End of the year party

Kai's baseball team finished almost last this season but they sure got a lot of good opportunities to learn and grow and play new positions. Kai started hitting really well and got to play in field lots of the games (which he has never gotten to do before). His best friend, Hunter, totally rocked playing in field. It's fun to watch them progress. Their team party was held at the bowling alley at the Beach.

"The things that make you go hmmmm"

The toilet in the kids' bathroom keeps getting clogged. If you have been following the blog for awhile you remember last year Matt had to take the toilet OFF the floor two different times because of flushed bath toys. I removed ALL bath toys from the tub and recently put a few back in. Every time the toilet gets clogged we ask Kaden what he flushed and then I count the bath toys. He always replies, "nuffing" and he's right, all the bath toys are accounted for. The other day it was just he and I home and the bathroom door was closed (he likes his privacy). It had been a little too long and it was too quiet. Kaden+Quiet=NO GOOD.
As I approached the door he yelled through it, "not yet mom", so I knew it couldn't be good. The picture tells all.

Land of the Lost

I don't know how I did it but I lost all the pictures we've taken over the past several months. Among them were our first camping trip (yes, we actually braved the FL wild life and took the kids camping) and Kai's 7th birthday that we celebrated at Animal Kingdom in Orlando. I hope one of these days they just magically reappear on the camera disk. We reached a monumental milestone with Kaden this week. He stayed dry overnight for TWO weeks so we took him out of pull ups at night. Can I just tell you how glad I am not to be buying any form of diaper anymore!!!! It was a big deal, he got to choose some new underwear (Star wars) and he is so proud of himself. Matt pulled his hamstring playing at the annual turkey bowl with other guys from church and had to miss Thanksgiving dinner. :( We had a nice time with all the family though (I took the kids over to his uncle's).
Now onto Christmas, "it's the most wonderful time of the year..."

Boiled WHAT?

Living in the south is different from living out west and we have slowly become accustomed to new ways. Kaden's buddy, Suzie, LOVES boiled peanuts (yah, you read that right) and it wasn't until a baseball game last season I tried them. Yuck, soggy nuts! Well, my little Kaden has become a boiled peanut fan. His memories of baseball will be drinking "flushies" (slushies) and eating boiled peanuts with Suzie. I will just be thrilled when he learns to open them on his own because I don't like the juice that comes out on my fingers when I go to crack one open. Nuts should be hard and crunchy shouldn't they?
Something else about the south I thought was funny is they serve SWEET TEA everywhere you go. I am even thinking it's at Chipotle.

Character Parade

Instead of dressing for Halloween Kai's class was allowed to dress as a character from a book for school today. They had to be able to retell the story to their class. Kai chose to dress as "Pirate Pete" and Kaden went as a pumpkin from Pumpkin Town. We are going to spend the afternoon in Kai's class helping with the "fall activities". We had to go to the grocery store after we dropped Kai off this morning and Kaden would NOT wear his costume in the store because all the other people would be dressed in normal clothes.
The other day I had to go to a funeral so Kaden and I went dressed in "church clothes" to school. He about melted down because he didn't want the other kids to see him all dressed up. He's fine wearing church clothes to church but he knew the other kids wouldn't be in church clothes at school. REALLY, concerned what you look like and fitting in at age 3?

Camping in FL

Kai has been wanting Matt to take him camping since he missed the Father/Son outing due to his broken arm last spring. So Friday night Matt pitched two tents in the back yard. Kaden was fine until it was time to go to bed and then he wanted to come in and sleep in his own bed. Me, I slept inside in my comfortable bed with the a/c on. Matt stuck it out and slept out there with Kai. I like this camping arrangement.

A pocket full

I was sitting on the bleachers watching Friday night's game and I looked up and saw Kai fumbling with his pants. I got a closer look and he had what I thought was a whole back pocket full of sand. His favorite past time in baseball is to play with the sand in the outfield. When he played catcher, he'd bend down to pick up the ball and make sure he got a hand full of sand in the process. Anyway, I jumped off the bleachers, ran to the fence and hollered at him to quit putting sand in his pants. He got up to bat and ran around the bases with a sagging bum. When he came out to talk to me he was playing with a rock. I put two and two together, he had that BOULDER in his pocket the whole game! His coach caught him playing with it earlier in the night and had thrown it out of his reach. Apparently Kai decided he must have this treasure for himself. He was so proud of himself for thinking he pulled a fast one on coach and mom!!

We had team snacks on Friday night and Kaden was insistent that he help pass the snacks out to the team.