our new dentist

one of my least favorite things about moving is finding new doctors.  I tend to wait until I "need" them to make the change.  Well, after 6 months had come and gone I knew it was time to find a dentist for both Adam and I and the boys.  I was very surprised at how difficult it was to find a dentist in the area that was covered by our plan.  The only pediatric dentist in network was in a town 20+ minutes away...not too far...just not what I have been used to.  I ended up finding somewhere close that will file the paperwork for me with insurance...and I think I have to pay an extra $10 per visit or so...worth the extra 40 minutes of driving to me!  So enough rambling...on to the fantastic experience.

First, the lobby was awesome.  They had lots of toys and two gaming systems set up too.  We don't have anything like that yet, but Carter immediately sat down to play.  After their check-ups they wanted to keep playing in the lobby.  Smart doctor.

Carter was in the big kid area in an open room with several chairs.  I wasn't supposed to go back with him...but I got to sneak a quick picture after Ben was done with his cleaning.  love the sunglasses.  another smart move.



Ben's check-up was in a private room with several toys too. And I sat on a cube and the dentist sat on a cube and I got to hold Ben (or at least the bottom half of him!) while I laid him back in her lap for her to do the cleaning. He resisted at first...but I think him sitting in my lap definitely contributed to a good appointment.

Here he is with his prized egg toy after a good check-up...



Another neat thing they do at this office is putting your name on a leaf on their cavity free trees! Each month they start with empty trees and if you have a cavity free check-up they write your name on a leaf and you get to hang it on the tree. Proud that both boys got to add a leaf to the tree this visit!





Can't believe it...but I am actually looking forward to taking them back to the dentist!!!

This and That...

Here are some random cell phone pics from the month of February...

We had a fun visit from Gram...



I got to watch a friend's little girl while she unpacked after a move. These two are just 10 days apart and are so cute!



The boys playing tee-ball in the backyard while I was busy in my sewing room...



We have entered the fort building world...



And the room deconstruction world...



We had a little bit of ice/snow...



This little boy cleaned more dishes than me...



We went to spy on a giant crane in the neighborhood...over 80 tons!



At the end of the day they let our boys climb in to the driver's seat (of course I didn't have my phone then!)

According to the boys it was loud...



We had lots of fun making "drums" at the Traveling Teacher show (a free art/music class at our local mall that is all about recycling and has a fun green haired puppet names "Org" (short for Organic)).



We had a hungry dinosaur in the kitchen one night...



The boys did some painting...



We always like to play dressup...



We made lots of Valentine's for our family...



We made mohawks in the bathtub...



Carter enjoys reading to Ben these days...so sweet.



Mr. Cool Dude...



Carter asked to dress up like daddy one day...button shirt!!



Still cool...



My laundry helper (Carter) made "people" out of his clean clothes...



We made a birthday poster for Mimi...



We got to go to the UNC vs NC State game and ran into my friend Bridget...



Here is another UNC vs. NC State match-up



We played lots of games with a package of cups...



And made edible tinker toys out of marshmallows and toothpicks...



That is just about as random as it gets. Hope you enjoyed (if you made it this far!)

Valentine Fun

I had fun using my embroidery/sewing machine for some Valentine decor and making Valentines for the boys to hand out at school.

Here is the Valentine garland I made...I hung some from the windows in our kitchen and some on our mantle in the living room...and it took less than an hour!



I started with several sheets of red, pink, and white felt. Next I cut each sheet into 3 vertical strips. I took each strip and folded it in half and just freehand cut out half of a heart shape on the fold. I did this while watching tv...it was pretty mindless. Next I made 3 stacks of hearts by color on my sewing table and started feeding them through the sewing machine...and voila...a sweet garland.



For the boys' valentines I gave in to a trend. I have seen mustaches everywhere but thought it was just a silly fad and really didn't think it was all that cute. That is until I saw an idea of making lollipop mustache covers for valentines. I caved. And this is what I came up with...



I created some cards on the computer to attach to the lollipops and the boys got to color in the mustache/lips and write their name.





And here are the boys on Valentine's Day enjoying their lollipops from each other.



On Valentine's morning the boys surprised me with flowers...



And we opened some fun Valentine's from all the grandparents too...



That morning I took the boys to Krispy Kreme for a donut treat...



And then to the local children's museum where we made towns...



