The Good Ole Days

Remember those good old days when you were a kid, and you sat at the table and ate your favorite cereal, while reading the side of the box? I say, relive those days! It doesn't matter how old you are, you can recapture those times. Who cares who might see you. Just do it. Seriously!

My kids are restricted on the sugar cereals on school days. They're just wild enough as it is. But during summer, or vacations, these restrictions are lifted. The other day, I came downstairs, and all three of them were sitting there in front of a cereal box, reading it, and doing the puzzles and activities.

So, if you can't beat 'em, I guess you should join 'em! I sat with them. I poured myself a good old bowl of Apple Jacks and ate it with them. As soon as I sat down, they were showing me things on the side of their cereal box. I helped Collin make it through a maze of syrup to make it to the bowl of Cinnamon Toast Crunch.

Theron said, look mommy, this one is good for you...it doesn't have any fat, but it has 5 grams of fiber. "That's good for you!" he said. Yea, that's good for you, Theron!

My favorite is Lucky Charms. I love it. I could live on it. In fact, years ago when I had my appendix out, and I was trying to get my appetite back, I ate Lucky Charms. After a week or so, that did the trick! Wait a second...that was 10 years ago! Wow. Time flies.

I think Lucky Charms is quite nearly a perfect food. If only it was all marshmallows, now that would be truly magically delicious! Collin says, "Lucky Charms make you lucky, mommy!" Well, I guess it's true, because I have those three!

What's your favorite?

Summer is in Full Swing!

Well, summer is in full swing here at my house. And with it comes the obvious question...what do I do with these three boys all summer? I really don't know. I'm going to have to figure something out.

So, we have a really nice family behind us at our new house. The boys really like hanging out with them. The only problem is, they have to climb over the fence to get there. Well, either that, or walk all the way around the block! And, well, that's just too far, especially for the little one. So, they climb the fence.

Here's S heading over at like 8 a.m. I'm still in my pajamas, but I had to snap these pictures. It's so cute. It's so early in the morning, and he even still has bed-head!

So, I love my new house! We planted some rose bushes, and look at this! I love yellow roses, and it's acutally producing flowers! I'm so proud! It's like a new baby.

All right, so I know that got you in the mood to see more of my nature pictures.

That was shameless. Just a shameless attempt to get more compliments for my amateur photography.

What a week!

Well, some of you have asked when I would finally be done driving my kids an hour to school. Well, we are done. It's a sad occasion, and a happy one. I have putting off blogging about it because I'm so emotional about it.

Here's Shane getting chased by the girls on his last day of school. He's gonna be a heartbreaker with that blonde hair and tan skin. He wanted to wear his "My Dad, My Hero" shirt on his last day. It's kind of funny. He was sooo sad about leaving his friends, yet he wanted to wear that shirt. It's so tough for military families to move as much as they do. It really puts a strain on the kids when they get old enough to really get attached to friends. Yet, I think my kids are proud of what their dad does, and understand that it's a sacrifice, but it's a worthy one.

At the end of the day, Shane and his class were supposed to sit in a circle, and tell one great thing about the year, and one thing they didn't like so much. The boys were all saying the one bad thing was their friend Shane leaving. Shane was crying, his head in his shirt. His friends all started crying, and there I was, in the back of the class trying not to lose it. It was sad. I don't think I'll ever forget that.

All right, on to my baby. Yikes, I'm holding back the tears now! He graduated from kindergarten! Here he is holding up a picture of what he wants to be when he grows up...a pilot! OK, I said to D, mommy's never going to sleep.. You can't see it on the picture, but the dude in the picture, which is supposed to be Collin when he grows up and becomes a pilot, has a shirt on that says, "I love my job". Too cute.

So, here he is graduating. He's in the front, in the middle. I don't know why he's so close to the other guy. Maybe because there's a girl on the other side. But, she's cute! I digress. The little hats were so cute. My son's was the only one that kept sliding forward. Of course, he was playing with the tassle, so that didn't help.

During the kindergarten graduation, they showed a video of pictures from the entire year. I was sitting there fighting back tears! I mean, seriously! I'm going to be a mess when this little guy graduates high school!

We went to the park this week with daddy, and here they are looking at nature. I love taking the unposed pictures!

So, here's the little guy...Collin, I am so proud of you! I love you!

OK, so on to Theron. He graduated elementary school. Here's his desk I decorated. I loved the card I picked out, if I may say so myself.

All right, so he had a graduation ceremony as well. Geez, people, come on, how much do you think I can take in one week? They also did a video recapping the entire 6th grade year. I'm a mess!

He's my shy one. He's a little nervous about going up to get his elementary school diploma.

But he does it, and his mommy is about to lose it big time in the audience.

So, that's my week. It was hard. It was very bittersweet. We are on to new adventures, which is nothing new to military families, and that's exciting sometimes. We had to leave friends, and that's excrutiating sometimes! Seriously!

Memorial Day Water Fight

Serious taunting going on here...

