Here’s a snippet from a car ride conversation (or should I say debate?) last night:

Ethan: The moon is out. But where is the moon?
Lucas: Moon sleeping, o-tay?
Ethan: No it’s not sleeping! The moon is out.
Lucas: Eet-an, moon taking a nap, o-tay?

Our car ride conversations are always entertaining!

Categories: Ethan, Family, Lucas
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My Grandpa has a farm… although he is retired from farming, he still has his fields that he rents out. For the past couple years he has had his fields full of pumpkins and squash… and Gram and Gramp always load up their car and bring us boxes and boxes of goods. This year we decided to go out and pick some of our own to give out to family and friends. It was a beautiful sunny day and a great time with the family. I enjoyed the afternoon with, not only my kiddos but with my grandparents as well. We usually go to their place on a holiday so the whole fam is in and lots is going on. This particular Sunday afternoon was a bit different…. just a regular old day on the farm with Gram and Gramp. Spending a few hours in the field and coming back to a warm house with sloopy joes waiting for us. It was a fun day to remember and cherish.

Categories: Family
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Wow, it’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything. I’m not doing so good at managing my time well these days. And the blog is the first to get shoved to the back burner… I guess it’s better this then my family right. Well, we’ve kept busy this fall. It’s been an interesting one this year with our crazy Ohio weather… 30 degrees then back up to 80 and back to 50… I feel like our weather is constantly changing moods. Anyway, I don’t even know where to begin with what we’ve been up to for the past month… just the boys getting bigger and requiring lots of attention. Ethan is loving preschool and is doing great. So far I’ve only worked in the class once and it was a blast. I loved watching Ethan interact with the other kids and just watch him learn. Lucas loves everything Ethan does, loves to play with him and copy him. They’re really starting to become little buddies. If Lucas wakes up before Ethan he runs around the house “E-E, E-E” (that would be “Ethan” in Lucas language) and Lucas is the first person Ethan wants to see when he gets home from school. I love it.
Kevin has been busy with school and work. I don’t think I ever mentioned that he changed jobs… so… by the way, Kevin has a new job… as of May. He’s been working from home all summer and it’s been fantastic. We all love having him home and it’s really working out quite well. He just closes the office door if the kiddos are getting to loud but they LOVE to go knock on his door to say “HI” several times a day. What a blessing to have such a flexible schedule especially while he’s in school. I’ve been busy with 2 growing boys, church administration work and occasionally letting my creative juices flow into sewing bags and such. Fall is my favorite season and we’ve all enjoyed playing outside on cool, crisp, sunshiny days, picking apples, raking leaves and planting spring bulbs.

Here are some pictures of what we’ve been up to for the past month.

Ethan, and all the kids from preschool love to climb “the tree” after school everyday!!! If we “forget” to climb it, it’s not a fun ride home.

Marybeth and I threw a baby shower for our dear friend Melissa Hatch. It was a beautiful day to celebrate such a beautiful miracle … with 30 friends and family!

Ethan LOVES Melissa!!

Great Gram and Gramp reading to the boys.

Ethan’s first field trip at school was to the Pumpkin Peddler. He was so excited and just loved picking his own pumpkin.

They got to go on a hayride too… can you tell he’s excited!

We also celebrated Kevin’s 31st birthday with our annual trip to The Real Seafood Company for his free birthday meal.

Then my parents took him out for another great meal at Mon Ami in Cawtaba Island, Ohio

I finished a new bag this month… for my friend Melissa (a diaper bag). I was quite pleased with my new design. And hope to be making many more.

No fall season is complete without going apple picking…

We had to use ladders most of the day as the trees were very picked over, all the apples were left at the top!

Kevin’s family came in to celebrate Kevin’s birthday… it’s always fun to have them here for a visit

Ethan cuddling with Uncle Joel

Categories: Family, General
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Every Sunday we go to my parents house after church for lunch and usually stick around till the kids bedtime. It’s become a “tradition” and the boys know it is part of our Sunday routine. Ethan loves playing with PaPa and Lucas is also getting old enough to anticipate the visit each week too. A few Sunday’s ago, my mom and I left after lunch to do some stuff around town and Kevin was inside the house studying while Lucas took a nap. Ethan wanted to stay with PaPa … I got this email from my Dad this week that brought tears to my eyes… what sweet memories for him AND Ethan! Thanks for sharing your heart Dad! I love you and so does Ethan!