And had quite the construction leader...



The boys gave me several Valentine's throughout the day...



After reading all of the above...I realized I painted the oh-so-perfect Valentine's...but thinking back on the day it was a tough day.  We were going through a bad spout with the boys behavior wise and I am pretty sure Adam didn't even fix the meal he had planned for us on Valentine's night because we were both so drained from the afternoon/bedtime routine that day.  I had several $ store surprises in a bag for the boys that morning and Carter (who is usually the most happy-go-lucky-sweet-kind hearted kid) took one thing out of the bag, threw it on the ground and said "I didn't want that!"  Well, that shocked me and hurt me.  We had some serious talks and I think it got through but the rest of the day still had difficult moments.  Adam and I tried to stay consistent with our discpline and responses and thankfully the phase passed...but it was a fun...but also difficult day.  Just wanted to mention that...even though I post about a lot of fun things...there are plenty of struggles too. 

Another Birthday Celebration

Somehow January and February slipped by without much blog activity...so I am going to play catch up again.  :)  We celebrated Adam's birthday in early February.  It is so sweet to see the boys getting old enough to truly get excited about someone else's birthday.  We let Daddy sleep in and woke him (rather loudly) with singing and a cup of coffee and birthday muffin.



That afternoon we gave him a few special presents...picked out very lovingly by the boys in the dollar section at Target.



Here is daddy being a good sport with one of his new wigs...just what he wanted.



Daddy requested an Italian Creme Cake...it was tasty...but definitely a recipe I need to work on for appearance purposes. (lopsided and I didn't have the right flour so it didn't rise properly) My sweet boys didn't seem to mind, though.



The boys took a turn with the wigs too.



And here is the rest of the birthday loot...



New cones for fun challenges with Daddy (he does a great job of making up games with the cones in the backyard)
A heart shaped bath fizzer for fun bathtime with Daddy (Daddy does bathtime 6 out of 7 days of the week...Mommy is very thankful)
And the green wigs for fun dress up time with Daddy.

This Daddy is quite the good sport when it comes to his boys. He defintely pulls his fair share and lots of time I feel he pulls more weight than me even though I stay at home with the boys during the day. One thing is for sure, we are all blessed to call him daddy/husband and I am so thankful to have him in our life.

It's Beginning to Look a Lot Like Springtime...

We have been busy with lots of springtime activities lately...first up: Easter Eggs!

This is the first year we have dyed eggs with the boys and it was a lot of fun.  It seems like a lot of effort to make the eggs pretty and then just stick them back in the fridge...but oh well...we enjoyed it so I guess it was all worth it. 

Here we are all set up and ready to go...



Carter didn't care for the vinegar process...



But he got on board once we got to start dipping the eggs...



Surprise, Surprise, Ben chose to dye all of his eggs blue!



So I am sure this is by fault of the egg boiler and not the egg peeler, but this is what all of Adam's peeled eggs end up looking like. :) This egg cracked at some point in the process and was not dyable so we ate it up.



Here is our finished product...



Our next spring time activity involved our garden! Yippee! We missed out on gardening all together last year due to the move/summer apartment situation so I was so excited for the boys to get to play in the dirt and help start our seeds. Our neighbors also came over to help.



They did a good job taking turns helping me plant seeds. I didn't think I could handle eight little hands at a time trying to plant tiny seeds in any sort of organized manner so I had two at a time and Adam kept the other two busy shoveling or asking them to water the sidewalk.





Love this! He was so concentrated and interested in the process...
(side note...he had his first soccer game earlier that morning and didn't want to take off his jersey or his shin guards! (he scored a goal too!))



We did one tray of veggies (okra, peppers, tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots) and another tray with mostly flowers.

We also did a little bit of landscaping in the front. We edged the front beds and added a little bit of a curve. I want to add some brick as a border...but we priced some this weekend and it was more expensive than I expected so we are still searching for a good border possibility.



We added a couple of low spreading plants to the front edge. We also planted two hydrangea shrubs that came from Poppa and Nana's house and have been patiently waiting in pots since we moved.

Here is Carter standing in one of the hydrangea holes.



Now we have to wait for our seeds to grow and figure out where we are going to plant them in the backyard!

They say we are going to be in the mid 40's with rain again next weekend so I am glad we got outside while we could! (That groundhog did not tell the truth this year!)