A Matthew Funny

Just a little funny from Matthew I wanted to share.
As some of you know, the boys like to go to a local restaurant called "Streets of New York". We usually go there on Sunday nights after church. We haven't been there since the first week of December because of tight finances this month. About 3 weeks ago they were really wanting to go and we told them that we didn't have any money to go there and we were just going to come home and eat. Since then we haven't had regular Sunday night services due to a couple different plays at the church. Last night things were back to normal and when we got in the van Matthew asked Eric "Daddy, you have money?" just like that, not do you have money but it was almost more of a fact than a question. It took us a little bit to figure out that he remembered us telling him we didn't have money to go out. So since we did have money last night the boys got to go out.
Just another glimpse of how normal Matthew can be at times.

An Outing with Framma and Poppa

This post is for my dad, who yesterday tried to kill us all by taking on us on a very scary car ride.

It actually started out as a nice trip, with my parents, to see the almost empty Canyon Lake. They have drained Canyon Lake to work on a dam and yesterday was the last day before they were going to start filling it with water again. The boys had fun running around and throwing rocks into the little bit of water still left in the lake. I had fun seeing all the old pop/soda cans laying around on what should have been the bottom of the lake. Some of the cans looked like they could have been from the 70's.

Some pictures of the boys. They are walking where water would normally be over their heads.

After about 30-40 minutes of walking around we got back into the van. My dad decided we would all like to take a nice drive further down the road. A drive into Fish Creek Canyon. A 22 mile drive on a dirt road that most of the time is only one lane. We made it 4 miles and had to have him turn around and take us back to the "real" road. Of course for 2 of those miles we were headed down a winding and curvey road into the canyon. I was sitting in the front with my dad and my knuckles were definitely white. My mom, who is terribly afraid of heights, was not having fun either. Even Eric was feeling a little leary of the whole thing. But he chalked that up to the fact that he wasn't driving. The 3 boys didn't seem to mind so much. Matthew did, however, wonder where the road went and was glad when we finally got back on the pavement.



For any of you interested, here is a little blurb I found about the road we were on and a few pictures.




Apache Trail
Arizona 88 (known as Apache Trail) is one of the oldest routes in the state highway system. The route was also part of the original Ocean to Ocean Highway until 1922.
The original route was constructed in 1904 as a wagon road, to provide access to Roosevelt Dam during construction of the dam. In the 1920s, the road was widened to handle automobiles, with a final reroute completed by 1936 to take the road around Canyon Lake and Apache Lake.
The road remains in the same condition as it was in 1936. Due to the steep grades, the road was never eligible for the federal aid system, so it has always remained a state highway. While portions of the road are paved, the majority is covered either by decaying asphalt or is a dirt road.
Apache Trail is a favorite weekend getaway of Phoenix residents. The road, however, is very windy, narrow, has steep grades, and sheer dropoffs. While it is a safe road, it is very challenging to drivers. Several sections of Fish Creek Hill have barely enough room for two cars to pass. The section from the Fish Creek overlook to Apache Dam is restricted to trailers of less than 40 feet, and RVs are not recommended on the route.

This didn't seem so bad.

But this did. I wish I could have found a picture of the drop off you could see the whole time you were in the car. My mom wanted to know if those flimsy rails would really keep a car from going over. My dad said "No, but it would wake you up in time so you could watch yourself go over."

Here is a small one lane bridge you had to drive over when you got to the bottom of the canyon.

Baking Cookies

So today I decided to let the boys bake Christmas cookies. My mom came over to help. Actually, she did most of the work. She is usually the one who make the Christmas Cutout cookies with the kids and I thought I would give it a try by myself this year. But once Mom/Framma gets here it's so easy to let her take over. Luke was the only one really interested in making cookies. Jonathan did make one cutout and then retreated to the stairs to look at books. Matthew was excited for cookie making, but it turned out he really just wanted to decorate them. We decided to frost them this year and Matthew had me make the four colors that came in the food coloring package. Luke got a little carried away with the frosting and the sprinkles and was covered in frosting. What do you expect from a two year old? Here are some pictures from the event.

This is Luke making Christmas Train cookies.

This is Jonathan making his ONE cookie.

Here I am making frosting for Matthew. Pay no attention to the mess on my island.

Matthew Getting ready to dump some green frosting on who knows what.

I guess he decided to just put it back in the bowl.

Got Sprinkles?

Maybe just a few more.

Jonathan decided to make an appearance. Look at that yellow frosting.

Here I am showing Matthew the fine art of frosting cookies.

Luke decided he needed to add a few more colors of frosting to his cookies.

