Legos

Legos, Legos, Legos...that is all that has been going on in our house since we got home from our trip. On the way home, we picked up all of Joel's Legos from when he was a kid. Wally is obsessed! Luckily the weather has cooperated and we've spent hours on the porch.

First thing when he wakes up (even before he comes to find us, he is out there playing Legos). During thunderstorns he is playing Legos. He has his "brave shirt" on just like Moose. There was a really close strike and Wally decided he was scared like Moose, so I fixed that with is scarf.

Playing in underwear after rest time.

Wally even sings songs about Legos. He was marching and singing, but of course stopped as soon as he saw the camera.

This morning, Wally was trying to hook up the motor to his castle so that it would open and close the draw bridge. With a little help from Mom, he got it to work! Those Lego guys better be quick!

Preschool Graduation

I know that I haven't posted on our trip to SD and MT yet, but I wanted to get these up as they won't take as long.

Our baby has graduated preschool. I can't believe it! Wally worked very hard on some cards for his teachers. He cut out hearts on the fronts and then put glitter in the inside so that the hearts were sparkly. Then he told me what to write to his teachers. He wrote their names and his name. He also picked flowers for his teachers, the administrator, and the cook.Since Wally missed his last 3 days of school for our road trip to SD and MT, he had to make his hat and tassels before he left. All the kids that are going to kindergarten next year made hats out of paper bowls and a sheet of paper. The tassels were the color of the rooms they were in. The graduation consisted of each kid being called by name, marching to the front, receiving their "diploma," shaking hands with the head teacher, smiling for Moms and Dads, and marching back to the blankets. I guess the kids had practiced this while Wally was gone. He was quite the pro though.

We were, of course, very proud! While the herds of parents, grandparents, and kids waited in line for pizza, we went to see the animals of course. Pearl the Pig is by far Wally's favorite animal. Can you sense the mutual love? Wally would always manage to find some old corncobs or dandelions to feed Pearl during and after school each and every day.

Though Pearl is the favorite, Wally loves all the animals, including Rex the pony and Rondo the horse. I guess Wally had a very rough day when Daisy the cow went "to live on a different farm with other cows." The teachers told me he cried and cried because he would miss Daisy...maybe we will see her again some day.

Wally's Purple room teacher Mrs. McGivern.

Wally's Green room teacher Mrs. Loan.

Wally had such a great time in preschool that none of us was ready for him to leave. Therefore, right after graduation, I signed him up to go a little during the summer as a "big kid," not a preschooler. I also figure it might help him out in kindergarten as he will be about the youngest kid there, but basically, we love the teachers and the animals.

Mother's Day

I had a great Mother's Day weekend. It started out with a trip to the dump. We borrowed a friend's pickup and took a load of big junk that we've been wanting to get rid of for a long time. Then, we loaded up the pickup with compost. The landfill makes compost from all of the yard waste they pick up. The compost is black and wonderful and cheap! We used the compost mostly to fill in random holes in the yard, raise parts of the flowerbed in front, and to put a layer on top of the area in the back around the patio that was originally bark. Only a little bit of compost made it into the garden. You can see my raised beds in the garden below. There is only a little compost on the bed on the right. I can't wait for my garden this year.
After church on Sunday, Wally took a nap and I planted grass seed and put some seeds in the garden. After the nap, we picked up some KFC and headed to "the farm." We met Dr. Donelson on the way in, which is always nice. Once they headed out, we had the whole pond to ourselves again. The dogs had a great time. Wally was so excited to throw sticks into the pond for Moose to get. Here, Wally was getting a "stick" for Moose.

Daisy won't swim. Looking at her, it seems like she would, but she won't go in deeper than she can touch. Being the wonderful person I am, I decided that when she came out onto the dock with me, I would push her in. Strong little mutt managed to get away from me before I got her in. Maybe next time...

Moose, loves the water and knows he's safe from Daisy there. Can you see all the gray around his muzzle? Old dog.

There is a canoe at the pond, so we paddled around. Moose did some swimming after us and Daisy ran along the shore. All was great, until we saw another dog! Ah! We paddled to the shore and I jumped out and grabbed the dogs. Luckily, the dog went away before any of the dogs saw each other.

It is hard to see, but Moose is following Wally and I. Moose didn't move much the next 2 days.

Who's kid is that?

