How does your garden grow - follow up.....

Growing quite well actually. I took the photo from this side to disguise the fact that our tomato plants have taken over the place and then fell over - which means we have some work to do this weekend. But for my first gardening effort, I'm pleased so far. Have learned some things and know how I want to improve next year.

Corn on the way

Our first cucumber! It was so fun to discover with Eli.

Green beans

Green pepper

The crazy mess of tomato plants

Fun stuff

Cole wants to walk so bad. He is now pushing chairs around the kitchen - so proud of himself and his new found abilities.

We thought a walker would get away from him too fast but we were wrong. Gave it to him and off he went, big ole fat smile on his face.

Little chimney sweep - last night when Owen left, Eli kept yelling goodbye to him from the screen porch with his face pressed against the screen. I didn't know until he turned around how dirty his face was. He was cute as can be.

for the love of Monster Trucks

Remember how many times I have talked about Eli's love of Monster Trucks and that he eats, sleeps, drinks all things Monster Truck? Well, here's proof - pictures taken tonight after he fell asleep.....

snuggled up with one truck

and four more beside the bed - I love having boys!

Father's Day x 2 - lots of love from Eli & Cole

Today, at our house, we celebrated Daddy!! We had lots of good stuff planned. First, we woke Daddy up with presents. Who doesn't love presents? Eli and Cole had each made Daddy something special at school (with a little help from their wonderful teachers of course!). I bought Tim a gift as well, a new camelbak and boy was he happy! We woke Daddy up kinda early since we were leaving the house and giving him some alone time. We left him with a warm-out-of-the-oven coffee cake, a fresh pot of coffee and the newspaper. The boys and I ran off for a 10 mile bike ride at the American Tobacco Trail with my co-worker Kathryn, leaving Tim with something he hasn't had in quite a while - peace and quiet to drink coffee and read the paper. Tim also went on a road bike ride while we were gone so it was a good start to the day.

We managed to get the boys down for a nap fairly early and then we just hung out relaxing ourselves. Once they were up, we did snacks and headed to the pool. It was VERY hot. We probably stayed about an hour and a half, doing our best to tire Eli out. =) For dinner, we had Daddy's favorite, hamburgers off the grill. More hanging out and Daddy celebrating, it was then time to put the boys to bed.

I hope Tim had a good Father's Day. Of course, we both called our Dads to wish them a happy day as well. All holidays take on a new meaning when you have kids of your own. Just a few years ago, this wasn't a day to celebrate Tim - now it is times 2! You're a great Father Tim and I'm very thankful that you're my partner in this crazy crazy adventure we're on. I love you.

Eli was excited to wake Daddy up with gifts

and even more excited to crinkle the gift bag

the boys were happy with paper but notice, Tim looks like he's smiling again!! He was so surprised and happy with his new camelbak.

Daddy and his boys

and what Father's Day - or any day for that matter - could be complete without Monster trucks?

How we spent our 5 year anniversary.....

Today was such a fun day! Tim & I took the day off work to spend together to celebrate our anniversary and the main objective was to go biking. So after we dropped the boys off at school, we loaded up the bikes and headed to Umstead. We rode over to Lake Crabtree, rode the trails there and rode back. It was the most single track biking I've done in well over 3-1/2 years. I did better that I thought I would but my mind remembers a time when it was so much easier! After biking, we stopped for a hamburger and a chocolate milkshake - YUM! That was my treat for all the exercise today and this week - the last milkshake I had was when Cole was born, almost a year ago!

Then we hung around the house working in the garden and doing a few chores. We picked the boys up from school early and headed to the pool to meet Kara, Brian, Owen & Faye for Friday night fun night at the pool. We ordered pizza and let the kids play and run around. We had a great time hanging out with friends. The boys loved running around together and splashing around. The night ended with very tired children and very happy parents!

a rare sight - BOTH our bikes on the truck ready for a ride

these jumps were SO much fun - Tim taking a turn

my turn - I went through them 3 times

happy couple - Tim looks like he's smiling!!

Cole was happy to be at the pool - he loves the water

flying water boy

Eil & Owen - such great buds

Cole & Faye - their 1st Friday night date

Weekends exhaust me

That is no lie - weekends always seem to exhaust me. And this weekend was no different.

