Beautiful days in our neighborhood

The past two days we've experienced a heatwave here. Forty degrees when the past week averaged at 11 is so warm, you're tempted to run outside with just a T-shirt, jeans and flip-flops. Unfortunately, I didn't take any pictures for your viewing pleasure.

Yesterday after school we played out in the backyard. The boys got to use their new scooters they got from Aunt Robin. It's pretty funny to watch them because neither of them could balance very well, but they had a great time.

Meanwhile* I took down Christmas lights and stared in horror at what's become of our garage. Rubbermaid is having a contest to see who has the most disorganized room of their house, and I'm seriously considering sending a picture of ours in for it. We are very focused on getting a good start on the basement that I really can't see us doing anything with the garage for quite a while. It'll help when it gets warmer and the patio furniture gets put out.

Today I dragged the boys out to run some errands and in the middle of that we stopped at Sharon Woods. This was a lot of fun. In the upper part of the park there is a new playground set (as of last year) that is split into two parts: 5-10 yr. olds and 2-5 yr. olds. Of course, numbers mean nothing to these kids, not even Charlie, so they played on the "big kids" part.

I wasn't so worried about Lou and Ben, but immediately Charlie went climbing up to the top and I realized that there wasn't a way for me to get up there fast enough to prevent a major fall. I called for Lou to run up there with him and I ran over to the most dangerous part that he could fall off of. Turns out the third nino has learned a lot from his older brothers: he turned around onto his belly and slide down the slide, albeit at a very fast speed. He was delighted, the other mother on the playground impressed, and I was catching my breath.

Later, after we were home and fed, Charlie went down for a nap and Louie and Benny went out in the backyard. I think Kevin's concerned that our yard is too small for them, it's a fairly small area of grass and driveway but it's something. They raced their scooters, played soccer (no, that does not mean I'm a soccermom), and put together sand buckets, a cooler and a light-up reindeer (that we also got from Aunt Robin) that put all together created Santa's sleigh. Maybe one day the backyard will be too small for three, possibly four growing boys, like when a hardball makes its way through a window and onto my dining room table, but for now it's just fine.


*I've been meaning to tell you about "meanwhile." Lou has been using it pretty regularly lately. He'll say things like "Well, in the meantime my leg itches." I'm not sure where he heard it, and he never uses it correctly, but it cracks me up.