Memorial Day Weekend 2012

5.25.12

{I've been wanting to work on this post for several days now but something always comes up that I don't get a chance to ... and now with the kids being out of school I have to set my "me" time aside which is when I get to work on my blog. I have to wait until Jacob gets home from work to be able to use the computer for a good amount of time.
At any rate here I am ... typing ... finally working on it.}

Forgotten pictures.
First ... I wanted to post these pictures from last week I forgot to add to the play back friday post. I mean how could I not post these. It's of my little guy at play. He loves his little people animals and he especially loves the giraffe. He gives it hugs {pic 3}.  And on picture 4 he was bringing me his stuffed doggy. He finds it hilarious when we make his stuffed animals come alive. We sit them down and we turn its head slowly with the same hand we're holding it and this makes Riley crack up.

Friday.

I had been wanting to get Riley a play tunnel for a while but the ones I saw at Target and other websites were just uninteresting in color. Obviously tunnels all serve the same purpose -that is for a child to crawl into and play but I wanted something bright and cute so when I came across this caterpillar tunnel on the Toysrus website I knew I had to buy it. I noticed it was available at the store so off we went to get it. I think I was more excited about it than Riley, lol. I was lucky too because this was the last caterpillar tunnel, the other one was too girly.

Once we got home and after eating lunch we watched Contraband {with Mark Wahlberg}. That movie is good. Definitely buying it.

Of course my girl Libby had to be present. I love her! She's going to turn 12 in July and is as pretty as a picture.

She didn't stay long with us because although I've shown Riley how to be gentle with her he forgets sometimes and begins to pat her body a little too rough. So she left the living room about ten minutes later.

Now that the kids are out of school we'll be spending a lot of our time at the Y. Jacob and Nathan love to play one on one basketball with each other. Usually it's just them two but on this evening we all tagged along. It has been months since Rileys been to the Y and now that he's walking and running I knew he would have a blast running around in the basketball court. I'm glad it wasn't too busy.

This is the cutest head I've ever seen. I love to take pictures of the back of Rileys head ... capturing what he's looking at. I have been doing this since he was a baby but I haven't really posted many of them.

Several guys left so I let Riley play with a ball and walk over to Jacob.

He ran past daddy and big brother. He's a blurr almost.

 Then he began crawling ... chasing after the ball that was moving much faster than he was.

Once he got it he thought it would be a good idea to throw them in the trash. There was a total of three basketball balls in there. Little snot!

He brought the ball over to big sister a few times but she was being such a teenager {ugh} and didn't want to play. Shame on you Sydna!

Nathan as short as he is he does make plenty of baskets. Remember I said before .... don't underestimate him because of his height. He can definitely get things done. You go Nathan!

Saturday.

The weather was awesome on Saturday. I don't typically say this living in Tucson and especially not in the end of May but it felt SO good. Low 80's and breezy but it felt way cooler, it was weird. We couldn't stop talking about it while we headed outdoors.

It had been over a year since we were at the Oro Valley farmers market. It's a small one but it at least has over 15 vendors. No roasted corn this time ... bummer.

Sampling some nuts and dehydrated fruits. Walked away with a purchase of three. I picked the red chili powder & lemon pistachios {so good} and the chili lemon corn nuts, crunchy but not hard like the store bought ones. Jacob and Sydna both agreed on  the dehydrated strawberries. I tasted one and didn't like it.

These pastries looked so good but I didn't buy any.

These green tomatoes also looked good. Perfect size. I don't think I've ever had green tomatoes. The vendor said you can use them like tomatillos and not just fried them so I'm definitely curious to try them.

Jacob sampled this jelly and said it was good.

This is Riley wanting to get out of big brothers grasp, lol.

Some cacti do sprout pretty flowers.

Three generations .... awesome!

Oh ... I did buy a pastry. I finally found my second favorite -a bearclaw. I haven't had one in a while. I used to get them at Sprouts but they stopped selling them, not sure why so when I saw them here I had to grab one. Now I know where to get them and they go great with dunkin coffee. Yes!

