent the majority of the day after Christmas snow blowing the driveways of our neighbors and our house.  Cooper and I spent the day inside enjoying new toys and watching too much television.

We finally left our house on Friday, only because Tim and I both had dentist appointments.  We were home by 1 and Cooper and I did our normal daily nap from 1-3.  Boy am I going to miss those naps.  Saturday and Sunday we spent at home, not leaving for anything. 

On Monday, New Year’s Eve, Tim went to work for 1/2 day, and while he was gone, Cooper and I cleaned some and ran some errands.  Then Tim picked up Kampbell and we spent the rest of the day hanging out with the Coop and the Soup.  That night, we had some friends/family over.  Erica and Mel, Andrew’s friend Garrett and girlfriend Hannah, and Stephanie and Ryan of course.  We played a euchre tournament and had lots of good food.  We also let Cooper stay up until after midnight, it was almost 1am before I put him to bed.  It was the first time he has stayed up that late and he did great.

Yesterday was spent catching up on sleep, laundry, cooking breakfast for all of the overnight guests and getting the house back in order. 

All in all, it was a wonderful break.  I’m so glad I was able to start the New Year fresh and relaxed!  I’m glad to be back in the blogging world too!!  I’ve been reading blogs so I hope to get back into the groove of writing! 

Happy Wednesday ladies and Tim :)

Birthday Recap & Hubby Guest Post is SCHEDULED!

For my birthday last week, I had the pleasure of taking off work (mostly because it was going to be pointless to go into work with the shortened day (day before Thanksgiving) and because Cooper had a doctor appointment, but that’s another story). 

So, I took Cooper to the Indianapolis Children’s Museum.  And, oh my goodness, that kid had a great time!  I only have one poor quality iphone picture with me right now (all my others are on my camera still), but he had a blast playing with the sand table, the water table, the dinosaur area and especially the big Hot Wheel car section.  They have an area where kids can build with blocks, can dig in mulch and so much more!  He had a blast!  So much so, that we applied our admission cost that day to the price of a year long membership and that is part of Little Mister’s Christmas present this year.  He’s going to love it!  I cannot wait to take him back!!!

When we were finished at the museum, we headed home, where Tim was already off work and was waiting for us.  We ate lunch and started the great clean.  Tim’s sister and kiddos were coming to stay on Friday night, and since we were to be gone all day Thanksgiving day, we needed to get moving.  Thing was….. I wanted our Christmas tree up and decorated, so that’s what I did.  We had gotten a new Christmas tree at the end of the year last year, so it was pretty exciting to get it up and take a look.  Here is it all lit up before decorations.  The final product along with my other measly decorations will be shown in another post.  We had a hard time figuring out how to get all of the lights on this tree to come on, but once we did, easy peasy.   The tree is over 8 feet tall, so I had to get a step stool to decorate as high as I could, then I had Andrew decorate the rest, thank goodness for tall people.

  

Later that day, I got a few pictures from Stephanie via text message.

Isn’t she the sweetest thing you’ve ever seen???

I made an Oreo Poke Cake and some Taco Soup for Thanksgiving.  I highly recommend both if you haven’t had them, you should! 

That about wraps up my birthday fun.  Now onto the good stuff.

I have been hinting that hubby was going to guest post for me for a while now.  It has been a long and hard journey trying to get his butt in gear to write something for me.  But guess what!  He finally did it!!  I have that scheduled for tomorrow, so be sure to check back, he’s got a pretty good story to tell you, if I do say so myself. 

Speaking of hubby – he has been amazing lately.  With this pregnancy, I have been more tired than I can ever remember being.  And by tired, I mean I am usually in bed before 9pm everynight.  I have really slacked on cooking, cleaning and pretty much everything in between including laundry.  What does this mean….. It means that my dear Tim has been stepping up with EVERYTHING.  He’s been Mr. Dad and Mr. Mom.  He’s been amazing and I cannot thank him enough.  Thank you honey!! J  Love you!

Happy Tuesday Friends!

Turkey Trot Linkup

Today, I’m linking up with Holly & Erin for the Turkey Trot linky party! Thanks for hosting ladies!

