Just the Two of Us

Nick and Cullen have been out of town for the 4th and are returning tomorrow. Geremu and me have kept ourselves pretty busy. We had a low key 4th of July- celebrated with cool whip, strawberries and blueberries- yummo! Today we went to the farmers market and hung out around the house. It has been 3 weeks since Geremu arrived home forever. He is picking up so many new words- yesterday I taught him how to say "cha-cha-cha". So when I called people singing, "Happy 4th of July to you" he could add the "cha-cha-cha's". I also taught him to say, "mama's hot". As you can see we are mostly focusing on the important words right now. He also just learned to sip liquid through a straw- something we have been working on. The look on his face was priceless when the water first came up the straw. So now when we are out and about we can bring juice boxes or something of the sort and leave the cups at home!

Videos

All is well, here are some videos of my boys in action these days.

The first video is what I caught the boys doing the other day when I was talking with my Dad on the phone. There is a warning on the bucket not to leave kids unattened by it, I'd better keep a closer eye on those little buggers.

Can you guess what Cullen wants to be?

I have to restrain myself from doing this to Geremu all the time.

Who needs cable when I can watch this all day long?

Geremu is a toilet singer (if you think this is good you should see his dance moves!)

The Lazy Days of Summer

Here are more pictures then you probably wanted to see of what we have been up to this summer. We spend most of our days hanging around and playing.

Today we visited a zoo down in Oshkosh (very similar to the zoo in La Crosse). The zoo even had a train (that Cullen LOVED) and a nice park!

The boys need a drink after playing so hard.

Cullen's Finger

The boys have been enjoying the short rain showers we have been having. When it's not raining out they still like to play with their umbrellas, I'm in charge of making the rain with the hose and I find myself doing stuff my mother use to do to us. Once in a while when they are looking up I squirt them under the umbrella with the hose. When they yell, I just pretend it was an accident and for some reason they keep coming back for more! They really do love it.
As of today Cullen is on the injured reserve list, he got his finger shut in the front door. The nail immediatly turned purplish black. I tried to have him ice it but he would cry, etc... We still enjoyed the day by going to the farmers market (which is always loads of fun) and playing outside. But when Cullen woke-up from his nap his finger was all red and really swollen so I called our doctor who met Nick at the clinic and put a hole through his nail to relieve the pressure. Cullen really has been a trooper though all of this, he just couldn't use his hand because it hurt so bad. I'm glad we got this taken care of today, the doctor couldn't believe he was able to nap without waking up from it. I think we would have been in for a rough night had we not taken him in today. (Pictures of the finger, that's right Katie "the finger")

One last picture for today of Geremu in the bath he might possibly LOVE baths just as much as Cullen. (Yep, we have a pink bathtub!)

Bay Beach

We made a trip to Bay Beach today with our friends Katie and Billy (they have a son, Carson, Cullen's age and a daughter, Sofia, that is 7 months). The boys went on all the young kid rides and had a blast. Cullen's favorite was the train and Geremu LOVED the big slide. Here are some pictures from Bay BeachAfter enjoying some of the rides Cullen and Carson cooled off in the wading pool. Nick sure missed out big not joining us (he brought Geremu on more rides) because I got to enjoy this sight at the wading pool- priceless! After Bay Beach we got lunch at Old McDonald's (another first for Geremu, he didn't seem to like it) and had a small picnic before heading to the bird sanctuary to feed the birds. The first picture is of the boys planning their bird chase scene.

Here are the boys feeding the birds. When Billy first handed a bag of corn to Geremu to feed the birds he opened it, reached in and started eating it. He caught on quickly with a little help. I really do think the boys enjoyed chasing the birds maybe more then feeding them.

All is going well here, no good stories to share, just some pictures. Here is a short video of the boys, they were sitting in the garage taking sips from their cups at the same time and killing themselves laughing. They did this for a few minutes before we grabbed the camera.

Last night Nick and Cullen camped out again in the back yard. This picture is from this morning after they woke up.

This afternoon Nick took Cullen to our local state park to "hike", from all the pictures it looks like Cullen had a pretty swift pace going. Between camping out last night, no nap today and all this running he was so crabby tonight.

Still going...

Geremu had another doctors apt today. Since he had to put up with more needles today I served up his favorite Ethiopian meal (Dorowot) for dinner- he was LOVING it! I made the boys take their shirts off to eat dinner (to prevent having to scrub them clean by hand) and when I sat down to eat with them Cullen said, "Mom, you need to take your shirt off too". To prevent a freak show at our kitchen table I wore a bib and kept my shirt on.

Our Very Own Croc Hunt...

Do you spy anything unique in this picture???

Have I mentioned that Geremu LOVES shoes. Size, style and owner of the shoe really doesn't matter to him. He wants to take every pair of shoes he sees for a spin. If someone is already in the shoes he is more then willing to help them out so he can get his grubby little piggers in. Well since Geremu has arrived in town we have been missing a few pairs of shoes that I have searched high and low for, all of the shoes that we have been missing have turned up except for Cullen's red crocs. Yesterday after cleaning the entire house I realized there was really no way the shoes were inside. As I was walking into the house in the afternoon I finally spotted the missing shoes, now look back at the previous picture and look under the hose box, you should see one of the shoes hardly peeking out. I can't believe it only took me a week to find this. So if you come over to my house you just might want to seriously think about leaving your shoes at home.

Today was another busy day, Grandma German came to see the boys today.

Then for lunch we had Nick's Uncle Mike and Aunt Karrie and their kids (pictured below) and Nick's Uncle Mark. Later in the afternoon Dan (Nick's brother) and Grandpa German stopped for a little while. It was good to see everyone and the boys loved all the action.

I will leave you with two pictures, one of my boys...

and the other of our walk tonight. The picture is how the walk started, it ended with Geremu pulling Cullen and me. Hey, he insisted and who am I to argue?