Adam's birthday

Here's a few pictures of the progress we've made in the yard in the past few weeks.  We had two loads of fill dirt come for the driveway and used some of it to even out the back yard.  Adam was excited for the dump trucks to come.  But he learned from watching the road construction at the old house that after the load is dumped there's a very load "bang" from the back swinging against the empty truck---thus the covered ears. :) 
On Labor day weekend, we put together a new swing set.  Donna and Wayne brought it down as well as the skid loader.  Wayne spread the dirt in the drive and moved some big rocks for me.  Then we put the swing set together.  It was a busy weekend, but satisfying to get some much awaited things accomplished! 

Adam turned 4 this week and we rented a bounce house for the weekend.  We invited family over on Saturday and then friend on Sunday.  The boys had a blast and Alex says he wants one for his birthday too.  I tried explaining it wouldn't be so fun in December. :)

first load

second load

progress after first day of assembly.  Also, see the green grass!?

Adam opening birthday gifts.

Erin wanted a picture taken too!

Adam helped me frost the cake.  He's into Disney's new movie, Planes, even though he's never seen it.

More presents.....Spiderman underwear!

Here's some of the landscaping I've gotten to in the last week or so.   Mom ripped off the ivy from the corner....well most of it.  We planted some hydrangias in the corner and I put a couple october plants in the front.  Also see the solar lights?   In the back, I finally moved some plants (lilies mostly) to fill in the corner against the deck.  I've also done ALOT of rock moving.  We found a pile of rocks in the woods and it probably had 100 rocks in it!  So I used the big ones near the swing between the trees and to redo the fire pit.  Small to medium ones are used around the house.  There's still lots more to sort through, but I'm very happy with how they look.  Oh, and it's so nice to see some of the grass I planted coming up and looking nice and green.  This week I plan on planting more and getting it started.  I still have more flowers to move, but things are starting to feel more homey. :)

Big rocks.....lots and lots of big rocks.

fire pit

First day of School!

Alex started kindergarten last week and he loves it!  It helped that the bus driver came by the house a day or two before school and they practiced how and when to cross the road.  He even got to pick out his seat (they have assigned seats).  And when we went to Meet Your Teacher night, we found that two of his friends from preschool were in his class!  God has blessed us so much.  Never would I have imagined things would work out so well.  And on top of it, Adam is doing wonderful as big brother without Alex around.  He and Erin play pretty well most of the day and Adam doesn't seem to have as many melt downs as normal----There's a reason we call him "Adam Bomb" at home. :) 
But Adam doesn't seem to mind Alex being gone all day, however we'll see how the year goes. 

Mommy is doing ok too. :) I had a hard time with it the couple days leading up to the start of school.  Especially when I found out the bus was coming 40 min earlier in the morning than I thought it was!  Since we live down a lane, we have to take Alex to the road to be picked up and meet him to be dropped off.  So that means all 3 kids have to be loaded in and go.  Some days, that is a challenge!  But we are getting used to the routine and everyone seems to liking the change. :) 

Work around the house

We've had some really nice weather and it provided the opportunity to get some things done outside lately.  The window wells for the basement bedrooms face north and are very.... green.  I cleaned all the windows, but only one window well so far.  Can you see the difference?  It's so much brighter in those basement bedrooms now! 
Pop came with his skid loader and we moved the two rubbermaid sheds.  We also are taking out part of the circle driveway, so he used the stone from that to make a base for the sheds.  So much nicer!  And he ripped out some tree roots here and there as well as help me rework the backyard a little.  I sprayed alot of the woods in the back yard to help push it back and make the yard a little bigger.  We will put the new playset back there when the time comes.
We had to dig the driveway out to 12-15 inches deep, so we were looking for places to put the extra stone.  So the part of the driveway we are keeping has a nice new layer of stone.  We also have a couple piles around the yard. :)  Over all things turned out pretty well.  We will be getting some dirt to fill in the driveway tomorrow.  We had a lot of rain after we dug it out, so it was full of water until we pumped it out (thanks to all the clay in the soil).  The boys have had fun digging in the rocks with their CAT tractors though.  :)
We had a dead tree dropped this week.  Andy didnt' want to risk it falling and hitting the house, so we had someone else to the job.  They also chipped out some of the roots that were too big for the skid loader.  The back yard is getting closer and closer to being ready to plant grass! 

Dirty Window

Clean window

That load was a little too big

See the sheds to the right?

The new house next door getting it's roof rafters put up.

Rocks to edge the grass/landscaping

Swing is up!  And it's the perfect spot.

Swinging at Mimi's house

Casen and Peter

Squirt gun attack on Jeremy!

Chipping out the roots

guy who did most of the work ;)

Tree is down!  They even moved the trampoline back.

Lake and Grissom

We put up a little pool for the kids over July 4th.  They love it!  It's been great since it's been so hot.  But the other day we decided a trip to the lake was in order.  :)  I just took the kids for an overnight stay at Mom and Dad's, but it was a nice quick trip.  The lake felt great and we even got to go down the water slide a few times.  But mostly the kids just liked playing in the sand and rocks. :)

This weekend we took the kids to Grissom Air Force Base Museum.  The boys thought it was pretty cool.  They were really excited when Daddy let them get toy helicopters before we left.  :)

This is a "Top Gun" plane