These are the days

You know those moments when you stand back and look at your children and realize how wonderful your life is? Yep, had one of those moments last night. As I stood watching Leyton play Hide-and-Seek with the big boys (Britton and his cousin Alex), I realized how very, VERY blessed I am. I listened to Britton in his very patient five-year old voice instruct Leyton on how to play, and how he needed to cover his eyes to count (really, he is the most patient little guy I've ever seen with his little brother). I watched Leyton with his eyes squeezed so tightly shut and listened to him count in his tiny two-year old voice through his chubby two-year old fingers and my heart just smiled. I love both of these little men so much, and it's the little moments like these I never want to forget. :)

POOF!

At Kristy's gentle prodding, I'm posting our 4th of July pictures actually within a week of the actual holiday. I know. It's a new record for me. :)

So we had a great holiday weekend! What did we do? Absolutely nothing. It was fabulous! Actually, we did a lot of little things. But we are always moving. And I mean ALWAYS. So the chance to sit at home for three days and just be a family? We were thrilled. :) Like I said, there were a bunch of fun little things in there with the kids, a few fun outings, dinner out, etc. But the highlight was definitely the fireworks on the 4th. As is the tradition, we met up with the Wingerters' for the annual fireworks display. We claim it's for the kids, but I think we all know who really enjoys it the most (ahem. John and PJ). We had grand plans to go watch the big fireworks display at Kristy's parents' old neighborhood, but it started to rain, so we stayed here and ate dessert instead! :) It was very low key, but the kids had fun and I think we all enjoyed the slower pace this year!

As for the title of this post, Leyton talked all day about "Mark Thomas come over and we do POOFS!" (fireworks - we told him fireworks go POOF, so now he just calls them poofs - love it!)

I love the look on Mark's face in this picture. Looks like he's thinking about doing something sneaky. ;)


Leyton and Mark, just prior to the Morning Glory smashing that would render them worthless (never could get them to light after Mark and Leyton got a hold of them).

Leyton showing Mark how it's done...

Britton with a sparkler... A huge deal for the kid that's scared to death of fireworks. :)

Leyton's first sparkler! Somehow I didn't get a picture of Mark with his, but he was quite a pro!

A Date with the Little Man

This afternoon, Leyton and I had some time to kill all by ourselves (rarely does this happen - we are ALWAYS going somewhere). I promised Leyton a special treat because it was Friday (a tradition my parents started with us when we were little - we always got a "special treat" after school on Fridays - usually a trip to QT for a snack!). I had a coupon for a couple of free cookies at Merritt's, so off we went, chatting about our "special treat" all the way. Too bad they were closed for the week for summer vacation when we got there. (REALLY Merritt's? A whole week? Don't they know there are two year olds and Mommies depending on them?!?) Needless to say, this didn't sit well with the two year old. Since I'm all about thinking on my feet these days, we made an emergency run to Starbucks! I know, it sounds like it's more for me than Leyton, but really, he loves it as much as I do. He flirts with all the cute baristas, and generally ends up with a cookie! Today was no exception, and we even had time to sit down and enjoy our special treat! And to top it off, one of the other customers told me she thought he was so handsome and should be a GAP baby! Ha! I wish!!

How I love this little man. :)