The Gardner Crew has been Sick!!

I've realized that I haven't blogged much lately, nor posted any interesting photos! What's new? Well, Little Man was sick last Thursday (pukey sick) and Baby Sis has been a Crabby Cakes with that bad cold that's going around. I am getting it now too, and now fully understand why she's been crabby - my head feels like it's going to explode. Brian says he feels like he's fighting it but he has an awesome immune system so I'm sure he'll stay healthy unlike the rest of us.
Above is a picture of my poor Little Man sick and snoozing on his Spiderman couch in the livingroom.
Our Fall schedule is turning out to be too busy, I am going to re-evaluate everything once swim lessons and baseball ends. We have far too few precious "lazy" moments of hanging out at home. The kids are getting sick of being hauled in and out of the car. Especially since it takes at least 30 minutes one way to go anywhere.
They both love the swimming, but Baby Sis is pretty much P.O.'d during the entire lesson because she wants to be doing what SHE wants to do, and not what the instructor wants her to do. She pretty much has a scowl on her face and her thumb in her mouth the whole time as all the other moms and babies all dance around singing "London Bridge" and splashing. I can just see a little cartoon thought bubble above her head "I am NOT amused". She would much rather be splashing around on her own in the shallow end. Miss Independent.
Big Sis had another soccer game this weekend, every Saturday actually and is doing awesome.

Pre-School is going great for Little Man - he's making lots of friends and learning lots. They had a little Fall Festival last Wed. & he had lots of fun, played games and ate LOTS of candy.

I've been working weekends for the past month or so at one of the farms here in Greenbluff. It is very busy this time of year but that makes the day fly fast. I love my job and the people I work with - I just hate leaving the kids and Brian every weekend. So needless to say Brian and I haven't seen much of eachother lately.... He is gone all week with school & FB and then I work all weekend. He walks in the door and I leave type of thing. The orchard shuts down for the season the beginning of November so not that much longer.

Because of this new hectic weekend schedule I missed out on my niece & nephew's 5th bday party this weekend. Brian took the kids though and they all had a great time. Little Man LOVES playing with all of his cousins and Nana & Papa, and has informed all of us that Uncle Jason is his best friend now, no one else.
NC Football hasn't gone very well this season but the kids and I still go to as many games as we can to cheer them on.

Well - that sums up life for the Gardner's lately. Busy, busy. I personally am counting the days til FB is over (not very supportive, I know). Brian gets annoyed with my grumbling but I think he should take it as a compliment. We love him and want him home!

Little Readers

Seriously, how cute is this? Little Man and Baby Sis have a new, cute habit. They sit together on their little Spiderman couch and read books together, pointing interesting things out to eachother. Of course the moment I pulled out the camera to take a picture they cheesed it up. But still. It is so nice to have them finally playing together so well.

Appearances Can Be Deceiving.....

Don't my 2 kids look so cute in these pictures? Happily playing, and sharing the watercolors with eachother as they joyfully paint colorful pictures. Look how well, and quietly they play together. Aren't they charming?

HA!!!

2 minutes after these pics were taken there was paint-colored water covering them, the floor, and the table.... a paint brush was snapped in half in the midst of a tantrum, the paints were thrown across the kitchen, paper was crumpled up into a ball and thrown, and they both dissolved into a fit of screams and tears.

Because they had to share the paint.

First Day of School

Little Man had his first day of pre-school yesterday!! Brian keeps reminding me that he's not headed off to college but I can't help but be hit with this realization that he's growing up. And then there's Little Man himself, "No, Mom! I'm a BIG boy!!" And then, this week for the first time ever he even told me that he was too busy for a kiss!! First thing pre-school - next step college. Ugh. But I do really love his new school, it's a private, Christian school and I know he's going to have lots of fun. He goes 2 days per week, 2.5 hours per day. He had a great time his first day and can't wait to go back. We miss him while he's there but I know he's having a lot of fun and learning lots. He's sad that Baby Sis can't go with him which I think is so cute. He was so excited to go school supplies shopping and get his very first backpack. Of course, Baby Sis had to get one too. :-) Here are some pics of him before and after school. In the after school picture he is showing me the owie (and band-aid) he got on his knee when he fell down during recess. That was apparently the most exciting thing that happened to him his first day because that's all he talked about.

Playing at the Park

While Big Brother was away at his first day of pre-school (sniff) Baby Sis and I had some girl time together. I took her for a run in the jogging stroller but after 30 minutes of wailing, crying for momma, and trying to bust out of the stroller I called a quick end to that. Let's just say that Baby Sis does NOT like to be restrained. So we went to the park which made her MUCH happier. She had a great time going down the slides and playing on the teeter totter and having me all to herself.

Gum?! What Gum?!

Little Man loves gum. Little Man is not allowed to have gum. Unfortunately for him, he's not very sneaky and is pretty obvious when he's doing something naughty. I found him like this, head under the couch cushion the other day. "What are you doing?", I asked. "Mmmpfffin mmm smack smack", he replied. When he finally came out from under the cushion I found him with mouth crammed full of a whole pack of gum, slobber dripping down his chin. He did this same thing at Aunt Rene's house at Christmastime with the candy canes he found on her tree. We found him in her nice living room, mouth full of candy canes, head under her couch cushion with candy cane slobber everywhere.

I baked!!

Melanie will be so proud. I used some of the yummy peaches that the kids and I picked and made muffins the other day. I found a great recipe on Allrecipes.com - I love that website, they have great recipes that have been reviewed by other home cooks with opinions, suggestions, etc. Anyway - I did alter it a bit to make it healthier; for example I used apple juice concentrate instead of sugar and use ground flax seed for most of the oil. I also use whole wheat flour instead of white.

Here's the altered recipe for healthy peach muffins:

* 3 cups whole wheat flour

* 1 1/2 T ground cinnamon

* 1 T ground nutmeg

* 1 tsp. baking soda

* 1 tsp. salt

* 3 cups ground flax seed

* 1/4 cup olive oil

* 3 eggs, lightly beaten

* 1 12 oz. can of frozen apple juice concentrate (thawed)

* 2 1/2 cups peeled, pitted, and chopped peaches

* 1/2 to 3/4 cup milk (depending on how juicy your peaches are) add this at the end to thin the batter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C). Lightly grease 16 muffin cups.
In a large bowl, mix the flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, and salt. In a separate bowl, mix the oil, eggs, apple juice concentrate and ground flax seed. Stir the oil mixture into the flour mixture just until moist. Fold in the peaches. Spoon into the prepared muffin cups.
Bake 20 minutes in the preheated oven, until a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes before turning out onto wire racks to cool completely.