Jam Packed

We woke up early this morning to get a jump start on the day, we had BIG plans.

Geremu on the other hand had some plans of his own.

Here he is preparing his plan.

I'm not sure if he was having trouble seeing from his old seat or what but the milking stool seemed to fix whatever the problem was as you can see from the below picture.

After a little play time it was off to Bay Beach. Geremu loves every ride.
Cullen on the other hand would rather cheer Geremu on than go on the rides. I'm not sure what the fear in the rides is about since he didn't have this last year but he did go on a few of them.
We had lunch at the park. The kids all stayed busy chasing the seagulls.
After lunch we headed over to the wading pool. This is a picture from across the pool of Cullen yelling at Nick.After Bay Beach we headed over to the bird sanctuary to feed the ducks and geese.

Did I mention we did this all with our friends Katie, Billy and family?

Chuggin' Along

Thanks so much for the comments and e-mails we've been receiving. We are keeping ourselves very busy these days. We spent everyday this past week with friends or family. Yesterday morning we headed to the town my father is from and spent time with my Aunts/Uncles, cousins and their kids. Here are LOTS of pictures from our fun day.

Mama swimming while the kids & Dad nap!

Sandbox fun

Geremu had a smile plastered on his face most of the day, he loved all the action.

Cullen's new favorite treat.

The Get-Along-Gang

Cal and Nick had a good time playing in the water together.

Little Jersey relaxing.

Turns out Cullen loves water wings.

The second cousins born within a 6 month period.

Grandma Great made an appearance, it was good to see her out and about.

We had a doctors apt today on our way home. Afterwards we stopped at the local state park to spend a few hours. Cullen caught a butterfly, it was his first time touching one- so cool. He let it go shortly after this picture.

My little tree climbers.

Geremu's a quick one.

I Spy… a Sense of Humor

Cullen thinks books are funny, really funny. He laughs out loud at certain books and it’s so funny to listen to his laugh when I’m reading out loud. In the book Diary of a Fly there is a page with a boy with a messy face from eating a sucker and the page says something like, “First graders are disgusting”. This is really funny to him.

Last night Cullen was talking to me when he let a burp sneak out. I looked at him and said, “Cullen what do you say?”
To which he laughed and replied, “I guess I’m a first grader.”
I knew what he was getting at but still asked him, “What do you mean?”
He laughed saying, “First graders are bgusting!”
Did I mention he doesn’t say disgusting correctly? It’s just part of his charm.

Geremu was up in my face the other day and delivered a knock, knock joke. I had no idea he even knew what a knock, knock joke was, so I was completely blown away when he started. The best part of him telling the joke is he really doesn’t understand that they should be funny to everyone, not just himself.

Here is what his first joke was…
Geremu: “Knock, knock”
Me: “Who’s there?”
Geremu: “Pizza man”
Me: “Pizza man who?”
Geremu (laughing so hard he can hardly spit-out): “Pizza man Geremu!”
Good one, I never saw that one coming!

These pictures are from right after the 4th of July at my parents house still.

Geremu the shoe thief

Mt. Tiki is broken so this cool sprinkler was taken out and Geremu was amazed that the ball stayed afloat.

Geremu recruits help to try staying on top of the water like the ball.

The boys back home now, set up a bike wash.

We hung out with our friends, Katie and Carson at the beach enjoying the beautiful weather.

Geremu and Carson off to the races.

I just love this time of day, getting ready for bed.

Pooped out after a hard day of play.

A Post We Never Imagined Writing...

We've been avoiding this post but feel like we can't and shouldn't avoid it any longer. We had accepted a referral for a young boy at the beginning of April. We didn't formerly announce it on our blog because Cullen and Geremu only knew they would be getting a brother and not much more than that. We didn't feel like it was fair to them to announce it to the world before they got more information. We did share our news with family & friends, we are now sharing via the blog to spare us from having to retell this.

At the end of last week we received more information about "our" little guy. Without going into details we are heartbroken to say we have since turned the referral down. This was not an easy decision to make and we consider it very personal, we are sorry for our lack of details. If you are the praying type, please add "our" little guy into your prayers that he is matched with a forever family quickly.

We are sad and NEVER imagined when we started down this adoption journey that it would have a similar ending as so many of our pregnancies... this is just a different sort of loss. We feel very blessed to have the boys we have, and at this point we are unsure as to where we will go from here.

Happy 4th of July

The boys started the day off with a hike through the marsh. Cullen LOVED seeing the animals and Geremu enjoyed the time outside.

Tonight we had a bit of a party. The big cookie was a hit with the theme "God Bless My Underwear", which is one of the boys favorite songs.

After dinner the crowd gathered around to watch Mike propose to Katherine on video.

Then we headed down to watch the firework display along the river. Before the fireworks started the boys entertained us with their wrestling, how long does this stage last?

Then Cullen kept getting "stuck".

Luke and Colleen all ready for the show.

So this is how it started, Cullen watching the fireworks first on his own...

and Geremu plugging his ears on Nick's lap.

Cullen slowly made his way to Granny Bird's lap...

while Geremu climbed on me saying, "Go home blue house Mom?" (ears still plugged)

This was Cullen's final place of resting to watch the fireworks...

and here is Geremu's.

It was Geremu's first time seeing fireworks and to be honest he didn't enjoy them as much as everyone else. Both boys were pooped out when we got home to Granny and Pop's house.

A Lesson Learned

One quick story before I tell you what we are up to. I was playing with Cullen two days ago and he was sitting on me as we were singing his name song (completely made-up but he loves it). He started laughing so hard at the dance I was forcing his arms to do that he let a little toot fly on me, which in turn made him laugh harder. He doesn't do this a lot but it has happened more recently when he laughs hard. So I thought I would take this opportunity to talk with his about it. I explained how he was going to be in preschool this next year and that letting toots go was basically frowned upon. I don't want him to be "that kid" that people remember as the mad tooter, etc... I finished by saying something like he really need to learn to squeeze his butt-cheeks to muffle the sound. (I'm a rookie at this stuff)

Fast forward until today, Cullen is in the bathroom and yells, "MOM, I SQUEEZED MY CHEEKS BUT IT STILL SMELLS IN HERE." Clearly something wasn't communicated properly, just because it didn't make a sound doesn't mean it won't smell. At least it's a step in the right direction:)

We are back in my hometown for a little 4th of July action. The weather is finally warming up and the boys enjoyed an eventful day outside. This morning Nick went hiking with the boys, I can't believe how big they are getting when I look at pictures. No stroller necessary and they went quite a ways.

They found a great hiding place and plenty of animals to tell me about.

This afternoon we went down to Riverfest to listen to a singer that the boys like. Anytime the singer would asked for volunteers Geremu would follow all the kids up to the front of the stage. Cullen would not go, he was more comfortable sitting back watching the kids. Geremu would hop right in the crowd and follow the kids. The singer would give the kids directions then start the song. Geremu never followed the directions, he would stand there and give us dirty looks like, "why the hell am I up here?" Cullen never went up but Geremu went every time (like 4 times). I'd post a picture of the dirty looks but it's too hard cutting the other kids out, remember his father's day card? That's pretty much what he looked like:) Below he is up in front not participating in the actions.

Geremu had a great time on all the activities. Cullen didn't want to go on any of them, he was pretty content cheering Geremu on.

Cullen did like the fountain, he would have jumped in if I'd have let him.

We got to see the water skiing squirrel.

Then sat down to watch the action on the river and a little air show.