Silly Moments

Silly did a lot of bike riding this summer. We all set some goals when summer started and one of his goals was to lose the training wheels. He and Cakes rode their bikes while I pushed Bubba in the stroller several morning every week, all summer. I was pretty sure that when Scott took the training wheels off Silly would just go and never give it a second thought. Over Memorial Day Weekend, Scott took him up to the park, found it was closed, then took him to the middle school to ride where there was plenty of grass to fall in and not so many turns, driveways and street crossings to navigate. They weren't gone five minutes before Scott called me to say Silly was riding on two wheels like it was nothing.

Then we had to hold up our end of the deal, which was to buy him a new bike when he started riding on two wheels. He has done a whole lot of 2-wheel riding since then. It was pretty hard for him to get started at first since his new bike is a little too big and his feet can barely touch the ground when he's on the seat. He's got it down now though.

 

He's pretty serious about it too.

The one perk to having him in afternoon Kindergarten is that we have plenty of time in the morning to go out to the bus stop way too early and he can ride his bike for a while. I know getting that exercise before school will help him work, learn and concentrate while he's there. They only get recess three times a week, if they're lucky, which is completely lame, but I try to compensate for that in the mornings.

And speaking of school, he really doesn't have much to say about it. He came home the first day and said, "Well, now I know that my teacher is really mean!" She's tough, but not mean, and a great teacher. At the end of the week he came home and told me she'd noticed his dimples and now she thinks he's cute, as if that was terrible news.

Waiting for the bus.

Three times now the bus driver has just gone right on past me and forgotten that she has my child on her bus. Thankfully there's a bigger boy who knows us and he immediately starts yelling at her that she forgot to drop someone off.

And finally, soccer has started again. First the whole season was moved back a week because of Hurricane Irene. Then the first practice/game was rained out. Then a makeup practice was scheduled but it was rained out too. Finally, last Saturday they had their game in the YMCA gym since it was raining once again. He was so excited (after suffering two weeks of heartbreak because of the rain cancellations). Last year he was right there with the ball all the time but never once kicked it. This time he and one other older boy were pretty much running the whole game. It was awesome. He's awesome.



Getting his pre-game instructions. Twice the coach told him "just stand right here" but didn't explain that he meant "until the game starts" so Silly just stood in the exact spot while everyone else ran around until the coach told him to run.




He's #11, and #2 is his little partner. Right after I took this picture he kicked the ball again and scored! I don't know why, but he was really trying not to grin from ear to ear after he scored, which leaves him making this fish-face. I think maybe he's trying to hide his dimples. Fat chance!

 A few Sillyisms:

Somehow we ended up talking about birthday suits. He said you're always wearing your birthday suit, "except when you're dead, because then you're not in your skin anymore."

The other morning he asked me, "Do you know how I get so smart? I just look inside my brain!"

The Birthday that Took All Month

So, Cakes turned 8 at the beginning of August. We spent the day in DC on her birthday, she was baptized on the 20th, her birthday party was scheduled for the 27th, but then Hurricane Irene decided to blow through our neck of the woods so the party at Hurricane Gymnastics was canceled due to a hurricane. Thankfully, they were really nice and super helpful and let us schedule the party for Sept 3rd even though they had blocked that weekend out because of the holiday. If not for that we would have had to wait until the end of October!

She has been telling me prety much all summer about this garden cake she wanted. Mainly, that she wanted it to be chocolate, covered in green, have tiers and lots of flowers. Sure. No problem. I guess it's a good thing that my kids just assume I can make any kind of cake or Halloween costume they come up with; it forces me out of my comfort zone. So far I have managed to avoid seriously disappointing them. I decided to attempt fondant for the very first time ever. I must say it really is easy to roll out. That was no  sweat, which was quite a relief because I usually hate that part. However, I was not prepared for the placement part. I rolled them out to the right size but had lots of issues fitting it to the cake. But hey, that's what decorations are for - hiding the defects. Cakes helped mix the cake and helped decorate. She put almost all of the letters on herself and thought it was cool that all the words end in 'y'.

So...here it is...

All her little friends came and played in the gym for an hour. They all loved the foam pit but had fun trying out most of the other equipment too.