The end result of that idea. Tie-dye cookies anyone?

It's a Miracle!!

Well, maybe it's not a miracle but, ladies and gentlemen, I got to sleep in until 7:00 this morning and I mean I slept until 7:00. I did not wake up at 5:30 and stay in bed until 7:00 like I sometimes do when Eric doesn't have to work. None of the boys made a sound until 7:00. I cannot tell you the last time this has happened. The boys are usually awake by 6:00-6:30 and sometimes as early as 5:30. My internal alarm clock usually wakes me up about 5:30 and I lay there and listen and try to go back to sleep. Then I usually drag myself out of bed at 6:15 to get the twins ready for school. So this was indeed a great thing at my house this morning and I just had to share.

Me and My Boy

I actually took Luke outside the other day. As some of you know I do not like to do things outside. This particular day was very cold for us here in AZ and it had rained 2 days in a row before so it was very wet and muddy outside. I had made the mistake of opening the blinds and Luke saw his slide in the backyard. What was I to do? We put on our jackets and out we went. Eric came out and took some pictures.

Christmas Vacation Begins

Today is the first day of the twins Christmas break. I am thrilled with the thought of not having to get my boys up and ready for the bus that comes at 6:55 in the morning, but I am not happy about them being home all day for 2 weeks.
Today I implemented rule number 1, more for my sanity than anything else. When Luke goes down for his nap after lunch all the boys will be going to their rooms. The twins have to stay up there for at least an hour. I did do this on Saturday and it worked very well. The twins stayed in their room for 2 hours and only came out to go potty. So far they have been up there for 30 minutes. I got the house picked up from their morning mess and the dishes going in the dishwasher. Now I am enjoying some computer time.
I don't care if the twins nap, I actually prefer them not to anymore because then they won't fall asleep at night. But Luke still needs his nap and that is the only way to get him up there so he doesn't feel like he is missing out on something. Let's hope I can keep this going so well for 2 more weeks.

There is Music in the Air!

Yesterday we received our Christmas present from my in-laws. A new digital piano. It is still on the ground but I have been playing it anyway. When we got it all out of the box yesterday and turned on Jonathan sat right down and figured out Twinkle Twinkle Little Star already. He did this last year on an old toy xylophone at my in-laws in PA. I was very impressed he figured it out on the piano so soon. Now I know this is not a hard song to play but the fact that he did it on his own is what is so impressive to me. He also watched me play BINGO on the keyboard and then tried to play it on his own. He did quite well with that too.
I am so excited to have a piano again. I am a bit rusty on it, since I haven't played in 6 years but I am sure it will all come back to me soon. I will try and get some pictures of Jonathan playing.

What Did You Say?

So tonight I was loading the boys into our van to go to church and Matthew looks at me and says "Happy Holidays, Mommy." My first thought to that was "WHAT????" But I just looked at him and said "Matthew, we say Merry CHRISTmas."
Now there was a time this wouldn't have bothered me but in recent years the term Happy Holidays has been used in place of Merry Christmas trying to take the Christ out of the Christmas season. I make it a point to return a "happy holidays" greeting with a "Merry CHRISTmas".
I was just so blown away that Matthew would say this to me. I wonder if he was taught to say this at school or if he just picked it up off the television. With him you never know.

Music

Thanks to my friend Kristin I finally got music on my blog. These first 2 songs can frequently be heard being sung by my boys, especially Jonathan. Matthew and Jonathan are now old enough to attend children's church on Sunday mornings and they absolutely LOVE the praise and worship part of church. The first week they came home singing Friend of God and the next week I frequently heard Every Move I Make. I didn't know that last song at the time but quickly had to find out what it was. I downloaded some other favorites of theirs and made a CD for the car. Now my little guy sings along as well. It is so wonderful to hear them singing praises to Jesus.

Trying To Figure Things Out

So I was going to post about each of my boys, but it is taking way to much time for me. I started writing about Matthew and then decided I better get my Christmas letter written instead. I am happy to say I did finish my letter. Now I just have to address all the envelopes. I will get back to my posts about the boys later. I think I will just have to write a little bit about them at time and then post it. I guess I will get it all figured out eventually.

I Finally Did It!

Well, I finally decided to just go for it and start a blog about my boys. As for the blog title, Those Boys refers to the twins because when they were just babies I frequently referred to them as "Those boys" whenever I was exasperated with them. When Luke came along I started calling him "That Boy".
I am not sure what this blog will really be about but just to warn you it may jump around quite a bit. I want to write down some of my favorite memories from the past 6 years before I forget them. So just humor me. Hopefully, it won't be too boring for you.