We came home after the farmers market. The kids played Wii for a bit.

Jacob rolled his back on the foam roller. He was sore from working out.

Riley had soup {without the broth} for lunch.

Then around 3:30 pm we headed over to my in-laws. The kids wanted to go in the pool first. I stayed with my mother in law because the little guy fell asleep. I knew that if I would have left him with her he would have freaked out. I didn't want to do that to him.

Looking through a couple of cooking magazines. Always on the lookout for new dishes to try ... well Jacob is the one that cooks all new recipes. I only cook authentic Mexican food and a few pasta dishes.

Then the little guy woke up and wanted to sit all by himself. The cuckoo clock definitely caught his attention.

Jacob was in the mood for his moms meatloaf so that's what she made for dinner. Me nor Nathan like it so we ordered take out. To me it's all about texture. For some reason I just cannot bring myself to eat meatloaf. No gracias!

Sunday.

Grocery shopping in the a.m. These tomatoes were HUGE. Great for burgers.

 

Went home ... put away the groceries, hung out for a bit then we headed back out but this time to enjoy some patriotic music under the starry sky.

Tucson was sort of dead during this weekend. Guess people either traveled to CA {which I hope I was doing too} or drove to lakes around AZ or at the concert we were headed to. I said traveling to CA because whenever we go back home we see tons of AZ license plates.

But before the concert we made a quick stop at McDonalds for more cherry berry chillers. They are good.

My in-laws came along and through all the traffic and parking fiascos we lost them. So we waited for Jacobs dad to make his way to where we were parked. There was plenty of parking on this side of the street. We arrived about an hour early and the place was packed. I guess next time we better arrive two hours early and pack delectable appetizers and some bubbly.

Riley was a little out of it ... he had just woken up from his nap.

I do love outdoor concerts. They are very relaxing.

About 45 minutes into the concert Riley began to get restless but I kept him occupied with his fishy snacks.

There was also an opera singer at the concert and these three here couldn't stop laughing. So immature! Nathan couldn't hold in his laugh any longer and had to walk away. My goodness. Now I know never to go as a family to an Opera.

Towards the end of the concert the orchestra played every theme song for all Armed Forces. It was so neat to hear. As they played each theme song those that served for that particular service stood up and once the song was over people clapped and so Riley thought he would do the same. It was so cute.

Now the orchestra played the Navy's theme song ... Woo Hoo!!!! My father-in-law Gerry proudly stood up.

A time of observation to honor and to respect those who fought to protect the liberties that our Founding Fathers proclaimed with certainty in the Declaration of Independence.

Thank you to our service men and women for keeping America the land of the free. For this we owe our thanks and our honor. Your service and devotion to duty will never be forgotten.

Monday.

I would have prefered to have been in San Diego somewhere by the beach but that was not possible {saving for a pending trip - no hints sorry}. However I didn't let this day go to waste. Since Jacob was off I took this opportunity to do something that we really needed to get done ... carpet cleaning so that's what Jacob did in the evening.

It was a slow day for us. We pretty much vegged out most of the day ... a much needed break from being on the go since Friday.

Riley had fun playing with his water wheel table. I had to put the water wheel directly under the sunny side of the porch ... and still Riley was freezing and shaking so bad after about fifteen minutes. Playtime's over ... sorry little guy.

After he thawed out and after lunch he had dessert ... a tiny scoop of ice cream with a little bit of chocolate fudge drizzled on it. He loved it of course. Jacob used a cantaloupe scooper for the ice cream. Perfect size for a little guy.

A beautiful mess there in the background = a happy child. I love that!

Then around 9:50 pm {I know a little late} we watched Little Einsteins just before I put him to bed. I sure love to cuddle with this little guy. This concluded our Memorial Day Weekend. Whether it was spent living it simply or not I hope yours was a fun one.