The humidity finally went away yesterday and we enjoyed a lovely evening at the park! Here are some pictures:

"Ooh, the view's way better from up here!"

Can't you just see the desperation on Cullen's scrunched-up face? He really wanted Daddy to pick him up.

And he got his wish of course

Daddy swung him around...

Pure bliss!

"Thanks Daddy!"

Jack just chillin' in the grass

He had a hard time climbing the hill in his sandals so he crawled up

They kept running toward Brandon and he would jump over them when they got close, such a fun game to a toddler!

Walking over to the bridge to look at the turtles and fish in the pond.

On the way back, the fire truck was parked outside our building. If you look closely, you can see Cullen pointing to it. He kept pointing and yelling "dat! dat!"

Today was really nice too and we took another walk to the store and to return our library books. On the way home we really lucked out, there were 4 fire trucks parked outside the station and all the firefighters were outside washing them! The boys were in heaven!

Swagbucks

Even though I've been addicted to couponing for over a year now, it's been a long slow process. It took me a while to learn the ropes, find coupon blogs, and start saving big. Back when I started, I kept noticing on these coupon blogs that every single one of them was raving about this thing called Swagbucks. I'd heard of it before but it didn't seem worth it to sign up for some weird program that would probably make my computer crash. But finally, at the very end of February, I gave in and signed up for it after reading this convincing post on one of my favorite blogs. Well, downloading a small toolbar didn't cause my computer to crash and I am loving Swagbucks! I've never looked back!

Let me preface this by saying that I haven't won crazy amounts of Swagbucks, I don't spend all day at the computer doing Swagbucks searches or hunting for codes. I obviously don't have time for that. But even with the minimal amount of effort that I put into Swagbucks, I have reaped so much in rewards! It's been only about 3 1/2 months, but I have already won over $40 in free Amazon giftcards.

And when I say minimal effort, I mean it. I rarely (if ever) look for codes anymore. If there's one staring me in the face I'll obviously use it, but I almost never look for them. I haven't yet bought anything that earned me Swagbucks. I've only referred one person (my sister Rachel, she's hooked too). And I only do about 15 searches a day using the Swagbucks search engine. That's it, that's how I win free money from Amazon! I use the Swagbucks search engine in place of Google. Simple, huh?

I installed the toolbar and whenever I'm searching for something I type it in there first. If the results don't come back with what I was looking for, I move on to Google but often I've already won some Swagbucks for checking there first. And instead of bookmarking my favorite coupon blogs or websites that I visit often, I do a Swagbucks search for them. This extra step probably adds about 2-3 seconds per search, so a total of a few extra minutes per day and I win free money! Sound too good to be true? It's not! Anybody who has a computer and about 4 minutes to spare each day could win big. Even somebody living in, oh I don't know, Stanley, Idaho could win free giftcards just by using the search engine! ;-)

In all seriousness, though, Swagbucks are awesome! Even if you only earned enough for 1 $5 Amazon giftcard a month, why would you turn down free money? Even with my minimal effort, I earn an average of $10 a month in Amazon cards. And if you have more time than me to be on the internet, if you have a job or class that you do a lot of internet searches for, if you often shop online, if you have lots of friends to refer, or if you're more proactive than me in getting codes and trying to earn Swagbucks, you could potentially win much more!

If you would like to sign up (and earn me some points for referring you), here's the link:

http://www.swagbucks.com/refer/kimberleeo


I would definitely recommend reading the blog article I linked to above, she gives great tips on how to win Swagbucks.
And right now, they're having a special promotion, if you enter the code SUMMEROFSWAG when you sign up, you'll automatically receive 20 bonus Swagbucks on top of the 30 you normally receive for signing up. You'll be well on your way to free money!

My Funny Family

Life is always so funny around here, I swear, I laugh all day long!

