The slide

Yesterday we attended a birthday party for the 5 year old daughter of our friends' Mark and Lisa. It was brutally hot yesterday and this party was well equipped to handle it - 2 pools and an enourmous bouncy water slide with 2 slides. Initially Nolan was a scared - "no, I don't want to". But it didn't long for him to see the other kids going down it and he wanted to join in the fun. Fun for him, lotsa work for mom and dad! The slide had 6 little foam squares that went up in a straight line to the top of the slide. It was quite slippery with the water on it, so we adults had to balance on the side of our foot on the little square, hold the rope on the side of it and the help boost our kids up to the top with one arm. My back and right arm are quite sore today! Nolan loved it - "again, Mommy, again!". Kale loved the kiddie pools and showed no fear. I should have just worn my swimsuit with the amount of sweat and pool water I had on myself! It was totally worth it, though. Nolan hurt himself once going down the slide attached to the swingset and in to the pool, and Kale faceplanted it on the cement. That didn't turn out too well - he had a mouth full of blood! He didn't cry as much as he thought he would, and I felt a lot better once we realized that he had just cut his lip pretty good. The swelling was gone today, too. Both kids, and me and Adam, were exhausted when we got home! They went to bed right away, but for some reason Nolan was up starting at 11:15 and would not go back to bed. This seems to be a trend anytime we keep him up past his bedtime. Adam tried to get him to bed but nothing was working. Finally at 11:45 I took my pillow and went and layed on his floor. He whimpered a few times and I reminded him that I was on the floor, and evetually he fell asleep. I woke up at 1:15 and decided to go back to my bed. I had to be to work early today (6:30), so the alarm going off at 4:45 wasn't very fun!

We had quite a storm roll through town today. It didn't seem bad until I left Jane's house with the boys. We turned by the elementary school and a HUGE tree was down in front of the church. As we drove closer to our house I could see streets were blocked off from all the trees and branches that were down. Our street was covered with leaves and fairly large branches. Some clean up had already been done, but our yard was a huge mess! Adam and I spent an hour outside cleaning it up. The mosquitos helped us work extra fast!

There was quite a bit of thunder with the storm today. Jane has been teaching the kids at daycare about storm and fire safety. Nolan really took it to heart today. He heard the thunder and immediately went and stood in front of the door to the safe room. Jane said he was talking a mile a minute and she couldn't really understand him. She finally opened the door and he beelined it for the rug at the end of the rooma announced "thunda I go here". He was the only kid to do it today, and Jane was especially impressed because he's not even 2 1/2 yet! He has so many traits of a first born - good and bad:)

Kale's walking has improved tremendously since he first started 2 weeks ago. He is pretty much walking full time now. The only time he crawls is when he needs to get somewhere fast - like wherever Nolan is going! He's getting more teeth - current total is 7 1/2. He's babbling and "talking" more, too, which is reassuring to me.

We discovered Nolan is also getting another one of his 2 year molars this weekend - which helps explain why he's been so crabby lately! Oh wait, that's just the 2 year old phase. He is really pushing our buttons these days. Last Wednesday he literally cried from the time we got home from daycare until the time he went to bed, including his bath that he wouldn't sit down for. He cried through the whole thing, all the while standing. He just gets to the point sometimes where there is no reasoning with him. When he gets to that point I've started sending him to his room until he's ready to calm down. I can take a lot, but constant whining and crying does get on my nerves! He was good tonight, so hopefully that means he'll stay sleeping, too.

Nolan was funny last week. He seemed to be having a little bit of a withdrawal from not seeing any of his aunts/uncles/cousins. He would randomly ask "where's Ryan? Pawette? Gina? Eric?" The answer was the same everytime - at their house. His reply was the same every time - "I want to see dem". Funny how kids remember that stuff. He talked about going swimming with grandpa Tom and riding the train, too.

Nolan is really in to coloring these days, and he likes to tell us what he's drawing. He told me he was drawing a house the other day, so I asked him who was going to live in it with him. He said "Gampa Geg (grandpa Greg)". So funny! We went out to eat last Thursday for Josh's bday. I brought the boys home so Adam could go have cake after dinner. While I was feeding Kale I asked Nolan what his favorite part of the day was. He said "Dave". The best I can figure is that he had fun playing his favorite game of peek a boo with Dave at the restaurant - and that was his favorite part of the day.

I'm not sure where the summer has gone - how did it get to be August? The weather has been truly amazing of the last few weeks. I feel like we're living in Florida instead of MN. We finally got Nolan to wear his helmet while trying to ride his trike this weekend - maybe not the best timing. He was so hot when he was done - and the giveaway is always a wet head with wavy/curly hair!