1. What do you look forward to more: the food, football or parades?
Family.  Oh wait, that’s not on the list.  Between food, football or parades, I’ll stick with the food.  I don’t understand football, so I don’t watch it, and the parades, well, we’re usually on the road when they are on.
2. What is your favorite non-traditional Thanksgiving Day dish?
Cheeseball?  Is that a traditional Thanksgiving dish?  I love cheeseball and crackers.
3. After dinner, is it football or a nap?
Nap, definitely.
4. Do you watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade? Which is your favorite float?
I don’t.  Like I said above, we are usually on the road heading to my family’s houses, but I have been to the parade before and my favorite float is Garfield.  I love that lasagna loving cat.
5. Where do you go to celebrate and eat your big meal? Who is there (family, friends)?  We celebrate on Thanksgiving day with my family.  We go back and forth to my mom’s and dad’s houses.  We do both on Thanksgiving day.  Normally we stay down there for the night, but this year we’re coming home to sleep in our own beds.
6. What is your favorite turkey day dessert?
Pumpkin Pie/Pumpkin Roll/Pumpkin Gooey Cake.  Yum!

Halloween Adventures

I'm back!  I actually meant to be back on Monday, but due to some sickness - I'm just getting back into the swing of things today.

I couldn't miss out on the opportunity to share our Halloween Adventures with everyone today, since I know most everyone else is probably doing the same.  What can I say?  I like to be with the "in crowd" sometimes.  :)

Our Halloween activites started on the 13th this year.  We decided to take Cooper to the Indianapolis Zoo for the ZooBoo they host each year.  Our awesome neighbors went also, and Allie and Cooper had fun.  It rained while we were there, but we decided we weren't sugar and we'd make it through. 

Pictures from that evening:



Before we left, Cooper and Allie's dad, Keith, were throwing around the ball.

 

Allie.  Isn't she the cutest DJ Lance Rock you've ever seen?

 

Checking out the penguins.

  

And looking for the elephants.



Allie getting some candy.

Cooper getting candy

The next few pictures are from an area of the zoo where the kids can go in and feed birds.  Cooper and I admittedly got a bit scared the first few times they flew right up to us, but we both got the hang of it.  Allie is a pro at this.

Of course, they had to get their heads inside these for a photo opp.

The next thing that I made for Halloween was this cute little pumpkin.  Lindsey had this cute little personalized pumpkin on display on her front porch and I just had to ask her to make me some cutouts!  She sent me the letters, polka dots and the ribbon and I made this, which ended up being the only decoration I did for Halloween:

Next, on October 20, our festivities included carving pumpkins.  Andrew was home from college for fall break, Steph and Ryan came over, and Cooper decided he was too scared of the pumpkins so he didn't carve any.  I am happy to say, I just sat back and enjoyed not getting my hands dirty this year also.



Tim and Ryan carving out their masterpieces.



Tim is super proud of his pumpkin.

Not sure what's wrong with Andrew, looks like he swallowed something sour

Steph carving a K pumpkin for Kampbell.

October 27th was the trunk or treat at a local church.  Our church had a fall festival, but we didn't attend that one, we thought Cooper would have fun trick or treating instead.  It was pretty cold out that evening, so we didn't stay a terribly long time, but enough time for him to eat some popcorn and collect some candy. :)

On the Monday before Halloween, the 29th, the high school for our area had a safe trick or treat in the halls.  It was from 5-7 and it was packed.  I didn't get many pictures because Tim couldn't make it, so I was wrestling with our coats, Cooper's football, his pumpkin, the camera and keeping my 3 year old in line.  Here are a couple though.  He really had a good time at this event.  I loved it because he got to see so many other kid's costumes - when they actually didn't have a coat on overtop.

Finally, on Halloween, we took Coop around to our neighbor's houses, and then he helped us hand out candy.  He got to wear his football costume all evening and that made him super happy.

Daddy with Cooper before heading out.

Mommy with Coop before going Trick or Treating.



Heading up to the first house.  It was decorated :)



We met up with the neighbors and you can tell, the Moms always get to take the pictures!  Janna and I were taking the pictures, while Keith, Diane, Pete, Tim, Allie, Julia and Cooper got their picture taken. 



Cooper wouldn't join the girls in a picture of just the kids, so I got one of the cutie pie girls anyway!
My neighbor Janna made that Princess Presto dress!  Isn't it awesome?!?

  Here's Cooper helping hand out the candy.  I think he had as much fun handing it out as he did collecting it!

That's a wrap!  Halloween is definitely not just a one nighter event at my house! :)