How lucky they are to have each other…

and how lucky am I to have them?

Happy Friday!  Have a great long weekend!

I have sung her praises many times before, but they bear repeating.  Susan (or Ms. Sooooosan as Maxwell says!) is the BEST and my babies love her to death.  She’s come up with so many clever and fun things for Maxwell lately.  A few of my favorites…

1. Friday is Moe’s for lunch.  Maxwell LOVES Moe’s (taco with black beans and cheese, no chips, and a cookie thankyouverymuch).  He looks forward to his lunch date with Ms. Susan all week and totally knows that Friday means “Welcome to Moe’s!”  I think the people in Moe’s even know he and Susan now!  🙂

2. Daily surprise.  Susan has instituted a whole process to get Maxwell down for his nap – a process that works great I might add!  Sitting in Maxwell’s room is “Maxwell’s very special bag” and each day Susan has a surprise waiting for him in that bag.  When it’s time to get ready for nap, they go in there and have a little party on the floor and see what’s in the bag.  They then read books, rock, etc.  But, the bag is the pretty special!  and when Susan gets here in the morning, she gives Maxwell a hint about what his surprise of the day is.  It’s been everything from 2 skittles to an elephant animal cracker to a starfish from the beach!  so fun!

3. Susan has been great at teaching Maxwell that he has to do his “duties” before he gets to do the fun stuff.  Duties = washing hands, putting on shoes, using the potty, etc.  She’s got that boy trained!

4. She is helping to make Maxwell LOVE the library.  Not only do they go to all the weekly programs, but they go once a week to check out a whole stack of new books.  It’s so fun for Maxwell to pick them out and Robert and I love reading all the new books at bedtime!

5. Thursday is craft day.  Each Thursday, Maxwell and Susan get out the paper, scissors, markers, glue and whatever else they need to make a craft.  They even made a little book about a twinkling star!

One of my favorite Ms. Susan ideas was last week when she texted me in the morning to tell me it was “Orange Day” and everyone needed to wear orange!  I got the boys all dressed in the citrus hue and when Susan showed up she had a bag full of orange surprises!  They then took a walk through the village to go on an orange “I spy” hunt!  Maxwell was spotting orange things around town all day – what a fantastic way for him to learn about his surroundings and how to be observant.  So, so fun!

Here’s the awesome threesome all decked out in their orange…

They could not be cuter together.  It was an all-out orange kind of day!  I even wore my orange…

and got some orange balloons from Maxwell!

Spencey loved getting to wear his orange and can’t wait until he’s old enough to participate in all the fun…and eat a Moe’s taco!  🙂

I just love Susan’s creativity and the fun she brings to this household!  How did we ever get so lucky to find her?!  We LOVE Ms. Sooooosan!  🙂

Our weekend was good…and not so good.  It went a little something like this…

Saturday morning Robert and Maxwell went out to a CF Charity walk and a had a big time.  Robert said Maxwell probably ran for about 2 miles of the 5K!  By the time they got home, they were hot and sweaty.  Nothing a little shower and a shave can’t fix!  🙂

That afternoon, we worked a bit in the yard, put out some fires…

and then went out to a nice little dinner…

Sunday morning Robert and I both needed to be up at church at 10:00 for Sunday School teacher training (we’re volunteering to ‘teach’ 3 Sundays this summer).  That meant that both boys had to be up at church at 10:00 too.  That meant that Spencer’s usual 2 hour morning nap got cut to 40 minutes.  Ouch.  But, we made it and Spencer did fine his first time in the nursery.

After church, my little helper went with me to Home Depot to get some annuals for planting.

Look at that smiling face!  Man, I love that kid…despite what happened next!  After Home Depot, I got to work digging in the dirt to plant all of the flowers.  Maxwell helped for a bit and then went inside to eat lunch.  Robert then tried to put him down for his nap and…it didn’t go well.  Maxwell has been on a BIG Momma kick lately and only wanted me to put him down.  Unfortunately, I was outside covered in dirt and just couldn’t get cleaned up to go rock him.  Besides, he needs to learn that Robert can put him down just as good as I can.  Well, lesson not learned.  Robert finally just had to put him in the bed and walk out and Maxwell proceeded to throw the single biggest fit we’ve ever seen him throw.  He was so loud he woke Spencer up who had only been asleep for 45 minutes.  So, not only did Spencer’s morning nap get cut short, so did his afternoon nap.  double ouch. After a full hour of SCREAMING, Robert went back into Maxwell’s room and, well, let’s just say things were a mess.  literally.  Not only that, he had managed to get his leg stuck in the slats of the crib.  It was rough, ya’ll.  I’ve never seen him so hysterical.  After getting him calmed down, we decided the  nap wasn’t going to happen and that we all needed to get out of the house.  So, we loaded up the stroller and (against Robert’s wishes) ended up at the local library street party.  Even though Maxwell had been a pill, I couldn’t deny him the chance to see a firetruck spray water out of its hose!!

Watching them raise up the ladder!

Happy boy!

The fire hose then sprayed all the kids with water from the top of the ladder!  We watched from the side but still managed to get a little wet!  That was some serious spray!

It really was a neat event with all sorts of fun things to do.  They even had a big digger out there!

This digger scooped up something good!  🙂

Here’s the 3 of us getting scooped up…with one set of closed eyes!  🙂

They also had a little train of cars that we got to ride.  Maxwell picked the orange car, of course!  🙂

He kept asking for an “ice keen” so I obliged… stupidly.  I had totally forgotten about the 3 powdered donuts they had given him at church that morning.  He ate some of both an orange push pop and a bubble gum flavored ice cream bar.

By the time we left, he was beyond exhausted, hot, dehydrated and full of sugar.  He whined most of the walk home until finally passing out like his brother…

When we got home, he tried to eat some dinner but was honestly just too tired.  I think the heat, the sugar and the hour he spent screaming at the top of his lungs in his bed honestly made him sick.  Yes, sick.  After puking up all that ice cream and most of his lunch (joy) I got him tucked into bed at 6:15.  Poor Spencer, who had been denied two good naps that day, cried for about 45 minutes in his bed before finally conking out at 7:30.  These two sweet boys were just pushed beyond their limit…and don’t even talk to me about Mom and Dad being pushed to their limit!  goodness.  Sunday was maybe the single hardest day of parenting I’ve had yet.  But, we survived and learned an important lesson – naps are essential for us!!

Hey, you take the good, you take the bad.  Onward and upward!!