*Diaper changes are always difficult around here because most of the time the boys are kicking and squirming. As soon as I lay them down on the changing table, they usually start freaking out. Jack was doing this recently and I was trying to talk him through it. I was telling him "No kicking, you need to hold still, you aren't getting down until I get your diaper on." Finally he stopped fighting me and then got this sly little smile on his face. All of a sudden he throws up his hands and starts waving them at me (this is the baby sign for 'all done' Whenever they do this at mealtime, I immediately take away their food and let them out of the highchairs or else they start chucking food on the floor). I guess he thought that if he told me he was 'all done' with the diaper change, I would stop immediately and let him go. I'm sure he thought he was pretty clever, but I don't think he quite gets the concept of 'all done.' :-)

*The other day I was sitting at the kitchen table organizing coupons when I heard both boys erupt into hysterical laughter. I peeked around the couch and saw Cullen lying on his stomach and Jack standing on top of him, bracing himself on the coffee table and trying to bounce up and down on Cullen. Hmmm, well, I guess as long as Cullen thought it was funny too then no harm done, right?

*That same day, the boys also shared their first mouth-to-mouth kiss. It was just about the funniest thing I have ever seen because they walked towards each other in slow motion with their mouths gaping open (this is how they kiss everybody, with wide open mouths). Then when they were face to face, Cullen leaned in and gave Jack a big slobbery kiss. So cute!

*Cullen thinks it's a blast to put a blanket or towel over his head and walk around running into walls and furniture. Keep that up, kid, and you're not going to have any teeth left at all. It's hilarious to watch though.

*Some videos from right after naptime:

Instant remorse when he realizes he's lost his cup to his brother...



Jack yells in gibberish a lot, this one is relatively tame, sometimes he gets so excited that he starts shaking. And Cullen's favorite activity is putting anything and everything into his hamper. I find the strangest things in there!



*A conversation with Brandon this week:

Me: I'm an aunt! Can you believe it? And you're an uncle!

Brandon: I'm already an uncle.

Me: No you're not, you don't have any nieces or nephews.

Brandon: Yes I do.

Me: You're joking right? You are not an uncle. Not unless Scott has some illegitimate child you never told me about.

Brandon (laughs, then says in all seriousness): No, my Dad's sister's kids have kids.

Me: So your cousins have kids?? And you think those kids are your nieces and nephews???

Brandon: Yeah, they are. I'm their uncle.

Hmmm, the guy can get an A in the hardest class in law school but apparently doesn't know much about family trees.

It's About Time

A few weeks ago, I found myself vegging out on the couch, eating a pint of Ben & Jerry's Half Baked and watching The Biggest Loser. Ironic, huh? Keep in mind, this was a pretty regular thing for me, the only variance was that sometimes I might have a brownie or a cookie instead of ice cream. Anyways, it was a couple weeks before my birthday, so call it a pre-midlife crisis, but I felt terrible about myself and the very next day I went and ordered a fitness DVD from Amazon. It came a few days later and I tried it out and, believe it or not, I have kept up with it for almost a month now!

Until a few weeks ago, I had not worked out in over 2 years! Seriously, 2 years! I go on several fast walks each week pushing a 70+ pound stroller, so that might be considered some form of exercise, but I have not been to a gym or done any kind of formal exercise in over 2 years. The last time I did was about a week before I found out I was pregnant and I got so nauseous and exhausted that I was sure I was coming down with the flu so I decided to hold off on working out until I was feeling better (which never happened of course).

And then after the pregnancy, I just kind of shrugged and thought, what's the point? I have stretch marks so I'll never wear a bikini ever again, I'm back to my pre-pregnancy weight, my clothes fit fine, good enough right? So why bother working out? Plus, I'm a mother of twin toddlers, how would I EVER find the time???

But for some reason a few weeks ago, I was finally motivated to try something. I may be back at my pre-pregnancy weight, but I would still like to tone up and replace some extra fat with muscle. I definitely have the dreaded "mommy-pooch" of extra skin around my middle, but I'm hoping that if I tone up and build core muscle, that at least it won't be as noticeable.

So that's where Bob Harper comes in. I wanted an exercise routine I could do from home while the boys nap and I didn't want it to be too intense or else I knew I'd never stick with it. I started out looking at some of the most well-known workouts, like Jillian's 30 Day Shred or P90X (or whatever it's called), but let's face it, I would have died if I'd attempted either of those at this point. Waaayyy too intense for me! Then I spotted Bob's pretty face on the cover of The Biggest Loser Weight Loss Yoga. I read some reviews and it sounded perfect so I used a few Swagbucks and got it for free! (I just love Swagbucks, but that's a whole different post!)