Some parts of the weekend are a blur, so much so that neither Tim nor I can remember what we did on Friday night (how sad!). Saturday started with me going to the Y for a very early workout and then we spent some family time running errands. We went to the Grand Opening of the Performance Bike store - very cool store and I scored some good deals on cycling clothing. Eli had a blast cruising the store on a balance bike. He was all over the place - in a good way. I'm not sure how we managed to get out of there without one! Then we went to the mall to Build a Bear for our friend Faye who just turned a year old. Eli did a great job helping build "Molly" and then carried the box through the mall. He's such a big boy. We had to force naps on the boys Saturday afternoon knowing that Faye's birthday party was later that afternoon. Couldn't take cranky boys to a party!! My friend Kara did an amazing job with her ladybug theme and the party was a great success. Eli had lots of toddler boy friends to play with and we pretty much kept them outside the entire time. Water play, play dough, spraying a sheet with paint and just running around being boys - it was a fun time.

Saturday night after he got Cole to bed, Tim headed down to his parents for the night. He went to pick up a console stereo that belonged to his Great Aunt - more on that to come, I'm looking forward to listening to some records on it. So it was weird being alone in the house with the boys for the entire night. I don't believe that has ever happened. Fortunately for me, the boys slept all night even though they were up early Sunday morning.

Sunday morning we had breakfast and then I packed the boys up for a bike ride. Yes, I pulled them both around in a double bike trailer. I figured out that I was pulling 90 pounds!! I took them down to the lake and around twice - not quite 7 miles. There were a few hills in there so I was proud of myself. Cole was a little fussy at first (Eli takes up quite a bit of room) but settled down once we were riding and ended up taking a quick cat nap on the 2nd lap around the lake. After the bike ride, we headed to Noah's for a play date. Eli & Noah have a lot of fun playing together - it's so fun to watch them just be boys. Robin & I end up refereeing every once in a while but for the most part, they're really good together. Cole wanted to be in on the action but isn't quite there yet. As soon as he's walking, those boys better watch out. Cole's going to be right there with them. Once we got home, we had a quick lunch and it was time for naps. I was really excited about naps because I wanted / needed one too. I got Cole to sleep and then Eli. Then Cole woke up so I had to get him to sleep a second time. Tim got home around 2:30pm so I then declared a nap for myself and took about 30 minutes. Once the boys were back up and fed, we made an attempt to go to the pool. I say "attempt" because as soon as we got in the water it started raining and the thunder rolled in. We then packed it up and came home - only about 3 minutes in the pool. The boys handled it great and didn't give much of a fuss. The night then got more interesting as our power started doing funny things. The night ended with no ac and the power company installing a new transformer outside our house at midnight. We were very happy to get our air conditioning back!

Friday morning - I think Cole is bigger than Eli was. This is what Eli wore for his 1 year pictures and I think it's tighter on Cole than it was on Eli.

Giving Molly her heart - Eli even gave it a kiss!

Eli got into one of the Build-a-Bear cars. I couldn't resist a quick picture.

Birthday Girl Faye

The cool toddler boys' table

Sprinkler action - the boys loved it

I love the faces of pure joy in these pictures

I tried to get a shot of the toddler boys - not much luck

Eli & Owen - birthday girl's brother

Cute boys painting

Ladybug cupcake tower

Sunday morning bike ride, still in their pjs

More cute boys! Eli & Noah

Toddler wrestle-mania

Snack time - interrupted by little brother

A beautiful sight at midnight - our new transformer being installed

Coleman Cooler

Mountain Getaway

This past weekend, we packed up the truck and headed West to the mountains for our first family mini-vacation - our first trip as a family of four not to a relative's house. To quickly describe the weekend, I'd say it had its' ups and downs but overall was pretty good.

We picked the boys up from school just after lunch on Friday and hit the road. We thought they would sleep a bit on the way up but that wasn't really accurate. Eli is a great traveler, talking about everything and nothing and generally commenting about what he sees. Cole, on the other hand, is not so great of a traveler. He would go from happy to content to not happy to crying / screaming without a whole lot of warning. The last 45 minutes of the drive were especially tough as we were all ready to get out of the truck (it did take us 4-1/2 hours to get to our destination).

Once at our cabin, we were all very relieved. We had packed all of our food so once we were there, we were there for the night. The boys explored and played - it was kinda like being at home in that monster trucks were everywhere. Friday night we grilled hamburgers and watched 'Cars'. After putting the boys to bed, Tim & I fell asleep on the couch until 1am. We made the mistake of trying to go into our bedroom where Cole was in the pack and play and it woke him up. Tim ended up getting Cole back to sleep and I was then relegated to a twin bed with Eli.