 

 

 

Everyone was having so much fun I had to talk them into eating cake. Never had that problem before.'



The traditional "mom's hands cutting the cake" picture.
Does your family have lots of these pictures? Mine sure does.





The whole gang.



 

The kids gobbled their cake pretty fast (I must say it was really, really yummy. I got the recipe from Wedding Cakes for You) and then Cakes opened her presents, which basically boiled down to replenishing our (I mean her) art supplies and projects for another year. That girl is always making something. And I'm not complaining. She is at this moment writing a book using the blank book, stickers and colored pencils one of her friends gave her for a present.

These are some of the pages she's colored out of her doodling books. Funny little story - Gummy and Mamie both bought Cakes similar doodling books. We've been doing lots of coloring around here. The fish one we colored together. The owls she colored with a friend. They're pretty cool books.

The Beach!

Most of my family got together for a week at the beach. This was the first time we ever stayed in a house with a pool. My mom, who doesn't get in pools or the ocean, declared we should get a house with a pool from now on. It was pretty great. My dad, Papop to all the grandkids, brought along lots of snorkeling gear, including some kid-sized stuff, and totally made Silly's day, week, year, by teaching him to snorkel. That boy stayed in the pool, mask on, snorkel in, for a long, long time. Papop gave him the gear when the week was over and Silly's first order of business when we got home was putting his gear in a safe place - in case it floods. He took it to the pool  and when he lost the little valve that keep the water out, Scott contacted the company and they sent us two replacements - free!

Our first day there the ocean was full of jellyfish and all kinds of other sea creatures. I don't think I'd ever seen jellyfish in the Outer Banks before, but this year made up for it. We saw huge schools of fish, jumping rays and dolphins and a few pelicans came out too. It was crazy.

Tuesday morning Scott took Cakes and Silly on an airplane tour. They reported seeing lots of sharks, very close to the shore. Great!

 

 

We were worried that Cakes might get sick, but she did just fine and filled in as photographer while Scott flew the plane.

Just some fun indoors...





He insisted I take this picture.



 

Papop took a few kids out truckin' on the beach and nearly flooded his engine so the kids played at the beach for a few minutes while he let his truck sit, and hopefully drain. At least he didn't get stuck; that's what usually happens.

Friday afternoon we forced everyone to go out to the beach one last time. We hadn't all been out there at the same time before so we had to do that at least once. Mom brought a few kites with her and dad set up the little tent. 

 

 

 Bubba hadn't really been in the ocean before Friday. He spent a lot of time throwing sand back into the water, but didn't get wet past his knees. Friday he just decided that he could go out there all by himself and was furious that Scott and I insisted on holding onto him or standing right behind him. He was so sure he could just walk right into those waves.

After our last hurrah at the the beach, a lot of us jumped in the pool one last time. Bubba also decided that he could swim by himself (with his floatie vest on, but even so, he didn't really know how to keep himself upright yet). He was have a screaming, water-swallowing fit in the middle of the pool, and the middle of our game of Marco Polo. He did not want us to touch him, but when we let go he ended up with his face in the water. He was totally beyond reason so I eventually had to just scoop him up and take him away from the pool. I was laughing so hard at the ridiculousness of it that it took me a while to be able to pick him up.

 People left at various times Friday night and Saturday morning, but since we didn't have the long haul home like everyone else we stuck around a little bit, cleared out the house with Papop and my older brother's family then set off to climb the Hatteras lighthouse. They have a height restriction and last time we visited Scott climbed with Cakes while I walked around with toddler Silly. This time I climbed with Cakes and Silly while Scott killed some time with Bubba.



Getting started



Bubbs waiting patiently





At the top



Still waitin'



 









Going down



That big sandy spot is where the lighthouse used to be



We did a pretty good job climbing. My legs were burning 2 or 3 times on the way up and when I stopped at the bottom my knees were wobbling. We stopped at all 8 landings on the way up to see how the view changed every time. Cakes was busy counting all the steps and I don't think Silly even knew he was doing anything hard.

By then all the traffic was cleared out so we started home for real. We will definitely do that again!