Our Weekend

Every now and then, I like to chronicle our days/weekends, etc, just so I can remember what we were up to when I'm reading this in years hence :) So here is our weekend: Friday night, we had a nice dinner of salmon, green beans & homemade italian bread. The boys accommodated us by eating their dinner and then playing peacefully with their train set for a long time after dinner so we could talk. We had good intentions about watching our Netflix movie after we put the boys to bed, but I was just too beat from the week of VBS and I fell asleep around 9:00 pm.

Saturday morning, the boys were up at 6:00 am sharp, so I took them downstairs so Marcus could catch up on some of his sleep. When Marcus got up, I took the boys to the gym with me so he could get some stuff done at home. The boys and I got home around 11:30, and I made a double batch of waffles and fed them lunch while Marcus mowed the yard. After Marcus came in and showered, he was very frustrated to discover that our antenae wasn't picking up ABC, so he couldn't watch the US/England World Cup Match. It wasn't until about an hour into the game that he finally got it to come up on one of our computers. By then, it was 2:00 pm and time for the boys to nap. Unfortunately, I had waited too long to put them down, because Ethan fell asleep in my arms while I was blogging, and Caleb fell asleep on his floor during a time-out in his room :) During nap time, I caught up with some housework and blogging while Marcus watched the World Cup game on his computer. Just before Caleb woke at 3:30, Marcus headed out to meet a friend for some compound bow target practice. (They had been talking about doing this for a couple of months, and it finally worked out this weekend.)

The boys got up and I gave them baths and dressed them and myself for our evening outing: the end-of-the-year residents' party. Marcus called me around 5:00 (the time that the party started), and asked that I meet him just off the interstate so we could get to the party a little less late. We made it there around 5:30, and had a surprisingly enjoyable evening. I say surprisingly because we were going to the home of a childless couple, and that is usually more challenging than fun. But, thankfully, the host had kid-proofed his fenced back yard, and all five kids had a great time running around and playing imaginative games all evening. The only casualty of the evening was Ethan getting bitten up by mosquitoes...he has about ten bites on his legs. We didn't even realize there were any mosquitoes out there because neither the adults nor the other kids were getting bit. But as I've said before, if there is a mosquito anywhere around, it will find Ethan and bite him until it collapses.

Sunday, I was up early again with the boys, this time because I had to cook for the church potluck. Our church always has a combined service and a big potluck on the Sunday after VBS, with the intent of meeting some of the visitors whose kids came to VBS. It was nice having church a little later than usual (we typically go to first service) because we had time to get ready a little more leisurely. The church service went really well, and we were happy to see that Caleb was willing to go up on stage with the other kids and perform the songs they all learned during the week. He got pretty into the hand motions (more so than he had all week at VBS). In between songs, he called to Ethan who was sitting with us on the second row, and beckoned for Ethan to join him on stage. Ethan ran up there before we had time to dissuade him, and thankfully an adult on stage held his hand and kept him still through the rest of the performance.

We stayed for the potluck after church, and that went better than it usually does. The question is always: do we split up, one of us with the kids and the other in the food line, or do we go through the line together with the kids? There are downsides to both options (#1 can't carry enough plates, #2 the kids are difficult to control in line), but we took the kids through with us and were able to all eat together. We hung around church for a while chatting with friends and didn't get home until almost 1:00. The boys napped for a couple of hours, and before we knew it they were up. We cleaned up the play room together and then took them to the library to get some new books. We intended to also take them to the pet store to look at all the animals (a favorite outing for them). Unfortunately, the pet store was closed (everything around here seems to close around 6:00 pm on Sunday nights). We consoled the disappointed boys with the promise of watching a movie together when we got home, since they hadn't watched any TV all weekend. The boys picked Wall-E out of the line-up of options Marcus gave them. Marcus and I knew that Ethan would only watch the movie for about ten minutes (which turned out to be right on the money).

When Ethan got bored, I took him down to the play room and folded laundry and edited pictures on the computer while Marcus and Caleb watched the movie. After the movie, Marcus gave Caleb a little math lesson using the Chuck E. Cheese money that is still floating around our play room. Caleb really enjoys numbers, and he is getting better at basic adding. A good friend called me around 9:00, so Marcus put the boys down on his own while I caught up with her. Now it is about 10:00 pm on Sunday night, and I am ready to post this thing and go to bed :)