Belated Father's Day

Father's Day was a kind of a drag this year... The week before I spent helping to watch my sister's kids while she was out of town and the rest of the week in the hospital with Zac. So, I got nothing done ahead of time for Andy and I told him we would celebrate the following week. He was cool with that!

The dinner menu consisted of Grilled Ribeyes, Tiger Pawns, loaded baked potatoes, corn, rolls, and salad. It was so good. I found the best recipe for grilling the prawns. It was 2 Tbl. Soy sauce, 1 Tbl. oil, and 3-4 cloves minced garlic. Put the prawns in a Ziploc with the marinade and let sit for 20 minutes at room temp. Throw em on a skewer and grill. To die for!!

Wendy - this picture is for you!

We got Andy a few new shirts for Father's Day, this is one of them. I have convinced him that he needs to dress a little bit more "hip". When you wear a size 3-4 XL, you kind of take what you can get but now that he's in a 2 XL, the choices are endless! this is one of my favorite shirts we got him!

Andy spent the afternoon in a secret clubhouse with the kids! Zac had fun in it too!

Are they excited to bring Andy his gift or what???

Andy's favorite - Henry Weinhard's Root beer, yum!

Brynley getting a look at Andy's favorite gift!

Andy holding his "Daddy" picture.

A close up of the Daddy picture.

I have done this for Andy every year beginning when Hayden was a year old. It has been a lot of fun and is something Andy looks forward to getting for his office. The more kids we add, the trickier the photoshoot becomes but it all works out! Hayden was my best model this year which is not like him at all so that was kind of fun.

We love you Andy, thanks for being a great Dad!

Memorial Day

Memorial Day was so much fun this year! We had Meredith and family (minus Steve - he was sick), our good friends the Bernigers, and it was so fun to have Andy's parents with us as well.

We began the afternoon with a ton of swimming! I didn't bring my camera out but the pool was full of kids, adults, and a lot of noise! Grandma stayed inside for this part, the craziness was a little overwhelming.

After swimming the kids (including Big Adam) had a watermelon eating contest. Meredith brought a few huge watermelons over for the kids to devour. I was actually pretty surprised at how much Hayden got into the contest, he hardly came up for air! It was a close race between Hayden, Lindsay, and Big Adam. I kind of think Hayden might have won, it was so fun to watch!

Brynley ate watermelon for awhile but then thought the slip n' slide looked a little more fun!

This is my only picture from dinner... I had to get a picture of it though, it was too good not to share! I made these amazing burgers, they are Basil Pesto Burgers. I got the recipe from my friend Kristin here. They are seriously so good... I am a basic cheese burger kind of person myself but I think I have been converted to liking these better. You must try them!

We ended the evening with yet another party for Hayden... More presents form the family and Bernigers ended a great birthday week for Hayden!

T-Ball Season is over!

So T-ball ended in May and I'm just now getting around to posting about it, oh well who cares right?!?!

Hayden had a great time playing T-ball. We can still tell that he is not going to be the world's greatest athlete any time soon but he had fun!

Poor Hayden... the big head, sticky outie ears and glasses made it very hard to fit a the helmet on his head. Apparently in a league like this, they only have one size of helmet. I felt bad for him every time he had to squish that thing on his noggin!

Good swing Hayden!

Waiting to run to the next base

Good running Hayden!

The entire team - Hayden was excited that his team was orange, his favorite color!

I must say this was our most disappointing experience with sports leagues around here. For what we had to pay, I felt pretty ripped off that all they got for it was a T-shirt, not even a baseball hat! And I think they only had 6 games. With 16 kids on the team, it didn't give them much playing time. I think we will seek out a different league next time.

Hayden's 6th Birthday Party!

I'm not sure why but it seemed like Hayden's birthday lasted forever this year! With Andy's parents coming to town we had time to do a lot of celebrating!

The week started with me bringing doughnuts in to Hayden's classroom. It wasn't on his birthday because school got out the day before his birthday so the teacher asked me to do it a few days before school got out. I forgot my camera so no pictures.