So far, I love it! The first time I was so sore I had to wait a few days before I tried it again but I took that as a good sign. It's not intense at all, just a lot of slow moves but they're still hard - for me at least! My arms and legs are shaking during the last few moves because they're so tired by that point! And I'm not gonna lie, my favorite part is at the very end where we do the corpse pose which, as the name suggests, is where you completely relax and lie on the floor like a dead body. Well, that and when Bob says reassuringly "You did it!" Anyways, there are 3 different levels, I'm still on Level 1, but I'm going to move on to Level 2 next week. We'll see how that goes...

The best part is that it's only 30-40 minutes (depending on which workout you choose) so it doesn't take up all of nap time and I can still gets lots of other things done before they wake up. So, 3-4 days a week, as soon as the boys go down for a nap, I just do the video for 30 minutes, take a super quick shower and still have at least an hour before they wake up to clean or do some 'internet errands.'

I'm already seeing some results too, not on my waistline unfortunately, but I definitely feel stronger lately and I have more energy too. It's also helping me to remember to drink more water which makes a world of difference. I feel so much better when I drink lots of water, I don't eat as much, I'm not drinking empty calories, and I swear it gives me more energy.

Anyways, I'm glad I've found a workout that is easy for me to stick with but I'm still afraid I'll start slacking off so that's why I'm publicly writing about it. Hopefully this will help motivate me to keep on with it! Even if I don't lose any inches off my waist, (and I'm not especially hopeful about this since it's all skin and not really extra fat) there's still something to be said for getting back in shape, right? And I'm sure I can count on Bob to whip me into shape!

Pictures from the Week

Can you believe how grown-up Jackson and Cullen are looking these days? Me neither.




These are some pictures from Memorial Day, we went on a picnic to a local park that we'd never been to before. It was crazy hot though so we didn't stay long. But we had fun while it lasted.

Jack heard an airplane flying overhead

A relaxing picnic with my boys. I know, I know, Cullen laying on his Daddy couldn't get any cuter!

Playing ball with Daddy. Not sure if you can see but poor Cullen's cheeks are so flushed!

This is from this morning, we walked to the drugstore to get some diapers. I took them out of the stroller when we got home and went to put my shoes in the bedroom (otherwise they mysteriously disappear). When I came back out they had both climbed back into the stroller, ready to go again!

Thursday Ramblings

*GREAT NEWS: Brandon got an A in his Civil Procedure class!! This was his hardest class yet and his professor told him it would probably be the hardest class he would ever take in law school. He came home from the final and said that he honestly expected to get a C, maybe a B if he was lucky. But yesterday afternoon, he came up to me with the strangest look on his face and said he had gotten his first grade back. I could tell from the look that it was either going to be really good or really bad so I waited in suspense until he told me it was an A and that he was "floored." I have only seen him this shocked once or twice in his entire life- he actually had to sit down and then kept shaking his head saying "I honestly can't believe it. It must be a mistake." Then he said it was a bigger shock to him than when the doctor first told us we were expecting twins! Well, I guess all that studying paid off! I am SO proud of him! And it gets even better! He consistently scored well above the average on all of his papers in his Legal Writing class and even got the highest grade several times! So we were expecting him to get an A in that class as long as his final paper was good and guess what... he got it! So far those are the only 2 grades he's gotten back, but what a great end to his first and hardest year of law school!

*More great news: We were approved for in-state tuition! We had to wait until this past March to apply for it because we had to live in Virginia for over a year to qualify for it. But his first application was denied and we were so worried that we would have to pay for out-of-state tuition which would double the cost! That would have meant double the student loans and double the debt he'd graduate with. But the Lord was so good to us and the board granted Brandon in-state tuition after we appealed! What a relief!

*Brandon's summer schedule has been wonderful so far! Between his internship and his part-time job, he's working full-time during the day but only has class 2 nights a week. And they've been cancelled all last week so he was here every night!! I almost forgot what it was like having him around so much, but I'm loving it! Another plus is that he takes the bus to his internship so I get the car 2 days a week and he leaves his computer here too so I can skype with my family during the day! So I will get to see lots of Violet during the coming weeks! Lucky me!

