This week we purchased a video camera.  Yup our very own video camera.  If you want details about it you’ll have to talk to Damion.  All I know is that it is a Canon HF11 with HD capabilities.  Once Damion figures the editing software and teaches me how to upload videos we’ll share our kids’ cuteness & funniness with you!

Yesterday we took the camera to the park and shot some footage while the kids played but unfortunately our time there was shortened by Jack pushing Anna into a slide which resulted in blood from her bottom lip getting on her, Damion and the slide.  For the record we are not sure if the push was intentional or not but at bed time Anna accepted the not present apology from Jack.  This morning the lip was a bit swollen but seems like it will heal okay.  

The one thing that came to light while watching the video from yesterday is that Jack squeals a lot!  I know he makes noises (boy he likes making random noises) but the amount of squealing surprised me.  Guess I’ve learned to ignore it.  Yesterday afternoon I mowed the backyard while the kids played.  Jack took Anna’s stroller, with Baby in it still, from her and proceeded to mimic me.  He went back and forth in the yard and when I stopped he stopped and when I shut off the mower a couple of times he too stopped and came closer to us and ran back to the stroller when I started the mower.  Today he once again stole the stroller, with Baby in it again, and pushed it around the yard.  Any guesses as to who is getting his own outside push toy this weekend?

Tonight per Anna’s request, she and Damion will be camping out in the backyard.  We even got her a youth sleeping bag.  She is excited.  She didn’t understand why she could nap in the backyard.  After our walk to Starbucks (fewer calories if you walk to get it :) ) we put the kids down for a short nap.  Damion took that time to lay out the tent so Anna can help put it up later.  He said while doing that he looked up and saw Anna in her window looking out at him.  They said hi to each other, he told her she should be napping and she walked away.  Too bad she’s not excited, eh?

Oh, and let me not forget a public thank you to Adam!  He saw my previous post asking for somebody to watch Anna & Jack so I could go scrapbook supply shopping.  He proposed a night out for all of us.  Adam & Damion took the kids to Gander Mountain & Guitar Center while I spent an hour and a half at Scrapadoodle.  I got a bunch more stuff bought for next weekend.  So, THANK YOU ADAM!!!

Much to Damion’s annoyance I let the kids play with stuff (read as dirty dishes) in the sink while I’m making dinner or doing anything that puts me in the kitchen for an extended period (read as more than 5 minutes).  Today the task was making cookies and phase one of dinner.  At one point Anna got down to get a cookie and cookie dough (for the record I think she prefers the cookie dough over the cookies) and went back to her spot at the sink.  A bit later she got my attention and said, “Mommy, your cookies make me happy.”  What a sweetheart!

Today I took on the task of mowing the backyard, seriously I think the kids could have gotten lost in it, okay maybe it wasn’t quite that bad.  We usually bag our clippings but out of pure laziness I decided to let the mower “mulch” the clippings.  Now when I was going to do this the kids were going to be in the backyard playing.  Apparently Jack didn’t get the memo about the playing part.  He spent a portion of the time walking beside me and making the happiest little noises he could make.  At one point I stopped the mower to talk with Anna and Jack ran to the mower and held onto the handle part with a great look of determination.  Is he to young to have mowing our lawn, of course you have to overlook the fact that he can’t push the mower.

Also, if anybody is in the area over the next two weeks and want to watch our kids for an hour or two, let me know….I have some scrapbook shopping to do.

Two posts in less then a week!  Can you believe it?  Everybody breathing okay now?

Friday night we had an Unbirthday Birtday Party for Damion .  It was a surprise party that remained a surprise until he got home from work.  I was so impressed that he didn't find out about it.  Anna & I were planning to have a party for him on his actual birthday but as you may or may not recall, that was was three days after he rolled the ATV and a day after he got home for DC. It was a time when he was enjoying the benefits of prescription painkillers. Basically it was not a good time to have a birthday party, which Anna was all excited about having.  A couple of days after his birthday Anna was still wishing Damion and happy birthday. Damion proceeded to advise Anna of the term Happy UnBirthday. From that point on she's been talking about an UnBirthday party for Damion.  So, Friday night was the night for fun with friends and family and friends that are like family.

