A Day in the Life...

Just doing a picture dump of all the random pictures that I have on my camera.

The boys absolutely LOVE playing outside.

This is how Brighton usually looks after...red face and sweaty (inherited from his mom).

Hose= hours of entertainment!

Greg loves to build forts/tents in the living room. Sometimes he is a little too particular about the construction for my liking, but oh well (ie. Mom, that blanket can't go there! It has to be the red side! There is too much light getting in! etc.).

One day when I was feeling exceptionally crummy, I helped him make a fort and told him he could watch a movie on his portable DVD player in his tent so that I could take a nap. After I slept for about an hour, this is what I found. I guess he needed a nap too!

Blurry but still cute. Brighton always wants his picture taken.

Greg being Bob the Builder, carrying his tools around in his boots. Who needs a tool belt? "Do my children ever where pants?" you ask. Nope.

Brighton being Daddy (he has Noel's pager and ID on)

Mariokart! I've turned into one fantastic mom since I got pregnant. Lots of TV, and Mariokart, and whatever else as long as I can lay on the couch.

FHE Olympics a few weeks ago with the Bylunds, Bylunds, Millars, Noehrens, and Powells. So much fun! I'm so glad that I have clever, creative friends who come up with fun activities!

Just being cute.

I was making a Moby wrap for a friend's baby shower, and the boys were very interested. I took the parts that I cut off to taper the ends, and they made great pirate bandanas. Pirates wear pink, right? Then Greg wanted to try the wrap on. Sorry Jennilyn, the wrap is pre-worn. :)

FHE singing time at the piano.

The picture really does not do it justice, but this is the cake Sherrill Moody made for Greg's birthday. It was AMAZING! I especially loved the fur on Hiccup's jacket.

The other day, I had a piece of toast with breakfast. Toward the end of the toasting, it started to smell really funny. Then after the toast popped up, the toaster started smoking a bit. I looked in and there were two cars in the bottom of the toaster (it's really hard to see in the picture). Didn't know that I needed to check for toy cars in the bottom of my toaster. You better believe I will from now on. I'm really glad that I didn't start my kitchen on fire!

My boys are just so darn cute and funny! I'm one lucky mom!

Happy to be 4!...and a little bit of 5.

We never imagined that the start of Noel's 4th year would be quite so busy and challenging. Perhaps it was due to one of the best summers in such a long time that we were bound to feel some let-down when school began again. Or maybe it was the conglomerate reaction of studying for Boards, anxiety about finally starting the beginning of the end, or worrying about the countdown to saying goodbye to so many wonderful Lexingtonians.

On Thursday and Friday, after studying for nearly a month, Noel took Part II of boards. So far so good. He felt good taking and finishing the exam. Fingers crossed :)

With one more item off the school checklist, we decided to celebrate by throwing Greg a "It's Great to be 4 Dragon Training Fest." 

We invited a bunch of his little friends, and we all had a blast making shields, darting fireballs, feeding Toothless, and being pyromaniacs psyched out on chocolate cake and ice cream. Simply put..."Awesome!"says Greggors. Here are some pictures from the party.

With lots of 4 year olds it was amazing that we had no accidents. We even were able to herd them into one big group and snap a group pic.

Those are some awesome looking dragon trainers!

Brighton and Greg had a ton of fun and were quite tired by the time the activity was over. Brighton was particularly tired but hung on long enough to make it to cake and ice cream.

We concluded Labor day weekend with some apple picking this morning and were surprised to find the apple orchard swarming with fellow Mormons :). 

I was reminded of Mitt Romney's thoughts from the RNC convention, 

"Like a lot of families in a new place with no family, we found kinship with a wide circle of friends through our church. When we were new to the community it was welcoming and as the years went by, it was a joy to help others who had just moved to town or just joined our church. We had remarkably vibrant and diverse congregants from all walks of life and many who were new to America. We prayed together, our kids played together and we always stood ready to help each other out in different ways."

We are so grateful for wonderful friends and a vibrant congregation and community.

As a last thought, there has been a lot of speculation regarding the size of our family. We can comfortably now say that Four of us wasn't enough and Noel and I have taken the plunge and are expecting the fifth Dickens in April 2013. 

Watch out, one more Dickens means another giant step in the entropy of the world!