Saturday morning we headed to Crabtree Meadows where we hiked to Crabtree Falls. This hike was MUCH different than the last time we hiked there. Almost 3 years ago - actually my first entry on the blog! - was our anniversary trip the mountains and our hike to the Falls. I was 8 months pregnant with Eli and Belle was physically strong enough to do the hike with us. From the parking lot, you can go 0.7 miles down to the falls and then 2-ish miles back out, a lot more gradual climb out. Well for safety's sake, since I was worried about having a kid on my back and falling down, we hiked the long way in and then the steep short way out. Tim & I both wore backpack carriers for the kids knowing that Eli wouldn't make it the entire time. He hiked for a while put then wanted to be carried. I first put him in my carrier and actually carried him a while. He was huge in there, seemed to be half my size. Then he got down and walked again but shortly decided he wanted to be carried. I then took Cole from Tim and carried him while he loaded up Eli. And Eli is quite a load! We took a break and had a snack at the falls and enjoyed the rest. The boys were getting antsy so we headed toward the steep way out. Tim & I both got our workout in that day! Funny thing was, while we were working so hard to get the boys back to the car, they both fell asleep in the carriers!! After the hike, we took a short break at the camp store and then headed toward Mt Mitchell. One day I'll have to do a Mt Mitchell post and look at some of our pictures from there. Mt Mitchell holds a lot of memories for us. We started going there early in our "courtship" and did several rides to the top, including Assault on Mt Mitchell (looking back I think we were insane!) and even got engaged at the top of the old tower. There is now a new tower, old one has been demolished so it was kinda cool to take the boys up there, a new beginning of stories on the top of the mountain. You would think that with all this activity the boys would be tired. Well, you'd be wrong. They finally settled down for naps about 3:30pm, giving us some well deserved and much needed quiet time.

Sunday morning, we headed to Emerald Village to do some gem mining. We thought Eli would really be into looking for cool rocks. He was interested in rocks but not the intended activity. He wanted to run around and play in rocks. Cole enjoyed it and wanted to get into everything he could. He was a handful! Our gem mining experience was a quick one - we did get some colorful stones though - but we hope one day the boys will actually be interested. After gem mining, we took a quick stop in Little Switzerland and the Switzerland Inn where we got married. I still love it up there and we hope to go stay there again soon.

After an early lunch, we packed up and started heading home. Thankfully the boys fell asleep and the first hour was quiet, allowing us to get off the mountain and back to I40 before they started making a lot of noise. Eli, again the great traveler, just babbled, told stories, sang songs and just observed everything around him. Cole was again high maintenance and his "want" changed every few minutes. He was probably good for about half the ride but when it's a 5 hour drive (yes took longer coming home), half of that in an enclosed vehicle seems like a lot. We were all happy to be home having survived our first family trip.

So yes, parts of the weekend were rough but parts were really good. Making new memories at some of our favorite spots was really cool. Reliving our athletic endeavors and thinking about what we have done in the past was cool but also depressing (Blue Ridge Parkway rides, training rides for Assault on Mt Mitchell, me hitting 46 mph on my bike coming off the top of Mitchell and then the event itself) - we're in no where near that good of shape! But we do hope to instill in the boys a love of being outside and being active. I don't think we're going to have any problems. So far so good.

the cabin

I thought this was cool - all our shoes lined up (and yes I do have big feet!)

Cole wants to walk and run so bad - he did some practicing with Daddy

excited to go hiking

Sherpa Daddy

We saw two really cool bright orange lizard / salamander things. Can anyone identify them? Brad?

our little hiker boy

leading the way - "walking stick" and all

Daddy and his boys

Doesn't Eli look huge in my carrier?

the switch

Daddy and Eli at the overlook

Mommy and Cole - same overlook

family self portrait 1

at the waterfall

Crabtree Falls

going for a closer look

this reminds me of a picture of Tim at Niagara Falls - I'll have to post it and compare

Another picture Mommy?

My not-so-little boys

family self portrait 2

This cracks me up. We took them off our backs, set them down and they were still asleep!

Mommy & Daddy self portrait (aka Evia & Tim)

new tower at Mt Mitchell

Marker - highest point east of the Mississippi

Family shot in the tower

and at the sign

I forgot to mention that the boys took their first bath together Saturday night. Eli loved being able to dump water on Cole and Cole thought it was funny. I took a lot of photos but some had to be censored.

I love their faces in this shot

priceless

again faces

Eli had fun swinging on the swing hanging from a huge tree

We even helped him climb in it.

Cole hitching a ride - ever wondered how many ways you can carry a baby?

This is what Cole thought of the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Gem mining with Daddy

scooping into the screen

Daddy finding treasures

Cole had fun searching and wanted to eat the rocks.