“Last Sunday was a very memorable Sunday with Ethan. He and I were out in the garden, which is always fun with him, when you guys were gone. We were picking the cherry tomatoes and I kept telling him just the red ones and not the orange or green ones. Every once in a while I would remind him when his hand was heading toward an orange one. On a few occasions his little hand came out of the tomato plant with a red or orange one as well as a green one. He promptly discarded the green one on the ground without a word or hesitation and quickly moved on to get the next tomato. A little later I was stooping by the garden’s edge pulling a few weeds and showing him how as of course he wanted to help and pull weeds as well. As I am going about my little task and not paying too much attention, all of a sudden I notice that he has somehow nudged his way into my lap to sit on my knee and watch. A few very precious moments occurred like that. The final episode came after I had tightened the sting on the grape tomato vine at the end of the garden and had walked back and stood under the apple tree looking at the garden and again not paying too much attention as to where Ethan was at that time. All of sudden I feel this great big thud square on the top and smack dab in the middle of my head from something hitting me. It must have startled me so since it caught me with such surprise, that I jumped. Before I could look around to see what the object was and where it came from that caused such commotion, I hear this soft quiet voice behind me saying with great sadness, “I’m sorry”. When I looked around, I must have had such a frown of bewilderment that he said he was sorry several more times. Then, when I looked at him and realized he had launched one of the largest apples that was lying on the ground and landed a perfect bull’s eye on my head, I gave him a great big grin and his forlorn look turned into jubilant laughter. Of course he want to do it again but I discouraged him and we went on enjoying the rest of our time by the little garden on a nice, quiet, sunny Sunday afternoon. Thanks for the memories, Ethan.”
Love,
Dad

I, of course didn’t get any pictures since I was gone that day but here are some pictures from last year… looks like this will be an annual thing… helping PaPa in the little garden.

Categories: Ethan, Family
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Actually… summer is more than in full swing… it’s almost over… tear. But we have been trying to enjoy every moment of it! Playing in the kiddy pool, going to the park, enjoying ice cream runs, and most recently bike rides… lots of them!!! Kevin finally got his old bike from his parents house, got it working and we bought a bike trailer for my bike for the kiddos. It’s been a blast riding all over Bowling Green. Getting some exercise but more importantly saving a few bucks in GAS!!!! I try to do as many errands as I can on the bike and so far have only used the car about once a week to do the big grocery shopping. It’s great… I feel so frugal. The kids like it too. We go to the bank drive through line to make our church weekly deposit and the boys love getting suckers. I never asked for them before when we were in the car… but now they know the bank gives out candy! We ride to Bible Study on Wednesday’s and the park a couple times a week. Tonight we all rode to the park for a picnic and the Library was doing a program on bugs which made it an extra special night complete with ice cream. On our way home, we stopped at DQ for some ice cream with our dear friends the Core’s. We are just loving the warm, summer weather and hope it lasts well in to the fall!

Ethan made wings and antenna for the “bug” theme

Categories: Family
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Ha! I can’t believe July is almost over!!! But here are some pictures from our 4th of July celebration. Yes, you will see us all in long sleeves and pants… thanks to our lovely Ohio weather it was rather cold on the 4th of July. Kevin and I were both suffering from 3 week colds that just wouldn’t go away but we couldn’t miss the fireworks at Ft. Meigs! Now that we have kids, it’s more fun watching them watch the fireworks than actually watching them ourselves.

Categories: Family, Holiday
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After the wedding, the rest of our weekend in Detroit was filled with playtime with the kiddos. The weather was great so we walked down to Kevin’s old elementary school to play at the playground… we all had lots of fun.

Lucas really started taking off walking this weekend… it was so fun to see both boys run towards all the playground equipment!

Gramp Vile really knows how to play!

Not ready to do this alone yet.

That’s better… thanks Uncle Joel

Categories: Family
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