July 29, 2008

Did I mention it is very hot here? Whew! I am so thankful that we have air conditioning. It is so hot that I pretty much have to get the kids outside in the mornings because the afternoons are just crazy hot. The weird thing is that it often feels very humid outside and yet my lips are chapped, my feet are cracking and my sinuses are totally messed up, all indications that it is very dry inside our house at least. Nick is also suffering from some bad allergies and/or messed up sinuses. His nose ran all day today and he complains about his eyes hurting when it is bedtime/nap time. Poor little guy.

We played outside this morning and the boys had a great time playing in the water, spraying the hose, playing in the sandbox and swinging. We really need some trees out back around the swing set though. It gets too hot to swing quickly if you are the one pushing the swings, although those little guys riding in the swings don't seem to notice or mind much.

We have several trees that we thought had some type of fungus. I had called several arborists, trying to get someone to come look at them, and nobody called me back. I finally found one who actually answered my call yesterday and came by this morning. Turns out several of our trees are still in distress from damage done when they built our house, long before we came along. One of the trees in our side yard is losing leaves like crazy. It most likely will not make it through the hot month of August, although if it does, it might be able to pull through. Anyway, the guy was really nice and provided me with a lot of information about the issues our trees are having and the best way to deal with it. He did not charge anything either. When I asked him what he charged he said not to worry about it this time and just to keep him in mind if/when we have more business for him in the future. We will likely hire him to do some special root feeding in the fall, which might help save the other trees. We really need to plant some trees.

I took the boys to the mall to play this evening. The dad had to work late so we ate at the mall food court and then the boys played for a while. It made for a much more relaxing evening for me, although I think we were all tired when we got home.

I have started singing songs to the boys at night, when they are lying in bed, the lights are out, and I am sitting in the chair in their room with them until they fall asleep. We spend the first 10 or 15 minutes singing songs and I think it really relaxes them and helps them fall asleep sooner. I think their favorite song is still I Dig Dirt but they also really like this porcupine song that my sister made up for them when she was babysitting for us recently. She is so funny. I love her sense of humor.

We are going to my sister's house to visit her family and my mom and another niece tomorrow. I think we are anyway. My sister's daughter had her wisdom teeth out today so we'll see how she is doing tomorrow before we take off. If we go, it will be the first trip we have taken out of our little city in our new van.

Something I wrote up above reminded me of something funny that Nick said the other evening, when we were reading stories before bedtime. I can't remember the sentence exactly but he was talking about something we had done the evening before and it called it "yesternight". I just love to listen to them working out how to put sentences together. Ben said something yesterday that was a very good sentence but some of the words were in the wrong place in the sentence, which made it funny, with his 2 year old cuteness. I should have written it down because I can't remember it now but I was impressed that he had all of the right words in the sentence, even if they were in the wrong order.

Well, I have not been very good about updating lately...must get better at this, but it is late and I'm exhausted, as usual:) so I am off to bed.