We had a great Memorial Day, and I hope you did also!

More Fun with my Zoom Lens

OK, so I am so inspired by a few other blogging ladies who take beautiful pictures! I'm just a newbie, but I did get a new zoom lens for Mother's Day, and I'm having fun with it. We went to the zoo today, and I kept stopping to take close ups of flowers. People would be walking up, looking into the greenery, wondering if there was an animal! It was funny. I was faking people out.

So, here I was trying to learn how to manually focus in on an object with the zoom lens, and blur everything else out behind it. I think it looks cool.

Even just a leaf makes a beautiful picture if I do say so myself!

OK, it's a little too late for Mother's Day, but look at this! AWWWWW!!!

PPPFFFFTTTTTT!!!!

OK, so this grasshopper walks into a bar...AH Ha Ha!

That cracks me up. It totally looks like he's telling the other one a joke.

OK, well, I took over a hundred pictures. Like a ton more flowers, and a ton of the bird sanctuary, with the boys feeding the birds, but I just can't bore you in that way.

I'll close with this picture. I think it would be a great entry for the Father's Day picture contest, but I am entirely sure I won't be able to figure out the "Mr. Linky" and "link back to here" and post this button process. I'm just such a newbie!

So, here it is. I think it shows the true nature of my boys. Number one, not following the rules, by climbing on the fence. Don't worry, this wasn't the lion display or anything. I actually think they were watching a ground squirrel. Number two, it's shows how daddy is just joining in. Lastly, I love it. After a year of doing all these things without him, I love it!!! I love it that they can have these daddy moments now.

Plus, he's a good husband also, because if you look closely, he's carrying my Diet Dr. Peppers in his backpack! Now, that's love.

Finally...a post!

Sorry, I have heard from someone...uh hmmm...that I haven't posted in a while. It's quite true. This week was another tough week of commuting the kids. It really is hard when you don't have a house to go to during the day! Luckily Wendy has been nice enough to let me go to her house.

But more importantly, what happened on Lost? I am so Lost. I can't figure out that show. I suppose that's the point. I truly believe the name of the show is Lost, not because the people are lost on an island, I believe it's a sick cruel joke that we're always lost! But, I loved seeing Apollo Anton Ohno with Dancing with the Stars. He was really good.

So, I'll post some pics now for the fun of it. Here we are at Wendy's b-day party...First picture of the both of us in quite some time...I usually don't like to get my picture taken...

Here I am feeling a little "sheepish" and Shane is a cow, and Collin is a pig. Theron refused, which is why he took the picture.
Here we are helping Thomas Jefferson with the Declaration of Independance. Don't look directly into Theron's eyes. It's a little creepy. Not sure why he did that with his eyes!

So, I got a zoom lens for my camera, and I've been trying it out. I'm not very good yet, but I'm trying. Here's my first attempt to get Collin on a see-saw from across the park...

Well, I was going to post some pictures from field day this week, but I think I'll do it tomorrow, just to give you something to look forward to...

Hope everybody has a wonderful Memorial Day weekend.

Two by Two...About Me

Liza from Liza's Eyeview tagged me to do this! I really enjoy reading her posts! Thanks for tagging me so I could take time out from my cleaning to do a post. Hey, at least I can tell D I had to do it!

Two Names You Go By:

1. Kristen to friends, or K to D
2. Mommy

Two Things You Are Wearing Right Now:

1. Exercise Pants (though I have not exercised today)
2. Purple T-Shirt

Two Things You Want in a Relationship:

1. love
2. honesty

Two of Your Favorite Things to do:

1. Napping
2. Watching movies

Two Things You Want Very Badly At The Moment:

1. A nap
2. A glass of wine

What 2 pets you had/have:

1. Bandit - a black lab
2. Brandee - a yellow lab (naughty dog)

Two people who will fill this out first: I'll tag...

1. Stacy - Bowl Full of Wishes - new blogger, go check her out!
2. Susie - The Solo Family - because she gives good answers to questions

Two things you did last night:

1. Went to a dinner for my friend Wendy's birthday
2. Watched an episode of 24

Two people who live at your house:

1. D
2. Boys (there's three of them, but I can't leave one out...there will be mass chaos)

Two things you ate today:

1. Rice Krispie Treat at a reception to honor active duty military at my possible new church
2. Hot Dog for lunch (hey, D made lunch...I'm lucky it wasn't beenie weenies)

Two people you talked to last:

1. Shane - "do your homework that's due tomorrow"
2. Collin - "pick this up..."

Two things you're doing tomorrow:

1. Driving my kids to school
2. Sitting on Wendy's sofa possibly

Two Favorite Holidays:

1. Thanksgiving (love, love, love fall)
2. Christmas

Two favorite beverages:

1. Diet Dr. Pepper
2. Regular Dr. Pepper (what can I say? I'm a pepper. Are you a pepper? I know you'd like to be one. I can show you how...)

That was fun. Does anybody know me any better?