*We got free Chick-Fil-A for dinner last night! They are having a promotion this week and giving away free spicy chicken sandwiches to anybody who signs up online. So for about $5 for two fries and a diet soda, we fed our family dinner and I didn't have to cook or clean anything! What a treat!

*It has been incredibly hot and humid this week, well above average for this time of year so we've been staying indoors as much as possible. But our pool opened this week and I picked up our passes yesterday so we should be able to stay cool by swimming this summer. The boys are just getting old enough for me to walk with them to the pool (which is just across the parking lot, but since they don't like to hold hands and aren't very good at going up and down stairs and have a tendency to try to escape , it hasn't always been possible to cross the parking lot by ourselves). I haven't attempted walking to the pool yet, but we did walk out of the building to the car for the first time ever yesterday! Usually I have to load them and all the gear into the stroller and try to maneuver the double stroller through 4 very heavy, automatically-closing doors. It's a 10-15 minute process to get from our apartment to the car and I often get stuck in the door frame because the stroller is too wide. Not fun. Not fun at all. So I've been anxiously looking forward to the day when they could finally (safely) walk with me out to the car. And yesterday's experiment went pretty well, just one incident of Cullen plopping himself down in protest but we were nearly on the sidewalk by that point and no cars were around so I just let go of Jack for a second and picked Cullen up and carried him the rest of the way. Oh to be free from that dreaded double stroller! It's so close I can taste it!

*My Wednesday morning small group has started up again which is a huge blessing to me! I love having at least one morning out with adults to look forward to each week. It's so encouraging to hear from other wives and moms who have similar struggles and situations as me. We're going to be reading through Instruments in the Redeemers Hands by Paul Tripp and I'm really looking forward to it. And we have a couple new members joining so we're going to be starting up a childcare rotation. This is going to be wonderful because this past year, we have had 6 children under the age of 3 running around during our study. As you can imagine, this can be pretty distracting so I'm really looking forward to a peaceful fellowship time.

The boys are starting to wake up from their nap, so that's all for now. I will try to post some new pictures of them later though!

Violet Has Arrived!!

At 5:29 pm on May 31st, (Memorial Day and my Mom's birthday), my niece Violet Kara Wallstrom was born! She was 8 lbs., 4 oz. and 20 inches long. And she's the spitting image of her mother!

Isn't she perfect? I just adore her beautiful dark hair! I actually thought Jack and Cullen would have lots of hair too and I was surprised when they came out with hardly any - I'm even more surprised now that it's turning blonde, but that's another story. I am just in love with Violet's hair, perfect to put lots of bows and ribbons in!!

My poor sister had a pretty rough labor and delivery though. Thankfully, it's over now and Violet was born safely! God is good! And the best part (although many of you might find this creepy) is that I got to watch the whole thing!! How did I watch it while 3000 miles away? On Skype of course! Violet was born at 8:30 my time on Memorial Day so Brandon was at home. He took care of the boys for a few hours while I locked myself up in the bedroom and talked with my family and supported Renee through her labor.

And it was the most incredible thing I have ever witnessed! Renee was so brave, she persevered through an incredibly long, drawn-out and painful labor. I don't know how she did it, she's an inspiration to me! I burst into tears the moment Violet finally came out, more tears than I cried when my own boys were born actually! It was because after watching my sister endure over 30 hours of labor, 2+ hours of pushing, and so much pain and exhaustion and then finally RELIEF - Violet's here!!! It was just overwhelming!

This probably sounds crazy, but it made me really sad that I missed out on the whole labor and delivery process. I have often felt this way, but most intensely after seeing my niece born. I never got to feel the excitement of those first contractions, wondering "if this is really it," the build-up, the incredible experience of actually birthing a baby. Of course I was excited on the way to the hospital and during the operation and when I finally saw my precious babies, but it's different. I don't really know how to explain why I feel it's different, I just do. I'm excited for my next pregnancy (a few years down the road) and I hope and pray that I can deliver without a c-section. I can hardly imagine a more precious or rewarding experience than laboring and bringing a baby into the world! (Note: I know I'm probably making a fool of myself here. Just watch, I will write a post 3 years from now, after having a regular delivery, and will be wishing I had just had another scheduled c-section.) Anyways, the whole point of this was just to say that I am so so SO proud of my sister. You did an awesome job Renee, I love you!!

