Bruiser

My cutie pie eight month old got a black eye from falling on a block last week at VBS (see post below). He also grew his first tooth last week. I had to take a couple of pictures today because that new tooth gave him a fat lip (to go with the black eye I guess)...TWICE. Poor kiddo! Atleast he's still smiley! :)

Other picnic pictures

I guess when you finally get around to unloading the pictures, you might as well post them! So here are some favorites from the company picnic.

After waiting in line for 40 minutes for Henry to jump on the bungy trampoline (like the kids even smaller than he were jumping on), the people told us that the harness wouldn't stay on his little belly...so we begged to let him just jump on the trampoline without the harness/bungy cords. He loved it just the same.

The firemen let us CLIMB INTO the fire truck. Definitely a highlight of the picnic for Henry. We probably spent a good 30 minutes in the same 3 seats. :)

Here is a tower building picture. Note Mike's blue glove! He definitely was the kid that didn't like to touch glue as a kid! We did not start early enough to let the glue dry completely before the competition. And there is Henry displaying our certificate...

Tower Building, Rangers/Royals & VBS

Kind of a random assortment of things to talk about, but it's been a while!

The video above is from Mike's company picnic. Mike, Henry, & I won third place in a pasta tower building contest! We actually should have gotten second place (but I guess they don't disqualify 10 year olds for not building their tower according to the given rules)... Anyway, the rules were:
-only Elmers glues & pasta could be used
-at 15 inches a string attached to a pulley would be tied to your pasta tower. The other end of the pulley would be tied to a bucket in which they would dump sand.
-the tower with the best tower weight to sand weight ratio would win
-there were also prizes for the tallest tower & the neatest design (theme: Rock 'n Roll)
Technically, we could have almost been disqualified too, because a "kid" was supposed to help. Although we had some input from our nieces/nephews, none actually "touched" the tower...so we had Henry put some paint on it (which I'm not sure was allowed) the morning of the picnic. He painted an "H" (that's about all he ever draws anymore), so we pointed that out to everyone.

So Mike's favorite-brother-Matt (whose b-day is TODAY) did the most thoughtful thing for us this week!! He flew up to take Mike & me to a baseball game! Not only that, but he flew in a babysitter for us too! (Matt works for Southwest...so flying his mom in was a "good deal" for all of us!) I had been nervous about leaving Andrew to be put to bed, (he'd only been "self-soothing" himself to sleep for about 5 days--during which he picked up the thumb-sucking habit), but Gram worked her wonders & both boys were asleep before 8:30! Having never lived in Dallas, I decided I should act like a native KC-er & root for the Royals (plus they were ahead by 4 runs for the first 8 innings). But, as the 8th & 9th innings took place, I decided to change my loyalties to the Rangers...for Mike & Matt's sake (plus they ended up winning on a crazy pitch that got past the catcher).

I helped in the preschool room at Vacation Bible School two years ago under two amazing women (Sharon Mason & Brenda Zawodniak). They are both EXCELLENT with kids & I remember it STILL being chaotic enough to recruit my friend Virginia to help out for the week! So when our church was in desperate need of help for the "preschool classes" last week, I volunteered myself (not knowing/remembering that it would coincide with Matt's visit, & not knowing I might be LEADING a class of 15 two & three year olds)! Needless to say, the trip to the allergist this morning was a LOT more relaxing!! :) (We found out that Henry is allergic to grass!) Henry LOVED going to "school" though & just loves playing with "friends." Since I'd be the last one out each day, he'd say, "Mom, where did all my friends go?" Andrew did really well in his class too (although he liked his "hooky trip" to the farm with Uncle Matt & Gram more I think)!