Brothers

Sparky told me the other day that at one point during the night he woke up and found a sweet little Tiger all curled up in bed with him. Sparky has no idea when the little man crawled into his bed, or how long he stayed. He just rolled over and went back to sleep and at some point Tiger woke up and went back to his own bed. It's these sweet little stories that melt my heart. Tiger obviously needed his brother in the night and had no qualms about crawling into Sparky's bed in order to be comforted, and Sparky, being the great big brother that he is, had no problems with his little brother hanging out with him in the night for a bit. These two bros are friends, and I hope it will always be this way.

On an unrelated side note, I am completely sucked into the show Duck Dynasty right now. I just love their family dynamics, the brothers in particular. Plus, the show just strengthens my desire to live out somewhere on some land where I can just do whatever I want with chickens that roam free and a pond for my kids to fish and catch frogs. Also, it makes me want to shoot guns.

Pictures for those of you not on Facebook

I post many more pictures on Facebook than on the blog because well, it is just so much easier. Posting on the blog takes so many more steps and sometimes I just don't feel like working that hard. Perhaps there is an easier way, but right now I sure don't know what it is. Regardless, here are some pictures from the last week or so that I took with my phone.

Doug and I headed to Costco to pick out some new glasses. While we were there Tiger found these sweet shades and thought he was looking pretty cool.

This boy of mine is about to turn 12 in one week and so it was time to buy him his first suit. I must say that he is one sharp looking kid, but every time I see him dressed like this I just want to cry.  I am having serious issues these days with my kids growing up.

Last Sunday I had a splitting headache and so what better spot for our Sunday walk than at the bottom of a dam. My, oh my was it loud down there. Not really helpful to my head, but way fun for the kids. My favorite quote of the night came from KK who, when asked if they had fun said, "Yes, but it smelled a bit like a man who never takes a shower." Descriptive and true.

What good little sports these kids of mine are. They are always being asked to stop for pictures and they handle it like champs.

I think Tiger just likes to use photo stops as an opportunity to practice his many expressions.

Sparky has been testing the bounds of his freedom and has been dying to walk to McDonald's which is really not that far from our house, but on a busy street without sidewalks. I am not quite willing to let him walk there by himself yet and so as a compromise we all walked there together. It was a small victory for my boy and I got to be "fun mom" for a moment.

Tiger's outfit choice the other day. Wow. It just hurts my eyes to look at this, but as a good mom I just let him go with his mismatched self.

My boys are quite obsessed with video games. Whether it be on the DS, the computer, or the Wii. It absolutely drives me crazy and I totally limit their time, but playing makes them happy. As you can see here it is Sparky's turn to play and Tiger is stuck watching because he has already played his allotted time for the day. Although, I must say that Tiger loves to watch his brother play almost as much as he love to play himself.

He also loves to make faces for the camera.

I am sure you have all noticed that Tiger likes to dress up. Well, we were walking through Costco the other day and all of the Halloween costumes are out. Tiger was instantly taken with this Ninja costume because, well because it is a Ninja and it has a mask and weapons.

He wasted no time running down the street striking "fear" into all who crossed his path.

So, there you have it, snapshots of our life from the past week. Two things have become very clear to me. I need to get more pictures of my girl, and Tiger and I spend way too much time together.

Joy of Love: Day 25

When you love them the most

The first thing I thought of when I saw this assignment topic was the fact that Doug cleans the kitchen every night after dinner (when he is home) because he knows how much I despise doing that after I just spent all that time making dinner.  Since I refuse to take a picture of my horrible kitchen, I realized that I needed to find something else.  That brings us to this picture.  I really wish that I had a before shot of this room.  This is the room that my boys share.  For the last two weeks it has been completely covered with toys/clothes/trash/junk, except for some cleared pathways to the beds.  98% of the mess was done by the littlest boy, who seems to be allergic to clean rooms, which is why the room was never clean.  The thought of cleaning this room was completely overwhelming to me.  Yesterday as I was tackling my other overwhelming task (the dreaded laundry), Doug very sweetly took the boys into this room and the three of them cleaned everything up.  That was love.  Then this room proceeded to stay this clean for about 2 hours.  Really, a miracle that it lasted that long.

Joy of Love: Day 20

When They're Home

These are my boys.  They have a shared love/passion for the Wii/computer/video games.  They probably think that I am the meanest mom on earth because I limit their time on these beloved devices.  Nevertheless, when the kids get home from school, this is all Tiger wants to do.  Basically, Tiger sits and watches Sparky play and beat levels that he only dreams about.  He sits on the edge of the couch tense with anticipation and bursting with excitement over the moves on the screen in front of him.  Sparky, on the other hand, sits nonchalantly, absentmindedly chewing on his lip and he beats the levels with ease.

Joy of Love: Day 12

The Eyes

The always willing photography participant

The reluctant and slightly annoyed photography participant

Cute Bedtime Boys

I don't have it in me to post pictures about Easter and so here is a cute pictures of my boys. Sparky decided that he wanted to put Tiger to bed and so they are reading Star Wars. Because what else would boys read before going to bed?