And here are a few more pictures of my darling niece:

This is right after they had cleaned her up

I just can't get over how much she looks like Renee!!

Well done, Ne! Don't they both look beautiful?

One last sweet story about Violet's name: Jon and Renee had told us a while ago that they planned to name her Violet May. So I was shocked when they told me right after her birth that her name was Violet Kara. Wanna know why they chose Kara as the middle name? After all of her aunties and her Nana!
Kimberlee, Anna, Rachel, Anne (my Mom's middle name). Isn't that special? So I now officially have 1/4 of a niece named after me! Haha, just kidding- I truly do feel honored! I think it's a beautiful name for a beautiful little girl!

My arms are literally aching to hold her! Soon, little Violet, soon! Just know for now that your Auntie Kim loves you very much! (And I hope you snuggle with your quilt and feel the intense love it was made with every night!)

Airplanes!

On Saturday we took the boys to visit the Air and Space Museum out by the airport. It was super hot and humid so this turned out to be the perfect place to go for the day! We got out of the house, the boys got to run around, and we stayed cool - everybody's happy!

They insist on walking pretty much everywhere by themselves now and they get very cranky if they have to be carried very far. They also hate to hold hands with us while they're walking, they want to be free to wander wherever they please. I think it's cute that they're so independent. But I do not think it's cute when they start screaming and sit down right in the middle of the street just because they don't want to have their hand held. So we're working on accepting holding hands with Mommy and Daddy sometimes, at least in dangerous places. It's a work in progress... Anyways, here's Cullen looking oh-so-grown-up walking up to the museum.

The museum is out by the airport and is in a gigantic hangar. As you can see from this picture, it's just filled with airplanes! Every little boy's dream!

In front of a fighter jet

Jack admiring some old airplanes

Cullen

We're standing in front of the Enterprise Space Shuttle, it was enormous!!

This picture doesn't do it justice, it was several times bigger than the biggest airplane I've ever seen! It was amazing to see a real space shuttle in person!

Of course, the boys spent a good chunk of time just running back and forth together. It's their favorite game :-)

A Boy And His Stick

While in St. Michael last weekend, Jack found a stick on the ground at the park and carried it around for a while. He used it to whack bushes, trees, people, anything that got in his way.

Birthday Weekend

Last Saturday was my 25th birthday and thanks to my husband and kids, it was very special! On Friday night, Brandon and I went on a date. With kids and babysitters these days, we have to be quite efficient on dates. No time for dinner, then a movie and then coffee like the old days. So it works out perfectly for us that right here in Old Town there's a movie theater that serves meals while you watch the movie. So we saw Ironman 2 and ate yummy paninis- then we got lost getting back to our car and took this picture on some random street corner in Alexandria while searching for it. A memorable evening :-)


On Saturday morning, I woke up to a delicious waffle breakfast in bed and a bouquet of roses! All 4 of us enjoyed breakfast in bed actually! The boys thought it was super fun to eat in Mommy and Daddy's bed and, a week later, we're still finding little bits of waffles and scrambled eggs in there ;-)
After breakfast, we packed up some snacks and toys and took off for the Chesapeake Bay. We ended up in a quaint little town called St. Michael and spent the day visiting parks, antique shops and just admiring all of the cute old houses. We found some really wonderful little parks too which the boys loved. We spent the whole day there and got home just in time to give the boys a bath and put them to bed. Here's Cullen running to "get" me while we were playing in the park, they think they're so funny!

Hmmm, that's a long way down. Good thing he's being cautious, huh?

Watching the ducks swimming in the bay

We saw the cutest little family of ducklings, I think I liked them more than Cullen though.

On Monday night, Renee took me out for margaritas and I completely over-indulged in chips and salsa. I had been craving it for months though, it was SO. GOOD. And I got showered with gifts from our family and friends, including an awesome sewing box from my inlaws! Inside were all sorts of little gadgets (I think in sewing lingo they're called 'notions') including a rotary cutter! YES! Look out anyone who's having a baby, now that I have a rotary cutter, I'm going to go crazy making quilts! Thank you to everyone who helped to make my 25th so special, even though most of you were far away! And yes, in case you were wondering, I definitely feel old now!

Are We Raising a Narcissist?

