Happy Late Birthday Boys!

I give the boys the option every year of either going to the store and picking out their own individual presents with the money that they get for their birthdays, or saving their money and putting it all together, and picking out one big toy instead of 3 little ones. They chose to pool all of their birthday money this year, and even did some extra chores and saved that money too so that they could buy a little swimming pool for the summer. We looked around at a number of different stores and they found and all agreed on the one they wanted that they could afford. The big day came, and everything went well until we got to the store. We must have spent a good half an hour standing in the swimming pool aisle at Walmart! All of the sudden Isaac changed his mind and wanted a slip and slide. Then they found all of these cool pools with slides that looked big in the pictures but in all reality were only about 8 inches deep and would only fit one kid at a time. After much debate, they settled on another pool that was not their original choice. I asked them if they were sure, and Isaac informed me that this pool was cheaper than the other one that they wanted and still as fun. If they bought this one, they could also buy some toys to play with in the pool. Well, you can't argue with that. So, we put the pool in the cart, picked out some fun toys, and went up to the front. The kids got a kick out of handing everything to the checkout lady and then paying her with their giant stacks of ones and their bags of change. I'm sure the cashier just loved that too! But, here they are, playing in their pool (on our driveway because we still can't walk on our grass) and showing off their bubbles, squirt guns, and diving rings!

Notice how Adam is sitting down in all of these pictures? Well, a few days earlier, he fell off his scooter and got a big gash in his knee. It looked pretty sore, but, we cleaned it and bandaged it and figured he'd be off and running in no time. We couldn't have been more wrong! This kid knows how to milk an injury! He crawled and hopped around the house for over two days! He whined about everything and no matter how hard we tried (sometimes forcefully), he would not move it or walk on it at all! I started wondering if maybe he really was hurt when he wouldn't play in his t-ball game (see the picture in the post below!!) and was still hopping around after we had filled up the pool. He played in it sitting down all morning, then after nap time we went out to swim again. He hopped down the stairs and hobbled outside, then, out of nowhere Adam came running down the driveway and jumped into the pool! A miracle? Or just an extremely stubborn kid. The best part? After he played for a while, he came up to me and said, "you're right mom, my leg does feel better now that I have been walking on it and moving it!" Really?!