Spencer's 9th Birthday and Other Goings On

So last week, Spencer celebrated his 9th birthday. I had all of these good intentions of scanning in baby pics of him (I didn't have a digital camera when he was born) to compare him as a baby to last Friday, but as usual, I wait until the last minute to get things done and I ran out of time. So I will just share the pics of him enjoying his day!
His birthday was last Friday and right after school he got to open his presents. Grandma Linda (my mom) came into town for the weekend to help him celebrate.

Here he is getting a roll of quarters. A few months ago the boys decided they wanted to collect all of the state quarters, so we have been searching for them. We got a roll of quarters from the bank for him to look through, but it didn't have any that they needed. But Grandma Linda also gave him some quarters and there was one in her card that they needed. So Spencer was very happy about that! I think it was Alabama.

This next present is Spongebob Squarepants Season 3. Spencer has decided that he "needs" to collect all of the seasons. He gots lots more presents from every one including a Ghostbusters Wii game, some ds games, tech decks, and some gift cards.
And of course, the CAKE! He wanted white cake with vanilla icing. A little boring to me, but that is what the birthday boy wanted, so he got it!
We don't throw big birthday parties every year for the boys. They alternate years. It ends up being on their even number year birthdays that they get to have a big party. So this year is Connor's year to have a big blowout. On the years they don't have a big party, they can pick where ever they want to go out to dinner that night. Spencer chose Chuck E Cheese.
He had a good time playing the games and we had pizza for his birthday dinner. I think he had a great birthday and enjoyed having Grandma come for a visit!
Yesterday, I decided to go up to Old St. Charles and enjoy the nice weather. For those unfamiliar with this area, it is this really neat place by the Missouri River. It has this row of old buildings turned into shops and restaurants. I forgot to bring my nice camera, so all of these pictures were taken with my Iphone. It does a pretty good job, but next time I need to remember my nice camera to get some really good pictures.
The streets are all cobblestone and brick. I thought this Open sign by one of the stores was neat.
And I have lived in this area for 10 years now and just found out there was a scrapbook store here. It is a cute litte store!
It has lots and lots of stamps and these huge sheets of paper! I didn't get any pictures of the paper, but I'm not sure what I would use those for. I think the owner does a lot of altered art here.
And I couldn't leave out Maggie from a post! This is her favorite spot to relax. Under the desk in the kitchen. Last week was a rough week with her (probably why I didn't post on the blog!). There were a few days when I wanted to evict her! But we are trying to work through our differences. I don't want to jinx myself, but the last two days have been pretty good! She even rang the bell on the back door a couple of times last night to go out and potty.

Thanks again for visiting me!

A Maggie Update

Isn't she a pretty girl?! Maggie had her first grooming this morning. We didn't have her cut too much. Just a little trim to spruce her up. She is already starting to lose the darker puppy color that all Soft Coated Wheaten Terriers start out with. She will end up being a cream color. I'm not sure about her ears though. They are pretty dark, so I would imagine they would keep some of that color.
They put a butterfly on her behind! I'm not sure what that is for, but I guess it is cute. :-) And they gave her a blue bandanna. I was expecting pink. Oh well, at least she smells good now!
She is just so stinkin' cute! She is doing much better on her house-breaking. My problem now is that she knows to go to the back door, but if you aren't watching her to let her out right then, she will go there. She doesn't alert us to the fact that she needs to go out. So we are going to get one of those bells to hang from the door and try and train her to ring that when she needs to go out.
Her favorite spot to lay is under my desk while I'm on the computer. She is small now, but I'm afraid once she gets bigger, I'm not going to have anywhere to put my feet! And I took her to the vet yesterday to get the rest of her shots and she gained 3 lbs! She is up to 10.5 lbs. That is a lb. a week. Yikes!

And on another subject, the boys had a great first two days of school. Connor was worn out though both days. He came off of that bus in the afternoon just dragging. lol! It will be interesting to see how he does with a full week.

Thanks again for visiting!

Connor's Big Day

It is official! Connor is a Kindergartner. He was so excited to start school today. He had the hardest time going to sleep last night that I thought I would never be able to wake him up this morning. He is my late sleeper, but not today. He was up at 6:18am. He looked at the clock so he knew the exact time he was up and he was quite proud of himself that he was the 2nd one up this morning, after Dad. ;)
We got his backpack all ready and packed his lunch in his new Mario lunchbox. And then we went outside to wait for the bus and take some pictures.

Chris went into work a little late so he could see Connor off on his first day.

Here comes the bus!

And Spencer was pretty excited to start 4th grade today too!

I can't wait for this afternoon to see how their day went.

And now it is just Maggie and me hanging out. It is pretty quiet around here.

Thanks again for visiting me!

Maggie the Mighty Dog

Maggie doesn't just walk down the steps. No, she does her Mighty Dog flying leap off of the deck.

Take a look.


Later this afternoon we have her first puppy class. I hope she is a good student!

Thanks again for visiting me. :)

Another fun-filled day

Yesterday we visited the Magic House. If you ever visit St. Louis and have children, you have to go to the Magic House. It is so much fun! Heck, even if you don't have kids you should go! It has so many different, fun, hands on activities for everyone.

This is the outside of the house. They added a cafe this year and there is outside seating on the porch there in the front. This was a really nice addition because half way through our visit we got a little snack of Gus' Pretzels and a drink.
Here are the boys in the bubble room. You can try and make a bubble go completely around your body. Connor was a master at this! I really think that the bubble he was making in the bottom pic would have got a lot higher but a little boy decided to stick his finger out and pop it. Major Bummer!

There is so much to do here. Like fix a car.

Be a Newscaster.

Or even the President of the United States.

Of course there is lots of climbing.

I think our favorite part is the Electrostatic Generator. This is so much fun!

Spencer's hair got really big. Connor's for some reason didn't stand up as much, but after seeing these pictures it looks like he didn't have his hand flat on the generator.

This is only a small sample of the different things you can do. I took over a 100 pictures yesterday. :) They have a marketplace, a bank, a Fishing spot, a Fairy Tale area, a construction zone, a library, lots of different musical instruments to play, a special area just for the ages of 6 and under, and the Presidential area also included rooms that explained the Judicial and Legislative branches of our government. There is even more to do that I'm sure I forgot to list.

I think this last picture is my favorite for the day.
So much joy on his face! Love it!

Thanks again for visiting me!

Here is my 7/8/9 10:11 picture

This little girl is very time-consuming. Right now I am pretty much on puppy-watch constantly to house break her. We are making some progress. I think. Probably just wishful thinking on my part.

Thanks again for visiting.

A little picture taking game.

Take a picture tomorrow, Wednesday, July 8, 2009 at 10:11:12 am (or pm).


So I got this from Elizabeth Kartcher's blog. Sounds like a neat idea and she is having a giveaway to go with it! And since I'm already taking a picture a day, this should be easy to do. Right? I think I will set an alarm on my cell phone to remind me. Any one else out there going to do this?

Our Holiday Weekend

We did a little swimming.

We went to the local Independence Day Festival.

Connor got a George Washington tatoo.

Spencer finally got to try one of those giant Turkey legs.

And win a few prizes.

All of the above was done on Friday, July 3rd because it RAINED all day July 4th. Our friends, Denise and Joey came to visit us from Ohio over the weekend. We had a great time with them and the boys can't wait for them to come back and have a Pictureka rematch!

Thanks again for visiting me!