Blueberry time

Today the boys and I went blueberry picking. We had so much fun! Jason and Matthew love blueberries. They are easy for the two of them to pick. When we first arrived at the blueberry farm Matthew went crazy. He was so excited to get picking, well I should say eating. The worker at the farm instructed us that they wanted us to pick the Early blue ones. Well, I parked the car near some other variety hoping that Gavin could sleep a little bit while we picked near the ones they wanted us too. That plan ended when Jason hit Gavin in the head as he was getting out of the car and the worker told us that we had to pick from the bushes farther away. As the worker was talking to us Matthew was shoving the wrong variety of blueberries in his mouth. I think he had like ten in his mouth at one time. Jason and Matthew were good little pickers however, I think they ate more then they actually put in their little bowls (The picture was taken 15 minutes after we started). Gavin was a good little trooper until he saw the boys eating berries. He wanted some so bad. I tried giving him some without the skin. He was not happy.He wanted to reach out and get some too. I don't think he realizes he is only eight months old and he can't go from eating mush to eating things that are shaped like little balls. I finally had Jason feed him some Cheerios he was happy. We ended up picking 6 pounds of blueberries which cost us $6.00. I know that when Brian gets back we will have to go back and get more. Our family loves them and they freeze well.
I have to include this. While we were picking Matthew would run up the row and then run back down. As he was running back down he would grab a ton of berries from each bush and shove them in his mouth.It was so funny. He also kept picking green ones and eating them.

It's HOT!

Ugh. I can't stand the heat. I hate the desert. Especially now... as the temperatures outside have consistently been over 100 lately. Whenever I get in the car I burn my hands on the steering wheel, and there aren't very many trees here to park under. And if that's not bad enough, Monday afternoon our air conditioner stopped working. Currently it's just me and my landlord living here, and as it turns out, he's been out of town for over a week, and won't be back until next Monday. I've told him about the A/C problem, but he can't get it fixed until he gets back (it's got something to do with pest control getting rid of our bees in the attic and making sure that's clear before the A/C repairman can go up there)... so basically, by the time things get cooler around here I will have survived an entire week in the Arizona desert without air conditioning! It's tolerable, but I will say it's not very conducive to studying. It's currently 97 degrees... inside the house! (So please, Stephanie, no more complaining about how hot it's getting in Oregon these days...) I've even tried cooling off by taking a cold shower a few times, but the problem with this is that we don't really have such a thing as cold water anymore, unless it comes out of the refrigerator. The good news is I've only got to endure two more weeks and then I'll be able to enjoy weather that is 30 degrees cooler!

UPDATE: The thermostat reading apparently maxes out at 99. My alarm clock has a built-in thermometer, and I have noticed it's usually a few degrees cooler in my bedroom (which is downstairs) than it is upstairs (which is where the thermostat is). Today after church I observed a new record temperature in my bedroom (93.6), but the thermostat upstairs was still at 99, same as it was yesterday, even though I expected it to be at least 100 up there. So I took my alarm clock upstairs to get a more accurate temperature, and this is what I saw: 102 degrees!

Boys will be Boys!

Our sons crack me up. Here are some of the things they have been doing over the last few days.

Jason and Matthew: love collecting caterpillars. It seems like the caterpillars love our little play structure. Over the last few weeks every morning the older boys have gone out and found at least a couple of caterpillars. We have a bug collector dish thing and they put the bugs in it.(Well, I should say we had a bug collector dish thing. It broke this afternoon.) The boys have recruited their cousin Caleb to help collect caterpillars. Unfortunately caterpillars are not toddler-proof. They get squashed very easily.
Jason received a ball for his birthday. The ball has these spike things on it. Gavin is kinda afraid of it. I took a picture because it was too funny.
Matthew can now say a four to five word sentence all on his own. His first official sentence was "mom I want a cookie."
We have had such a crazy few days. I wanted to make sure I wrote on our blog before I forgot.

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Enjoying the nice weather

Couple weeks I took some picture of the boys. I thought I would post them here on our blog. I bought them a sprinkler toy. Jason really liked, Matthew took a while to adjust but he came around to it. For some reason we do not have swim shorts for Matthew, but underwear worked just fine.
Also, after looking high and low for a pair of sun glasses for Gavin. We finally found a pair. I thought it would be good because they had a little band thing on it so he would not take it off. Well, that lasted a minute. Crazy kid! Well enjoy how cute they look because after only having them for a week we lost them. So, we are on to another pair, but of course the weather has not been so sunny.
I also painted my toe nails and Matthew wanted his painted too. So, since Brian is not here there was not a problem . His toes looked so cute.

Jason's Birthday Party

On Saturday we celebrated Jason's birthday. We decided to do a Star Wars Jedi Training party. At first I was not sure how to do one. But, thanks to the internet Jason got to have a wonderful birthday party. I made the invitations. They turned out pretty neat. With the boys help I made a pinata. It was the death star. It took a little time each day since I made two just case. But I think it was worth it. I also made light sabers for all the kids. They loved them. If they could play light sabers the whole time they would have been happy. We had pizza and Yoda punch. The pizza was good but the Yoda punch was pretty bad. I think next time I will just do juice. I kinda felt bad because this was the one time that I let my kids drink soda (there was soda in the punch) and it was horrible. Oh well, Jason does not like soda anyway he always says that it is spicy because of the carbonation. I made a light saber cake. I made that also. It turned out alright. However, one kid told me that I made a fake cake. I was like what? "He told me it was not made from real frosting." "I told him it was real right from the box and carton to you." I had no time to make a cake from scratch I went through three boxes of cake mixes before I figured out how to do it just right. We played some wonderful games they were: unfreeze Han Solo. I froze Han Solo and had the kids divide up into two different groups and dunk him water until he was out of the ice. Then they had to free Princesses Leia from the Death Star. The kids had to pop some black balloons and in one of them was a girl lego person with hair. I was informed that she did not look like Princesses Leia I told the kids to use their imaginations. The kids also helped Darth Vader find his Light Saber. I bought a star wars poster and made some Light Sabers with craft sticks. Then, the kids tried to place the light saber in Darth Vader's hand. Overall I say the party went great. I sure could not have done with out the help of two wonderful parents. In the morning my friend Michelle came over early and helped me with some of the decorations and even changed a diaper for me. Then, during the party Ellie watch the younger boys. Without the help of these two wonderful ladies, I would have been stressed out beyond belief. I am glad that I have such wonderful friends and that my kids do too.

Fresh Strawberries

Anyone that is reading this 10 days left until the u-pick it strawberries will be ready. I can't wait. We love them and they make great jam.

Jason is Seven

Today, Jason turned seven years old. I can't believe how fast seven years have gone by. He has turned into such a wonderful young boy. He is about to finish the first grade. He has been working so hard.
We had a great little family party tonight. He received some wonderful presents. His favorite of course were the legos.
Here are some of the things that our little guy has accomplished this year.

• He has become a little monkey. Jason loves to climb the tree in our front yard.
• Jason loves playing with his little brothers. They love playing with him.
  
• He built his first snowman.
• Jason took a reading test during the school year. He got the highest grade of any other first grader in the school.He was ranked the best reader.
  
• He got his first pair of sun glasses
• He got to have a bunny for a pet. Well, at least for an hour.
  
• Jason has helped out so much while Brian has been in Arizona.
• He is learning to serve others and preparing to be baptized next year.

We are so thankful to have Jason in our family. I could not imagine our family without him.