Daddy and his little girl.

Again, who's kid is that?

Wally was so excited to find palm trees!

Joel brought some glass jars from home to fill with pond water so that Wally could see all the little things swimming in it.

All my boys like to learn. Well, maybe Moose was just looking for sparkles.

Wally had to get the good stuff.

We had to let the stuff settle before we could see the creepy crawlies. Waiting without bumping was hard to do, especially when Wally saw something and got excited.

A Mother's Day picnic with KFC. Can't get much better than that!

Since it was Mother's Day, I spent some time taking pictures of flowers.

And Wally spent some time in the mud.

Wally loves dandelions and loves picking them for everyone, so how could I not take a picture of one? They are actually rather pretty.

Quite the photogenic dog.
Wally and Joel went canoeing and saw 9 turtles sunning themselves on a log. When they got close, Joel said they would all disappear, but Wally said they would stay. All but one jumped in. Wally said, "told you Dad!" I guess he was right.
More flowers!
Wally loved seeing Papa Steve's cows and still talks about them a lot. So, we had to take a picture of some of them on the way out of the farm.
The weather was beautiful and I got to be outside almost the entire weekend. Life can't get much better than that! Thanks for a great Mother's Day Daddy and Wally. I love you both!

Our big (and strong) boy

I can't believe how big our baby is getting. Last Thursday he went to Kindergarten Round-up. There he got to meet the teachers and some new friends (and several old friends), see his class rooms, and get a taste of kindergarten. The parents were in the cafeteria getting the run-down from the principal while the kids were playing (aka- being closely observed by the teachers to determine class assignments, etc). This is a picture of Wally and I walking to kindergarten. Wally had to pick dandelions for his teacher. Only one teacher got a dandelion because he found friends to give them too first. This is a demonstration of Wally's engineering skills and his muscles. I'm not sure which I'm more impressed with.
I like how Wally states that he can do it without any help, and then at the end of the video he asks me for help. He does still need his mommy!

Easter

Easter is a magical time. Obviously, it is the time that we celebrate Christ's dieing for us and his resurrection. But, with a kid, there are so many fun things to do as well.

A tradition that Joel's family always did was an Easter tree. On Palm Sunday, you cut a branch from a flowering tree, like a crab apple, you put the branch in water in the house, and on Easter, it blossoms. Wally and I cut a couple branches from a crab apple tree and the pear tree mid-Holy week, and decorated it with Easter eggs. Wally is very much into making silly faces for pictures.
Wally and I also decorated Easter eggs. Wally started out being very careful and watching the eggs to make sure they were the right brightness...
Then I mentioned to him that he could put the eggs in multiple colors to make fancy eggs and new colors. Next thing I knew, he had nearly 2 dozen eggs in his dye cups at the same time...that Wally!

Wally worked very hard on every egg, and was very proud of his work. This year, rather than breaking the large majority of eggs, only 2 of 24 were cracked at the end!
The Easter bunny showed up at Hy-vee the day before Easter and hid eggs in the parking lot. When Wally saw the Easter Bunny, he ran right up to him and gave him a huge hug and kiss. I was too slow with the camera of course. Wally is not shy about sharing love with giant animals. After Wally found a few eggs in the parking lot, he began searching for trash. He learned about Earth Day in preschool the day before, and is taking it very seriously. He was much more into picking up trash than eggs...he continues to do so today. Because it looked like it wasn't supposed to be very nice weather for Easter, we decided to let Wally have his Easter present a day early. We got him a bicycle a couple weeks ago and hid it in the blue Blazer. A week before Easter, we were at a baseball game and decided to let Wally ride home in the Blazer with Dad while I picked up pizza in the van. After it was too late, Joel remembered that Wally's bike was in the back. Wally crawled into the Blazer and looked right into the back because he was looking for a toy, but he didn't seem to notice the bike...maybe he was too focused on finding the toy. On the way home he yelled out the window to pedestrians, "Happy Easter!" Later that week, Wally made a paper Easter egg with a drawing of a bicycle in it. We asked him why he drew a bike (figuring it was because he saw his new one) and he responded that he thought it would be silly because chickens come from eggs, not bikes! We were thinking...did he really not see the bike? I decided to get his response to the bike on camera, so I waited outside for Joel and Wally to come out. As you see, he was happy, but not really surprised. Later that day, Wally said to Joel, "That is the bike that was in the blue truck." When Joel asked why he didn't mention that he knew it was back there, Wally responded, "Because it was supposed to be a surprise!" Did he really see the bike, decide it was a surprise, and decide not to respond at all to it? I guess we will never really know.