Today we made a decision regarding Anna.  After two and a half years of Anna growing her curly hair we decided to "tame" it by getting her hairs cut and giving her hair shape.  We took her to a place that specializes in doing kids' cuts.  They have fun chairs for the kids and a small area to occupy siblings.  Anna got to pick a movie (I selected Finding Nemo) to watch while getting her hair cut and got to select which chair she wanted to sit in (she selected the pink car).  Anna sat in the chair like she'd had her hairs cut several times already.  My little baby girl looks like a little girl now.

I also have to complain about something.  Last week while making lunch I burnt my onearm (Some might call it a forearm but I only have two arms and since I count left to right my left arm is my onearm and my right arm in my twoarm.  Quite simple don't you think?) on the pizza sheet that I had used to cook our fun hot dogs (our Schwans man prefers I call them mini corn dogs).  It created a burn about four inches long.  It is healing well, thank you for asking.  The problem is that it is SUPER itchy and all I want to do is scratch it but I know that's not good for it so instead I think I shall go get some sugar snap peas or watermelon and watch Firefly and try to ignore my itchy onearm.

An issue was brought to my attention that I already knew about.  There were a couple of albums in the gallery that did not have pictures in them.  Here’s the deal.  My puter wasn’t allowing me to upload pictures.  And when I say it was my puter I mean it was my puter and not user error.  After Damion deleted my IE cookies (anybody for a Cookie Monster “Delete Cookies!!” flair here?) all seems to be working again.  And the problem was with an update that my computer just does without me telling it to do it!

Damion is slowly healing.  He is working at getting his bicycle ready so he can ride it to work again.  He is also working on several projects around the house, with Anna’s assistance and approval of course.

I am trying to get my scrapbook stuff organized for a weekend of working at catching up.  I’m having to start at the kids’ birthday party and work my way forward.  Gosh we are busy people when you try to scrapbook the highlights.

Anna is testing her boundaries and talking in fuller sentences.  Some of her favorites phrases are “one more thing”, “Jackie buddy” (FYI she is the only person who gets to call Jack Jackie”, “wait guys”.  After the last rain store she was all excited because she thought I stopped the rain.  I told her I didn’t.  Then she got excited because that meant Damion stopped the rain.  Damion told her he did not stop the rain but that God did.  So now she thinks that she stopped the rain and “Gog” helped.  While a bit flawed it’s a good start, right?

Jack is starting to realize that he has the ability to grab Anna’s hair or shirt and get a reaction from her.  He is attempting to grab her shirt more and move her out of the way.  He is working on his verbal skills.  The words he utters the most seem to be “thank you”, “uh oh”, and “door”.  The phrases he recognizes the quickest involve leaving the house.  “Jack, let’s go bye bye” translates into drop everything and run to garage door.  “Jack, wanna play outside” translates into drop everything and run to open the patio door.

Ah, the patio door, which we are looking at replacing.  Why?  Well, Anna & Jack can now both open it themselves.  So if you visit and you can’t find them in the house they are likely left the house and are in the backyard blowing bubbles and playing on their new playset.  Yup we finally got them a new playset.  

We took delivery of the playset pieces Mother’s Day weekend and the kids were playing on it a week later.  Not too bad I think considering most of that time period we were under thunderstorm warnings/watches, tornado warnings/watches and flood warnings/watches.  One of Damion’s co-workers came on night to help get it started and a couple hours later there was a deckles tower.  Last Saturday Damion and I worked on it for almost 2.5 hours while the kids slept.  We started around 1 pm and by 6:30 pm we had a completed play set.

Pictures?  Oh we got bunches of them.  A couple of albums to end Aprils and some to start May.