End of the Week Ramblings

*First of all, my niece Violet is due exactly 2 weeks from today!! I won't get to meet her until the beginning of July, but I'm stoked for her to be born nonetheless!

*Brandon and I are going on a date tonight! The only bad thing about dates is that the babysitters will see how dirty our house is so I've been cleaning all day long! Normally it wouldn't take somebody an entire day to clean a small apartment like ours, but I have two little destroyers who are very good at their job and who follow me around as I clean. As soon as I've put a clean shirt in a drawer and turned my back, Cullen's pulled it out and dashed across the room to throw it in the dirty clothes hamper. And Jack tries to steal the broom and mop out of my hands while I'm still using them! He grabs on with both hands and pulls as hard as he can, and he seems genuinely surprised that I won't let him have it.

*We gave the boys a haircut earlier this week, they look so old now! They're definitely more like little boys than babies :-( Well, you know, apart from the fact that they don't speak and that they throw tantrums left and right. Here's a video of Cullen getting his hair buzzed off:



*Speaking of speaking (hehe), they actually are making a little progress lately. They've been showing me that they understand a lot of what I say lately. Before, when I said, "Jack, go get the ball," I would get a blank look. The past few weeks, though, he's been getting huge smiles on his face and runs as fast as he can to get the ball. And it's not just with toys either, twice over the past two days I have asked them to go get their sippy cup and hand it to me so I can refill it... and they've brought it! When I ask them "Where's the kitty?" they immediately start looking all over for the cats and they'll point to them when they see one. Cullen often says 'mama' when he wants my attention, both boys say 'dada' though not always to Brandon, Jack says 'ba' for ball, and I may be hearing things, but I swear Cullen says "ow" when he wants to go outside.

*They've been a lot more interested in reading lately. Well, not so much me reading to them, but more them sitting on my or Brandon's lap and reading to themselves. It's the funniest thing to watch them! They go get a book, walk over, turn their backs to us and start doing a quick little backwards shuffle until they run into us and then plop down. Then Cullen points at all his favorite pictures and yells 'ba' or 'da' or 'oo.' Jack does this really fast quiet murmer where he says "bwee, wee, wee, whoah, whoah, bee bee." It sounds almost like he's really reading aloud to himself, only in gibberish. It's so. funny. Also if I'm reading with Jack, Cullen comes over and tries to plop himself on top of Jack so he can read with us too. Nevermind that I have another leg for him to sit on, he wants to sit right in the middle. Jack of course gets furious and starts screeching and punching him in the back. I just laugh and rearrange them so we can all read together. And then about 3.5 seconds later, one of them decides he's over it and gets up to play with something else.

*By the way, both boys do this awful high-pierced screeching sound when they're angry now. It's the bane of my life. If they're both screeching at the same time, I just want to run into my bedroom and slam the door. It doesn't seem to bother Brandon that much, he just ignores it. Maybe it's because I hear it a lot more often or maybe something about it just especially bothers me, but it drives me crazy! I hope they stop doing it soon!

*Jack hasn't sat down in the bathtub in over 2 months, crazy huh?!? One day in March, he just suddenly decided that he didn't like bathing anymore. He doesn't mind baths if he can walk around the tub playing with toys but he absolutely refuses to sit down and usually hangs over the side of the tub the whole time. This makes it extremely hard to wash him and results in a lot of the dreaded screeching when I have to rinse the shampoo out of his hair. (And no, he's not afraid of the water because he still loves pools just as much as ever and doesn't mind being up to his shoulders in water then. It's just something about the bathtub.) Cullen on the other hand is still happy as a clam during baths. His favorite thing to do is steal the washcloth when Mommy's wrestling with Jack and suck the water out of it. Gross!!

That's about all I can think of for now, besides the babysitters will be here in an hour and a half. I better go finish up the cleaning and make dinner for the boys!

Another Family Outing

On Saturday, we took the boys to the National Arboretum which is basically a giant, beautiful park here in DC. The boys had so.much.fun. They just love playing outside, it's definitely their favorite thing to do!

They think it's really cool to ride on the front of their stroller instead of in the seats. Until they fall off of course.

Splashing in the fountain

Throwing a frisbee for the first time, it didn't go far...

