Forever Young

Monday, June 27, 2011

Addicted to the Sky Trail!

Last week we were able to go to the Louisville Zoo with our neighbors. They were planning to do the Sky Trail High Adventure Course that day and wondered if Brandon and Bekah would like to do it also. When they were looking at the course trying to decide if they wanted to or not, Brandon decided that he did not want to, but Bekah thought she would like to try it. We decided to eat lunch first and let them think about it for a while. (They don't really like heights and we had to pay extra money for the course, and I didn't want to pay for them to do it unless they were SURE they were going to do it!) After lunch they both decided to try the course. Here they are getting ready to go up!




Once they got up there, they decided it was scarier than they thought it would be. Brandon was very brave and decided to try it (slowly!) anyway! I was able to be right below them and talk to them from the ground.

You can see from his face how he felt about it!

When Bekah got up the stairs, she was terrified and just started to cry! One of the staff members came to help her and walked with her for a while and showed her what to do.



Brandon got braver and braver the more he tried it!

Brandon said this was one of his favorite parts!

There's Liberty way up there! There were 2 levels on the course. Brandon and Bekah both preferred the bottom layer, but both were brave enough to try out the top course also!
You can see Bekah, Brandon and Jacob (above in the red) in this picture!

After staying with the staff member for a while, Bekah was able to do it on her own!

There's Josh!

There's Brandon, Bekah and Liberty!



You could stay on the course as long as you wanted to. They were up there at least an hour. They both decided that it was the funnest thing ever, and they can't wait to do it again! (Thus, the blog title which Bekah insisted I use!)

Here are all 5 kiddos at the zoo having a great time!

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

16 Years Together!

Last Friday Todd and I celebrated our 16th wedding anniversary! We thank God that He has blessed us with this many years together, and we look forward to many, many more years together!
We typically make plans to do something special for our anniversary celebration. This year, however, Todd was scheduled to work on our anniversary/Father's Day weekend. We were hesitant to make any plans not knowing when exactly he'd be working and if we'd be able to do anything. We had some friends volunteer to keep our kids overnight if we wanted them to, so we went ahead and made those plans hoping something would work out. Well about a week or two before our anniversary weekend, Todd found out that he would not be working after all (it was postponed to a later date because they weren't ready). So, we started looking around for places to stay and things to do. We never really could decide what to do and didn't want to spend a ton of money, so we just kept talking about what to do but not committing to anything. Then the week before our anniversary I was leaving the house in our van and noticed that the speedometer wasn't moving. Then I noticed that gas tank gauge was empty, and I had just filled up. Nothing on the instrument panel was working. So, Todd tried changing out a fuse, but it still wasn't working. So, we took the car to our mechanic to look at. We mentioned that we had been having some coolant leaking from the van recently also. Sometime on Tuesday afternoon, the mechanic called and said that we needed a new instrument panel which would probably cost $700-800 plus labor. He also explained about the coolant leak, but I do not know enough about cars to explain what the problem was. All I know is that he said it would probably be about a $2,000 repair. Well, our van is a 2000 with almost 189,000 miles on it. The value of the van is less than the cost of the repairs. So, we opted to not get the van fixed and to buy a new one. We were really hoping to pay off Todd's car before we bought a new van so we would only have one car payment. But, that is not the plan that God had for us! Todd had already planned to take Friday off from work for our anniversary, so we ended up spending our anniversary car shopping. Car shopping is no fun, but at least Todd and I got to spend two days together! And the kids didn't have to endure the car shopping since we had made plans for them to stay with our friends for our anniversary! We ended up purchasing a 2008 Honda Odyssey with 43,000 miles on it. We hope it will last for a long, long time! The van needed some work done on it, so we still don't have it yet, but here is a picture of the van we bought:




Saturday, June 18, 2011

Happy Birthday, Brandon!

On June 15th our boy turned 11 years old! He is getting so big! We enjoyed celebrating his special day. Here is his day in pictures:

We typically decorate for the kids' birthdays after they go to bed the night before. When Brandon awoke, he found this on his door!


More decorations in the house!


He got to open some gifts from Mommy and Daddy. This new backpack was one of his favorites. He's been wearing it around the house!

He was also excited to get a pocket knife!

After Daddy left for work, the neighbors came over and brought gifts! He got a GameStop gift card and a DS game.

Brandon wanted to go to McDonalds for breakfast with his friends!

Everyone enjoyed a McGriddle!

Then we went to the Free Summer Kid's Movie at Great Escape which was Megamind! Our friends, the Prestons, also came to the movie.

After the movie, Brandon's friend, Asa, came over for the afternoon. He made Brandon this cool sword and axe out of PVC pipe and duct tape!

They enjoyed playing the Wii together!

For dinner Brandon wanted to eat at Cracker Barrel. He got his favorite food, pancakes!

Mommy and Bekah enjoyed Cracker Barrel too!

At Cracker Barrel they give you a free dessert on your birthday. Brandon chose the multi-berry cobbler with ice cream. Yum!
After dinner, Brandon wanted to do something with Daddy, so they spent some time playing the Wii together. That was the end of his special day! But now he's looking forward to a laser tag party with a few friends on Monday night! I'd say he's a pretty blessed kid!

Thursday, June 09, 2011

Success!

When I first tried to potty train Brandon at age 2, he didn't really get it. So, we stopped and tried again when he was about 2 1/2. After a short period of time he was doing very well, and he had very few accidents. He automatically started staying dry at night and during nap time as well. He was completely finished with diapers and pullups before his 3rd birthday.
Potty training Bekah was much harder than it was with Brandon. She knew how to use the potty before her 2nd birthday, she just decided that she didn't really want to stop playing long enough to go when she needed to. Potty training for her took over a year and included many, many accidents! And, she never could stay dry at night or during naps. Since I didn't have to deal with that with Brandon, I wasn't sure how to train her to stay dry while sleeping. I talked with her pediatrician about it, and he said that some children's bladders develop later, and they really don't even worry about it until about age 8 or so. Eventually Bekah stopped taking naps, so we didn't have to worry about her wetting during nap time any more. But, she still wet the bed at night. We tried different things throughout the years and never had any success. She would occasionally have a dry night but they were few and far between. So, we've been buying her Pullups or Goodnights to wear to bed every night. Well, she is now 7 1/2 years old! Recently I had noticed that she was starting to have more and more dry nights and was hopeful that maybe she would be ready to stay dry at night and stop wearing Pullups to bed. Then, a friend of mine got a Potty Alarm to use with her daughter who was having the same problems. She used it for a few weeks and was amazed that it worked! Then they loaned it to us to use. This is an alarm that has a sensor that clips onto the outside of their underwear and has a cord attached to that which is connected to the alarm which clips onto their pj's. If the sensor gets wet the alarm will make noise and vibrate to wake the child up. After only using it for a few nights, Bekah is now staying dry at night! We had bought her a skunk Webkin probably more than a year ago as a bribe to stay dry at night. She really, really wanted that particular Webkin, and I had to call around to several stores to find this skunk. All this time she has looked at it but could never play with it. We told her she had to have 2 weeks of staying dry, and then she could have it. Well, yesterday Bekah received the beloved Skunky!! At another time we had told Bekah that if she could stay dry we would let her spend the amount that a package of Pullups would cost on whatever she wanted. So, last night Bekah also got to go shopping, and she purchased the Tangled Barbie! We had a great day celebrating with her yesterday! It looks like she has finally figured out how to stay dry at night, and we are so happy for her!