Happy Halloween!

Rhetty is 4!

This little squirt of mine is 4. Wow!It is as hard to write that as it was putting 4 whole candles in his birthday cake. Can you believe it Porter!?!

Rhett loooves to hear the story about his birth (although he still can't get his head around that we didn't go to the hospital and simply pick out a baby). But I love retelling the story to him too. Not that it is anything hugely eventful (thank God), but it was such a sweet time in our lives,  welcoming our first child that October ( See Rhett's Birth  here).

 

Four years on this earth and we still haven't shaken our trash truck obsession.  So consequently, the recycle truck took center stage for  his fourth birthday party.

 

 When asked about his favorite part of the party- it was the pin the trash can (tail) on the trash truck (donkey). He was so flattered about his face being on that truck and about explaining where precisely his friends should aim their targets. We either have a future engineer in the family or sanitation worker :)

A few fun facts about my favoite 4 year old : Rhett has grown leap years in the past year. Three inches and 1 pound. That was his growth tally according to his teacher at the end of last school year... And evidenced by the picture of that string bean in his very first swim class this summer.

He is so inquisitive. From the time he wakes up to the time he goes down every question bears another question (sheesh!). On the way home from school the other day, Nina was singing London Bridges (on reapeat), Rhett chimed in : "Were the bridges brown or black? Were they train bridges or car bridges? Why did they fall down? Why did they lock her up?" He tells time via "days." "Is it morning day yet? Is it nap day yet? Is it Daddy-go-to-work day?"

Getting ready for school on his birthday

He thrives at school. I think we hit it out of the ballpark with his 3 year old teacher.

Miss Dallas putting his birthday hat on for the day

And while most kids have imaginery friends, Rhett has imagninery kids. Henry, Luke, and Egwitz. Although I haven't heard about Egwitz in a while. These are his kids, although they have a seperate mom and dad? Mostly I think he lives vicariously through them when things aren't quite going his way. "Well Henry and Luke get to eat candy corn for their breakfast!" "My kid Luke, you know his Mom and Dad let him watch cartoons for LOTS of times!" "My kid Henry always wanted a horsey and he is going to get one for his birthday!" Nice coping mechanism for a 4 year old.

Rhett is also the whistle blower of the family. He'll freak out if we acciently move 2 inches out of the driveway without all seat belt harnesses in place. He insists we stop and pray at the sound of a an ambulance, hold hands in the parking lot, and helmets, helmets people!

He often asks his mom (sweet)  if she will leave her hair down- because  he likes it " long and brown." The other day I was helping him cleanup after his bath and he looked up at me and asked "Will you always be my mommy?" After I wrung out my heart, I told him yes.

Happy 4th Rhett head!

Aack! Can I be any more fickle about blogging? I love it though. I love to look at old posts and see all those "remember when's" and how are family has changed and grown. I love writing about these times. But gosh, considering we just  did a couple major life events in a period of a few months like-   getting settled in our new house (yes we moved) and staying 'with it ' this pregnancy (yes, I am pregnant!), it has been hard to keep up. Which is why I think this weekend away was so helpful!

We took the kids to my mom and stepdad's place for a long weekend in New Mexico. An 11 hour road trip. In the car. With the children. I will just leave it at that.

For some reason when my kids think grandparents they automatically think ice-cream?

But once we got there it was nice to be pampered and taken care of a little bit. And for the kids to be doted on by some grandparents. I, myself, took a few million baths, a couple naps (!) and did a little shopping with my mom and my best girl. And the boys -   a father son hike up a mountain peek. And our kids' first trip ever to a zoo/aquarium (we are terrible parents, I know). Really, our time together as a family, the change of scenery, and the cool mountain weather would all have been reason enough to go.

And the baths.
And my 2 naps.
Just saying.
 



The Zoo!

 Art imitating life...or something like that?

 

"Hey mom, they have this ice cream at Schlitterbahn!"

 

Can we just do one picture without shake-face? Boys? 

 

The wrestling polar bears: our favorite.

But the highlight was the Balloon festival. Apparently the Albuquerque Balloon Festival is quite the attraction and my mom has been bugging, hounding, encouraging us to come for a few years now. And with the timeline fast approaching of traveling with 3 carseats, this was our year to do it.

Although we missed the initial ascension (because of windy weather conditions, Porter can tell you all about it), we made it for the night glow and it was awesome. I totally see why people come from all over for the balloon week. Like  the gals in front of us on the way down to the balloon park from Michigan, and one balloon family Porter be-friended (he's so shy, shocking) hailed all the way from Belgium. The event was awesome. And so was our weekend.