(This picture should go later in the post but since I am not able to move pics around when blogging, it will have to stay here. This is a picture of Hadyen's B-day party when all the boys were having contests with their paper airplanes)

Andy's parents got to town the day before his birthday so we decided to go out to dinner with them on his birthday. He ALWAYS chooses Red Robin but we were not in the mood for burgers so I somehow convinced him to choose Gecko Grill instead. It's our favorite Mexican/BBQ restaurant, Andy's parents loved it as well! We then made out trek over to Krispy Kreme for a free dozen glazed doughnuts since it was Hayden's Birthday. We go there about 4 times a year (when each of us has a birthday!) Gotta love Krispy Kreme!

The day after Hayden's Birthday we had a "pajama party" at our house for him. He wanted a sleepover (which was out of the question) so we opted for a pajama party instead. The kids would come in PJ's bring pillows and end the party with a movie! We ended up having 8 boys, a few had to cancel at the last minute but I think 8 was the perfect amount. As they arrived they each chose a paper airplane and had races with them outside. We then played some outside games and later came inside for pizza. I decided to let the kids decorate their own cupcakes - they thought it was super cool and I didn't have to frost and decorate them!

Here's a picture of the boys with their completed cupcakes!

Singing to Hayden

Opening presents! Hayden got some great gifts including some Bakugans, slip n slide, Bionicle, spider man lego ship, magnetic cars, a transformer, and money! He was not at all disappointed that's for sure!

The boys all settled down and ready to watch a movie!

This was by far the best/easiest Birthday Party I have ever thrown. The kids had a blast and there was very little effort required on my part! I overheard two of the boys talking about how this was the best party ever! Yay! They all left that night with a king sized candy bar. That was way easier than filling a small bag with crap and sending it home!

It doesn't end here though... Hayden had another small party a few days later on Memorial Day. That will be included in another post.

Summer Days

Fun in the sun!

It was only 105 degrees out today so the kids thought it was a perfect time for jumping on the trampoline! It only lasted about 5 minutes, just enough time for me to get a few pictures!

What a difference a week makes!

Zac - 1 Week Post Op

So, he's as cute as a button, what can I say? Zac is getting around quite well... however, he has not spent all of his time the last few days being this cute and happy! It's been a rough couple of days. Andy thinks he's going through withdrawals because he got addicted to the Hydrocodone that we have now stopped giving him. I think he's just still a bit uncomfortable and he can't quite figure out how to be still and just rest! Hopefully he will be back to himself in a few more days. These pictures are evidence that he is well on his way! We are so thankful that the surgery appears to have been successful. Zac has not vomited 1 time in the last 7 days, woo hoo!!! Miracles do happen!

Hospital Pictures

I never got these uploaded while we were still in the hospital so here they are:

If you look at Zac's poor face, this is how he looked for 4 straight hours, pacifier hanging out of his mouth halfway and scowling. It was really sad...

As soon as I brought Mr. Turtle near him he immediately grabbed it tightly and held on even in his half drugged state.

This picture shows both of Zac's IV ports, one at his wrist and one at his ankle.

Finally in his room and sleeping soundly (once he was given morphine) it knocked him right out!

The first time he actually woke up not screaming, this was taken Friday afternoon, 24 hours post op.

The first time he sat up, also Friday afternoon, and he's almost smiling!

We took him to the playroom but the IV's were bugging him so badly that he only lasted a few minutes.

Playing with dad and actually almost laughing on Saturday morning.

Saturday afternoon... I was trying to sleep and Zac figured out finally that he could stand up even with the annoying IV's.

Staring at me, wondering why I won't get him out of his cage!

You can see 4 of the 5 incisions here. I am so glad that they are so small, hopefully they will eventually hardly be seen! The scary cutting was on the inside, those were some big incisions!

Saturday afternoon, Zac is happy to see Hayden and Brynley and get some real clothes on! The kids wanted to sit in his crib with him, how cute!