Wally knew exactly what to do with it the first time he got on.

Within minutes, he was cruising around our loop. He has made many many laps since then. He would make the loops faster, except that he must stop and pick up all trash and dandelions. The Easter bunny left Wally a Zhu-zhu pet and a chocolate Easter egg with a duck (basically a Peep) inside. I thought Wally would get a kick out of it, but as you can see in the video, he didn't really care that much...but I tried hard!

Aw, a cute little ducky (that he gave to me to eat - he wouldn't touch the thing, and can't keep anything for himself - except for chocolate).

Notice the chunk of chocolate shell stuck between his glasses and nose. I guess glasses can be handy!

Last year, we thought that it would be nice this year for Wally to have a little competition with the egg hunting from Brother and Sister (ha ha ha...maybe next year). The Easter bunny definitely hid the eggs in harder places this year though. We were talking to our neighbors when the Easter bunny hid the eggs (or so Wally thinks). After we were done talking to them, Wally jumped back on his bike. When he got in front of our house, he saw an egg and jumped off his bike. We told him he couldn't leave his bike in the road like that, so he ran to his bike, picked the thing up (I'm sure not an easy task when the bike is a big as he is), and waddled with it to the curb so he could hunt for the eggs. I wish I had gotten that on camera because it doesn't sound nearly as cute as it was. Being the only kid looking for the eggs, he made out pretty well.

Despite all of the "stuff" that goes with Easter, Wally still managed to remember what Easter means. I was told that on Palm Sunday the youth director asked Wally how he was, and he responded, "You should be sad because Jesus is going to die soon." Then on Easter during the children's sermon, the kids were asked what they are celebrating on Easter. Wally immediately piped in "Jesus is coming back to life!" But, since he has a hard time with his "L" sounds, it sounded like Jesus was coming back to his wife. That got a few giggles from the congregation.

How did the Easter bunny know Wally loves jelly beans?

If anyone is still unsure, Wally is full of love and is not shy about sharing it. At times during church, Wally gets over-powered by the need to kiss and just attacks Joel or I with a billion kisses. This batch that Joel got was nothing. Note that Joel is asking for a napkin because Wally had just finished eating some of his Easter candy and was wearing it all over his face.

A big holiday meal isn't the same when it is just the 3 of us, but I still try. This year, we had ham, cheesy peas, cheesy potatoes, marshmallow fruit salad, and fresh bread. Not so healthy, but delicious! The Easter tree bloomed perfectly! During the Easter egg hunt, we found 4 real eggs in one of the trees in our back yard. We figured out that these were cardinal eggs.

About a week later, we found that 3 of the eggs had hatched really ugly birds! It was fun to see since we've been watching the eagles. Too bad the momma had built the nest right at nose level for the dogs. The next day, we found the nest tipped and no birds or eggs to be found. "Maybe the mommy bird carried the babies to a new nest away from Moose and Daisy." Maybe, Wally, maybe.

Random Pre-Easter Stuff

Wally wanted to paint the other day. I was busy cooking, he knows where his painting supplies are, and I was busy cooking, so I just told him to go ahead and get his stuff. He got it all and then sat down to paint. Next thing I knew, this is what I found...
He decided he wanted to "hand paint" and was sticking his fingers as far as they could go into the paint bottles and slopping it onto the paper. To mix colors, he would just rub his hands together. I guess he needed a bigger pallet and used the backs of his hands, wrists... Oh Wally! (I find myself saying that a lot!)

Wally and I had our friends "Friend Joel" (to differentiate between him and "Daddy Joel) and his mom Suzanne over. We decided to stop letting the rain run our lives and take a walk in the rain. It was in the low 40s, so we bundled up.

Wally's new rain coat had a lovely cone head.

Those two boys have a great time together and are hard to tell apart from behind.

Though the weather is getting nicer, I'm going to try to get an Easter blog up soon. I'm off to pick up Wally from school now. I can't believe he has less than a month left before he has preschool graduation! What happened to my baby?!?!?!!