Playing catch with Daddy

Playing peek-a-boo with the frisbee

Jack fell near the fountain and hit his lip on the cement. He split it open and it bled for a few minutes, but after that he was just fine and had a great time. Thankfully, no teeth were damaged this time.

Cullen climbed onto his daddy to enjoy his water

Fighting over the ball. When Brandon saw this, he said "that picture pretty much sums up our life nowadays ." I couldn't have said it better.

You might be fooled into thinking that Jack's sticking his lip out because he just busted it up. But no, he is actually making his new favorite face. He started sticking out his bottom lip about a week ago and does it pretty much anytime I tell him no or take something away from him. He is so stubborn! But I guess with Brandon and I as parents, that really doesn't surprise me ;-)

Me and my boys enjoying the sunshine. A thunderstorm came on Friday night so there was no humidity on Saturday, it was wonderful!

The Zoo

On Friday afternoon we took a family outing to the zoo. It was super hot and humid and the boys weren't terribly interested in the animals (probably because most of them were resting in the shade and out of sight) but still a very fun time because at least we were all together! This rarely happens anymore because of Brandon's crazy schedule and the boys were just ecstatic to spend extra time with their daddy this week :-)

We spent a lot of time in the bird house because it was air conditioned. The boys didn't care too much about the birds but they sure did have a great time chasing each other back and forth.

An action shot of Cullen running as fast as he can

They especially loved hiding behind these clear plastic sheets and then jumping out at each other and laughing hysterically.

Once the birds started squawking, they were spellbound though.

Refueling before another game of running-back-and-forth-while-giggling.

The weather report had said it was only going to be in the high seventies so we all wore jeans. Too bad that didn't take into account the humidity which raised the temperature to about 95 degrees. It was SO hot so we stopped and got slurpees on the way home. I gave the boys a taste of mine. But, of course, a taste wasn't enough for them- they screamed for more the whole way back to the car.

Evil Laugh?

We're obviously working on understanding what things are ok to throw and what things aren't. Also, no throwing anything directly at other peoples' faces/heads ;-)

Last Word on Coupons

I promise- but for those of you wanting to know what coupon resources I use, here are some coupon blogs I check daily:


The Krazy Coupon Lady - This site is mostly for West Coast stores, but I like their Safeway, Target, and drugstore deals. Plus they always have the best internet and clothing deals and I LOVE their printable coupon database. I use it all the time!

The Thrifty Mama - She has the best deals on organic and natural products plus all the drugstore and internet deals too.

Money Saving Mom - She's one of the biggest coupon bloggers out there and an inspiration to me! She and her husband have ZERO debt, not even a mortgage! They save up and pay cash for everything, isn't that incredible?!?

Frugal Fun and Fortune - She's on top of all the deals and always has good extra posts too, like on being vegetarian. We're not going vegetarian or anything, but we do eat a dinner or two every week without meat in it (to save money and eat more veggies) and she always has good recipes on her site.

I read a few other blogs too, but they're all local so I know what the best deals in the DC area are. I don't have much time to spend clipping coupons and planning, but I do thoroughly enjoy it so as soon as the boys go down for their morning nap I grab my coffee and head straight for the computer for my daily blog reading. It's a nice break during the day for me and I feel productive planning out ways to save money. Of course, I also check family and friends' blogs too, which negates my productivity, but what else is a stay-at-home mom to do during naptime? I can't cook and clean all of the time, right?

Oh and P.S. I know some of you are going out of your minds waiting for more pictures/videos of the boys but Brandon accidentally deleted all the pictures on my camera and I haven't been able to take any new ones today so you'll have to wait just a little longer. I'll try to put some up tomorrow though!

I Heart Coupons

I don't even think that words could adequately express my love for coupons! I feel like my life was so empty before I discovered the joy of couponing and I can't believe that I actually used to pay full price for all my groceries! I just look back on those dark pre-couponing days, shake my head, and thank the Lord that I at least discovered coupons when I did. It's saved us untold amounts of money! I've gotten our weekly grocery bill down to about $60 a week and that includes diapers and toiletries and everything. We're actually spending about 30-50% less on groceries now than we were a couple years ago when there were just two of us to feed!

One of my favorite things about coupons is that my grocery store here occasionally has "Super Double" and even TRIPLE coupon weeks! (Now that I think about it, this may be the first truly great thing about the East Coast. I have never heard of a West Coast store that triples coupons. I'd be happy to be wrong though!). Super Double week is when the store doubles the value of coupons up to $1.99 (normally they only double up to $0.99) and Triple week is when the store triples all coupons up to $ 0.99! This means that a $0.50 coupon becomes a savings of $1.50 and a $0.75 coupon becomes a savings of $2.25!!! Incredible, right?! Each week I always get one or two freebies using coupons but during these special coupon weeks I usually get tons of free stuff!

For instance, here are some free things I got this week:

Worcestershire sauce, Skinny Water, hot sauce, refried beans, taco seasoning, Land O' Lakes butter, canned chiles, Greek yogurt, McCormick spices, dish detergent, 100% apple juice, white rice, frozen veggies, tortillas, Ziploc bags, Arm & Hammer cleaners, and pasta.

Since I usually have multiples of the same coupon I got several of each of the things listed above all for free. I seriously got 6 bags of white rice! And I also got tons of other things including milk, lettuce, and shredded cheese for $0.75 cents or less!

If you're one of those people who doesn't use coupons because you think you'd end up buying things you don't need just because they're cheap/free or think that coupons only exist for junk food, think again. Granted, there are tons of coupons for junk food and if I wanted to I could probably get twice as much free stuff if I used these coupons. But I don't even bother cutting junk food coupons out, instead I only cut out coupons for the things we actually use. And before I buy anything I ask myself, "Would I buy this if I didn't have a coupon?" and "Will we actually use this?" If the answer is no, I don't buy it. Nearly everything I bought this week is healthy and something I feel good about feeding to my boys. (Well, ok, with the exception of the refried beans and taco seasoning... but you can't make 8 layer dip without them and Brandon and I can't have movie nights without our 8 layer dip!)

There are coupons for every single household staple (including milk, butter, eggs, etc.) as well as toiletries, cleaners, paper products and everything else you buy at the grocery store. And there are even many, many coupons for healthy and organic products. I regularly get organic frozen berries for less than the store brand non-organic frozen berries. I have a stockpile of Kashi cereal that I got for about 25 cents a box. I also got 3 bottles of Seventh Generation cleaners for absolutely FREE a few weeks ago. And just today, I got a big container of organic yogurt and a block of organic mozzarella cheese for less than $1.50 each. That's about half the price of non-organic yogurt and cheese! These organic and natural deals are the ones I get most excited about! And I get them a lot! Plus, I can take the money I'm not spending on paper towels or rice and use it to buy organic fruit and vegetables and they don't even make a dent in my grocery budget.

I could go on and on but I'll stop preaching to you all about coupons. I got so excited about triple coupon week that I just had to share though! If you don't use coupons, you probably think I'm crazy. But guess what- I think you're crazy! Haha, in all seriousness though, coupons are AWESOME! They've completely changed my life!

Coloring

I bought these crayons on sale at Target in March and was so excited to come home and try them out. I envisioned the boys having the time of their lives scribbling away and proudly showing me their artwork. Not quite. Instead, they were only interested in eating them. So I packed them up and decided to wait until they were a little older.

I broke them out again a few days ago and this time, they actually caught on and tried coloring! And, you can tell from the smug look on Jack's face and the way he glances at the camera as if to say "Are you getting this, Mom? Look at me coloring!" that they're pretty darn proud too. Cullen colored a little bit, but he mostly wanted to chew on the crayons or bang them on the table. But I have a nice "drawing" done by Cullen with lots of little colored dots all over it. And Jack couldn't get enough of it, he loves coloring! I've hung each of their first drawings on the refrigerator, what a milestone!






P.S. The way Cullen has that crayon in his mouth totally reminded me of the way I used to take the white crayons and pretend they were cigarettes when I was a kid. Weird, huh? Am I the only one who did that? In my defense, though, it was the 90's and I was too young to know cigarettes cause cancer, I just thought they were cool because I saw it on TV and movies. (Nowadays, I think they're actually banned from TV and movies that kids can see, thank goodness.) I think I'd have a heart attack if Jack or Cullen ever did that, though.

Cullen

He's talking to himself about all the things he sees out the window. They do this all day long!